#nuanced take is that she is very busy and also a little concerned/frustrated with me for my ma paper not being checked off

[tarantula-hawk-wasp]

does the tone of this succinct email suggest my academic advisor is annoyed with me or is it just that I put off eating lunch for 3 hours? and other fun games to play

[1moreoffkeyanthem]

ryry will you tell us about the ojv sp parents! or their relationships with the sp boys? like stan ft shelley ( love stan and shell) sharon and rancid ( ik u touched on that one but im nosy ) or like kyle ft. the broflovskis? those dynamics? or how the broflovskis feel abt stan and stan’s parents abt kyle, vice versa? ill also accept star seven fam situations anythin u want go crazy go stupid

( also i love u mwahmwahmwahmwahmwaaaah )

Oh I ABSOLUTELY WILL!!! And I will get WAY too into it!!! Gonna be sticking with the Marshes and Broflovskis this ask, but I’ll get to the rest of the ojv star seven sometime! (This bouta be convoluted tbh)

So starting with my darling Stanathan, Sharon and Randy Jackass Marsh divorced for good when our boy was 12. At this point the only thing Shelley and Stan agreed on was that their parents should NOT be together and when shit was finalized they were both like FUCK YEAH MOM TAKE US OFF THIS FARM!!! And Sharon moved them back into their old house. Randy’s pretty much all over the place and not NEARLY the dad he thinks he is, but the kids still have to spend weekends at the farm a few times a month.

And like a lot of little kids, especially little boys, Stan REALLY looked up to his dad when he was younger. Like that’s his dad, the “cool” parent. But about the time Stan turned 10 and his mental health went through a really bad spot, he started to see the world a LOT less idealistically and ESPECIALLY started seeing the nuance of the people in his life. A lot of people are selfish. And his father is a prime example of that.

That’s not to say OrangeJuiceVerse Randy is truly insidious. He’s not. He just genuinely doesn’t think about anything that doesn’t directly affect him, or acknowledge that his actions can hurt other people. He’s selfish. And a lot of the reason Shelley and Stan had a rocky relationship when they’re young is because she’s four years older than her brother, and she sees their dad for all his bullshit long before Stan does, and a 14 year old Shelley is honestly jealous of that innocence. That, and the general teenage angst, but once they’re on the same page, it’s very “Annoyed Siblings vs Parents Who Need To Get Their Shit Together”. Like Sharon and Randy will be fighting again and they just share that Sibling Look lmao.

That brings me to my queen Sharon. That woman’s highest priority is her kids, always, which is a lot of the reason she gets so exasperated with Randy. Like during Stan’s stint as the poster child football star of South Park, well after the divorce, she is calling him up like “REALLY RANDY?!? You’ll use our boy to promote your weed business but can’t be bothered to come to a single game?!?” She and Sheila have also been essentially second mothers to their sons sbfs forever, and the families have been fused for style’s entire lives.

Also, Stan is a total mamas boy. Both his own and Kyle’s. He has been known to call his mother ‘dude’ because he calls everyone that and he’s very “yes ma’am” with Sheila most of the time but they’re so close that once he called HER dude and she wasn’t even phased she just likes that Stan likes her enough to feel comfortable like that lmfao. He and Sheila tag team being overly concerned about Kyle and they totally gang up on him when he’s not taking care of himself.

With Stan and Gerald, it’s a really casual thing. Like they’re mostly chill towards each other. Unless Gerald is around Randy, in which case Gerald’s dumbass tendencies come out full force, because Gerald’s kind of an idiot but he’s pretty harmless other than some minor cyber bullying and Randy Shenanigans.

So Ike. Ike and Stan have SO much fun together, especially as they get older, like they’re playing video games together, especially the puzzle games that frustrate Kyle, and when Ike’s in high school he goes to Stan for advice on things he’s too embarrassed to ask his brother about (Stan is not the person to ask for advice) and it’s so funny bc like they’re adults and Kyle will wake up at 3am for water and Stan’s in the office on the GTA RP with Ike and they’re trying to get kicked out of servers by pissing off the mods

Kyle time bois!!! As much as he tries to deny it, he is a LOT like his mother. He can be stubborn and reactive, sometimes preachy, but they’re like that because they just care so damn much about everything and everyone. If there’s an injustice to be found, they’re fighting it. And they’re both incredibly nurturing and passionate about loved ones. But because they’re so much alike, they tend to argue. At the end of the day, though, Kyle loves his mom and she loves him.

His relationship with his father was a little strained in high school. Gerald’s well meaning encouragement to push Kyle to succeed came off as IMPOSSIBLE expectations and the pressure Ky felt was on him was enormous, because Gerald really sucks at communication in a sensitive way. He actually felt a lot of guilt, for a long time, about unintentionally stressing his son out to the point that it got to. Kyle didn’t blame him really, mostly himself for getting so carried away, but he did have to learn to take everything Gerald says with a grain of salt.

