#my only options are retail and that is not a good job for me

[babybluebex]

another vent

[hairyjocktf]

New Recruit

Luke was at a low point in his life. He’d graduated high school but wasn’t smart enough to get into college. He had tried working some retail jobs around but he never had the work ethic to last long in those. He had similar problems in other gigs. It had been months of him bumming around and his parents had finally had enough, he was officially out of their house. With few options left, he was desperate. While walking down the street one day he saw an ad for the military, boasting stable careers and plenty of benefits. He’d played a couple seasons of sports in school and felt like he might be able to at least pass the initial evaluation, and out of near desperation he decided to try and enlist.

He made his way to the army office nearby that had been listed in the ad, and to his surprise there was no trouble. They did a quick physical evaluation and he was good to go, ready to sign up for boot camp. Luke was nervous; there was no coming back from this point. He thought about it for a couple minutes while being stared down by the recruiter, realizing he really couldn’t think of a better option. And so he signed the contract, unsure of what was to come. 

Two weeks later he was on a bus out to the base to start his boot camp. Luke didn’t know what to expect; he’d heard numerous stories about how brutal this training would be to weed out people. The bus was filled with the strangest mix of people he’d ever seen. Some guys looked like they’d been using steroids since they were 12, some looked like they belonged in an accounting department, and some he just couldn't pin down. Regardless of who surrounded him, Luke felt out of place, and he was only growing more nervous as the bus sped through the dense woods. After what felt like hours they finally cleared the trees and he saw the huge fences that would enclose the next few months of his life.

The buses pulled into a large dirt clearing at the center of the base where they forced everybody out. A huge and built man addressed the new recruits with his booming voice.

“Privates! Welcome to Fort Eagleton!” he shouted above the noise of disembarking men. “I am Drill Sergeant Thornton, and I’ll be in charge of whipping you lot into shape!”

Luke gulped, it looked like those rumors had been true. He was in for a world of hurt.

“You’ll be under my watch and command for the next ten weeks, learning what it takes to be a soldier. First, I want to see what I’m working with. Privates! See those chalk markings on the ground? Space yourselves on them for inspection!” 

His loud voice echoed across the clearing. The men all scrambled to stand in position, each on a chalk marking that were spaced four feet apart in a grid. Luke found an open one unfortunately near the front of the pack. He glanced nervously around at the others. Some were standing at the ready like they had been born for this, but the rest also looked around with worried looks on their faces. Their attention was brought back to the front by the thundering voice of the sergeant. 

“Listen up, privates! Here with me I have Corporal Evans, a prime example of what you should all strive to become in the next ten weeks!” The sergeant gestured to a tall and strong looking man next to him. Evans was at attention in full uniform, but Luke could tell the man was absolutely jacked underneath. He could see how the coat was straining against his huge, broad shoulders.

“He is the epitome of a soldier, and what all men should model themselves after,” the sergeant continued. “I will make a real man out of each of you! That is my promise as your Drill Sergeant. However, some of you may take to that easier than others.” He began walking through the rows of men in plainclothes, observing each of them with scrutiny. Luke’s eyes went wide as the sergeant stopped directly in front of him.

“You, boy. What’s your name?” The sergeant did not quiet his voice even when right next to him. 

“Luke,” he said shakily, “Luke Peterson.”

“Private Peterson, you may have passed the exam to get here, but I hold doubts that you are up to the challenge that is basic training,” the sergeant said while making intense eye contact. “Do you think you have what it takes to become a soldier?”

“Yes.. sir,”

“Well! Let’s put that to the test,” he boomed again. “Evans! Bring me this private’s new uniform.”

Within seconds, the man was at his side holding a folded army uniform. Thornton took it and handed it to Luke.

“Put this on, boy! Let’s see how you’ll fit in here,” he said with an almost sinister twinkle in his eyes. 

Luke had no choice but to then strip down to his underwear in the middle of the crowd. The eyes of the dozens of men he had entered with were burning holes in him as he changed into the fatigues. They immediately felt too large for him but he continued as the sergeant watched impatiently. He pulled up and belted the pants before buttoning the shirt closed. They were at least two or three sizes too big, Luke thought, and he looked ridiculous in the oversized fatigues. He laced up his boots which were also excessively large and stood back up to address the sergeant’s burning gaze.

Out of nowhere, Luke suddenly felt like he’d taken a punch straight in his stomach. He collapsed to the ground on his hands and knees, gasping for air as the pain in his stomach did not lessen, but began to spread. His torso felt like it was on fire, and he groaned in distress as his body was overwhelmed. Everyone else in the clearing was watching in awe as Luke’s body began to grow. His spine lengthened slowly, back widening and shoulders broadening. His legs began to stretch and grow longer, adding a good eight inches to his height. He began packing on muscle like he’d been working out for a decade, limbs inflating in seconds adding strength and size. His chest pushed out into two meaty pecs, which finally caught Luke’s attention from the incredible soreness he felt as his body exploded in size. His eyes widened as he watched his own body fill out the fatigues that had moments ago been far too large, arms swelling to fill the sleeves and chest pushing against the now tight shirt. His legs also bulked up, adding 20 pounds of muscle as quads and hamstrings grew in and thickened. His feet expanded, pushing against his large boots. He felt a sharp pain shoot through his jaw as it widened, giving him a square and masculine face. The pain began to subside and Luke managed to stand back up, this time matching the sergeant in height. 

The drill sergeant addressed him, “Good start soldier.” He had a hint of a grin on his stern face.

Luke was angry and confused, “What the hell was that? What did you do to me? What do you mean good start…” His sentence trailed off as he felt an intense tingling feeling arise on his chest. Underneath his tight uniform shirt, in the center of his massive pecs, tiny brown hairs began to poke out of his skin. The hairs started out thin and wispy but quickly thickened as they grew longer, spreading out across Luke’s mountainous chest muscles. The hairs erupted across the expanse, burying the skin under a dense layer of fur as they grew thicker, longer, and tangled together. Especially dark hairs sprouted around his sensitive nipples, causing Luke to let out a moan as he brought his hands up to massage them. The crowd watching Luke was stunned at his actions in front of the sergeant. Some of the men closest to him could see what looked like thick hairs beginning to poke out from above his shirt collar. The fur on his chest had spread up across his collarbone and had started peeking up onto his neck, where it was finally visible. The sergeant stood watching with a smirk as Luke was lost in a world of pleasure, rubbing his nipples as hair began taking over his body. The hair was not confined to just his chest, and shot down south across his stomach, coating his new abs and muscle in the same thick rug. The hair was growing in so densely that it started to push out through cracks and seams in his uniform. 

The other privates were speechless watching this erotic display in front of them, not knowing what to do. A few noticed Corporal Evans, who was standing behind the drill sergeant, subtly mimicking Luke’s actions, seemingly lost in his own bodily pleasures as his hands roamed his body. Luke’s breaths grew louder as the hairs continued climbing up his thick neck, creating a river of hair traveling up from his chest to his square jaw. He’d never had much stubble before, just some light peach fuzz, but that was changing. The soft hairs were overrun with thick, wiry, testosterone-fueled growth that coated his jaw in an incredibly dense beard. His upper lip was next, first darkening with the shadow of thick stubble before the hairs pushed out and completed the full beard on his face. Luke’s hands moved upwards, stroking his fingers through the long wiry hairs that now covered the lower half of his face. His eyes closed as the pleasurable sensation began to control his actions, wanting to experience every ounce of this growth. The beard growth was very noticeable to the crowd as well, as men further away began to break formation and inch closer to see what was happening to Luke. Evans was in the back, feeling the scratchy stubble on his own face as it pushed out a couple millimeters, just enough to leave a dark five o’clock shadow.

Unbeknownst to the crowd, Luke’s body was continuing to change under his uniform. Luke could feel every new hair sprout out of him as the hairs spread, conquering more of his newly buff body. His armpits tingled as the follicles there went into overdrive, pumping out hair after hair. What had previously been a sparse grouping of hairs quickly became a thick tuft of sweaty, musky hair. Dark and wiry hairs pushed out of bare skin, spreading out and covering his pits in a full manly bush, already dense enough to trap his body sweat and stench. Luke stuck one hand into his shirt to scratch the growing forest in his pit before pulling it out and smelling his fingers. He shivered from the euphoric smell of his own musk that was only growing more potent. The pit hairs continued to spread and even connected with his chest hair, creating a seamless rug across his whole upper body. 

The wave of hair growth continued advancing across his muscular body, with hairs beginning to pop up across his broad shoulders. They were joined by more and more hairs, giving Luke a thick coating across his traps. The hairs began to crawl down his brawny back, knitting a rug as they grew thick and tangled across his shoulder blades. As the hairs advanced down his spine they also began covering his arms, where long dark hairs were pushing out across his triceps before utterly engulfing his forearms in dark fur. Luke watched as the thick hairs poked out of his sleeves, ensuring anyone would know even in full uniform how hairy he was under there. That is, if they didn’t notice his large, calloused hands, which had their own small carpet of hairs sprouting across the backs. Luke could feel as the hairs creeping down his back reached the bottom, where a bushy tuft sprouted up just above his waistband. He subconsciously knew what was next, and moments later he was overcome with bliss as his thick ass cheeks sprouted their own rug of dense curly hairs. He could feel how the thickest, longest, and darkest hairs were pushing out of his crack, and he reached his hand into his pants to feel the silky fur that filled the gap. As all eyes were on Luke, Corporal Evans was still engaged in his own stimulation, feeling his pit hairs push out a little more, his back get a little more hairy, and his ass plump up just a bit more.

Luke felt his now size 16 feet heat up in his boots, beginning to grow itchy. Hairs were crawling out of the tops of his massive feet, popping out of his thick toes shortly after. The hairs climbed up his thick legs from his feet, coating his calves in dark hairs before engulfing his massive thighs. The hairs came in thicker and darker as they neared his groin, where his formerly modest bush began to double, then triple in size. Thick pubes were sprouting up all across his crotch, enveloping the area in a dense forest of curly hairs. Luke let out another moan at the sensation and shoved both his hands into his pants. He felt the coarse hairs sprouting through his fingers as his bush continued to spread outward. His cock began gushing precum before it too began to grow. It had almost been swallowed up by the immense bush, but now it hardened and pushed out, growing longer and thicker. Luke grasped his growing member and felt the hair climbing up the shaft as it continued to push further out of his bush. He felt his balls swell in size and drop a little farther down, becoming coated in hairs just like the rest of his groin. 

Luke was overcome with euphoria, and the animalistic instincts took full control as he began stroking his nine inch cock with both hands, each pump blasting his brain and body with pleasure. The sergeant and everyone else watched as Luke jacked off to his own transforming body right in front of them, stunned into silence. Corporal Evans, still unnoticed, slid his own hand into his pants to deal with his rock hard problem. Luke kept at it, moaning louder and louder as precum poured out of his cock. Every stroke seemed to make him grow just a tad bit larger, just a little hairier. Finally, after a few minutes of being overcome by pure ecstasy, he erupted, a fountain of cum spraying out covering his new uniform in sticky white semen. Some of it even got on the sergeant, who seemed unfazed. Evans grunted quietly as he pumped a massive load directly into his jockstrap that he had on under his uniform. He wasn’t prepared for quite how large it would be, leaving a wet spot on the front of his trousers and leaking down his leg. Luke panted as his mind returned to his body, finally taking stock of the situation and realizing in a moment of panic what had happened.

Before he could say anything Sergeant Thornton started to laugh. His roaring laughter pierced the awkward silence that had overtaken the space for the last while. He walked over to Luke and slapped him on the back.

“Atta boy! That’s what I like to see,” He said to Luke with an uncharacteristic smile. The crowd was shocked. That was not the response they’d expected in the slightest. 

