#my family doesn't talk to me

[killerchickadee]

I just hate that I've spent nearly my entire summer at my shitty job. Like worked 6 days a week for most of the summer, so I was either too busy or too tired to do stuff.

I wanted to go hiking a lot more. And I wanted to take a vacation and go see some loons, and I wouldn't have had the money for that even if I had been able to take the time off. Despite working 45+ hours every week. I just want to be outside in the sun looking for birds and wildflowers and whatever else. Or to be doing one of the millions of awesome things Milwaukee has going on in the summer. But I can't.

I'm so tired of life being like this. This isn't a life worth living.

[fictionadventurer]

I have to talk about Chester Arthur. His story makes me go crazy. A mediocre president from the 1880s who's completely forgotten today has one of the best redemption stories I've ever heard and I need to make people understand just how cool his story is.

So, like, he starts out as this idealist, okay? He's the son of an abolitionist minister and becomes famous as a New York lawyer who defends the North's version of Rosa Parks whose story desegregates New York City's trolley system.

Then he starts getting pulled into politics and becomes one of the grimiest pieces of the political machine. He wants money, power, prestige, and he gets it. He becomes the right-hand man of Roscoe Conkling, the most feared political boss in the nation, a guy who will throw his weight around and do the most ruthless things imaginable to keep his friends in power and destroy his enemies.

Because Arthur's this guy's top lackey, he gets to be Controller of the Port of New York--the best-paying political appointment in the country, because that port brings in, like, 70% of the federal government's funds in tariffs. He gets a huge salary plus a percentage of all the fines they levy on lawbreakers, and because he's not afraid to make up infractions to fine people over, he is absolutely raking in the dough. Making the rough equivalent of $1.3 million a year--absolutely insane amounts of money for a government position. He's spending ridiculous sums on clothes, buying huge amounts of alcohol and cigars to share with people as part of his job recruiting supporters to the party, going out nearly every night to wine and dine people as part of his work in the political machine. He's living the high life. Even when President Hayes pulls him from his position on suspicions of fraud, he's still living a great life of wealth, power, and prestige.

Then in 1880, his beloved wife dies. While he's out of town working for a political campaign. And he can't get back in time to say goodbye before she dies. Because he's a guy who has big emotions, it absolutely tears him up inside, especially because Nell resented how much his political work kept him away from home. He has huge regrets, but he just moves in with Roscoe Conkling and keeps working for the political machine.

And then he gets a chance to be vice president. The Republican Party has nominated James Garfield, a dark horse candidate who wants to reform the spoils system that has given Conking his power and gave Arthur his position as Port Controller. Conkling is pissed, and he controls New York, and since the party's not going to win the election without New York, they think that appointing Conkling's top lackey as vice-president will pacify him.

They're wrong--Conkling orders Arthur to refuse--but Arthur thinks this sounds like a great opportunity. The only political position he's ever held is Port Controller--a job he wasn't elected to and that he was pulled from in disgrace. Vice President is way more than he could ever have hoped for. It's a position with a lot of political pull and zero actual responsibilities. He'll get to spend four years living in up in Washington high society. It's the perfect job! Of course he accepts, and Conkling comes around when he figures out that he can use this to his advantage.

When Garfield becomes president, Arthur does everything he can to undermine him. He uses every dirty political trick he can think of to block everything that Garfield wants to do. He refuses to let the Senate elect a president pro tempore so he can stay there and influence every bill that comes through. He all but openly boasts of buying votes in the election. He's so much Conkling's lackey that he may as well be the henchman of a cartoon supervillain. On Conkling's orders, he drags one of Garfield's Cabinet members out of bed in the middle of the night--while the guy is ill--to drag him to Conkling's house so he can be forced to resign. He's just absolutely a thorn in the president's side, a henchman doing everything he can to maintain the corrupt spoils system.