Kyle and Ike ayyyyyy! Dude even if Kyle kind of terrorized Ike when he was like 8 because he thought that’s what big brothers were supposed to do, he grows into the best big brother and it’s HILARIOUS when Ike’s in middle school and Kyle’s trying WAY too hard to be cool and friends with him and Ike CONSISTENTLY reads him for absolute filth, makes fun of him for everything he can, and rips on him. He has totally told him that he likes Stan better and Kyle was like “yeah, well so do I!” “no shit, homo!” It’s all in good fun, they really love each other a lot, and if anyone fucks with Ike? They are getting the Kyle Rage Volcano.

Shelleys always been kinda indifferent towards all Stan’s friends unless they’re bothering her, but when Kyle and Stan got together, she gave him the ‘take care of my baby brother’ speech. Over the years they come to know each other pretty well, are even friends, maybe not as close as Stan and Ike, but still.

Kyle and Sharon are lowkey BESTIES dude Kyle is Team Sharon from day one. He adores his mother in law, sits with her at football games, loves gushing over Stan with her, just really enjoys her company. As a kid it’s because her more quiet nature is a break from his own mom, but as he gets older, he is the CAPTAIN of Sharon Defense Squad, because

Kyle does not like Randy. And OrangeJuiceVerse Kyle is someone who truly wants to see the good in everyone, give everyone the benefit of the doubt. Not Randy. Like he was 7 years old witnessing Randy Bullshit and he was like “dude your dads a jackass” and Stan was all “he’s okay” but over the years that exasperation with his best friend’s dad turned into an actual grudge, because how could this deranged man not see the emotional toll he was taking on his own son? Why didn’t he care about Stan? Didn’t he give a shit that he was hurting Kyle’s favorite person in the entire world? And Kyle does NOT try to hide the fact that he hates Randy, out here glaring at him, telling him off when he does something stupid (and it’s scary tbh, like OJV Kyle isn’t very intimidating until he’s mad, then he’s snapping like an angry fox) like bruh Kyle was SCREAMING at Randy kicking him out of the wedding for bringing alcohol to his SOBER SON like an uncaring dick, meanwhile Stan was more upset that his dad bothered a beehive lmfao. Kyle ‘Speak No Evil Take No Shit’ Broflovski, everyone. Randy’s a little scared of him.

That’s what I got, my dearest, THANK YOU FOR ASKING I LOVE THINKING ABT OJV!!!

[spectraspecs-writes]

Korriban - Chapter 95 (Bastila, Carth)

Link to the masterpost. Chapter 94. Chapter 96.

CW: Lime

@averruncusho @ceruleanrainblues @chubbsmomma @strangepostmiracle thank you for reading, you get a tag. @skelelexiunderlord thank you for support, you get a tag.

———–

“… so it’s pitch-black, right, I can’t find my pants anywhere, and there’s something growling outside my tent.” I recount the story to Carth, both of us sitting on containers in the cargo hold. Passing the bottle of Tarisian ale back and forth. Carth laughs, as well he should, it’s a funny story. In hindsight, anyway. “I’ve got my T1 unit’s head in my lap, I was trying to upgrade its sensors so it could get a more nuanced readout to find the exact thing that was outside my tent!” He laughs again, tears starting to come out of his eyes. “My tent mate is closer to the entrance, she’s sitting there in a panic, because she knows this is her fault --”

“Why the hell did she take that egg in the first place?” he says between laughs.

“I told her it was a bad idea, but did she listen to the ecologist? Noooo - God forbid Tania ever admit she was wrong about something. But I was like, you’re a freaking anthropologist, you should have realized how taboo it was in the local culture to take one of those freaking eggs! Screw your breakfast - you’re about to be dinner! And I’m sitting there like, you are not taking me with you. But we are both frozen until we see the tent flap open and this giant nose pokes in.”

“Oh, shit!”

“Right? And I panic, I just chuck the droid head, Tania screams and ducks, but now I’m sure I just pissed this thing off even worse so we’re both screwed. And now Tania’s screams have woken not only the rest of our team, but the Mandalorians who also made a camp in the ravine. You know, the same Mandalorians she had antagonized earlier? And I wasn’t about to save her ass again - if Arus wanted to fight her, at this point, I didn’t give a shit.”

“Man, you’re heartless!” he joked.