“You’re fit to be a real soldier now, and I trust you’ll serve us well. A fine specimen!” he turned to the crowd. “Look here, privates! This is a real man, a bastion of strength and masculinity who can take a beating and give some hell.”

Luke too was stunned. He was scrambling to process what had just happened to him, and that it was seemingly planned by the sergeant the whole time. His thoughts were cut short by the sergeant addressing him again.

“Well son, you’ve done good today. We’ll have to clean up that scruff of yours to get you in regulation,” he stroked Luke’s new beard with his hand, sending a bolt of lightning directly to his still semi-erect cock. “Corporal Evans will help you out with that, and with cleaning up your fatigues,” he said as Evans approached from behind. Luke noticed the darker stubble on his face and the dark splotch in his bulging crotch. 

The drill sergeant once again spoke to the crowd, “The rest of you will be assigned living quarters and shown the areas for training. I want you all back here at exactly 1300 hours!”

Evans ushered Luke away from the grounds and into his own private quarters, where he stripped out of his cum soaked uniform and finally got a look at himself. He was taller, absolutely built, and incredibly hairy. It turned him on in a way he never knew he could be, his cock once again rising to full mast. He rubbed his hands through all of his new fur, unable to believe what he was seeing.

“I was in your shoes when I enlisted,” Evans said to him. Luke turned to face him and saw a slight blush in his cheeks, and his bulge was even more noticeable. “I’ll make sure you get cleaned up and everything, but how about first we just enjoy the new you in its raw form,” he said, stepping right up to Luke and wrapping his hand around Luke’s cock. Lost for words, Luke pulled off Evans’ hat and leaned in for a kiss, grabbing his bulge and pushing him against the wall.

Maybe bootcamp wouldn’t be that bad.

This was my longest and most ambitious story yet! Hope y'all enjoy it and thank you for nearly 400 followers in just a month! Feel free to dm or send an ask if you have ideas for future stories.

[muzanswaifu]

Out of Options

Sugardaddy!Toji x Fem!Reader

18+

You needed money. He wanted free use. You weren't past making an exchange... until he started to get cheap. What else was a girl to do?

5k Words

Big thank you to my beta readers @mistymuichiro & @thosestarry-nights & @mrskokushibo !!!

Sfw Warnings: Sugar Daddy Toji, Sugar Baby Reader, Themes of prostitution, Angst, Bad Communication, Toxic Relationships, Creepy Old Men, Misogyny, Toxic Work Environment, Jealousy

Nsfw Warnings: Smut, Hints of Breeding Kink, Dirty Talk, Fingering, Oral Sex (fem! receiving), Cunnilingus, Squirting

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The wooden frame of the bed slammed viciously into the thin walls of the motel bedroom, the withered coat of eggshell white chipping away with the ruthless collision, likely cracking the wood as well. The hellish creaking burned into your ears, scratching at the back of your brain and preventing any chance of relaxing in the moment. You’d had a shitty day, and the fact that this wasn’t even the worst of it was almost sad.

Work was exhausting, stupid old men yelling at you all day that you couldn’t do your job and the lead physician not doing a thing to stop them. Not to mention that you were in charge of most of the side work all day, replacing the instruments and utensils, emptying trash bins, cleaning out inpatient rooms, none of which was given to any of the newer technicians. You were good at what you did. You studied hard in school, you perfected all of your residency, you had astounding references. Your only flaw? Your gender. You were one of the only females in your department - hell - in the entire building. Most either quit or moved to different hospitals, entirely due to the terrible environment. None of your peers or superiors or inferiors respected you. You were always stuck with the dirty, side work while the others got to do what your job actually entailed, and the rare occurrences when you did get the opportunity to work with patients, they were always abusive to you. It was hell.

But what other choice did you have?

All the other openings at other hospitals were either filled or about to be. No other fields or retail jobs made enough pay. You didn’t have near enough money or grounds to seek out legal help. You were stuck. You were desperate for money. You were out of options.

You had family to take care of - two brothers, a sister, your mother. Dad died years ago in a car accident. Mom was already working overtime with two jobs, barely making ends meet. Rent, insurance, taxes, student loans, car payments, groceries, clothing, hospital bills, schooling, existing. It all cost money. So much money. It felt like you were suffocating. You were out of options.

Finally the creaking stopped. You back was already sore beyond belief and your legs numb. Your knees were probably bruised, too. Damn, you could go for some marble cheesecake right now. Your nose scrunched as you smelt the familiar scent of cigarette smoke, you lungs burning from the second hand nicotine.

“Here.”

A wad of cash fell across your back, the paper crunchy and bent. You groaned as you rose up, stretching your back out and hissing at how tight you were. How much was ibuprofen again?

You flicked through the money, your brow furrowing when you shuffled across the last layer.

“This isn’t enough,” you countered.

The end of his cigarette burned gold. He stood in front of the window, brushing away the curtain to peer outside as he took a drawl. He was still naked and didn’t seem in a rush to dress himself.

“It’d be more if ya didn’t make me wear a condom.”

You scowled but kept silent, fidgeting at the sides of your panties where he tied the damn things. The latex was knotted tight with each used rubber, five in total today. It’d be easier to just throw the whole pair away.

He took another hit.

“Won’t make our date on Saturday,” he mumbled, “got plans.”

You were already redressing yourself, desperate to get out of there and get going. Shower. Eat. Jerk off. Go to sleep. There were only so many hours in a day and you still had work in the morning.

You sighed, “Yeah, yeah, whatever.”

He chuckled softly to himself. “How’s work.”

“Bye, Toji.”

The store wasn’t all that crowded surprisingly. It was Thursday afternoon, but people tended to not follow norms around here when it came to scheduling. They were out of marble cheesecake so you had to get turtle. It was too sweet in your opinion.

Everyone was asleep when you got home, but you were grateful for the privacy. Mom was still at work.

You locked your door and ruffled through your bottom drawer, fetching out your vibrator. The fan in your room was loud so nobody could hear it anyway. God, you were tired.

You never thought of anything particular when you were trying to get off, it honestly depended on the day. Sometimes you thought about getting eaten out slowly by a fireplace. Sometimes you thought about getting dicked down in a dark alley. No matter the scenario, there was only one similarity. You never imagined anyone in particular. You couldn’t put a face to the man. He was big, muscular, strong. You felt safe yet thrilled underneath him. But you couldn’t see him, if that made any sense.

Your sex drive had always been high. Ever since puberty you were antsy and pent up, yet you couldn’t bring yourself to date. Your first boyfriend was overwhelmed with how needy you were, and the moment you sensed his rejection, your attraction to him plummeted. You needed to feel secure before you felt horny. Were you demisexual? Maybe. You weren’t sure and hardly had time to find yourself.

You tried to find another partner again in your third year of college. There was a party at a local bar, and your friends hyped you up to go. You were both drunk, him more than you. He had whiskey dick. You didn’t feel comfortable. You left relatively quickly after calling him an uber. Failed again.

You didn’t try again after that.

You were fine keeping to yourself. You had your own assortment of toys awaiting you in your room. And work only solidified your hatred of the male species. You likely would’ve remained celibate forever if you hadn’t run into Toji.

You had just gotten off work, walking through the subway to catch the next train. Your engine was busted so your car was in the shop. Not many people were around, and the ones that were left after a while since it was taking too long. But you were too tired to walk so you stayed. The sketchy figures in the back didn’t seem like a big deal at the time. Finally the train came and you got on, only about six people onboard. The man a couple feet down on the bench smelt like burnt flesh. He had a cigar in his mouth despite the no smoking sign. Whatever, it wasn’t any of your business. Your left side was occupied, surprisingly, despite the abundance of free seats. This man was close, too close. Two others gathered in front of you. 

“Where ya headed to baby?

“Yeah, yeah, you need some company?“

“We’ll treat ya real nice.”

You tried to ignore their taunts, keeping your eyes down and trying to appear as small as possible. You immediately noticed when a knife was drawn.

“We’re tryna talk to you, bitch.”

The blade nicked the bottom of your jaw, your blood running cold.

“Yer makin’ too much ruckus over there.”

Everyone slowly turned to look at who spoke. The man looked without a care in the world.

“Didn’t fuckin’ ask you, now did I old man?” The knife was now pointed to him.

He drew a long sigh and took out his blunt, pressing the lit end into the seat, the plastic screaming in agony.

You don’t really remember the rest of the conversation. Everything was a blur. Words were said. Punches were thrown. Bones were shattered. The man with the cigarette hardly got up from his seat, really. The next thing you knew he was sat back down and the others were lying on the floor, knocked out. You shifted your feet away so they didn’t get near the bodies.

Awkwardly, you tried to thank him, offer him what little you had in your pocket, mostly out of fear. You didn’t want to get on the bad side of someone who could so easily hurt people, and you didn’t want to appear ungrateful. Based on the scar that tore into his mouth, he’d seen his fair share of violence. He turned it down. You offered to buy him food. He turned it down. Medical care to clean his fists? He turned it down. You were out of options. Was there anything you could offer him? His answer still burned in your mind.

“You wanna fuck?”

The money afterward was unexpected. You woke up sore and broken, your thighs burning and covered in bruises. He was long gone, in his place a wad of cash that made your eyes bulge. Did he think you were a hooker? You weren’t sure. The sex wasn’t bad. You didn’t get off, but he obviously knew what he was doing. It felt nice. You felt safe.

Your next meeting, he found you walking the streets. Money in hand, stinking of booze. Wagging a room key in your face and giving you an address to go to if you need some money. Maybe he thought you were someone else. You didn’t care. You needed money and didn’t mind the sex. You were always wet enough to be comfortable for a decent amount of time, but it would hurt more after each round. You wish he didn’t last so long. Or for so many rounds. You wondered if he was even human. More money.

You had a couple rules for your… relationship. No kissing. No oral (for either of you). No raw contact or cumming on your body. No telling. You didn’t need a reputation.

He paid based on what he felt like paying you, but he was never stingy so you didn’t mind. Until lately.

He wasn’t paying as much as he used to. He didn’t seem to be enjoying himself as much. Maybe he was getting bored. You were worried.

You needed the money. You always needed money. And this wasn’t paying like it used to. It was a hard pill to swallow, but you knew what you had to do.

You needed another outlet.

It was going to be hard to find one. You were essentially selling your body, but you still had standards. You refused to sleep with anyone who you didn’t find attractive, anyone who was married, anyone dangerous. Your work was cut out for you.

And since you were now free on Saturday, you would go out then.

You put your siblings to bed early, double checking with mom that she’d be out until early morning. You dressed nice but not too nice. Hot but not too hot. It was a fine line you were walking, and you absolutely were not going to cross it.

The bar in the popular part of the city was going to be the number one spot for rich bachelors. You never went there yourself because it was so expensive and uptight, but you were looking to get drinks anyway. You didn’t have to wait long before you had a drink in front of you, courtesy of a gentleman sitting in a booth in the back. He was too old for you but you smiled at him. The others came quickly. You had the bartender sneak most of them into the sink. You couldn’t get drunk and most of these men you wouldn’t touch with a ten foot pole. It was starting to get late. You didn’t spot anyone worth your while.

“This seat taken?”

You whipped around to your right, surprised to see a young man - no - someone your age in here. Not to mention attractive. You shook your head, trying to cover your own shock.

“Not a lot of… not… old guys in here, am I right?” He laughed, nodding toward the tables of older gentleman. Most were fifty or so. You felt gross now realizing how many were staring at you.

You laughed back nervously, “Yeah…”

“What brings you here?” He asked innocently, “Not that you don’t belong here! You just look… I don’t know - uncomfortable?”

You cringed. Did you look uncomfortable? 

“Yeah, sorry. Just… hanging around, I suppose,” you offered. He was too cute now. You couldn’t bring yourself to take his money even if you wanted to. 