Then in July 1881, when Arthur's in New York helping Conkling's campaign, the president gets shot. By a guy who shouts, "Now Arthur will be president!" just after he fires the gun. Arthur has just spent the past four months fighting the president tooth and nail. Everyone thinks he's behind the assassination. There are lynch mobs looking to take out him and Conkling. The papers are tearing him apart.

Arthur is absolutely distraught. He rushes to Washington to speak with the president and assure him of his innocence, but the doctors won't let him in the room. He gets choked up when talking to the First Lady. Reporters find him weeping in his house in Washington. Once again, death has torn his world apart and he's not getting a chance to make amends.

Arthur goes to New York while the president is getting medical treatment, and he refuses to come to Washington and take charge because he doesn't dare to give the impression that he's looking to take over. No one wants Arthur to be president and he doesn't want to be president, and the possibility that this corrupt political lackey is about to ascend to the highest office in the land is absolutely terrifying to everyone.

Then in August, when it's becoming clear that the president is unlikely to recover, he gets a letter. From a 31-year-old invalid from New York named Julia Sand. A woman from a very politically-minded family who has been following Arthur's career for years. And she writes him this astounding letter that takes him to task for his corrupt, conniving ways, and the obsession with worldly power and prestige that has brought him wealth and fame at the cost of his own soul--and she tells him that he can do better. In the midst of a nationwide press that's tearing him apart, this one woman writes to tell him that she believes he has the capacity to be a good president and a good man if he changes his ways.

And then he does. After Garfield dies, people come to Arthur's house and find servants who tell them that Arthur is in his room weeping like a child (I told you he had big emotions), but he takes the oath of office and ascends to the presidency. And he becomes a completely different man. His first speech as president mentions that one of his top priorities is reforming the spoils system so that people will be appointed based on merit rather than getting appointed as political favors with each change in the administration. Even though this system made him president. When Conkling comes to Arthur's office telling him to appoint his people to important government positions, Arthur calls his demands outrageous, throws him out, and keeps Garfield's appointees in the positions. "He's not Chet Arthur anymore," one of his former political friends laments. "He's the president."

He loses all his former political friends. He's never trusted by the other side. Yet he sticks to his guns and continues to support spoils system reform. He prosecutes a postal service corruption case that everyone thought he would drop. He's the one who signs into law the first civil service reform bill, even though presidents have been trying to do this for more than ten years, and he's the person who's gained all his power through the spoils system. He immediately takes action to enforce this bill when he could have just dropped it. He becomes a champion of this issue even though it's the last thing anyone would have expected of him.

He oversees naval reform. He oversees a renovation of the White House. He still prefers the social duties of the presidency, but he's respectable in a way that no one expected. Possibly because Julia Sand keeps sending him letters of encouragement and advice over the next two years. But also because he's dying.

Not long after ascending to the presidency, he learns he's suffering from a terminal kidney disease. And he tells no one. He keeps going about his daily life, fulfilling his duties as president, and keeps his health problems hidden. Once again, death is upending his life, and this time it's his own death. He's lived a life he's ashamed of, and he doesn't have much time left to change. He enters the presidency as an example of the absolute worst of the political system, and leaves it as a respectable man.

He makes a token effort to seek re-election, but because of his health problems, he doesn't mind at all when someone else gets the nomination. He dies a couple of years after leaving office. The day before his death, he orders most of his papers burned, because he's ashamed of his old life--but among the things that are saved are the letters from Julia Sand, the woman who encouraged him to change his ways.

This is an astounding story full of so many twists and turns and dramatic moments. A man who falls from idealism into the worst kind of corruption and then claws his way back up to decency because of a series of devastating personal losses and unexpected opportunities to do more than he could have ever hoped to do. I just go crazy thinking about it and I need you all to understand just how amazing this story is.

[welcometogrouchland]

Disgustingly messy and crusty sketch dump but I couldn't get my own terrible theory out of my head and ended up making a bunch of sketches about it. Also at the end a bonus dickbats and Damian doodle bc I was reading an issue of their Batman and Robin run (IDs in Alt)

[tizeline]

So Splinter was willing to trade the world for his son. If Draxum had to choose between his world domination plans and the safety of his own sons, what would he pick? If he was choosing between the world and Donnie?