“This was the tenth time in half as many days she had threatened my life with her bullshit - even I have my limits! And by the way, this was not the last time we were in life-threatening situations on this mission. But after this time she was far more willing to actually listen to me. But anyway, so the Mandalorians were pissed and Arus was out for blood, but first he had to take out this animal, which was too huge for even a Mandalorian to take out alone. He gathered a few of his men and they took care of it in no time. I finally managed to find my pants so I finally get out of the tent to get a good look at this thing, and it is. Huge. Arus split the meat with us and there was still way too much. Afterwards he was still a bit thrilled by the kill so Tania thought it was fine, but then she got cocky and tried to play it off, got in Arus’ face again, but he was having none of it. He looked her dead in the eye with that Mandalorian intimidation glare and said ‘I should have known you were behind this.’ And her face drops. He’s like ‘Is it your goal in life to challenge as many combatants as foolishly as you can?’ Calling her out big time. ‘And for what, this time?’ So she goes into her bag and pulls out the egg. Arus takes it and smashes it on the ground. And you’ll never guess what happened next.”

“Tell me.”

“The egg? The one that almost got us killed? Was made of WOOD!” Carth breaks down hard, cannot contain his mirth. “A Sith scout team had been there earlier, a bit of a rival of mine, and thought it would be a fun prank on me to swap out one of the eggs with a wooden one. He told me about it later, but he had just planned to frustrate me. When I told him he almost killed me with that shit, he never stopped apologizing.” I take the bottle from Carth. “And that is my worst story. What have you got?” I ask as I take a drink.

“Nothing that good,” he says, “You’ve got me beat.”

“Oh, come on, no war stories where you got screwed over hard? No piloting lessons where you came out of a nebula upside down?”

“My life has been boring compared to yours, if that story is any indication.”

“Hey, I have plenty far more mundane stories - that planet was just a wild ride from start to finish. If Arus was here, he’d tell you the same thing. Albeit, he and I did have different definitions of wild.”

“I thought you had just crossed paths with him - did he hang around for the rest of the scouting trip?”

“That was the first time we met him, but he kept finding excuses to hang around our campsites. The shameless flirt that he was, I’m amazed he never just came out and said he was into me.”

There’s that face of his again. He gets so uncomfortable when I make off-hand mentions of former partners. “You don’t need to be jealous, Carth. The very nature of a scouting fling is that it’s temporary. The few times something has gone on longer than a single mission we quickly got sick of each other.”

“I guess,” he shrugs. Is there… something else on his mind?

But before I can ask, Canderous comes in behind us. “Hey, Rena,” he says. to get my attention.

“Something up?” I ask.

“We’re kind of in the middle of something, Canderous,” Carth says gruffly.

“And ordinarily I wouldn’t interrupt,” he says before looking back at me, “but Bastila wants to talk to you.”

Oh joy and rapture. I scoff. “If she wants to talk to me so bad she can come see me herself.”

“What happened?” Carth asks.

“Long story, I’ll tell you later,” I shake my head. “I’m not going to her, she’ll have to come to me.”

“She won’t,” Canderous says, “not this time, but I can tell if she doesn’t say what she needs to say she’ll never forget it.” Oh yeah? “She regrets that things aren’t working as smoothly as they could between the two of you.”

“Bastila regrets something?” Well there’s a shock. “Jedi princess admits a wrong?”

“Look, I get that you’re upset with her, I understand,” he says, trying not to get angry at me, “and you’re right, she needs to keep her nose out of your business.” At least he’s on my side. “But she’s as proud and as stubborn as you are and admitting something like this is hard for her. Would you just let her say what she has to say?”

I sigh heavily. “Fine,” I say and I stand up. I set the ale down on the container. “I’ll be back.”

“I’ll be here,” Carth says.

I follow Canderous to the port side quarters, where Bastila is sitting and meditating. When we cross the threshold she opens her eyes and sighs. “Canderous, you didn’t need to do that.”

“Like hell, I didn’t,” he says, “You’re not the only one who can read the tension in a room. Now, I don’t care if you two want to talk this out or use your fists, but I’m not letting either of you leave until that happens.”

Oh, for God’s sake. I’m pretty sure I could take Canderous in a fight but that’s the wrong way to go here. I idly look around the room before feeling Canderous’ glare on me and look at Bastila. “If you try talking to me about giving into my emotions again, I’m gonna throw up.”

“Our conversations on that topic have a tendency to end abruptly, so I wouldn’t be surprised,” she says.

“Well, it’s not exactly my fault that happens, is it?”

“No, you’re right. I do share fault for that,” she sighs, “I admit I have questions, and perhaps a Master could have addressed them all with the proper wisdom, but I never should have brought them up here. And not with you.” Canderous shifts behind me, and Bastila must be reading him. “It’s not solely about you, Canderous,” she says, before turning back to me, ”Or even about you and Carth. It’s… “ She stops, orders her thoughts, and starts again. “Part of my purpose on this mission was to guide you in the way of the light; to help you avoid the temptations of the Dark Side. But I fear I've failed in that task.” What makes you say that? I haven’t fallen to the Dark Side. I’ve done nothing but help people for the past two months, even before I knew her. “I don't think I'm the proper Jedi to guide you. I am no Master. You should have remained with the Council.”