He smiled. “Same here. I thought this place was going to be fun, but there’s not a lot to do.” He looked around. “Most of these guys are talkin’ business.” Looking around yourself, you realized he was right. Most of them were meeting up with business partners whiles others were trying to make business partners. Some looked pretty shady. You were getting more nervous by the minute.

“I-I have to go,” you mumbled quickly, getting up from your seat end creeping toward the door. He was surprised. “Uh, by-”

You bumped into something, stumbling back into the bar. 

“Oi, you should watch where you’r-”

You gasped.

The music got louder. The air felt heavy. His eyes looked dark.

The corners of his mouth tugged down and his eyes narrowed. Sweat condensed on your brow.

“What are you doing here?” He growled, his stature big and menacing. His green eyes bore into you sharply.

“I-I-I-”

“Hey-” The boy from before was back. “Are you okay?” He looked to Toji and frowned.

“This guy bothering you?” He asked, all too naive. You gently pushed him back. You could see Toji about to pounce. 

You pushed him back a little harder when he didn’t get the hint. “No, it’s fine, man,” you told him, “just go.”

He gave you another concerned look, but left when you gave him a stern one. You felt bad. He seemed nice.

Much to your disappointment, the other man you were dealing with didn’t just vanish into thin air. You sighed. “I was just about to leave, anyway.” You tried to step past him. He didn’t let you, his wide torso stepping in front of you. His smirk made your skin crawl.

“Let’s talk.”

You weren’t given the option to deny him as he stole you away, a large fist grabbing you arm far too harshly. He pulled you through the exit, dragging you down the crowded street. Any struggle you made was met with a firm tug, his grip getting tighter and tighter. You were definitely going to bruise.

When you’d rounded lone alleyway between the buildings, he’d pressed you against the wall, the grainy texture of the brick scratching your skin.

“What the fuck was that about, huh?” He hissed, his teeth sharp and burning white.

“You fucking around? You screw any of those fuckers?” He’d never been so angry with you before. He’d never been angry with you, period. Your heartbeat pounded in your ears.

“N-no!” you argued, “Toji, no. What the hell - what are you doing here?” When he gave no answer, his eyes still glaring, you continued.

“You said you were busy today…”

No answer.

“I can spend my free time wherever I want.”

No. Answer. Your eyes glazed over, and you turned away from him.

“I… needed money…”

With that he seemed to let up.

“Money?” He scoffed. “This how you get money now? What the fuck happened to your job?”

“Nothing… I just needed more.” You bit your lip. “Your’s isn’t enough.”

“What do you mean mine isn’t enough?” He barked. He wrapped his hand under you jaw, his palm grasping your pulse.

“I told you I’d give you more if you let me screw you raw. Didn’t I?”

You swallowed thickly, tears clinging to your eyelashes.

You looked back at him with fear in your eyes, his hand slowly closing around your neck. His expression softened ever so slightly as he realized he was scaring you.

He released you with a huff and walked a few steps away, running a hand down his face.

“What’s the issue? STDs? Birth control? I’m clean, and I’ll get you pills-”

“No!”

He looked at you surprised. You calmed yourself down and rubbed your arms, suddenly feeling the chill of the air.

“Toji…,” you began, “we’re… not together. You have your fun, I get paid - that’s all we do.” You looked up at him softly. “I need more than what you’re giving me.”

His eyes narrowed. “You saying you don’t have fun.”

You bit your lip and looked away. He scowled. Wrong answer.

He took wide strides forward, cornering you against the wall yet again, this time with his hands on either side of your head, forcing you to face him.

“You saying you don’t love it when I fuck you? That your cunt doesn’t fuckin’ love my cock?

You frowned back at him.

“You tell me.”

His mouth thinned.

It was no secret that you didn’t come when you two fucked. It’s not like he was trying either. You always prepped yourself beforehand, lubing yourself up and stretching yourself out so he didn’t hurt you. And during your escapades, he always just pulled his dick out and got to it. He never touched you more than necessary, never tried to feel you up or grope around. His only goal was to get himself off. And you were fine with that. So long as he paid you.

His eyes looked at you softly, he almost looked guilty, but you knew him better than that. You sighed and pushed away from him.

“It’s late… I gotta go hom-”

He grabbed your wrist, squeezing tight.

You looked down at it, his hand engulfing your arm, his fingers and knuckles all too big for you. His nails dug into your skin and he pulled you back. You couldn't walk away if you wanted to. You were trapped. You wanted to push him away, you wanted to be mad, but you couldn't find it in yourself.

He leaned in, his eyes soft yet cold.

You flinched, his lips connecting with the side of your neck. He was rough, his mouth moving against your flesh in a sloppy kiss. His tongue flicked across your neck, and his teeth tugged at your skin. He was hungry. Always hungry. You pushed your free hand against him. He ignored it.

His free hand snaked up to the underside of your breast, the other dropping to your hip, his palm resting on the bone. His thumb rubbed at the exposed skin where your chest spilled out. You felt conflicted.

He bit you harshly, drawing blood. Your eyes widened and you hissed.

“So that’s what this was all about, huh?” He rasped, his bottom lip resting on your skin, his breath hot.

“Little girl not cumming like she wants to?”

You pushed his face away and groaned.

“As if you’ve ever gotten me off? I’m leaving.”

You went to move, but he kept his grip tight. He grabbed the other wrist as well. He squeezed hard, forcing you to gasp. He smirked.

“You’re this stubborn you’ve forgotten how to ask for things? You had me worried there. Thought you were tryna end things for real.”

Your face flushed in anger and embarrassment. You yanked your arms away but he didn't let go. You tugged once, twice, three times - he didn't let go. You yelped as he tugged back, forcing you to stumble and fall against him. He pressed his hips against yours, his groin digging into your stomach. You grunted at the pressure, your toes curling at the contact. He was hard already, his cock throbbing against your navel.

He pinned your arms over your head, his weight forcing you up against the wall, his mouth looming over yours. You turned your head to the side. He couldn’t kiss you, that was against the rules. His hot breath fell down your cheek and neck.

He leaned in again and you turned away.

He was hungry. Always hungry.

He leaned in again. And again.

You whimpered softly and groaned. Your heart throbbed.

You swallowed thickly as he leaned in again, your chest heaving, his lips brushing against your jaw. You shook your head weakly. He huffed, a deep, almost animalistic rumble leaving his chest.

You whined and shut your eyes.

His tongue smoothed over your jawline, his hand finally letting go of you.

You placed a hand on his shoulder but didn't push him away. He was too strong, anyway.

He grunted and ran his fingers through your hair, grasping a handful and pulling your head back. You whined, the sound only encouraging him to continue, your hair tightening in his fist. He pushed his hips against yours, his hard cock pressing against your pelvis, the fabric of your skirt doing nothing to stop the feeling.

“C’mon sweetheart, Don’tcha wanna feel good?” He cooed.

He forced you into the wall once more, his free hand moving down to your thigh, squeezing the skin just under your knee. He pulled your leg up, wrapping it over his hip, his bulge rubbing your heat. A chuckle rose deep within his throat, and he licked at your ear.

“Ugh, Toji, stop it! You’re being annoying,” you complained, despite the thrill lacing up your spine. He laughed.

“Don’t lie,” the man crooned. “I’ll make you come so hard, you’ll be beggin’ me to fuck ya.” 

Your cowered away. “Wha-” Umph.

You couldn’t finish as you we dropped onto a hard surface, a mixture of both brick and stale dirt. Looking up, dead branches and deader leaves filled your vision. The alley way had led to a smaller subsection of the street, a lone crevice in the city district that was long abandoned and withering away. Your dress was smushed into the dirt of the old dirt bowl that was in the center of the small courtyard, the tree taking root twisted and weak. It almost seemed pitifully metaphorical to your current situation.

A scheming hand slithered up your thigh, scrunching back your crinkled skirt and hiking it around your hips, your lacey g-string fully exposed.

“Fuck,” Toji moaned, licking his lips, “You were definitely looking to get fucked tonight.”

“No I wasn’t!” You countered nervously, trying to press your thighs together to hide yourself. Despite being in an abandoned area, you were still in a public space and didn’t want to be seen by anyone. Much less be here for the long duration it took him to be satisfied. But this time felt a bit different. He was taking his time, touching you more, teasing. He usually got straight to business and had his fly down by now, but instead it was you who was being undressed, his big, warm hands encompassing your thighs and groping them. He was trying to break another rule, you could feel it. He had a devious look in his eye. He smiled at you.

“How much to touch your pussy?”

You were taken aback by the question, squeezing your thighs even tighter.

“Wha- that’s off limits!”

“No, no,” he insisted, “everything’s got a price, baby. What’s yours?”

He couldn’t possibly be serious. You’d never seen him so adamant to give you pleasure, much less offer money for it. From your experience, men were hesitant to do anything besides receive, convincing themselves that woman adored pleasing them. And the rare moment when they did touch a girl, it was always careless and short-lived, the only real goal to get them wet enough to be a slippery hole. You weren’t in the mood to be disappointed.

“Thirty thousand yen? Forty?”

“Not interested.”

“More?”

“No.”

He leered.

“Three. Hundred. Thousand.”

Your eyes bulged. Mouth gaping.

“Th-thats…”

“Going once,” he announced. “Going twice!” Don’t let him get to three.

You could get a new computer with that, replace your old busted one that had lost half the keys and took fifty years to load.

“Going-”

“I’ll do it!” You gasped, defeated. “I’ll do it…”

His paws squeezed your thighs, drifting up the insides and gently prying them apart. You hardly fought him when you realized that was the only way you were going to get the money. New computer. New computer. You tried to focus on the positives.

Toji pressed his cheek into your inner thigh, kissing your skin softly. You shivered at the feeling of his soft lips brushing your flesh. He moved up your leg, placing his hands on each side of your panties and tugging them down, your skin glistening with sweat as he pulled the cloth against the curves of your flesh. He pulled your legs apart further and licked a long stripe up your skin. the wetness cold on your overheated flesh. You clenched your teeth. You were on the verge of telling him the deal was off, but his tongue brushed against your core and you could no longer find the words. He kissed and sucked at the sensitive skin of your thighs, leaving marks in his wake.

Your core throbbed.

He pulled you closer to the edge of the pot, your body lying at an awkward angle, the base of your spine aching.

Toji pressed a thumb against your slit, dragging it across your folds and collecting your slick on the pad. You shuddered.

He ran the pad of his thumb across your clit, rubbing slow circles into the bundle of nerves. You gripped his hair with one hand, tugging it hard, his muffled groan tickling your core. His finger slipped between your folds, easily entering your wet hole, his finger much bigger than your own. You grunted at the intrusion, the thick digit stretching your inner walls, his knuckle pressing against your clit as he bottomed out inside of you. He wiggled his finger, stretching your walls before pumping his finger in and out of your cunt, dragging out every little noise he could from your mouth.

He pulled you closer to the edge of your seat, your legs dangling in the air as he sat between your thighs, your hands digging into the dirt beneath you for support.

His finger moved slowly within you, his eyes never leaving yours, a fire burning within his emerald eyes. You grunted when he added another finger, the feeling almost too much for you. Your noises echoed briefly throughout the courtyard, bouncing off the concrete and surrounding buildings, and you were all too aware of how loud you were being. You pulled harder on his hair as the knot in your stomach grew tighter.

But you tried to keep your composure, your body still tense with the fear of your surroundings. Any moment someone could come waltzing by, see what you two were doing, your disheveled appearance, perhaps even try to take advantage. Your alarm hindered your concentration on the pleasure.

“What’s up?” You heard, turning your eyes back down to look at him. You hadn’t realized your gaze had wandered to the opening in the walls to where the city life buzzed about. He glanced over to where you were looking.

“Ain’t nobody comin’ over here. Relax,” he mumbled, his eyes getting warm again. “I’ll protect ya. Just relax.”