Honestly TSAU!Draxum would very much choose his sons (including Donnie) over the world. Sure, world domination is important to him, but also remember that he views world domination as a necessary step to save yōkai-kind from destruction, which includes his boys! Draxum isn't the perfect dad, and he didn't exactly plan on getting as attached to his sons as he did when he first created them. But now that he does have them he is Attached™ and he'll be damned if he lets anything bad happen to them.

[buttercupshands]

rewatched Kurogiri's holiday story from ultra impact (not related to sketch at all)

(but it did inspire me)

on another note

finally!!

[gingermintpepper]

Why did Apollo favor the trojans in the Illiad?

So, dear Anon, I've been thinking about how to answer this question since I got it a couple days ago and I think I kind of want to make something clear before I get into it.

The Iliad by itself as a poem only covers some of the events that occur in the final year of a long protracted conflict that had been brewing for at least two decades and was an active war for ten. Within the space of the Iliad itself, the motivations and affairs of the major players are often referenced but there are many, many parts of the story that are not there because they belong to a different story cycle that has been since lost or was never recorded with words. In the space of the Iliad Apollo's motivations are questioned a lot - his pride is questioned by Poseidon who thinks Apollo should be just as angry at the Trojans as he considering Apollo was treated equally as poorly by Laomedon while they worked together. His honour is questioned by Hera who chastises him for taking the Trojans' side when he'd proclaimed that Achilles would live a long life and prosper at Thetis and Peleus' wedding. His own sister calls him a coward for refusing to fight when Zeus gives permission for the gods to go wild on the battlefield. For all that there's this image of Apollo in the Iliad as some staunch and unwavering protector of the Trojans, believe it or not, I largely think of Apollo as neutral in the war.

Which, I suppose, comes back to the question - why did Apollo favour the Trojans? The truthful answer is that I don't know. The Iliad and all its connected stories isn't something I've done enough research on to have an answer or a reference to an answer off the top of my head. The reasoning I'm aware of is that Apollo was a Patron God of Troy and really a god doesn't need any reason besides that to protect his people but it's not like Apollo abandoned the Greeks either. Calchas is the biggest example of that I can point to - descended directly from a priest of Apollo and one who attributed his mantic power to the god, Calchas was pivotal in ensuring the Greeks even got to Troy in the first place.

From a personal perspective however, I think Apollo was more dedicated to the house of Priam than he was the city of Troy itself. Apollo's affection for that house and all its members ran deep - from his admiration of Hecuba and Hector to his love and attempted courtship of Cassandra to his blessings given to Helenus, Deiphobos, Cassandra, Troilus and even his partnership with Paris - Apollo loved the house of Priam. When you think about the times Apollo lashes out against the Greeks, it's generally because they've done some nonsense to earn his ire. The plague was caused by Agamemnon disrespecting his priest, his aid in the slaughter of Patroclus was because he didn't respect him, his minor grudge against Diomedes too was because he tried to test Apollo's mettle and well, the less said about Achilles the better. Apart from his obvious favouring of Hector in the skirmishes, Apollo doesn't really oppose the Greeks. He has a ton of reasons to by the time the Iliad rolls around, including avenging the death of two of his sons, but he remains mostly satisfied with conducting his father's business and overseeing the war from a somewhat professional perspective. To me, it's always been less about Apollo caring about the fate of Troy as a city itself and more about him just really wanting to protect the people in the city that he's come to love and respect.

Of course, I encourage you to take my words with a big tablespoon of salt - like I said, I don't really know enough about the facts in particular to give a solid, confident answer but I can give you my interpretation of it. Maybe consult someone like @littlesparklight for a more comprehensive and grounded response 🤔

[alliseaisfandom]

Look.