“I have no idea where this is coming from,” I say, “Even if you take Carth out of the equation - and that’s an argument we’re not having again, because there is no way you can without being hypocritical and you know it - I haven’t fallen to the Dark Side.”

“The fact of the matter is that I have never possessed much skill at controlling myself,” she says, “With the bond that joins us, it seems I have even less. You have maintained the path of the Light Side, yes, but it has been in spite of my influence, not because of it. It is increasingly obvious I am unable to guide you properly.” She sighs again. She feels very anxious and upset. “I think… I think I may have made a very big mistake. I simply hope that you are not the one who pays the price, ultimately, for the fact that I can't help you enough.”

There was definitely an apology in there somewhere, even if it wasn’t in so many words. But we still disagree on a major point and if she — “This has nothing to do with our respective relationships, I assure you,” she says. Reading me again. “As Jolee is the closest thing either of us have to a Master, he has been kind enough to consult me on these matters, and I have come to the conclusion that we should both let the matter lie.” Hey, I’ve been willing to do that. But that means her concerns make even less sense.

“Honestly, I think you’re being too hard on yourself,” I say, “I mean, I already had impulse issues, so a lot of what you’re feeling might be me influencing you rather than the other way around. This bond works both ways, right?”

She smiles softly. “That’s a kinder response than I deserve,” she says, “And I can see there is wisdom in your words. Perhaps you can help me then.”

“On the impulse front? I’ll do my damnedest - so long as you don’t start building droids in the middle of the night. That’ll be lesson one - don’t do that.”

She laughs a little. “I will leave that in your capable hands,” she says, “Hopefully this will all work out, for the both of us. And for the sake of the mission.”

“Good!” Canderous says suddenly, “And with that settled, you are free to go.” He moves away from the door and lets me leave. Glad that’s over with, Carth and I really were in the middle of something. He seemed more bothered by the interruption than I was but that’s probably because he had something to say and Canderous broke his train of thought.

Carth’s still in the cargo hold, like he said he’d be. He’s taken his jacket off. Hot damn, he’s got some strong arms. It’s a good thing he keeps that jacket on all the time, otherwise I’d never get anything done. He’s also moved so that he can lean against the wall. He looks at me when I come in. “Everything all right with Bastila?”

“Yeah, she‘s agreed to stop being nosy in my personal life,” I say.

“Oh, because you’ve never been nosy in our personal lives,” he says sarcastically.

“Yeah, but I’m also not a hypocrite,” I say, “For weeks she’s been riding me about the Dark Side and my feelings for you, and the whole time she’s got the same thing going on with Canderous. So yeah, naturally I was quite pissed about that.”

“You’ve had feelings about me for weeks and didn’t say anything?”

I shake my head and sit back down next to him. “Somehow I knew that would be the part you heard,” I say, “In my defense, I’m not accustomed to making the first move. Every other time it’s been someone thinking with their crotch sick of beating around the bush with me. And it was different before anyway. This is different.”

“Good different or bad different?”

“At the moment?” I say, “Good different.” He smiles at me. I love his smile. He’s just so soft. When he actually gets soft, that is. “But anyway,” I say, “Before Canderous came in, you wanted to say something.”

“Oh, you could tell, could you?”

I scoff and take the ale from him. “It doesn’t take Jedi powers to read you, Carth, believe me.”

“Oh, yeah?” Oh, excellent, it’s play time. “Well, listen, beautiful, I don’t need to take this abuse. I get enough female Jedi bashing from Bastila, thank you very much.”

“Oh, I get it, there’s something between you and Bastila.”

He sputters, like I’ve caught him completely off-guard. “What? No! I mean… no! Don’t be crazy!”

“So someone would have to be crazy to like Bastila, huh? I’ll have to tell her that!”

“Oh, no, you don’t!”

“Or better yet!” Better idea! “I’ll tell Canderous! Oh, Canderous?”

“Don’t you dare!” he says playfully, “I’d have to shoot you down first, and I’m not kidding!”

“Sure, sure,” I say sarcastically, “You’re all talk, Carth, and you know it.”

“And just what would you do if I wasn’t?” I open my mouth to answer, but he stops me before I can. “No, no, wait, don’t answer that,” he says quite wisely, “I don’t want to know.” He shakes his head and smiles, sighing. “Anyway… as fun, uh, as this is, I do have to talk to you about something serious. Really serious.” It must be if you’re stopping the game.

“What’s wrong?” I ask. What has my Bunny Man in distress?