Your heart throbbed at the promise, warmth enveloping your body. You hesitantly let your head fall back and sighed, dropping your shoulders. His free hand moved to the hem of your skirt and pushed it up over your belly. He wanted a good view. You didn't care. You felt… safe.

His fingers picked up speed, fucking you harder as you bit your lip. His thumb moved back to your clit, rubbing circles on the swollen button. You hummed and sighed, his fingers twisting inside you. The pleasure began to build up again, boiling in your belly and tingling up your spine. And just when you got comfortable he only took it further.

Heat enveloped your clit, wet and slippery and hot like a warm bath. You gasped out, squirming around a bit and digging your nails into the roots in the ground. Looking back down, you confirmed your theory. Toji’s head was between your thighs, his mouth on your pussy and wrapped around your little bead, his fingers still working inside of you. Soft pants and whines left your mouth, your legs shaking around his head as he continued to suck at you, his tongue swirling around and prodding under the hood, leaving you slick and sensitive. Your core throbbed.

You felt a sharp pressure inside you, and then a slow stretch. You yelped. A third finger was entering you, your cunt molding around the thick digit. You writhed  again, trying to ease the ache of the intrusion. His other hand rested on your belly, gently smoothing over your skin as he ate you. His head moved side to side, tongue laving over you, his hands never stopping their movements. Oh god. It felt like you going to- to-

“Ah!,” you moaned, shaking viciously and clutching at his head, holding him in place. You were melting, you were sure of it. Everything was slipping away from you, your bones, your brain, your worries. His tongue kept lashing at you, extending your pleasure and refusing to slow down. His fingers remained pressed against your sweet spot, his other hand pushing on your belly. It was all too much, you were squealing with overstimulation. It got tighter. And tighter. And tighter. Until something popped.

All the tension broke from your body, the shocking sensations melting into something warm and fuzzy. You slowly let go of everything, all tension easing away from you and allowing for complete bliss to take over. Sweet sighs and mewls left your lips, your back lying against the dirt as you caught your breath and waited for your head and pussy to stop tingling. Another whine was pulled from you when he took his fingers and mouth away from you, unraveling your legs from his head and stepping back.

“You fallin’ asleep now?” He laughed.

You pouted and groaned. “No… jus’… gimme a sec.” Your bones were like jelly, your eyelids heavy. He cackled at you and that was the push you needed to get off your ass. He looked smitten.

“Good, right?” He crooned, wiping his mouth, “Ya fuckin’ squirted on me.”

Your face got dark and you looked to your lap, embarrassed.  

“Nothin’ to be ashamed about princess.” He assured, fishing out his wallet and shufflling through the bills. He took out a stack and threw it in your lap.

“It was hot.”

You groaned again and dug your face into your hands, trying to ignore his raspy laughing.

You jolted when you felt his breath on you, looking up and freezing. His eyes burned into you.

“Now next time, let’s work out this condom situation, alright?”

You gulped.

~

Part 2 coming eventually...

[milkweedman]

oh, thats awesome !

very good to know--ive got some top (un-dizzed as well, i hate dizzing) that would make a good dressing, so i'll give your method a try too ! thank you for writing it out :D

I'm a big fan of keeping a basket of combing waste that i can pick through later for colorful scraps, so lots more waste is only something i care about if its a small fleece and i need every last handful, yknow ?

another thing ive been wondering about re: distaffs in modern use is, what's the appeal for you ? i completely understand why they were used so frequently in the past (if you're going to be spinning all day you need to carry your whole day's fiber supply with you, and it certainly helps if you havent tangled and destroyed the prep after a couple hours, among other things), but since most people today don't spin all day--what makes it worth the extra effort ? or is not much extra effort at all once you've got some practice ?

ALSO. see now youve caused problems for me because i need to tablet weave a pretty ribbon for my distaff after seeing that BEAUTIFUL PICTURE. so badly.

and so true.

💖 PENIS 💖

WARNING OP LOVES COCK THIS POST IS ABOUT COCK. ITS SO GOOD AND BEAUTIFUL ❤️ GOOD MORNING TO PENISES EVERYWHERE

I spun more of what's on the distaff--im starting to get a feel for how to draft from this. Decided to pull of a sample to see how it turned out--its quite worsted ! I dunno why but I was completely expecting a woolen yarn from this. Makes sense though, the fibers are pretty aligned the whole time.

Still a problem with tons of lumps and bumps though. The prep is the issue--I willowed it first and it wouldn't draft for shit, so I layered it onto a blending board after that and now it's much better, but still very inconsistent. Next I'll try processing on hand cards first. I wonder how wool is supposed to be processed for a distaff--surely not how I'm doing it ?

[jamiepaige]

Constant Companions Closeup #5: CADMIUM COLORS

(also on bandcamp and spotify!)

Once again, welcome back to the Constant Companions Closeups - a series of in-depth dives into the songs off of my latest album, Constant Companions! Last time, I wrote a whole diatribe about my OCs while talking about I Wish That I Could Fall, and today, we're eating paint! Cadmium Colors featuring Soneji of Project Mikan!

Consider this a content warning: this post will discuss the pandemic, struggles with mental health, and suicidal ideation/attempts. I'm hoping it'll ultimately be uplifting, but the discussions at hand are incredibly heavy, and it wouldn't do this song right to be vague. Please be warned.

---

Let's talk about COVID.

At the beginning of 2020, I was in the midst of a long-term break from making music. It wasn't completely cold turkey, and I might not have even called it a break if you'd asked me at the time, but things were dire. I was still dealing with the burnout I'd sustained from the making of Autumn Every Day; I'd had my ego bruised by a live performance at a house party that went so hilariously bad it'd hurt even the most stoic performers (imagine watching an entire packed room of people clear out in 5 minutes flat from the already hyper-exposed vantage point of being on stage in front of them and knowing you single-handedly caused that lol); I had just moved across the country, and was preoccupied with trying to make ends meet as a 22 year old dealing with pure adulthood for the first time.

I was working a shitty minimum wage job at a discount clothing store I will not be naming, slogging through late-night shifts that wouldn't get me home until 3 am some nights. I had friends and roommates, but they were all just as overworked and exhausted and dealing with their own shit as me. I was mentally ill and unmedicated. Suicidal ideation was rearing its ugly head at my lowest moments.

Then, as I turned 23, a global pandemic shut the world down, my grandpa died with me being unable to attend his funeral, and I had a catastrophic mental breakdown that suddenly turned the voices in my head into a deafening cacophony of self-inflicted malice.

In hindsight, I think being 23 kinda just does that to you

---

Fast forward to 2021. I was back at my retail job with the pandemic raging in full force, my sense of self was held together with duct tape, positive self-talk essentially didn't exist for me, and I was the loneliest and lowest I had ever been. I was working the fewest hours I could get away with, and still, almost all spare time I had was taken up either by work or by my recovery from it.

This was around the time I got an email from Crypton, of all places - the people that make Hatsune Miku, for anyone uninformed. They wanted a remix of the song Happy Synthesizer for a Digital Stars compilation. I could not for the life of me tell you how I lucked into this or why they reached out to me of all people, but they did, and I was deathly determined to prove myself worthy of it.

This was August of 2021. I was staring down the barrel, languishing in what felt like only half of a life, fantasizing about death and trying to twist my thoughts into something that could at least keep me blearily shuffling forward another couple days. It was untenable.

(I'd also recently been diagnosed with OSDD 1b - this is a whole can of worms I can't really open until we talk about Breeze Blows, but it's important to at least mention that coping with this was a significant part of this turnaround.)

It's melodramatic, but I had only two options - make things again, or die.

I finished that remix within 24 hours of getting the stems, and I will gladly toot my own horn about it - it's really fucking good, in my opinion. Bittersweet ended up coming together in a mad dash over the next couple months as well. I was making music again.

Even though I was exponentially busier, things paradoxically got easier. I made the creative process a priority in my life, and not only did it give me an outlet for everything that had otherwise been eating away at my soul, but it struck a chord with other people who had been struggling as well. Things just... started getting brighter.

So I kept making music and living and yadda yadda blah blah here I am. This is all a lot of words and very personal stories of mental health struggles to say this:

One: The line between being an artist and being one of countless people forced to work jobs that go nowhere, that put their life at risk, that force them to strip parts of themselves away - it is a faint and transparent line built on circumstances of class and privilege and luck. Making Art and being an Artist aren't magical elevated states of existence, but something anyone is capable of if given the space to nurture their creativity. I believe the world should be a place where any person can do this.

Two: It's easy to convince yourself that art is meaningless in the face of the world at large. And yes, revolutions aren't fought by poetry and paintings, and people aren't fed through songs. But art is a source and a medium for connection; Art is how we find beauty in a disorganized and entropic world; Art is what we come home to and what words we write and pictures we paint and songs we sing to remind us that people matter to us and love is real and life is worth fucking living. Maybe that's corny and stupid, but it's true.

Three: So help me God, I will never work retail again in my entire life.

---

This is another song that is heavily inspired by artists like Prefab Sprout, Peter Gabriel, Kate Bush, and other artists of that ilk - very 80s, very flowery and sentimental lyricism, focused on telling a story. I greatly admire songs that aren't afraid to paint otherwise banal or ordinary scenes in abstract reverence!! I wanted the verses to contrast heavily with each other in that way, with verse one's relentless poeticisms (prosaic practice of depravity) and idioms turned on their head (suspending innocents above their disbelief) against verse two's incredibly straightforward depiction of a factory worker's circumstances.

The flowery language might have worked against me somewhat, though! I've seen a lot of folks that thought the ending was darker or much more defeatist than I intended, and while some of that is just inevitable with a work of art, I want to be clear.

Translator's note: this means "don't kill yourself, you idiot"!!

As you may have picked up from the previous post in this series, this song does heavily feature a leitmotif or two predominantly performed under pudgy pretenses. I'm not going to go on that whole novella-length spiel again, but rest assured knowing that this song, too, is one that makes me think about my OCs. Since it's something many people missed, however, I will take a moment to point out that this song quotes none other than Autumn Every Day off of my album of the same name!

Painting and visual art have been something of a reoccurring obsession of mine in my own art. I grew up around visual artists, have always been friends with many visual artists, and generally have a really intense love of it as a medium and a mode of expression. However, there's also always been a sense of... well, I don't want to call it jealousy, but it's jealousy. I've tried many times to start making visual art of my own, and I have made some things, but it's been a struggle, and I worry sometimes that my eye has permanently outstripped my ability.

However, in my quest to toss out grand expectations and simply have fun making art, I did recently pick up a cheap little drawing tablet! I'm excited to be a beginner at something artistic again...

Finally, I want to thank a couple people: Soneji of Project Mikan for the gorgeous, soaring saxophone solo; friend_xp for the mindboggling MV editing; and especially my good friend Que for the GORGEOUS painterly art that goes along with this song! Que's style was just perfect for this, and really tied the whole thing together immaculately!! There's no joke or deeper lore or anything I just fucking love Que's art go follow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And with that, I think this post is complete!! If you have anything else you wanna know about, ask away in the replies! Tomorrow will be Breeze Blows with Marcy Nabors and Marlow Jacobs!!!

MAKE ART AND BE GAY

[iridessence]

I would like to take a moment to acknowledge myself and say that I am elated and proud to have manifested some of my major goals since 2018-2019. Basically before then, 2014-16 I struggled with depression and suicidal ideation quite frequently due to not having steady income, as jobs in retail seemed the only available and “safe” options, but long shifts standing at a registers or posts were damagingly hard on my body. In 2017 I got a desk job that set me on the path of financial stability and reduced physical load, which did absolute wonders for my mental health but it was an absolute blight to my existence over time due to terrible management and the usual corporate garbage. I knew that staying there was fine for a time but not sustainable in the long run, so change must come eventually.

also around then, I continued to explore self portraiture and personal style but I really wanted to perform/create Burlesque acts and book them, and invest in and actually have choreography/technique and beautiful costume pieces that looked like the visions refining themselves in my head through research. I was also perpetually struggling in the dating sphere with the deficit of romantic fulfillment that I deeply wanted. and while they weren’t hostile, things were definitely weird with my family (dysfunctional, literal small town energy, upset that I didn’t want to be around them more in the suburbs but lots of interpersonal toxicity and lack of emotional growth).