I'm not saying I've seen this film before.

BUT

I'VE SEEN

THIS FILM

BEFORE

(and I fucking hated the ending)

[lgbtlunaverse]

While rereading mdzs I am once again shocked by how talked about the "you were the only mistake he ever made" line from Lan Xichen to Wei Wuxian is and how heated it gets some people because honestly... I don't think he actually even believes that.

Stay with me. Look at the actual line. (I Included 2 translations for comparison's sake)

Firstly, yes he is mad at Wei Wuxian in this scene. But his biggest moment of anger was actually before this. By this point he's realized that Wei Wuxian forgot what happened after nightless city (and therefore ISN'T stringing along his baby brother on purpose) so he has in fact calmed down a bit.

Secondly, notice that he starts by talking about how his uncle felt. This is not Lan Xichen making a value statement about what he thinks. When he says Lan Wangji was proper and righteous he is talking about him being a model lan, he's talking about their family and clan's perspective of Wangji. Indeed, in their eyes, Wei Wuxian is the only time Lan Wangji was ever not the textbook perfect Lan.

Thirdly, what is Lan Xichen trying to say here? What is he mad at Wei Wuxian for? It's that he doesn't know Lan Wangji is in love with him. His anger is eased by realizing Wei Wuxian doesn't remember the very blatant confessions lwj made in the cave after nightless city, or Lan Wangji fighting his own clan elders for Wei Wuxian, and so had no way of knowing the whipmarks on Lan Wangji's back were related to him. But he is still mad, he still thinks Wei Wuxian should have been able to figure it out. So what does he highlight?

The fact that the only thing Lan Wangji, perfect model-Lan righteous Lan Wangji, ever defies his clan for is Wei Wuxian.

And Wei Wuxian has seen him do this! Even if he doesn't remember this one instance. Because Lan Wangji has been doing that the whole story through. Wei Wuxian has watched Lan Wangji blatantly stand against the entire cultivation world for him, and here Lan Xichen is highlighting just how unusual that is, how much Wei Wuxian must mean to Lan Wangji that he's willing to do that. The important part of the sentence here is not "mistake" it's "only."

Lan Xichen here isn't trying to say that he disapproves of Wei Wuxian, or telling him to stay away from his brother. Remember, the thing that made him mad in the first place was Wei Wuxian saying that he and Lan Wangji slept in seperate rooms. He thought they were together! He's mad because they're not!

At no point does Lan Xichen say he individually considers Lan Wangji's feelings for Wei Wuxian a mistake. If he ever did, it's clear he accepted them regardless long ago. Mistake or not, what he wants is for his little brother to be happy.

[i-love-ropes]

LOOK AT MY BABY COUSIN!!!

LOOK AT HER!!!

I’VE NEVER SEEN HER THIS HAPPY BEFORE!

(Not everyone in Rope MF’s family have such strong emotions displayed on their faces naturally. It’s a recessive trait.)

THIS IS THE PICTURE MY AUNT TOOK OF HER ON HER BIRTHDAY TWO DAYS AGO

SHE JUST TURNED FOUR!

THAT’S THE DOLL SHE WAS GIFTED

I GAVE HER A PRESENT TOO!

IT WAS A DOLL HOLDING A ROPE!!!

SHE TOLD ME THAT MY GIFT WAS HER FAVORITE!

ISN’T SHE ADORABLE?!

I LOVE HER AND ROPES SO MUCH!!!