“I’m uh… I’m concerned about you. I’ve been keeping these thoughts to myself, mostly, but with this… if we… “ Find your words, Carth. “I think it’s time I say something.”

“What’s this about?”

“It’s about you,” he says, “I’m worried about what might happen to you.” Well, this is the second time that’s come up in conversation today, but somehow Carth’s concern feels more genuine than Bastila’s. “You have a lot of courage, and the fact that you’ve remained strong is amazing, but there’s even greater danger ahead. I think you might be setting yourself up for a fall. Maybe at the urging of the Jedi, I don’t know… but you’re definitely going to become a target.” I can feel a lot of pain from him. He tries to block it from me, I’m not sure if that’s an accident or on purpose, but I can feel it, anyway. “If, uh, if I’m going to find some purpose beyond taking revenge on Saul, then it’s going to have to be in protecting you.” Protecting me from what? He’s seen me fight - what does he think is out there that I can’t handle? “I don’t know why, but I think some terrible fate is waiting for you. I think the Jedi Council knows it, too. And I don’t want it to come to pass.”

“You think the Jedi have thrown me to the wolves?”

“Don’t call it up to my paranoia just yet.” I wasn’t. Carth has a good - and attractive - head on his shoulders and I trust his instincts. (Well… most of the time. His instinct to not trust me was obviously wrong.) “Something isn’t right. I blamed it on you, before, but I… I think the Jedi didn’t tell us everything.” Which is hardly out of character for them . “If I’m going to live past Saul, I need you to, as well. Let me protect you… from yourself, from the Sith, from… whatever, you have to let me try.”

“Not that I don’t appreciate it,” I say seriously, “but… you’ve seen me fight, you’ve watched me in action. I don’t need that kind of protection. Why are you doing this?”

“Because…” he says slowly, and with difficulty, “... because I never got the chance to save my wife and son. Because I didn’t stop Saul when I had the chance. Because I finally have the chance to do it right. You are an extraordinary woman… you make me think that maybe I might have some purpose beyond revenge. I don’t know whether it means anything to you… but it does to me.”

Oh, my God, this is the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard. ”It means a lot to me, Carth,” I say, “Thank you.”

He smiles softly. “I’m glad to hear that. I’ll do my best.”

I just… can’t stop looking at him. I can’t believe I didn’t see it before. How much I love him. Ever since Taris. Ever since I woke up in that mangy apartment. He’s always been there for me. And it was only a couple days ago that I really realized that I love him. Maybe I just didn’t want to think about it. As a scout you get used to being part of a tight-knit group of people for a few months, a year tops, and then you split and never see each other again. The few times I stuck with someone for longer than one mission, we were dating, and like I said before we would always and very quickly get sick of each other. You start to notice little things that didn’t bother you before but suddenly they’re all you notice. Chewing with their mouth open. Feet that smell like death. A grating voice. And for whatever reason you just can’t live with it anymore.

I’m going to miss this group a lot when we split. Oh, they’ll say we won’t. I know one of them will say, “no, we’re a family, we’ll always be together.” But I also know from experience that it doesn’t work like that. Bastila will go back to the Council. Juhani has a lot to work through on her own. Mission is still a kid with her whole life ahead of her. Zaalbar has a government to lead. Canderous will go wherever Bastila goes. It’s anyone’s guess what Jolee will do. Leaving me and my droids. The way it’s always been. The way I’m used to.

But with Carth… Loving him means I’ll want him to stick around. And maybe he will, maybe he won’t. Maybe he’ll want to, but he’s still a Republic soldier, he may not have a say in where he goes. And if he doesn’t want to stick around, it’ll hurt, sure, but it would hurt worse if he stays. Because I know what will happen then. We’ll get sick of each other. That’s how it always happens. We’ll have a few months of passionate sex and casual flirting before we each drive the other crazy. I don’t want that, I don’t want to get sick of him. But we have nothing in common beyond this mission. We‘re close due to circumstances. It’s happened to me at least a dozen times before. And I don’t want it to happen again.

But I love him. And as much as it could hurt me, I wouldn’t stop loving him even if I could. This feels so different than anything I’ve felt before. Like it’s… right somehow. And I don’t want to mess up a good thing. It makes me nervous but it’s a good nervous.

“What are you thinking about?” he asks me softly, taking another drink of ale.

“I’m… “ I start to say slowly, “… really glad I met you.”

He smiles at me. “I’m glad I met you, too,” he says in that same soft voice. He gets close to my face, just like before. His eyes close. And it doesn’t take a Jedi to know what’s going on, I’ve seen it all before. And I want it. He kisses me gently.

And he doesn’t stop kissing me.