I knew that in the coming years I wanted to…

quit my soul sucking job and set out to be a full-time or at least professional level burlesque performer, creating the qualitative and classic show girl acts I dream to see on stage

work on the floor at a boutique or mom-and-pop type shop that sells goods or services that are interesting to me, especially aesthetically, such as an antique shop or a jewelry boutique etc., but a place where I could sit intermittently as needed for my physical disability. Also, ideally it would be a position where I could express myself through style at my choosing and it would be received well, and also my hours would not be very early or very late.

find a loving and supporting partner who I could lavish equal amounts of love and support on to, live with and hopefully marry

Achieve/maintain financial stability enough that I have a reduced risk for homelessness and sometimes treat myself to things that I enjoy.

Figure out why the relationship with my family was such a struggle and do things within my power and desire to fix it.

In a world that isn’t a corporate machine devoid of empathy, none of that seems like a tall order to ask… but I live in America so… It took some time, but I’m starting to see the fruits and returns. Honestly sometimes things feel like a blur and I’m not exactly sure I could say there was a huge system to what I did overtime to make it work, but I know the work was there.

As of today, September 9, 2023:

I am a respected professional burlesque performer with costumes I figuratively gag over and acts that come closer and closer to hitting the aesthetic nail on the head for what I want to embody. (I quit that shitty desk job at the beginning of 2019 and haven’t looked back since. Sent a whole ass company wide message with a long and detailed “fuck you” too.😂🙈)

i’ve managed through burlesque, social media work, donations and savings, and —since the global pandemic—,odd jobs and grants/minimal loans, to continuously pay rent and ward off homelessness 

I live with the love of my life, to whom I am engaged and actively planning our wedding (we looked at a venue yesterday!)

I’ve helped my mom on the growth of her emotional intelligence and commitment to learning more about values under the race, gender, and sexuality umbrella, as well pushed her to examine the enabling and entitlement dynamics with her adult children that take advantage of her. While my relationship with my brother and sister is not great, my relationship with my mom has been steadily getting better since the pandemic. we had a breakthrough at the beginning of this year where she acknowledged and apologized for guilt tripping me for not being around the family more, when I was (she quoted) “actually protecting myself like she should have been.”

and litcherally within the past week I was offered the job at a local boutique I interviewed with a year ago and didn’t get, and I signed an offer letter to begin work within the month. 

To say I’m happy with the way things look right now is an understatement. The world still terrifies me, but I have no choice but to carve out a sliver of its beautiful experiences for myself, and I am doing just that. It may not be perfection, but it’s pretty damn good and I’m going to do everything in my power to keep it that way and make it even better. I am living my ancestors' wildest dreams!!

for anyone reading who might be struggling right now to make things work, I hope you hold on to hope that it can get better. A beautiful life is possible even on this hell scape, even for the marginalized.

[vorenado-m]

happy disability pride month! please consider helping me take back my life as a disabled person!

the TL;DR is that for the last 3 months i have had an absolutely soul-sucking miserable minimum wage retail job that, due to the way scheduling works (and the app being broken as fuck) has prevented me from having access to literally any of the life-saving mental health/medical care i need as a disabled person.

my disability is best managed through a combination of medication, therapy, and casework-- not a single one of which i have had since march! :) contextually, up until i got this job, i took three daily medications and had casework once a week and therapy once or sometimes twice a week. these services are offered at an affordable cost to me through a local organization that is threatening to close my case due to lack of participation.

ill make another, more detailed post later with some of the services i can offer for money (i draw! i code! i write!) but until then here is a code you can scan if you have a few dollars to spare:

there are more details beneath the cut (idk about you guys but im kinda nosy so i wrote some more stuff in case anyone else is also nosy) but thats the gist of it. you can also always ask for details. i dont have a therapist right now so it might feel good to say things.

my plan is as follows: i would like to take the month of july more or less "off" from work to get my affairs in order, starting with scheduling appointments for therapy and casework and getting back on my meds. i am actively looking for a job, but i would like the ability to be somewhat picky instead of applying everywhere i think might have me for the sake of having money coming in to pay rent.

for the last two years i have made less than $800/mo and i can survive on roughly $600-$650 a month. my july rent ($550) is paid and my august rent (at least $500) is most likely also squared away, through a combination of some cash i was hoarding, a previous donation, my last expected paychecks from my current job, and my brother generously offering to cover whatever is left over. the extra $100ish is for roughly a months supply of the food that is part of my daily routine that i get cranky without (i have tea every morning, for instance.)

i have a fantastic roommate who is not struggling as much financially who will do everything in her power to make sure i have access to staple foods (rice, eggs, etc) so i really just need to buy the things only i consume (kimchi, milk, etc.) there is a food bank i go to, so i am not worried about food, but i can only go to it once per month. we have a barter system where i trade her the things i dont want from the food bank and she buys me things i will eat; alternatively, i sometimes give her things i get from the food bank (eg meat) that she turns into meals for both of us.

i live independently/"alone" with roommates and do not have support from my family pretty much at all. they have never been particularly useful for emotional support and have openly denied me financial support since i was a teenager. moving in with them/getting help from them/talking to them is not an option.

i have emailed my caseworker at the mental health organization i work with as well as my caseworker with the disability vocational program i work with to help me find a new job that is "back of house" and requires less customer interaction. i did this over the weekend, so i expect to hear back from them sometime this week. in the meantime, i am searching for jobs on my own in places like indeed, jobhat, careerbuilder, etc. as well as checking company websites of places like chain grocery stores to see what is available in my area.

my job pool is a bit limited due to the fact that i cannot drive (due to both my disability and the medication im supposed to be taking for it) but i am very well-versed at taking the bus, which is free. getting to and from work is not a concern for me; it is being able to do the job without being driven to the edge of a mental breakdown that is the problem.

the disability vocational program is my ticket out of poverty! last month i had a follow-up evaluation (i had to call out of work for it, but frankly i was at the end of my rope then too) where they approved my career goals as a web developer and we are in the process of deciding what my next steps are! the program will likely (depending on what route i take) help pay for vocational training, too, but i obviously have to pay rent while in training. which i think i can do if i have a job that doesnt make me want to die.

i have some other things that make my life a bit harder (im mixed race, i am nonbinary + gay, etc) but i would say those things dont really impact my ability to get a job as much as the disability does LOL which is why i did not feature them prominently in this post. like, the reason i cant get a job isnt because people dont want to hire me because i have blue hair and pronouns, its because im obviously disabled.

if you have any other questions, no matter how intrusive you think they might be, feel free to send a DM or an ask, and i will try to answer.

[crustless-toast]

Screaming Your Name

Here is Chapter 1 to Screaming Your Name! An Oc x Daryl Dixon story! I'm gonna really try to not make the story too cringy and if I am please let me know so I can fix it lol. I hope you enjoy it either way!

I'm a little new to posting on Tumblr so I hope to be able to link all the chapter together properly as I post them. Until then, Enjoy!!

Raven was like any normal person. She worked a boring retail job that paid close to nothing. Just to go home to an empty house, pay bills, eat and sleep. Nothing exciting really happened in her life. She was just different than the average person. She enjoyed the little things. She was more of a glass half full kind of gal. Always enjoying the little things in the world. Unfortunately, the world came to an end. She wasn’t the athletic type but when monsters are chasing you down to eat you alive the only thing you can do is run. Running is what led her to her new life with people she never thought would enter it. She found friends, family, and love. She learned to fight, to face her fears, and to keep pushing forward even through the dark times. Out of everything all she wanted was to get one man to open up to her more. To show him the good that was left in the world. For Daryl Dixon to see there is still hope in the world. That life is still good. 

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Gripping my blanket closer to my body, I shiver as cold sweats soak my body. I don’t know how much more I can handle this. My cold that I've had from the start of this, has turned into something much worse.

 What medicine I did have is gone. Finding medicine is close to impossible nowadays. A few Advil here and there, as well as a bag of cough drops can only get you so far. Everywhere I’ve looked has already been picked through. The more populated areas are hard to look through. Too many of the dead filling those areas. I can't look through them on my own. It’s close to impossible. 

The summer heat had no effect on my cold body. The warmth just feels like the blanket. The slight breeze just makes me shiver more. If it was a normal day in the old world, people would think I was insane having a thick blanket wrapped around me with the sun beating down on me. But in the old world I’d have medicine and I'd be fine in a few days.

The sound of the dead was behind me and there was nowhere to go. No place to hide. I looked around to maybe find something, but there was only an empty road surrounded by woods. I grip my knife, deciding my only option was the woods. 

My legs were getting so heavy. I was having a hard time staying ahead of them. I needed to keep moving but I had to stop. My throat was burning from the sickness and the heat. I need to stop and to drink some of my water. Quickly getting back up. The sun was starting to set and it was getting too dark to see. 

I was getting too tired to keep going. My eyes feeling like someone is pushing them closed. I drop my bag, dropping to my knees but I kept a tight grip on my knife. Taking deep breaths that end with me coughing. I covered my mouth with my blanket, needing to keep quiet incase any of the dead were near. 

I jump at the snap of a twig not that far from behind me. Looking around, seeing if there was anything up ahead. I didn’t see much, but there was something ahead of me. It was hard to tell what it was exactly. But what light was left I could see something reflecting. Like a window.

Grabbing my bag, I moved ahead, dragging my bag next to me. Not having the strength to pick it up. As I got closer, I could see it was a cabin of some kind right in the center of an open field. Abandoned before the world ended. 

Growling was behind me. Staying here was my only option. 

Throwing my bag on my shoulder, almost making me fall. I raised my knife and slowly made my way to the cabin. I head up to the steps of the porch, listening closly to see if I could hear anything. So far nothing. 

I closed the door behind me, locking it with its old rusty padlock and placed a chair in front of it that was close by. Moving forward once my eyes were adjusted to the darkness. There was another door in front of me that led to the other side of the cabin. I drop my bag, heading to the door to close it as well as put a chair in front of it. In case something comes in I could hear it first.

To my left looked to be some kind of dining room with a table flipped over and chairs thrown all over. As well as the kitchen that appeared to be cleared out with every cabinet opened wide.. To my right I think it was a living room. It was empty with only a couch that looked so comfortable. The livingroom appeared to have a small hall that lead to other rooms. Each was empty with nothing in them but some old furniture that was rusted and destroyed. 

Grabbing my bag I made my way to the couch. My body relaxed as I sunk into it. Not caring about the dust. Exhausted from having to run all day. 

Reaching in my bag I grabbed my water, but it was empty. Just my luck. I didn’t realize I drank it all already. 