Size difference:

[utytimeline]

[breadandblankets]

Thomas family dinners, everything from lazy meals on TV trays when everyone is too tired to cook to extended family meals for holidays, memories stocked to the brim with laughter filled kitchens and food made with love, dinners of hope and recovery and mourning and joy

duke who feels awkward and alone even surrounded by other bats because where is the warmth and love? duke who still now feels like an outsider because he is reminded that this is not his family, that his family may never come back

Thomas family dinners in the recovery process, the tentative poking around each other's new found traumas turning into a new familiarity, a new kind of living, a living that has his fellow ex robins and his parents and some of his fellow bats all milling around cups of kool aid in hand as his dad regals a gaggle of teens with his stories

a warm place where laughter echoes on the walls

home

[niuxita21]

😭😭

[horny-ex-catholic]

You know, I post a lot of horny content here but tbh the sexiest thing that's ever happened to me was the time I got embarrassed because I realized I'd already told my partner about this statue I love and they told me to tell them about it again because they like listening to me be excited

[zeivira]

no rest for the wicked...

pls more

this shit is hilarious

like what are the others thoughts on this "illness" like garfiel, we've seen a bit of otto but i want more of him cuz he's best boi.

i imagine him going on full mama/big bro mood lmao

also that ficrec abt the crack fic by scissors? LMAO thx my parents knew im awake at 3am

point is

i like you now

so im gonna stalk- ahem- stick to you like a leach 🥺🌹

feed me more

The Cap’n's rule about everyone being strictly forbidden from watching him sleep—something about Garfiel being exactly like Rem but without pretty girl privilege—never actually stops the members of the camp from keeping an eye on him while the Cap’n's rests. 

The camp is nothing if not resourceful, and it’s not like they need to be inside the room when he’s sleeping to make sure he stays safe. Waiting a few feet away from the only entrance is just as effective. 

That's why when Garfiel smells a person approaching the Cap’n's room, during a time he knows he is asleep—they spent the last few days traveling to Pristella, like Hoshin traveled the desert to Banan after all—he rushes into the hallway and grabs the visitor's wrist right before it gets to knock at the Cap’n's door. 

"—the hell do ya think yer doin’?" Only after he finishes talking, under the dim hallway light of the mansion-like inn, he takes notice of the visitor's red, flame-like hair. A sharp horror, the one he had felt hours flooded through his entire body, as he realized whose wrist he grabbed. 

For a second, all is still. 

"Hello again, Sir Garfiel," the Sword Saint greets him, smiling as if they were pals and he hadn't evaded Garfiel’s senses and stopped his punch with a casual block a couple hours before. As if he weren’t the main obstacle between Garfiel and the title of Strongest. "I apologize if my presence alerted you, but all I wish to do is talk to Subaru." 

"W-well isn’ that convenient.  Anythin’ ya might need ta tell the Cap’n, ya can tell my amazin’ self instead." Big fat lie. There is a reason why the Cap’n is the Cap’n despite being borderline comatose and apparently not that much older than him. But Garfiel can’t trust anyone stronger than him, and as much as he hates himself for it…

The difference between him and Reinhard van Astrea is like a newborn Earth dragon and the Divine Dragon themself. 

His mere presence makes Garfiel's rawest instincts scream—tell him to either fight-or-flight. Garfiel doesn't want to be anywhere close to Reinhard, but much less he wants Reinhard anywhere close to the Cap’n when he sleeps. At least not until Garfiel proves himself a stronger shield than Reinhard. 

Even if the Cap’n is not defenseless—at least, not usually— he is useless while he isn't awake. And that means Galfield has to fight for both of them.

"I see," Reinhard's lips tilt downwards. "I do not mean disrespect, but what I would like to discuss would be related to something personal, unrelated to our respective camps..." 

Right. Garfield's eyebrow twitches. Right. The Cap’n said they were friends. 

"...the Cap’n's asleep," his voice sounds hoarse even to his ears. Maybe if he makes his tone drier than the Augura Sand Dunes, he can get Reinhard to give up and leave?

Reinhard's eyes widen. "Is that so. From what I gathered he mostly slept during the night." 

Garfield scowls. Of course the Sword Saint knew that much. "The Cap’n does, but he couldn' sleep during the trip, as we moved without pause, just like the Emperor of the Briar who never knew rest," Garfield crosses his arms. "So he is sleeping now and won't wake up in a while." 