One. Another. Another, pressing his lips into mine. Continuing what we started in the cantina. But no one will bother us this time - I reach out with the Force and close the door to the cargo hold. Carth notices but doesn’t stop or say anything. And I don’t want him to. I want this. He takes my head into his hand and I lean into it. His other hand brushes mine and I take it, our fingers locking together. And between kisses he whispers softly, “I love you.”

“I love you,” I whisper back. And he kisses me again, And again. And again. I unfasten my belt and my lightsabers clatter on the floor. He pulls me closer and I loosen my tunic a little. I can feel this. I want this. More than anything I want this.

Somehow, I know this is a bad idea. If this goes bad it could ruin our entire relationship, either as friends or more than friends. This is the point of no return. And hoping for shit has gotten me in trouble when things don’t work out. But this also feels so, so right, more right than anything has this whole time. He’s right, things have been a little off somehow since Taris. The Jedi adding me to the Endar Spire at the last minute. I’m an ecologist, why did they need me? The Jedi accepting me for training - Master Vandar said I was a special case? What did that mean? The Star Map on Kashyyyk seemed to recognize me, when I’ve never been to Kashyyyk in my life, much less down on the surface. There have just been so many little things that seem to add up to a great big something, but I’ll be damned if I know what it is. But as crazy as things have been, and as crazy as they might get, Carth will still be here. Carth will still be Carth.

I come close, wrapping my legs around him, and he holds me. Which is a great feeling and we haven’t even done anything yet. As he runs his fingers through my hair, I feel loved, so loved, more than I’ve ever felt before. Even if this doesn’t last, and I hope to God it does, it will still be the best I’ve felt my whole life.

--------

He holds me close after. Which is not only sweet, it’s also great because the cargo hold is a lot colder than you’d expect. I wrap myself up in his jacket and cuddle closer. “Have I mentioned how much I love this jacket?” I say.

“You’ve mentioned it once or twice,” he says, smiling. And then he sighs. “We should probably go to bed,” he says. 

“You mean sleep here or go back to our bunks?” I ask, “Because that would be a horrible idea.”

“What? What do you mean?”

“For one thing,” I say, trying to look at his face, “I can guarantee you Bastila already knows about this because of that damned Force bond. If she’s spending the night with Canderous, she’ll hem and haw and stew about this despite her promise to shut up about it. But she won’t need to say anything because Juhani will also be there. She’ll be disappointed in me and go on and on about the Dark Side and Jedi attachments so Bastila won’t have to. Mission will try to be my girlfriend and goad me into telling her what happened like we’re two teenage girls at a slumber party. And she really doesn’t want to know.” I know these girls. I know all of that is exactly what would happen the minute I walk into the starboard quarters. “When you go back, Canderous will --”

“You’re right, that is a horrible idea,” he says before I can even finish, because he knows as well as I do that Canderous is going to be insufferable, as a man, as a Mandalorian, and especially as a matchmaker. He’s been trying to put us together since Dantooine. “But we can’t exactly sleep in here, can we? They’re going to come looking for us in the morning. Besides the fact that it’s cold as hell in here.”

“We can grab some blankets from the emergency supplies,” I suggest, “Or we could get dressed again.”

“Let’s grab the blankets,” he says quickly, and he starts to get up to grab them from the plasteel cylinder.

“You slut,” I tease, “If you wanted to see me naked you could have asked sooner.”

He comes back to me with the blankets and drapes one around my shoulders, over the jacket. “It’s not just that,” he says, “Or the fact that you look damn good in my jacket.” He spreads one blanket on the floor, sits down on it and pulls me close again, lying down. He kisses me, and runs his fingers through my hair, sending goosebumps rippling through my body. “I just…” he starts to say softly, sweetly, “…like how this feels. And I don’t want it to end.”

I curl in closer. “Me neither.”  

[could-have-beens]

Like A Memory

For Day 6: First Christmas of the @hansannafortheholidays event!

I kind of stretched the prompt for this one, but I hope you guys like it! 

Also posted on ff.net and ao3. Feedback is very much appreciated.

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Summary: In which Anna spends her Christmas Eve panicking in the emergency room, worrying about going to jail, and embarrassing herself in front of the man she may or may not have run over with her car. Modern AU . . . sort of.

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The night had started out innocently enough. All Anna had wanted was to get some glögg before Elsa came over for dinner. It was Christmas tradition, after all. One of the few she and Elsa remembered from their childhood, in the years before their parents died and her sister shut the world away. And now that she and Elsa were reconnecting, now that Elsa was learning how to let people in again, Anna wanted their Christmas Eve to be fun and memorable and special. Just one night of bonding and reminiscing with the only family she had left. Was that really so much to ask for?

Go get some glögg, Anna, she thought to herself. It won't take long, Anna, just drop by the grocery store and, boom, you're back in a jiffy! Ugh.