My body was so cold. I could see the bottle shaking in my hands. I dropped it, not caring where it went. Gripping my blanket even tighter around me as I lay down, my knife still in my hand. Finally being able to rest my head on something that wasn’t a hard floor. I don’t care that I can feel the springs in the cushions. I was so tired and sick. I couldn’t keep my eyes open any more. No matter how hard I fought it. I needed rest so I let myself sleep.

~~~~~~~

A loud bang woke me from my sleep, but I couldn't move. My body was so heavy. I couldn't keep my eyes open long enough to see if it was one of the dead or not. I was still shaking to the point where it hurt even more. My bones are sore from, well, everything. My knife was no longer in my hand. I must have dropped it in my sleep.

I could hear footsteps getting closer to me. I opened my eyes just enough to see the sun was up, shining through the windows. A figure walked into the door frame. I can barely make out a man holding something. It was pointed at me. 

“You bit?!” The voice was stern, southern and loud. 

I close my eyes, not able to keep them opened any longer. “N-no. Sick.” 

“Sick, how?” 

My lips quiver as I try to speak, “Fr-from a cold. I-i had fr-from the begin-beginning.” 

“Is it just you?” He was demanding an answer. 

I nod, too tired to answer. 

I felt a hand being placed on my forehead. His fingers were cold and rough. 

“Ya burin up.” 

I grip my blanket closer, “So-so cold.” 

I hear things moving around. I couldn't tell if he was taking my stuff or looking around the place. I didn’t care either way. 

“My camp has a Doctor. ‘M take ya to him,” Before I could answer him, I could feel his arms snaking under me. He grabs my arm and places it over his shoulder. Picking me up from the couch. With my blanket still gripped in my hands, I wrapped my arms tighter around him. Scared to fall. 

“Gonna make me hot,” He says in my ears.

He started to walk. I opened my eyes enough to see who this man was. His face was a little dirty, with some facial hair around his mouth. His hair was short and filled with sweat. His eyes were sharp, looking at everything around him.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper. 

He looked down at me for a second, and his eyes were a sharp blue that when the sun was shining just right, it made them shine a beautiful sky blue. 

My eyelids were getting heavy again so I closed them and fell asleep to the sound of his breathing and the morning birds chirping.

~~~~~~~~~~

“Is that Sophia?!” A women screams, waking me up just enough to hear whats going on around me.

“Nah, just some girl I found. She sick.” I hear from above me. The man that was caring me.  

“Bit?” Another man spoke.

“Said it’s some cold.” He held onto me tight as he got closer to the people

“Bring her inside. I’ll take a look at her.” 

I was still too tired to speak. I fell back into my deep sleep. To a place that was safe. 

[tauforged]

like the thing that i think a lot of ppl gloss over is that a large majority of the talon aligned heroes have little to no interest in the actual ‘goals’ of the organization (to the point where we still don’t entirely know what talon wants or why they exist, lmfao) so much as it just being a means to an end. like we can all conceptualize that sombra is pretty much just there because it gives her access to more resources she can use towards her own goals, moira is there for research opportunities and funding that she’d never get elsewhere due to the nature of her work, i can only imagine that ramattra’s alliance with talon (and thus null sector’s as a whole) is purely situational because it provides advantages he considers useful, reaper is pretty much just there because they’re against overwatch therefore he can use it as an avenue for his revenge, even doomfist doesn’t really seem to hold as much stock in talon as an organization as he does use his position as a tool to achieve his goals, if it stopped being useful he would likely just walk away.

in opposition to the overwatch aligned heroes who all seem to be coming together solely for the sake of this like, ideal of Overwatch as a concept being this paradigm of good and justice and doing what’s right, and rallying behind their faith in the organization and what it symbolizes… i genuinely don’t think any of the talon operatives really care all that much about talon at all. it’s just a job. like, sure, we’re doing cartoon supervillain shit, but the pay is decent and we’ve got benefits and i can continue to do my own thing on the side, no questions asked. it’s honestly a pretty sweet deal.

all of that to say i really don’t see why people seem so averse to the idea of sigma having that same mindset. like yeah, he’s not exactly thrilled to be using his research and abilities to assist in acts of violent terrorism, but does he have many other options? he says it himself in that interaction with baptiste, talon gives him everything he needs - funding, resources, something to fall back on after being in total isolation for decades and coming out with absolutely nothing. it’s a guaranteed safety net — so long as he’s with talon, there’s absolutely no chance of anyone dragging him off or locking him up again, and so long as he contributes when he’s needed, he’s free to pursue his research to his heart’s content. does he regret it? sure, sometimes. i think they all do. i doubt there’s a single talon-aligned hero who genuinely believes what they’re doing is genuinely morally correct and sound. but ultimately in his mind he didn’t have many options left, so he had to settle for something he knew would at least guarantee his safety and continued freedom. it doesn’t really mean he’s being manipulated or held against his will any moreso than most of the other talon heroes, imho. he’s not proud of it, but hey, it pays the bills.

i feel like he regards it with a similar level of resentment/annoyance as i felt towards my horrible soul sucking corporate retail job of several years - like don’t get me wrong, the company i worked for absolutely sucked and i HATED how they operated, policy was bullshit and so much of it was unnecessary and needlessly counterproductive. but i also really connected with my coworkers in the same situation AND i got to get paid to do stuff i already would have been doing on my own anyway, and ultimately the experience i got and connections i made were really helpful in pursuing what i actually wanted to be doing with my life. it’s like if your shitty day job required you to kill people but they also like, got you hooked up with a place to live and a healthcare provider and all that shit and paid for all of your living expenses no questions asked AND gave you a decent budget to screw around with so long as every now and then you showed them what you were making and maybe used it to kill people more efficiently sometimes. i wouldn’t exactly feel any amount of loyalty to the company paying me but i wouldn’t exactly be in a hurry to quit either

[jo-harrington]

Get To Know Store Manager Verse Eddie

What story is he from? What kind of story is it (Fix-it fic, Older!Eddie, Rockstar!Eddie etc)? My Eddie I'm going with it my original Eddie from Store Manager Verse. It's a sort of EveryoneLives! NoUpsideDown! Amalgam where Eddie works at StarCourt Mall and he meets a New Romantic interest in the Claire's Store Manager.

What inspired you to write this Eddie? I've worked retail forever and the horrors but then I moved to corporate. New job, no customers. But corporate teams usually go into the field and help during Q4 and especially in the special...department I work in? Christmas 2022 really made me ask "what if little Store Manager Jo had an Eddie who worked at her mall and she had a crush on him" and SMVerse was born.

What are your favorite headcanons about him/share something you never shared in your story? In my story, he had friends in his first stint through high school/senior year that left him behind and broke up the band. Then Corroded Coffin 2.0 was born with Jeff, Gareth, and Unnamed Freak (who I named Dave). Now that he's approaching a potential graduation with Jeff and some of them aren't...he's worried about Jeff leaving first, but the others shortly after. And then his band will have broken up a second time and what will he do then?

What does he wear on a casual day? On a dressier day? What does he wear to bed? Casual Day: Jeans, T-shirt, Flannel optional based on the weather. Jacket/Vest combo if he's going out. Dressy Day: Bought a nicer button down from Montgomery Ward, sleeves are rolled up, a few buttons undone. He's got the least offensive graphic tee he owns underneath it. Leather Jacket on top, no vest. (There's a Regional Manager visiting Tape World. Kyle is wearing a suit. He also bought sunglasses for all the guys to wear inside secret service style.) Pajamas: Summer, underwear only. Spring/Fall, no shirt, and either flannel pj bottoms or there's a pair of sweats that he's cut into shorts. Winter: Hoodie, sweats, thick socks

Favorite foods? Mountain Dew, Zebra Cakes, Pizza, Watergate salad. End of story. He also likes how reader makes pasta.

Tell Us About His Family/Friends I intentionally left it vague. Mom dead dad in jail, the usual. In SMVerse, Reefer Rick was his mom’s boyfriend for a short amount of time. That’s when things were really looking up in his life. He had a father figure (aside from Wayne) who loved and cared about him with no familial obligations. Mom was working, Rick obviously selling, Wayne working either driving or at the plant. It’s a mutual aid situation. Then his mom dies and Wayne and Rick share as much responsibility as possible because neither of them can do it alone. Wayne and Rick are both Vietnam war veterans? I don’t history good. So they have the benefit of being from the same down and going through the same shit and then they need to raise a kid they both love more than life. And he in turn would do anything for them.

Yeah Yeah, he's a Metalhead. Tell Us MORE About His Taste in Music in your story Oh GOD. Listen. He’s a fucking asshole about his music but if you’re respectful, he’ll be respectful. (If you’re his friend though, it’s extra disrespect). Aside from metal, he does enjoy the classics. He has some rock, he’s got some blues. His mom’s favorite were the Monkees and he listens to that tape to be close to her.

Eddie and Store Manager are currently in my WIPs listening to music and getting high. Stay tuned.

What are his views on romance? On sex? Sex is casual to him. It’s nice to feel nice. He’s slept with a few people, at parties where he’s made sales. He had a “girlfriend” that he thought was a girlfriend who was actually trying to get close to his friend Mickey. Kind of made him a little jaded. All of that to say, that specific event made him hesitate with saying anything to Store Manager. She reminds him SUPERFICIALLY of someone who hurt him and it’s easier to pine and keep her at arms length as a friend than potentially get hurt.

Is he optimistic or pessimistic? Pessimist. Next.

Where or with whom is he most comfortable? He’s most comfortable in his van. Home is home but is it really home? Wayne’s rarely there. Rick’s would have been home if his mom was still alive. He likes being with his friends and he is mostly with them at school which…blah. Or in the van.

What are his views of his future? What are his hopes/dreams? Music!!! music music music. He would like to be a musician and SPOILER he’s gonna be. Just not the fantastical rockstar we would wish for him. But he’s also debating what his future looks like as it pertains to Tape World. He likes it there. He likes being part of a team. Working with them, working with Kyle…he’s very much questioning what he wants.

Anything else you'd like us to know about your Eddie/your story? He’s the softest Eddie I’m gonna write. With the nicest future I think. He’s been dealt the easiest card out of all of them. No Upside Down. Got to have the most ideal childhood given his circumstances. AASB Eddie is harder for obvious reasons. STFF is going to be hard in his own way. But SMV!Eddie is the sweet boy we all need. He’s the sweet boy I need.

[a-b-riddle]

Pen Pals Chapter Two: Confessions

We never really spoke over the phone that much after that. We still messaged constantly through text or via messenger. C made honest on his promise of financially supporting me. It was more money than I knew what to do with to be honest. I was constantly asking him what to do with it. I mentioned I had no furniture.

Why don't you get some? You should have more than enough in your account by now.

Can I?

Of course. You don't have to ask permission before making a big purchase, sweetheart.

Okay. Do you mind if I send you some pics? I've never had to buy furniture and I would like your opinion.

Of course. 

With that I went to work. I ordered most of my things from Ikea, but the one thing I got, which was stupid, but something I always wanted was a velvet chesterfield sofa. I sent C a couple of color options and asked which one he liked.

Blue. It's my favorite color and goes with just about anything.

So I ordered it. It came almost a week later and was the last thing I needed to really make my apartment feel like home. 

It looks good. Good job, gorgeous. 

I felt so proud of his approval. I did feel guilty about spending so much money on a couch, but he liked it and he was paying the bill for it.

A few months passed before I finally got the interview for Stark Industries lined up and C was less than pleased about it. 

It has nothing to do with your area of study. The whole point of me taking care of you was so that you could wait out a position at a university.

I understand that, but it's been months and it doesn't look like things are going to open up in time for me to start teaching in the fall. 

You're back tracking. I don't think you should just give up and settle on whatever job you can get. 

For some reason that struck a nerve. I wasn't giving up, but things happen. The entire world has been put on pause and who knows when life would return to normal. 

Nowhere is hiring and I need a job. I have been cooped up in this apartment for months and I can't take it anymore. At this point I don't care if it's in retail. My mental health can't take being alone and inside like this anymore. The only social interaction I get is either talking to you or going to the grocery story. I have been in the city for months and I haven't made a single friend. I understand your concern, but it's not your decision to make. I will eventually get there, but this is something I want to do. I appreciate all of your help, but as I said, it's not your decision to make.

I turned the messenger offline.

A few days had passed with nothing from C. However, when Friday rolled around, money was still deposited into my account. Maybe it was automated and it accidentally posted. This had been the longest we went without communicating since the start of our little arrangement. 