"I see..." Reinhard says, and an uncomfortable silence falls between them. His gaze felt so heavy that if Garfiel moved carelessly, he wouldn’t know what his fate would b— "I wanted to ask about my father, actually—” Reinhard spoke up, breaking the silence. “I heard there were some issues close to Lady Priscilla's domain that involved Subaru and him." 

It takes Garfield a second to realize what he is talking about. His joy over learning the one and only Sword Saint's father was joining Emilia's camp to help Subaru stop the Argyle healer evaporated the moment his eyes actually lied on the man. After a couple days he just became Old Man, a skilled drunkard with a sob story, rather than a member of the family his mother used to read him stories about. 

"Issues,” Garfield snorts at Reinhard’s choice of word. “Tha's one way of sayin’ it." He makes a face. "Yeah, I was there too. The Old Man made us go lookin’ for a stupid chalice with the power to cure all sickness, but in the end it's only power w’s turning water into booze. Big ass let down." 

Reinhard’s shoulders sag. "So that’s what happened…” Reinhard’s eyes finally looked past Garfiel and looked at the still closed door, an unreadable thought reflected in them. “...I am glad father was with Subaru and you nonetheless. I can't imagine him taking another disappointment well..." 

How could any member of the group that went after the dumb cup not be disappointed? The chalice would have been able to cure not only the Old Man’s wife, but the Cap’n too. As the camp’s shield it’s his duty to protect everyone from everything—including hereditary diseases. When the Old Man mentioned the rumors, he was the first to tell Emilia they absolutely needed to go.

Still— the entire conversation leaves a bad taste in his mouth. The Cap’n was already carrying enough on his shoulder, with being the Hero that defeated the Archbishop of Sloth, the White Whale and the Great Rabbit— did he really need to trouble himself with family drama when the man ain’t even dead? “Why?” 

Reinhard blinks. “Well, it has been many years—” 

“—no, not that.” Garfiel’s scowl grows. “Why do ya need to imagine it? Yar dad’s alive, you could ask him.”

Reinhard just stares, before a bitter smile covers his lips. “Although true, my father doesn’t enjoy my company, so I wouldn’t like to impose myself when unnecessary.” 

But he is alive, is what he wants to say. “My mom’s dead,” is what he says instead. Because damn— he saw the Old Man, the even Older Man and him talk during dinner and how Ottobro almost lost his head trying to stop Old and Older from killing each other, right before Priscilla arrived saying this was the most amusing shitshow she had seen in weeks. The Old Man genuinely didn’t want to be with Reinhard and his dad.

But he is alive. All three of them are. They can talk. While Garfiel's mom is dead and gone and he can't tell her how much he loves her. "Just because your father is with us, and the Cap’n is strong enough to carry the weight of yar family drama, doesn't mean he should."

Reinhard's eyes widen again. "I—" 

"The Cap’n sleeps longer when he overworks himself," Garfield cuts, his words stronger than any punch he ever did. 

And Reinhard's mouth shuts with an audible click, expression shifting into one of horror— as it should. 

"He carries everyone's problems on his back— no matter how tired he is...!" He clenches his fists. "The Cap’n is so cool, cooler than the Sage and Reid! But precisely because he is like that is that we need to push ourselves harder. Be the people the Cap’n wants us to be, even if he is too shy to tell us. Because— because...!" 

“—will you two please SHUT UP?!" The Cap’n's door parts open with a bang, and the Cap’n appears in the doorway, rubbing his eyes while scowling. “Some of us are actually trying to sleep around here!”

Garfiel rushes back to his room only minutes later, but also doesn't miss Reinhard walking in direction to the Old Man's room rather than the hallway he originally came from.

beta read by @daemonerik

[unopenablebox]

i admit that i find it a little bit frustrating how Wildly Astonished other antizionist jews act when i tell them my israeli jewish family have lived in the region since [some unknown length of time before 1800 when there start being records about it]

[caspersscareschool]

he literally sews his kids stupid little outfits from scratch does anyone even fucking care