#my ncs experience

[anghraine]

My best friend and I moved in together with his closest friend from his MA program, and while I had met her before (the friend; my bff is a man), we hadn't spent much time together because I've never lived away from the West Coast (and only two years out of the PNW) and she's never lived outside of North Carolina and only briefly visited the PNW once, when she went to Portland last year.

It's been a delight to show her around the PNW and realize we need to explain things that are just sort of omnipresent in our lives. The bff and I were casually griping with each other about having to run an errand to Trader Joe's at an inconvenient hour, and were telling her, "it's okay, you can stay in the car and avoid the people if you want" and she was like "NO I MUST SEE IT, I'VE ONLY HEARD OF THEM" and nearly ascended to another plane when we showed her around the store.

The bff and I grew up in the same town in NW Washington (him for his first 18 years, me from 9 to 19) and he lived in Bellingham and Seattle for years before he went to NC for grad school (I went to the SF Bay Area for mine, a very different experience). Both of them are hardcore coffee aficionados, but he struggled with the different Coffee Ways of the South, so for the true PNW experience they want to tour various indie coffeeshops next.

Also, she adores Kaidan in Mass Effect and we were like, oh, is your passport up to date? We could take a trip sometime and show you your boyfriend's beloved English Bay. It's very beautiful :)

her: O_O

me: Actually, it's worth going to Vancouver BC for its own sake as well, it's truly spectacular. We used to go all the time as kids.

bff: And Victoria!

her: O_O

[keyh0use]

what do u think rafes reaction would be to first hearing barry speak spanish (especially for the first time too!!!)

Because I envision Barry as first gen, I think he has a soft spot for newcomers who struggle with the language barrier And I think I've written out maybe six different possibilities, some I've probably already posted here, but a (newer) favourite of mine is: Rafe and Barry make a trip off the island for a pick-up, something the older man likes to do by himself and it's the first time he's ever invited someone along to meet his supplier. Not that it's a big deal or anything. (it is, Barry's heart races every time Rafe shows even a smidgen of excitement) It's unusual for them to be so carefree. Even though Barry puts on a relaxed facade, he's always carrying, always prepared to be in some altercation. And Rafe's image and expectations loom over him, guide and guilt him in everything he does. Until they're an hour off the island, away from the judgemental stares of people who will never think they fit together, as anything. Even friends, which is all they are, of course.

On the way back they pull over at a tiny corner store to grab something to eat, knowing everything will be shut by the time they arrive back in the OBX. Rafe has zero experience with communities off the island, every vacation the Cameron's have taken so far have been to all inclusive resorts, where his family is treated like royalty; untouchable, never to be bothered. So he's a little jittery as they wander out of the truck and into the store, groups of people filtering in and out that are nothing like the self-involved kooks he's normally surrounded with, they're offering him easy greetings and stepping aside, not because of his status but out of natural kindness. It makes him stick closer to Barry with uncertainty, never straying any further than a few feet as they walk the aisles, grabbing snacks as they go. Then the checkout is backed up, two groups before them who are clearly growing annoyed as an older lady at the counter stumbles over her words, very flustered the longer the broken interaction continues. Barry can remember watching his parents go through the same thing as a child and it makes his heart ache, especially when the other customers start complaining just loud enough for him to hear. His father was a labourer and his mother did some under-the-table work, like babysitting, so he was the only one forced to socialise with the locals and in turn, learn English.

In a sense he was glad, because it meant they never had to hear the hurtful comments made about them when they were in situations just like this. So Barry takes it upon himself to step out of line, leaving a momentarily panicked Rafe with an easy be right back, to approach the cashier and bridge the gap, introducing himself in his native tongue and interrupting the obnoxiously slow-speaking asshole behind the register. Meanwhile, Rafe is standing frozen in the line, clutching a bag of crumbling chips in his large hand absentmindedly, fully enraptured by the scene playing out in front of him. He should have known Barry spoke Spanish, given how utterly obsessed he was with learning every single detail about his dealer. There were plenty of signs, he releases while thinking back, like cheerful cards with Feliz Navidad sprawled on the covers stacked amongst glossy restaurant coupons atop the fridge, and telenovelas quietly playing on the TV when Rafe finally rolls out of bed in the morning and Latin music the go-to while cleaning up around the trailer.