After a few glasses of liquid courage, I called him. It was late in the evening, way past my normal bedtime, but I wanted to talk to him. At least to let him know about the deposit.

"Hello?" He answered. His voice was scratchy and slow.

"What are you doing?" I asked stupidly.

"I am trying to sleep considering it is nearly 2 A.M." I heard him groan. "Is everything okay?"

"Yeah, I just wanted you to know the money got posted to my account." I swallowed. "I was wondering if you had venmo or something and I could send it back.

"Why would I want you to send it back?"

"Because I got a job and you don't approve."

"You don't have the job yet, you have an interview." He corrected.

"And because I don't think I was nice."

"Nice?"

"With how I spoke to you. Or 'typed' I guess." I huffed and laid down on the couch. "I shouldn't have caught an attitude like that. I'm sorry. You've been a saving grace these last few months and I really appreciate everything you've done for me." I finished off the glass of sweet moscato.

"It's okay." He reassured me. "I understand you probably are sick of staying inside, but I just want you to be safe and not settle." God, how was he so perfect?

"I got to thinking." I felt warmth of the wine start to get to my cheeks. "You know, we have been friends for like five years and I have no clue what you like and you know what I look like and you know I like you? Isn't that stupid? Like I have no clue what you look like and I like a stranger I've never met."

"You sound drunk." He chuckled. 

"I've had a couple of glasses of wine," I admitted. "But I'm not just saying that because I've had a few glasses of wine. And like I'm kind of glad I haven't seen you. I mean you're this person I can't even envision and you know that now you know where I live and I don't know."

"What are you trying to say? That it makes you uncomfortable that I know your address?"

"No, it's like..." The words embarrassed me as they came out of my mouth. "I don't want to say like aroused, but.. I don't know." I fell against the bed. "It's something that I think about sometimes." He was quiet and I felt like I had said something wrong. "I'm sorry that was too much. I shouldn't have called. I'm sorry, go back to sleep. I'll talk to you tomorrow." And with that I hung up the phone. 

That was too much. Oh my god why did I say that? Did I seriously just tell him I thought it was hot that I didn't know what he looked like? Shit shit shit.

I got up and put my empty glass of wine in the sink, promising to unload the dishwasher when I didn't feel so lightheaded.

Suddenly, from across the room, my phone began to ring. It was him.

"Tell me what exactly you think about, Princess."

[ks-caster]

I’m Avoiding A Task So Here’s a Commentary On Society and Gender Instead

“What are your pronouns?”

My parents live in a suburb (NOT a “small town,” much as my city friends might quip about it) with a couple of older, classic, mom and pop restaurants. When I visit them it can be difficult to decide on where to go out to eat, as many of the dishes and even common ingredients that I’m used to ordering at home just aren’t available where they live, but instead I find access to some strange menu items.

“A Hot Turkey Sandwich used to be a big thing,” my mother tells me one day as we sit down in a half diner, half bakery. She points it out on the menu, talks about it, surprised to find a place where it’s still served.

“This restaurant must cater to an older clientele, who still expect to be able to order that,” I say, and she agrees. Most places took it off the menu decades ago, because they wouldn’t have made a profit from having it available, but not this place. This place can profit from nostalgia.

Businesses have to change as people’s tastes change, to survive.

“What are your pronouns?”

I read an article a while back on why department stores suck so much more now, from the perspective of someone who had used to work at one “back in the day” and then re-applied for the same job many years later. The premise was that individual workers used to be responsible for individual zones—back room, men’s clothing, kitchenwares, etc., taking ownership of their sections and knowing their products, but that now, every person is responsible for every section as the companies run on skeleton crews, and as a result no one truly knows where everything is. 

Once upon a time, in the micro-society that is retail, each employee served a specific function for the benefit of the whole. Now, a few employees are expected to perform every function simultaneously, creating a dreadful experience for themselves and for shoppers, and pushing more and more commerce online.

“What are your pronouns?”

The last time I worked in retail, I had a coworker, a single mom, who once laughed and said that the reason she couldn’t hold down a relationship was that she was both more of a woman and more of a man than all of the men she tried to date. She could cook a gourmet meal and crawl under a car to fix it. Ultimately, while she enjoyed men’s company, what did she really need to keep one around for? She’d gotten so good at performing both functions that there was no purpose behind having a partner in her life. She was enough on her own.

My parents are older, but my dad is much older—born in 1949, schooled in the 1950’s and 1960’s. When he was in high school, he asked to take home ec as an elective, because he liked food, and he was told, “you are a boy, boys take shop class. Girls take home ec. Your wife will do that for you.” 

He was a bachelor with male roommates until the age of 37. 

My mom was born in 1964, schooled in the 1970’s and early 1980’s, and in school she was discouraged from taking home ec, because “women can have careers now, you don’t want to waste your time learning how to take care of some man, do you?” 

They wouldn’t teach my father how to cook because of his gender, they wouldn’t teach my mother how to cook because of her gender, and the end result was that when my parents got together, my dad had to teach my mom how to fry an egg. 

People change; hunger does not.

“What are your pronouns?”

I took an archaeology class in undergrad, and my professor mentioned she had beef with most forms she had to fill out, because they’d ask her gender, but only offer sexes and not genders as response options. “Sex is biological—if I dig up a skeleton, I can generally determine the sex based on physical characteristics. But gender is cultural, and to determine that, I need to know more about the culture, burial items, circumstances of death. It might be something that only bothers people like me, who study ancient civilizations through their trash, but it does bother me.”

I dutifully took notes. I was, after all, a straight-A student.

Decades ago, when my grandmother was young, defining what made a man a man and what made a woman a woman was much easier—their roles in society were clearly defined, generally based on their biological sex. Men and women performed set tasks in order to keep society functioning. Whether each individual necessarily fit into the roles they were assigned is another matter—if I had taken a job in retail and been assigned the paint and decor section, I’m sure I could technically do it, but given that I am mildly colorblind and have a questionable-at-best sense of aesthetics, I certainly wouldn’t be a good fit.

But as my grandmother grew up, fleeing her home with her family and coming to America to escape a world war that sent American women into the workforce into jobs previously reserved for men, society began to change. While my grandmother was busy learning English and perfecting an accent that would allow her to pass as an American to her school fellows and avoid xenophobia, American women were learning about economic freedom, and perfecting skill sets that would allow them to avoid the helplessness of being the less-respected gender.

“What are your pronouns?”

In the 1940s, “boner” was slang for “big mistake.” There’s a vintage batman page somewhere circulating the internet of Batman gloating to the Joker that because the Joker was too busy trying to get the Batman to make a mistake that the Joker wasn’t paying attention and messed up himself. 

Except, well, you can imagine how it’s worded. 

In 2024 it looks and sounds hilarious. But in 1944 it would have been completely ordinary. Language changes and evolves as people use it. The English my grandmother painstakingly learned in the 1940s is not the same English that we speak today—she keeps a coffee table book of Teen Slang in her living room that’s 15 years out of date.

When I went back to school for my master’s, I had to re-take English I and British Literature as prerequisites, since they didn’t accept CLEP scores. I was fascinated by the experience of reading Chaucer in the original language, and how often I could intuit the meanings without having to look down at the extensive footnotes in my student edition. I wondered at the time how much of it my grandmother might have been able to understand, as she also spoke German. The text would have been incomprehensible to most of my students today; I only understood it because of my background.

“What are your pronouns?”

One thing I found particularly interesting in the Canterbury Tales was the word “hir,” a possessive term that seemed to mean either “his” or “her” interchangeably. Gender-neutrality all the way back in the 14th century? Or perhaps spelling simply wasn’t standardized yet. Language changes and evolves with society, but the idea that we don’t need to be too terribly rigid with pointing at the shape of people’s genitals every time we refer to them in conversation? That’s not new.

After all, pithy internet rhymes have brought up the fact that Shakespeare used the singular “they,” making it older than the singular “you.” (You is plural—read that aloud to yourself, hear how the “you is” sound a little off? It’s “you are”—plural.) It’s only in recent years that using “they” to refer to a person of indeterminate gender has become this big, frightening thing to Conservatives, and it’s not because the word itself is new to them. (And don’t cite their age—this is not a vampire movie, none of them are older than Shakespeare).

The very word “conservative” suggests “reserved,” or “restrained” or “traditional.” The sudden fear of the singular “they” represents a much greater fear: a fear of how the use of multiple pronouns shows that people’s overall roles within society have changed.

In order for a society to function, it has to grow and evolve along with people and their wants and needs and comforts. A restaurant will only profit from selling a Hot Turkey Sandwich in a community with a large older population, and without that population, they must innovate. A store expecting employees to take on multiple roles must find a way to manage those roles effectively so that the work gets done, or that store will fail. The same is true of society as a whole.

People no longer function within the rigid man/woman Western Society dichotomy. There are more available roles within society and people who are comfortable within those roles fill them. To deny this and try to make it about genitals when it never really was is just a fear response of last resort.

For Conservatives to choose to cling to a model that no longer works in the modern era is like a restaurant trying to serve only older traditional dishes when their clientele is rotating through age groups. Sure, people will probably always like some classics like coffee and waffles, lower taxes and cheaper gas. But if the rest of the menu is a refusal to innovate, it’s no one’s fault but their own when they lose business.

So, why not innovate? Why be afraid to add in a bacon and brussel sprout skillet, some avocado toast, have some truffle aioli available on the side? Why, when the other option is to lose profits and eventually go out of business, would Conservatives continue to try and push the Hot Turkey Sandwich on younger generations, when fewer and fewer will be interested in ordering?

“What are your pronouns?”

As more and more Trump voters insist that if he does not win, they’ll leave the country, I’ve been seeing videos pop up on my social media from various other countries, of people explaining how America’s Left-Wing candidates are actually the rest of the world’s idea of Centrist or even Right-Wing Moderate. “Where will you go?” they ask. “You’ll still be in the most right wing country we can think of, other than Russia.”

The dying out of the far right is too slow, considering their views, but it’s happening. Even my uncle—everyone has That One Uncle, don’t we?—who damn near worshiped Donald Trump and was desperate for him to win, is starting to fade out as he learns about planned cuts to veteran benefits. Watching him vomit up the kool-aid isn’t as satisfying as it should be.

“What are your pronouns?”

Why would anyone, anyone, want to take an evolving society and try to shove it back seventy-five to a hundred years? What must it be like inside the mind of someone who would rather watch the majority of people be oppressed than lose one ounce of perceived privilege?

I think I can imagine.

When I was finishing up undergrad, I spent much of Senior Year holed up in the library to avoid my ex and ex-best-friend, who had taken nearly all of my friends in the dual divorce. But I never felt lonely, because no matter where I hid myself, my classmates would find me, talk with me—and ask me to help edit their papers. I was an amazing editor—some people get Math Autism, I got Grammar Autism—and I’m told I was responsible for several “highest grades ever” just by helping people reorganize their ideas and make them readable.

After I graduated, careful to avoid my two exes, angry stares burning into the back of my head even though realistically I was the victim in both cases, I left the campus, moved back with my parents, and began to notice how quickly most of my classmates stopped talking to me or completely deleted me on social media.

They needed me, you see, but they did not want me.

I think that icky, horrible, lonely feeling might be what Conservatives feel as society changes around them. The feeling of knowing you’re not needed anymore, and you were never wanted, so you can be cast aside, even though you did everything right, fulfilled your role perfectly. People like my former coworker don’t need a man—as she said, she’s man enough and woman enough all on her own. So perhaps every man she spends time with feels a little like I felt after college, like even though he’s doing everything right he’ll never be enough.

I can’t fault them for the feelings—feelings are always valid, no matter how fucked up.

But do you know what list of things I didn’t do, after college? If you’ve read this far, you can imagine. 

