#mary + soldierhood

[shallowseeker]

The thing with Mary is that Mary is and always was a child soldier in a way that John isn't.

Soldiers die for the Cause, they sacrifice for the Cause, and above all else, they die for each other. That's built into Mary's bones.

This is how the Campbell story begins and perpetuates.

Mary is young. She's desperate. Mother? Dead. Father? One foot in the grave as we speak. And John? Lying dead in front of her, felled to the ground because of Mary's hunting life.

Of course she's going to be vulnerable to make that deal. Of course she makes the deal.

She's been coerced, backed into a corner, torn up by grief. She crumples under the pressure of everything leading up to this moment.

But beyond the machinations and beyond the romance lies her soldierhood.

It tells her it's worth the cost.

She's used to doing the ugly thing.

(Find her "Queens" and she'll move to protect.)

[shallowrambles]

And Mary…

Later in SPN prime, Mary’s dealings with the British Men of Letters is her own False Answer. It’s her hope to make all the monsters go away, to create a (perfect) world without monsters for her sons.

It turns out to be a pipe dream.

As is Samuel’s hope of obtaining a box in SPNwin to create a world completely without monsters for the sake of his daughter.

In terms of grieving life, this is bargaining. If only I can accomplish X, then Z.

Mary is interesting because she engages in escapism to the point of hiding her full self, especially when she’s young. But when she’s older, she does the opposite, entirely giving over (at expense of self and family) to various Causes, The Total War.

She comes to a tenuous balance much later, living in a Merged Life. We see her trying her best to lend support to a suicidal Dean, and we see her being present for daily lives of her family such as family game nights. She remains in the fight, fighting her own battles and hunting the best way she knows how.

Hunter Heroici haunts me, because it says chasing happiness can’t be solely about running away

i.e. you have to face your actions and integrate the good and the bad parts of your psyche

Apple Pie Life for Sam is, in this view, a meager half-life, a false “Charming Acres” wrapped in golden hues, like a happy gas that blots out all the harder parts of living. Compared to Hunting, the Romanticized Home Life is The Balm of Escape.

And in this same episode, we have Cas goofing off with the whole “becoming a hunter and interrogating the cat” stuff. He’s having a grand ole time and he knows he’s Being Silly with it. Here, the Idealized Hunting with Friends Life is Cas's Apple Pie, The Balm of Escape from brutal soldierhood.

As mirage-home is to Sam, silly-hunting is to Cas. (Here, perhaps Sam & Dean are Cas’s symbolic Ben & Lisa, which is also why he tends to want to shield them from harsh world of Heavenly War.)

The specter of The Apple Pie life, when carried to its extreme, can be a false, idealized happiness. (It's not happiness itself that is the problem. It's that it's not an integrated happiness when it's weighted too far into escapism.) This "fantasy-life” is in sharp contrast to the messy business of living your life as your complicated, imperfect self and showing all your warts to those around you.

And yet it’s important to note that the tempting traps of penance & suicide loom large in this season, too...

Dean's blood-donation (coded-as-organ-donation-in-the-form-of-a-cooler) symbolizes his tendency to sustain the life of Others at his own expense; i.e. sustaining Benny’s addiction-in-order-to-keep-him-on-the-straight-and-narrow (and even bearing some of Sam’s parallel struggles)

Dean's simplified Purgatory world of black-and-white kill-or-be-killed (no-mistakes-can-be-made-here-no-one-can-let-me-down-here) is his False Answer to ending the difficult decision-making associated with hunting in a complex world AND maladaptively dealing with disappointment

Cas's staying-behind-in-Purgatory is metaphorical-suicide for what he did to Heaven (and yet, Heaven comes to rescue him; he cannot escape)

Later, Cas's Heaven trials are his False Answer to ending the difficult decision-making associated with Endless Heavenly Wars

And of course, Sam's Hell trials are his False Answer to ending the difficult decision-making associated with hunting in a world overrun with threats

These are ALL different kinds of extremes of “checking out of life,” and they will all learn that this extreme of not integrating both the Good & Bad parts, and of giving up Self to serve Others, is as unsustainable as is diving into the drunken happy kind of escapism.

It's about integration: family + past actions + mistakes + internal wants + personal needs + duty & obligations.

The path to the Apple Pie Life is in obliterating its Romanticization. The path to Penance is in truly valuing the Imperfect Self.