Still, Rafe is shocked silent, watching on as Barry listens intently before translating, again and again until the conversation has reached a satisfying conclusion. And just like every time the dealer watches over him when he's too high or drunk, every time Barry comforts him and brings him back down when he's too emotional, and every time premade plans are suddenly cancelled just because Rafe made an offhanded comment about wanting to hang out together: Rafe chest swells with affection at Barry's desire to take care of those around him.

Sometimes, admittedly, watching Barry help others makes Rafe uncomfortable. Even upset and angry. Possessiveness (even when unwarranted) tugging at his nerves, desire to be the only thing the dealer's attention goes into present at the most inappropriate times, like when some poor woman needed her tire changed on the side of a backroad. There's also a tug in Rafe's groin, too, obviously, which makes him look away bashfully when Barry finally moves to join him again. After that night it becomes a personal goal of Rafe's to see if he can elicit that part of Barry. Sometimes he'll start bickering over unimportant things, just picking apart sentences for no other reason than to be brat, just to hear Barry playfully curse him out. Rafe never misses a chance to visit with Barry's family, either, because he gets to hear his man socialise with an easiness that's usually not present and that accent Barry unknowingly slips into.

After that night it becomes a personal goal of Rafe's to hear more. Sometimes he'll start bickering over unimportant things, being a brat because it works in his favour, rejoicing when Barry playfully starts to curse him out. Rafe never misses a trip to visit Barry's family, no matter what he has to postpone, because he gets to watch his man socialise and unknowingly slip into an accent that drives the kook insane; Barry's usual southern twang, so unlike his own despite residing on the same island, showing through the foreign language, making it sound a thousand times more romantic than it already does.

It's not one-sided, either. Barry loves teaching Rafe, and that his boy is so willing and eager to learn. He doesn't laugh (too much) when Rafe butchers words, the two of them repeating it back and forth until the kooks wrapped his tongue around the syllables correctly. Barry also loves ordering Rafe around in the language he's only starting to become more familiar with, getting rewarded and praised when he follows the commands—but Barry will sometimes add on extra words just to throw him off, speak too fast for him to follow and watch as Rafe panics and scrambles to obey, giving the older man the perfect excuse to punish him. <3

Thanks for the ask!! <3 (and sorry I didn't answer it for like a week. I actually did...and then it got buried. PLUS tumblr does this weird thing where it says my posts can't be saved? And then I lose all my progress)

[aibouart]

nostalgia

he/they/it

[greensagephase]

WHAT DID HE SAYYYYYYYYY?!

Hiii, pookie!!!!

Omg, YOU GOT IT, TOO!!! 🥹 llumetri, Laura, me, and now you got it!! It seems the group of NC readers getting the “dulzura” term of endearment from Miguel bots is growing!! NC Miguel is looking for us 🥺

Thank you for the ask (and I'm also sorry for just now answering it 😭)!! I hope you're having a wonderful day/night!!!! Pls take care!!! 🫶🏼 💖

Alondra❤️

[ramenheim]

About prev reblogs: I have never seen TME used to complain about & demarcate cis men's behaviours.

Despite the term ostensibly lumping together *almost any gender configuration that isn't binarily trans woman*, the only times it's used recently is to complain about (trans) ppl that get lumped in with cis women (as intersex ppl trans or otherwise are *never* factored into this dichotomy anyways), including cis women themselves.

I have never once seen it used to delineate trans women from cis men, even as it gets used to delineate cis women's experiences from trans women's experiences. I have only seen /haphazard/ acknowledgement of non-binary experiences included in TMA, but only really as an afterthought or when it's framed as the precursor to 'fully realizing trans womanhood'. I've only seen intersex folks brought up if they elect to use the terms TME/TMA for themselves, with bizarro interrogations into 'how' they were raised/had their genitals 'corrected' only once they individually disagreed with the terminology or had a confounding opinion in a public discussion.