I didn’t go around complaining and causing trouble because people weren’t interested in ordering a Hot Turkey Sandwich anymore. I innovated, learned how to make some delicious cocktails (literally and figuratively) and made some real friends, who wanted me before they needed me.

“What are your pronouns?”

Plenty of people didn’t exactly fit in with the rigid gender roles of Western Society, just as they don’t now—but methods of self-expression have changed. Society is different, and people have more wiggle room to get comfortable in a role that works for them. That comfort comes at a price of everyone having to fulfill more roles, of course. Division of labor is still healthy (especially in this economy!) and we as a people are still working on what that looks like, outside of the gendered tradition. Modern living still assumes the existence of an unpaid laborer at home, and this leads to a lot of tired, broke people augmenting with paid labor (such as meal kits or other services). We certainly have a long way to go.

But responding to the new bacon brussel sprout skillet being a little undercooked and over-seasoned by suggesting a hot turkey sandwich instead isn’t the Gotcha! that Conservatives wish it was, because what we really need as a societal restaurant is to perfect our roasting technique on things that will actually improve dinner service for everyone, not just remind them of “The Olden Days.”

You want to run America like a business? Then step up, and compete, like a business.

Hi, my pronouns are they/them. I don’t fit into the traditional man or woman categories, and I don’t think it makes any sense for me to try to. I am myself, I am a problem-solver, I am an educator, and I suppose somewhere around here I have a set of genitals and secondary sex characteristics—but unless we get really, really friendly, I hardly see how that last bit needs to be any of your business. 

...

Did I open my laptop to work on Red Queen? Yes. Did I do that? No.

[boltedfruit]

Employment Struggles

I'm going to do something shocking and use this as an actual blog post.

I am SO sick and tired of applying to jobs, only to be ignored completed, or even worse the interview is scheduled and then the role is filled before I can interview. Today the interview was cancelled a minute before the scheduled time. Then the person who would be interviewing me ignored me on email and phone.

I am mentally exhausted. I am broke all the time. I don't get unemployment because I've never been eligible for it. The only good thing about this is that I have full healthcare coverage and food stamps.

I am a medical assistant with experience, I am a certified professional medical coder with internship experience, I have experience in retail, yet I cannot even get a call back from McDonald's, let alone a good healthcare job.

I've considered becoming a behavioral health tech, but I just truly don't want to be hit/bitten at work. I also couldn't deal with the families of children disagreeing with a preset therapy plan while I'm physically stuck in their home. The other options I was looking at was security, or 911 dispatcher, but dispatch classes are few and far between into next year, and also expensive. And security can be dangerous.

At this point, being 30 and just defeated by how unsuccessful I am in life, I am considering going to a trade school. Like welding. Or automobile tech or something that is actually in demand. There is literally no other options for me and I'm literally five minutes outside of San Francisco. I am mildly considering an IT course, but tech is so unstable and unsafe while also being over saturated right now and I don't trust it. But then, you have to deal with stereotypical personalities in 'conservative' trade jobs too. The other risk is I spend time and money doing a trade school and then no one wants to hire me (like I've done twice now). I don't know what to do.

The trades I'm considering:

Electrician

Welder (part of machinist trade) (honestly this is most appealing to me)

Aircraft Maintenance Technology (Can't hurt with SFO next to me and their planes literally falling to pieces in the sky every week)

HVAC (still don't really understand what this job even is)

The guilt I'm feeling is that I am about to finish my BA in psychology next month, and I'm waiting to hear back from the two colleges I applied to for a Master's to become a therapist. If I get in to my top choice, that's $60k+ I'll need to fund. If I get into the state school, which is slim, that's likely covered by school loans, but I'll still want to make some kind of income for three years I'm in the program. If I don't get into either program, then my last choices are: work while getting med school pre-reqs done, or work while doing an online MFT program (which I really don't want to do an online only program but if it's accredited at the end of the day I don't care.) The online only school would also be $60k+ so I'd need to work regardless.

I'm feeling guilty too because I've never been the fanartist who can drop a new print and have thousands of followers want it. I can't make money that way. Commissions have always been my most lucrative offering as an artist, but it's often mentally very taxing. It's also unstable. I don't have a lot of followers to drum up a successful pays-my-rent-every-month Patreon, and with the way of algorithms and sites are these days, I likely won't ever. I'm not trying to complain for sympathy, but this is just how it's been for me.

I know it's stupid to feel guilty for things like this, but I just am in this nebulous space between being apparently unemployable while also not being unemployable enough to receive livable benefits while continuing job hunting.

So I guess I'm looking for opinions on trade professions. I'm trans, but I pass masc in public save for my voice really. I also am not the kind of person to wear pride pins or color my hair rainbow, which would draw attention that way. I'm not too concerned about mean people in a trade job, because honestly the rudest people I've worked with have been in healthcare anyway. And a trade job would mean no customer service positions/working with my hands, which requires little mental gymnastics.

Also pointless, but true, I keep thinking of Debbie in Shameless getting her welder certification after becoming a teen parent.

I guess the takeaway here is, I'm more willing to be hurt on the job by a machine mistake on my part than I am willing to be hurt by other people assaulting me (very real in healthcare jobs/security) while working.

What do you think?

[mooifyourecows]

Have you considered looking into work-from-home jobs? I’m not sure what field you’d be looking into, but that might reduce some of the anxiety of the process. A zoom interview might be required, but you could probably see if you could do camera-off.

Based on research I’ve done in the past, script-writing and editing jobs can often be done remotely! You do have to be wary of fake offers, but those are often the ones that seem too good to be true. You’re intelligent, so you can probably spot those easily.

Regardless, take a deep breath and remind yourself: if they don’t want to hire you, it wasn’t meant to be in the first place. Work on solidifying your resume and building your portfolio. You already have lots of pre-written material you could use as references!

I hope this isn’t too much coming from a stranger, but we’re all rooting for you!

Yeahhh... tbh I don't really have much of a resume. I had one soul sucking retail job about ten years ago that my uncle helped me get on account of me being the equivalent of the world's most pathetic-est sopping wet beast in interviews 🥲 and I wound up getting fired in the end for having the audacity to call in sick 4 times a year instead of 3! I know, I know, I'm horrible and lazy and undeserving of the 8$ an hour they were paying me to lift heavy boxes and deal with rude middle aged women 9 hours a day 😮‍💨

I'm kinda wary about getting a job doing any sort of writing since writing is what I like to do for fun and relaxation. If it turned into a soul sucking activity for me I'd be pretty boned. Getting donations to write chapters is different because I'm getting money to write what I love and want to write anyway, but I don't want to start associating my favorite thing with work, ya know?

I know that kinda limits my options though. Especially since I ain't got no skills that could be used remotely beyond that. I'd love to have a part time retail job that I could just show up a couple times a week, do some menial tasks for a few hours with minimal human interaction, and then go home. That's my ideal job. But the only jobs available near me are full time or have requirements I do not meet.

I know, excuses, excuses! But I'll survive. I might have to sell a kidney but I'm sure I'll live (jkjk things aren't that dire, I promise)

Thanks for the advice though! It's been a really long time since I've had to work and the prospect is terrifying but with any luck it won't literally kill me 🤞

[mathosapabeads]

hey! i was on your site and i had a question as someone also thinking about starting an online shop. how did you get your website set up? did u use a particular other website to it or smth?

i use a website builder but im planning on switching once my contract ends since i am not happy with my current one and i own my domain thru squarespace. my biggest advice is to not use shopify, my previous retail job used shopify and we constantly had issues with it not marking when things were out of stock, allowing people to buy more of something than we had, etc. which wouldve been catastrophic if we werent selling manufactured goods primarily at that store. the other thing is that you need to be ready to drop $100-200 on specifically a retail platform and take money, as there are additional costs to actually be able to sell things and not just have a website, the domain itself is only like $10-15 a year. my other big thing is that i had help from my dad who is a software engineer so i had someone whos job (in part) is building websites to help me but that isnt necessarily an option for most people. while i havent used squarespace entirely from what ive seen of it it seems like a decent option, i know as an etsy alternative there was recently a lgbt+ focused alternative called pink robin opened too. hopefully this is at least a little helpful 🖤

[moshintheteagaiwan]

T. Kettle Part 11: The New Year & The Missing Stock

It was a new year and we had successfully gotten through our first Christmas season as a new store. As you would expect after Christmas, the shelves were bare and stock was scarce. We still has a handful of Christmas infuser mugs left and some left over tins of Christmas blends, but overall we sold out of nearly everything. I had to give it to the company, they really did deliver on excellent Christmas tin designs and gift boxes. The teawares left something to be desired but overall, I’d seen worse.

As January slowly passed, we spent the final remaining weeks with our seasonal staff. They really had come through for the store and delivered on everything I had taught them. Around this time one of my original team members had come to me with his two weeks notice as he had gotten a full time position in his field. I was sad to lose him as even though he wasn’t the biggest fan of tea, you would never be able to tell from watching how he sold it. He was a good kid and I wished him well. I initially took this opportunity to extend his soon to be open position to Maggie, but she turned it town because she didn’t feel she could handle two jobs at the time which was fair.

I then extended it to Zack who accepted. I was grateful to have him with us permanently as he was hard working, always early no matter how many times I told him not be arrive an hour early, and he was great to work with and was great with customers. Initially I decided not to extend the offer to him first because I knew Maggie really wanted to have a permanent position in a tea shop again, but she end up circling back around later.

Soon the store was back to three people, but because mall hours had extended and our sales were high I was able to schedule more hours and didn’t have to work alone four days a week anymore. At this time we were focusing on selling off the remaining Christmas stock and awaiting the arrival of new stock to replenish the shelves. But it never came....

Managers were submitting stock orders weekly, trying to push for more stock to refill our shelves, but as time passed and the shelves became more bare, we waited on word of when to expect our orders. But it wasn’t just teawares, ordering the actual tea became an issue too. We placed orders weekly but like the teawares, nothing was coming. Then one day a shipment of tea did arrive, only it was not what we had ordered, but was instead the new Valentine’s Day blends.

It was something but didn’t fill much space. Finally though we got word of the missing teas and teawares on our next conference call. We were told that due to supply issues, as many retails stores were going through that at the time, stock orders had been placed but that when it would arrive was unknown due to lack of supply. This seemed believable at the time but as I’m sure your not surprised to hear by now, this was a bold faced lie.

The actual truth was that the company had become fed up with their teaware supplier failing to fulfill orders and thus decided to cancel their contract with them. However, before doing so they had failed to first obtain a new contract with a new supplier. This meant that not only did they no longer have their old supplier, but they now had no supplier at all, which meant teawares and stock was never coming. As for the tea itself which was supplied through a separate company, the delays were due to the company’s new manager of operations deciding that store managers were not properly capable of keeping track of and ordering their own tea stock.

This was due to an internal issue during the distribution of the Christmas stock. At the time, some stores received large amounts of Christmas stock, while other stores received less stock, and few received almost nothing. This issue was no fault of any store manager as we did not have the option to order Christmas stock, instead it was shipped to us automatically. In either case due to this error the manager of operations decided he himself must sign off on all tea orders made by stores, and he would compare the orders to recorded stock, and decide from there if he wanted to sign off on the orders.

Not only did this create more delay but it came with an extended delay because just before Christmas, Toys R Us was going out of business in the United States and the company had bought the rights to Toys R Us Canada. This meant the same team that was already responsible for our brand as well as three other bigger brands now also had to run operations for Toys R Us Canada. And as you can imagine this meant the new manager of operations had no time to look over and sign off on tea orders.

And so day by day out shelves became more bare and the tea wall became more empty. On occasion we would get random mixed stock from stores the company had decided to close, but this stock was usually very little and last no time at all. And with this everyday my faith in the company diminished and I couldn’t help but think to myself, I need to get off this sinking ship.

To be concluded...