[ninthfeather]

ALSO, Louise's struggle with soldierhood is great. Seeing her interact with Saji, and seeing her turn him down?? Because she's CHANGED in the past 5 years. She's very intentionally put herself in this situation, and it's so HARD to go back on that? She's put so much weight on revenge, and even though she loves him, he can't expect her to just.... change back on a dime for him? And it's terrible and heartbreaking but also it makes so much sense and UGH I hope they end up happy

This is why Saji/Louise is an OTP for me in this series. Like, S1 Saji/Louise is a hard pass--Louise just pushes him around and Saji isn't able to stand up for himself. But as time moves forward both of them become kind of obsessed with what might've otherwise been an unremembered first relationship, because to both of them, it represents when things weren't terrible. And when they meet again, and Saji realizes Louise has changed, he actually grapples with that and makes the conscious decision to try and be there for her, even if she's pushing everyone away. While Louise insists that she's no longer the person Saji loved and can't be that person, all the while blowing off Andrei's efforts to flirt because on some level, she's still in love with Saji, or at least the idea of him (and also because Andrei is a jerk about flirting with her, but it's clear that isn't her only reason).

We see them together in the hospital in the Awakening of the Trailblazer movie, and Saji is very clear about being in this for the long haul despite Louise's worries about being too much of a burden. Over the course of the series, Saji's unwillingness to assert himself and his puppydog crush on the foreign exchange student turn into a sure, steady loyalty that he's willing to fight for, while Louise's self-assured facade breaks down and shows a very insecure woman who nonetheless has a core of steel. And they both are very aware of how the other changed and they both embrace those changes, and it's just...good.

Anyhow in my headcanon they live in the same apartment building as Allelujah and Marie post-series and Louise's hobby is making cross-stitch of increasingly rude sayings.

Thank you for coming to my impromptu mini ship manifesto.

[shallowseeker]

Hey, Cas is semi-canonically partial to Ecclesiastes + more about windmills and futility

(I cannot remember which script but I believe it's something he suggests to Jack in season 13 or 14.)

But anyway, his praises for Ecclesiastes are fascinating and lovely. (You should give it a whirl, even if the Bible is not typically your book of choice.) There are things in Ecclesiastes that are so Cas. (I think of Season 10’s Cas: “Oh, I have seen the glory and reaped vast rewards…”)

Ecclesiastical nihilism is relevant for all of SPN’s soldier-marked characters, but especially season 7 Cas and of course AU Michael. (See also: Dean, Mary, Raphael.)

///

Ecclesiastes begins:

2 “Meaningless! Meaningless! says the Teacher. “Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.”

///

-OR-

2 “Futility of futilities,” says the Preacher, “Futility of futilities! All is futility.”

…

Also, the sun rises and the sun sets; And hurrying to its place it rises there again. Blowing toward the south, Then turning toward the north, The wind continues swirling along; And on its circular courses the wind returns.

-Ecclesiastes (NASB)

///

(Cas is right, Jack. You should read Ecclesiastes. He’s wry and dare I say acerbic at times? For, you know, an ancient philosopher.)

“…unhappy to me; because everything is futility and striving after wind…”

- Ecclesiastes (NASB)

///

Cas's existential crisis, nihilism, and fear (season 7)

This mindset calls to memory so much of season 7-Cas, but here in particular:

Meg: What dogs? [to Dean]He says he's surrounded by unhappy dogs. Castiel: They're chasing a rabbit around [indistinct]… Meg: Oh. Okay. He's at a dog track in Perth. Castiel: I'm surrounded by large unhappy dogs. Meg: Yeah, they're unhappy 'cause the rabbit's fake. Castiel: [to Meg] You know, those racing dogs were absolutely miserable. They can only think in ovals.

-Reading is Fundamental (SPN, season 7)

///

Cas is beaten down after billions of years of military service. He’s effectively frozen. He laments the repetition of war and procreation and finding no meaning in it.

He tries focusing on smaller perspectives: bees, gardens, flowers. He’s trying to find a plan in it all. A divine plan would give it meaning. More importantly, a “laid-out route of flowers,” would give it a meaning he doesn’t have to discover for himself.

So, he devolves into a kind of self-horror in his own participation in the machine, in the repetitious nihilism. Ecclesiastically, he laments his place in the cosmic hierarchy. With respect to his loved ones on earth, he despairs over the pain of gaining wisdom, the shame of his prideful mistakes, and of the recognition of his own violent nature, that he “will destroy…again.” (No matter what pretty things he stood for, he was angry at Heaven. He did want to punish them.)