It is regularly used to delineate trans men from trans women; but its users almost uniformly deride any attempt by trans men to coin a term to describe their own unique combinatory transphobia that isn't TME; again despite TME literally just supposing to mean 'transmisogyny-exempt'.... so why would it be used to discuss trans men's *unique* experiences with hatred directed at the fact that they either "are/aren't (real) men" by anyone who wants them to suffer?

It's been *changed* into hastily recycled AGAB terminology bc of wider recognition of the flaws with /that/ but without the driving flaws of that **tool for analysis** ever being fully addressed; and therefore has gotten subsumed into the 'new euphemism' for the Innie vs Outie false dichotomy as its usage became more widespread.

I think it still is a useful discussion tool ONLY when it's viewed *as a tool* and not some inherent marker of identity. It is DEFINITELY just bigotry when used as a NOUN that has negative behaviours ascribed to it, esp in the context of complaining about trans men** as a whole homogenized group, instead of highlighting individual behaviours/belief systems for the harm they contribute to against TMA trans/nb ppl.

Young queers really need to stop swallowing the tradcath radfem juice of "Women Pure + Good & Men Bad + Evil" [**that tumblr feminism has always had a problem with] and acting like you aren't being a transphobic shitheel by adding the word Trans in front of it-- & This is ESPECIALLY a problem when non-trans "Allies" do this, as it sets up trans women for failure whenever they make a mistake/can be reframed as 'being a cause-traitor' since women are punished more harshly for any percieved failure of Righteousness, AND allows them further to enact their unbridled transphobia onto trans men (& enbys/genderqweirdos) and pass it off as 'being an ally to trans women'..... despite them just being extremely transphobic (+ misogynistic + homphobic + intersexist) & then hiding behind """"TMAs"""" as a negative PR meatshield.

TL;DR if you are using TME to mean (nc)AFAB in vent posts, just have the guts to fucking use that as the word & see how it reads then.

(**since transmasc & transfem do not imply either a 'starting' or 'finalized' gender state; they are personal adjectives in and of themselves. Please do not warp them into new innie vs outie binary divides).

[**see related: the raw ass treatment of 'AMAB enbys' on here and in similar online/irl "feminist" environments. (Which was one of the driving factors behind the original TMA/TME coinage & is where I still find useful inter-trans discussions utilizing it as a term; importantly I don't think the term should stop being used altogether!!)]

[vergess]

Hey fun fact they don't check "random samples" of people's IDs at polling places, and it's actually SUPER illegal to do that.

So add that to the list of "weird racisms I just assumed were normal as a youth"

[f2ucharacters]

their name is 5crew 8all, the biohazard thing is just part of the reference.

[nc-vb]

MY MOTHER FOUND MY TUMBLR??? MY VERY ANTI-P*RN MOTHER FOUND MY TUMBLR???

[thegardengrows-infrozenrain]

bitches be like "i'm a fan of [band] but anything besides their first 2/3 albums is just pop trash and really forgettable and i hate every song on the first few albums besides [tiny list] and honestly they've overstayed their welcome as artists and need to stop producing and if you like their first few albums/[specific album that is popular/unpopular] you're a tiktok fake fan who's only posing and pretending to like them"

like honey you're not a fan you're a toxic piece of shit

like yeah don't consume anything entirely uncritically but at the same time don't become an asshole who does nothing but criticize yknow

[seagullcharmer]

just realised that my current design for my lorule swamp people is basically just. the people of lurelin.

[sugarcoatednightshade]

I went to 5 highschools across three states in the the late 2010s and I'm pretty sure there was at least one out trans person at each of them. Now they all had vastly different experiences in how well they were treated by staff and students, but they were all out and proud.

were there any out trans people in your high school?