But Anna had underestimated the number of last-minute shoppers, and what was supposed to be a quick, twenty-minute trip turned into a frustrating two-hour crawl down the checkout queue and, later, through the godforsaken traffic.

And then this, of all things, just had to happen — the final nail in her proverbial coffin.

"You're going to jail," said Kristoff.

Anna groaned. "Shut up."

"Isn't that what happens when you nearly kill a dude?"

"You're exaggerating."

"Anna, you ran him over."

"I did not!" she cried indignantly. "I just . . . grazed him, that's all."

"Yeah, well, graze or not, poor guy whacked his head on the pavement and was knocked unconscious."

"It's not my fault, okay? He was jaywalking. I had the right of way! The stoplight said so!"

"Still," Kristoff said, shrugging.

Anna glared. Not that he noticed. The hospital's waiting room was equipped with a vending machine, and Kristoff was busy steadily working his way through each of the snacks. The crunching of the bags made Anna's head pound and her teeth grind.

Kristoff wasn't that bad, really, all things considered. He and Elsa had been friends since their freshman year, and it was easy to see why her ever paranoid sister, always so determined to keep her safe and sheltered, had insisted they share an apartment when Anna left home for university. He was nice. Responsible. An all-around good roommate who did her dishes with minimal complaining when she forgot to. But sometimes he was a bit too pessimistic — realistic, he would say — and it grated on her nerves.

Like right now.

"How are you so calm?" Anna demanded.

"I wasn't the one driving."

"If I'm going to get charged, I'm pointing you as accessory to — to — to whatever it is I'm gonna be charged with — which won't happen because I didn't do anything wrong! If anything, he should be getting fined because he wasn't watching where he was going —"

"Neither were you."

"You were distracting me."

"Yeah, because there was a guy crossing the street. Which I told you."

"You didn't tell me — you screamed."

"Nuance," he said, shrugging again. Then there was a bag of chocolates being shook under nose. "Here. It's no marzipan, but it's better than nothing."

Anna was touched, in spite of everything. Maybe being roommates with him for the rest of the year wouldn't be so bad after all. Maybe she might just survive living with Kristoff Bjorgman until the end of the school year.

Unless she went to jail.

Oh god.

"I don't think I can eat right now," said Anna, feeling her stomach churn with dread.

It must have shown on her face, because Kristoff started to look a little panicked. "Look, I'm sure it's going to be fine," he said carefully. "Just . . . calm down, okay?"

She tried to breathe. In, out. In, out. It was easier said than done, more so when she felt her phone vibrating in her bag and heard the familiar ringtone. As she looked at the screen, Anna could have sworn her heart plummeted to her stomach.

"Please tell me you didn't call my sister," she said, voice barely above a whisper.

There was a long, agonizing pause. "Um."

Anna put her head in her hands and groaned. Elsa's never gonna let me borrow her car again, is she?

That is, if her sister didn't lock her in the house first. Anna could imagine it, and at this point, she wouldn't even blame Elsa for closing the gates and throwing away the key.

.

An hour, a panicked phone call, and several bags of chips from the vending machine later, they finally let Anna in to see the guy she had lightly grazed. She had a whole speech planned — a long, winding, heartfelt monologue where she apologized to the guy and begged him to not press charges because it wasn't like she meant to hit him, okay, she really was just following the stoplights and the signs and being a good, safe, harmless driver and, besides, it wasn't like he broke any bones, right? All he got was a concussion, and he was obviously fine now, wasn't he? So it wasn't like it was that big of a deal, right? Right?

Except the words died in her throat the moment she saw him. When Anna had hit him, it had been too dark out in the street to get a good look at his face, and she had been too busy panicking and freaking out to register what he looked like when Kristoff had helped bring him to the hospital.

But now, under the fluorescent lights, it wasn't hard to see his face at all. The auburn hair, the green eyes, the high cheekbones, even the light dusting of freckles —

— they're dancing, gliding, flying across the ballroom and she feels the swish of her ballgown as he twirls her and his smile makes her cheeks flush with a strange, pleasant warmth — they're climbing up rooftops in all their finery, staring up at the star-strewn sky and there's goosebumps all over her arms as the cool night air passes over her — he's down on his knee and the rush of water is so loud that she almost doesn't hear him, but she sees his eyes, beautiful and breathtaking and guileless — gloved hands in her own, on her waist, brushing her cheek — Oh, Anna, if only there was someone out there who —

The room stretched out at the corners, then shrank back in again before finally blurring all over — and suddenly Anna was back to white linoleum floors and pale blue walls and too bright lights.

The man had cleared his throat, she realized, pulling her back forcibly into the moment. Anna could hear her heart drumming in her ears, faster and faster the more she stared at him, loud and heavy in the dead quiet silence.