"Because in much wisdom there is much grief; and increasing knowledge results in increasing pain." (-Ecclesiastes, again)

The “punishment resurrection” gets more painful each time, as Cas said. Why? Wisdom.

///

How do you make meaning out of senselessness? Do you find it in each other?

Later, if you read too much into 12x19’s “The Future,” (as I do), you’ll note that Thank You (Led Zeppelin) seems like it could unofficially be Dean and Cas’s "song." After all, the scripted, "Cas...thank you," is such a loaded phrase to find in a script, coming on the heels of the Led Zeppelin mixtape. There are things about Thank You that echo Ecclesiastes as well, but with opposite meaning. A hopeful meaning. Not a despairing, “All things are wearisome,” but a thankfulness that you got to be here at all, surviving pain and the crumbling cycles together.

(This is indeed the wisdom Cas tries to give to Jack in Ouroboros as Dean lies dying of a gorgon-induced head injury.)

///

So what of the the Ecclesiastical stirring of wind? What of SPN's windmills?

The characters that struggle with meaning-making amidst the futility of war are often marked by the Ecclesiastical windmill of futility, which is why we see this motif with Cas and Dean so often. We see it particularly when they are marching off to war (like when they meet Raphael in Free to Be You and Me), or when Cas dies in war (ashes near a windmill). It also appears as an industrial building fan when linked to demons. On a related note, in season 10, Cas's grace is hidden inside Don Quixote. (Taking into account Metatron's beef with Heaven and archangels, this may be an Animal-Farmesque hit at Heaven's machinations as much as Cas's chivalry.)

Another related motif is the simple house fan. It’s a kinder symbol. There is almost always a fan on the shelf near the taller lamp on Dean’s “Cas” side of the bedroom.

But, importantly, a fan isn’t a windmill. It’s not a grand motif. Not duty. Not enemy. Not cause. Not mission. It's gentle and small, tucked into the bedroom and thus intimate. It’s not made for grand purpose. A fan is simply there to be, to comfort, to bask in a private breeze.

When we see an outright “industrial windmill,” it marks darker things, and it calls to mind other futility symbols, like the windmill of Animal Farm—that complicated grand purpose of design that runs the efforts of the hopeful, dutiful civilians into the ground with its corrupt machinations (it stands in for: hunting, Heaven, demonic deals, and just…most career and “cause”-coded things in SPN).

There is an entire scene dedicated to (alt) Mary dealing with the after effects of her child soldierhood in The Winchesters, episode 5 "Legend of a Mind," set to a rather haunting Dusty Springfield cover of Noel Harrison’s Windmills of Your Mind.

Its lyrics echo Cas’s existential crisis from season 7, and also that of late-seasons Michael and terminal-seasons Dean. And that is no accident.

A circle in a spiral, a wheel within a wheel Never ending nor beginning on an ever-spinning reel As the images unwind Like the circles that you find In the windmills of your mind

[shallowseeker]

Mary is definitely the king to John’s queen. Ever the stalwart child-raised soldier, she will always move to protect him first.

Mary is The King of Hearts.

It’s love.

It’s John’s worst nightmare.

It destroys him.

[shallowrambles]

Core wound of the solder + Mary Cambell + the wound of feeling powerless

On doors, SPNwin 1x05

"Every door to every future I could possible have closed that night forever.

Not today. But someday. I'm gonna find a way to open all the doors that were closed for you. I promise."

Mary Campbell

Followed by a cover of Noel Harrison's Windmills of your Mind:

Round like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel Never ending or beginning on an ever spinning reel Like a snowball down a mountain, or a carnival balloon Like a carousel that's turning running rings around the moon Like a clock whose hands are sweeping past the minutes of its face And the world is like an apple whirling silently in space Like the circles that you find in the windmills of your mind!

Like a tunnel that you follow to a tunnel of its own Down a hollow to a cavern where the sun has never shone Like a door that keeps revolving in a half forgotten dream Or the ripples from a pebble someone tosses in a stream Like a clock whose hands are sweeping past the minutes of its face And the world is like an apple whirling silently in space Like the circles that you find in the windmills of your mind!