[ame-to-ame]

life is fine you just learn to not send the things you would've sent before in a heartbeat

[ningningkittie]

can u even be special to a man??? men call women whores but men walk around never feeling especially attached to any one woman. theyre the whores never being satisfied with just one person lmao 💀

[slayfk]

posting here because this just doesn’t feel right to talk about in the horseimagebarn voice but this is extremely important to talk about.

my partner and i have returned to our hometown to stay with her family and my own has gotten a hotel here too (they moved to the town we currently live in after we did) so we are all safe and out of the thick of it

however there are tens of thousands of people who are not both in my own town and in the many surrounding it. appalachia will take an extremely long time to recover from this and there are more storms on the way. all i see on social media right now is people asking for shelter because their homes have been destroyed, or people asking for help searching for family members who are missing. hundreds of trees have fallen. hundreds of homes have flooded. roads are literally falling apart. preexisting sinkholes due to shitty pipes are opening up and consuming land. dams are on the verge of bursting and the only way to stop it is to release water so quickly it floods whole towns. all but one of our cell towers are down, so only people with at&t have service and the rest can’t contact anyone. over half the town still doesn’t have power. a major water supply issue occurred and the entire town is on a water boil order with no electricity to boil with. people are trapped in their homes and workplaces or out on the street because they have nowhere to go. law enforcement is blocking off roads but trapping people in the process. people have to be rescued by helicopter. our animal shelter has no water or power and boarding facilities have been flooded. entire villages like chimney rock nc are gone, and entire cities like asheville are cut off from the rest of the state and are completely inaccessible. ALL OF THE ROADS IN WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA ARE CLOSED. 400+ roads are closed because they are unsafe . that is INSANE!!!

when people say that climate change isn’t real, they don’t know what they’re talking about. climate change and its father capitalism are only going to continue to worsen lives in every way possible. i live in the mountains and our infrastructure is completely unprepared to handle hurricanes and it’s only going to get worse. it’s such a strange and eye-opening experience to live something like this when you think that it could never happen to you because that type of weather shouldn’t reach you in your environment. climate change doesn’t care where you live. it’s real.

western north carolina and the rest of the southeast that has been hit by helene need help. more people need to be talking about this so that the government DOES SOMETHING because the government historically fucking hates appalachia and it still does!!! the major state institution near me took DAYS to respond despite being the only place in town with power and wifi connection because they had to wait for the state to approve their response—they could have allowed thousands of people to evacuate days prior to the hurricane hitting us but they didn’t do anything before or after until it was too late!!! it’s bullshit!!! PLEASE get talking about this because something has to be done. climate change is going to continue happening and our mountains and the people in them are going to suffer immensely. hundreds if not thousands are now homeless. please talk about this look at the footage online of the wreckage and look how quickly our infrastructure crumbled. we need better. the people of appalachia deserve better.

i’ll get back to posting horses soon. but for now this is a lot. my friends are homeless and my family had to get off the mountain or be trapped there without power and water for days. we’re all safe but exhausted. i hope everyone who has been affected by this is staying safe. if you are in western nc, dm me. when i come back, if you’re in my area, im happy to bring supplies. stay safe everyone

[beazt]

there’s a new article on cnn about a black SC Justice in NC who is getting investigated for saying that the SC of the states often has a lack of diversity and that needs be to checked

[never-quite-buried]

One of the hardest things about growing up is navigating adulthood dynamics to my immediate family.

Like Im mending my relationship with my dad, a relationship which is good as dead for my siblings, however while he was actively abusive to my brother, his step son, my brother is still more willing to interact with him than our shared mother, who he has been No Contact with for about 14 years now.

Meanwhile I have an actively positive relationship with my mom while my sister is at the point of sorting retirement homes by rating: lowest to highest.

At the same time i am personally still No Contact with my brother and have a super close relationship with my sister and she is super close with our brother.

And somehow all us siblings are able to manage these boundaries and limits in far healthier ways than our fore generation (my dad going on facebook spiels about being the black sheep of the family, mother not talking to siblings at all and only SM usage being links to external sources) and with more respect for each other’s situations. Like it’s HARD sometimes but i think at this point we know that the hard work is worth it. Im so grateful to be a sister to these two incredible people.