Keys that jingle in your pocket, words that jangle in your head Why did summer go so quickly, was it something that you said? Lovers walking along a shore and leave their footprints in the sand Is the sound of distant drumming just the fingers of your hand? Pictures hanging in a hallway and the fragment of a song Half remembered names and faces, but to whom do they belong?

When you knew that it was over you were suddenly aware That the autumn leaves were turning to the color of her hair! Like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel Never ending or beginning on an ever spinning reel As the images unwind, like the circles that you find In the windmills of your mind!

[shallowseeker]

Bobby Singer needs to be in #SPNwin.

Like, seriously, he’s one of The Most Interesting Characters. He’ll always be a main to me, because he’s not straightforward.

He’s got that warring, contrasting nature. That seesaw-soldier thing. He’s complicated and loving and and yet…he screws up royally. He does what he thinks is right, is necessary.

He can be hot and cold and sweet and vengeful and respectful and encouraging, and then he goes and throws down these misogynistic little digs. Every feminine thing gets spit on; turns into a barb. And yet it’s not a barb. The teasing is somehow warm n’ homey n’ familiar. You decode its true meaning.

And…he’ll break the mold with soap operas and pedicures. He’ll cook for you in his little kitchen. He can spit with words, but accepts with his actions.

He goes from love, “do you value yourself so little?” to, scoffing, letting you down at your most vulnerable moment: “you’re not a person.” (Because sometimes, he thinks tough love will carry you through and help you survive.) He a rocky foundation but he’s a foundation.

That’s Bobby!

[shallowseeker]

I watched s13 for the first time this past summer and these Lucifer metas are super fascinating to me. As I was watching I was very much the opinion that Lucifer only wanted a "relationship" with Jack because of how powerful Jack was and how Lucifer could use him for his own goals (whatever those may have been), with maybe a bit of spite towards God/Chuck of "I'm better because I won't be a deadbeat dad" if that makes sense? I'll admit that post Kripke era Lucifer has always been hard for me to really understand, so these metas on Lucifer (and Jack!) are super interesting to me!

Ah, yes. For me, I get the most mileage out of how joyful Lucifer seems to be of use in the war against Amara. He was so happy, so in his element, you know? He had Cas, a stable brother who "gray rock" tolerated him, so he wasn't alone. He even had Dean, Sam, Crowley, Rowena as "war companions." Pairing that with Rock Never Dies and Lucifer's resulting nihilism is delicious to me.

LUCIFER: I'm not especially interested in his opinion. Dear old dad, he finally apologized for abandoning me. And what's the very next thing he does? [Voice breaks] He ditches me. [Laughs] And you, too, by the way.

Don't you get it? This is all meaningless. Heaven, Hell, this world. If it ever meant anything, that moment is past. Nothing down here but a bunch of hopeless distraction addicts, so filled with emptiness, so desperate to fill up the void… they don't mind being served another stale rerun of a rerun of a rerun. You know what my plan is? I don't have one.

But post-Jack's conception? He doesn't "need" them anymore. It's like he's looking for Jack to fill his own void.

Lucifer's cognitive empathy is definitely on display in these seasons, but there's also...this childlike need to fix his core wound with such self-centered family-building, you know?

And I mean, so many many people find purpose in family-building (for example, Cas too found purpose in raising Jack), but Lucifer's world is so small and shallow. It's just interesting to me...

There are glimmers in 12x08 of what he wanted from God:

LUCIFER (in a speech): And yet, we need "our Father"...to...be there when we fall.

And after Jack is created, Lucifer focuses all of his energy on getting to Jack, on impressing Jack. He doesn't need them anymore—not the family of his childhood, or the family of his soldierhood. Jack represents a fresh start.

in 13x02, May says, noticing Lucifer's desperation to get to Jack:

LUCIFER: I’m gonna exchange you for my son. MARY: You can’t possibly care about raising a child. LUCIFER: Oh, you have no idea what I care about.

He cares to a degree that he wants Jack to pump himself up, I think. Power is a big part of it, but Jack is also a narcissistic supply, I think. It's when Jack rejects Lucifer that he goes after his power. But Lucifer wants Jack's locus of morality to be angelic. Humans are to angels as the hunted-monsters are to humans, so to speak.

And I can't seem to find the meta today, but even in INHERIT THE EARTH, Lucifer is STILL making a play for Jack to be "on the winning team" with himself and Chuck. Even after taking Jack's grace, he still seems to want to have him.