"Um, hi," she said at last, and just like that it was as if a dam had broken inside her, and a stream of words came flooding out all at once before she could reign them in. "I didn't mean to run you over — I mean graze! I grazed you! And I didn't mean to do that, honestly, but — well . . . look the sign obviously said — not that I'm blaming you for getting hit by my car! It's just — well, I — er, are you okay?"

He — I'm so sorry, are you hurt — was looking at her, eyebrows slightly furrowed as he struggled to parse out all the word vomit she had spewed at him. It occurred to her then, as her eyes searched his face, waiting for some sort of response to her rambling, that there was no spark of recognition in his eyes, no flicker or hint of anything that could have meant he remembered her —

But why would he? Anna had never met him before tonight — why on earth did she think he would recognize her? That she should recognize him?

And yet . . .

She couldn't help but feel that she had done this all before. The longer she stood there, watching him watching her, the more she found herself unable to tear her eyes away from him, afraid he would disappear at any moment.

Wrong, something inside her whispered. Wrong wrong wrong but —

Familiar.

But how — why would he — why did she —

"I think I should be the one asking you that," the man said quietly. Hesitantly.

"What?"

"You're crying."

Mortified, Anna raised her hand to her cheek — tears, she realized, because she was crying, why was she crying —

"Oh," she said, forcing out a laugh as she quickly wiped her cheeks. "Sorry. Um . . . it's been a long day, you know?"

"Are you sure?" he asked, eyes soft with concern.

He's sitting astride his brown horse, looking at her worriedly as she blushed and stammered and tried to stand up with as much grace as she could muster —

"Oh yeah," Anna started, a little too loudly, and tried to look away. Good grief someone shut me up, she thought, inwardly cringing. "Totally. I'm fine. Super fine. So, um, are you? Okay, I mean?"

"Super," he replied with a small half smile. "I'm just sorry I kept you waiting."

"No, no — it's fine — er, not fine, obviously. Because you're in a hospital bed and all. Which is on me — sorry about that."

"It was my own fault anyway. I should have watched where I was going."

"And I should have been paying more attention to the road so . . . I'm sorry for hitting you with my car. And for every moment after."

I'd like to formally apologize for hitting the princess of Arendelle with my horse . . . and for every moment after.

He gave a slight shrug. "Don't be. If anything, I actually want to thank you. You single-handedly kept me away from my brothers for the evening. Believe me, I owe you my life."

"I'm pretty sure there are other ways to get away from family reunions. Ones that don't involve spending Christmas Eve in the emergency room."

"Well, you're here too," he said. "So I'd like to apologize anyway, for keeping you and your boyfriend from whatever plans you had for the evening."

"Boyfriend? You mean —" Anna broke off, snickering at the thought. She hadn't even realized he had seen Kristoff. "He's not — that is, I'm not really seeing anyone right now —"

Again, Anna cringed. How many times was she going to do this in one night? Ugh, too much information there. Way to go, Anna. If he doesn't already think you're an idiot, then he definitely does now.

"Really?" the man said, tilting his head. "So I take it no one's going to object if I wanted to, say, buy you a drink?"

Anna's mind went blank.

"Wait, what?" she sputtered. Surely she hadn't heard that right. . . .

"Either that, or I press charges," he said, still grinning — which was strange, because it felt like he was asking her so much more.

"What?" she repeated. He still hadn't looked away. "You're serious."

"Deadly," he said, but his laugh didn't reach his eyes. He looked nervous all of a sudden, and it made her aware of the heavy pounding in her chest.

"But you — you're asking me out on a date? Right now? On Christmas?"

"It doesn't have to be right now — I'm sure you have plans . . . but maybe after? Tomorrow? Whenever you're free."

"This is crazy. You — you don't even know me and I don't even know your name —"

"Hans," he said, and for a moment Anna saw someone else — the same man but different, offering his hand, pulling her to her feet, dropping to his knees and bowing —

"And isn't that the point of dates?" he went on. "To get to know each other?"

"Well, I guess but . . ."

She still didn't understand what this was, what it meant. But he was looking at her, waiting, still with that same nervous — hopeful longing guarded — look.

It wasn't like that day by the dark fireplace, when she was crawling on a cold, hard floor, shards of ice piercing her skin from the inside. It wasn't even like that night on the balcony, on the rooftop, by the waterfall, when he had promised no more closed doors, no more pain of the past, I would never shut you out, can I say something crazy, will you marry me —

This was different. Familiar, yes, but different too. Somehow there was a distinction, in ways she hadn't worked out yet. And maybe it didn't matter — maybe for now just knowing and being and living — because he was here and she was here and maybe —

"Yes," she said at last, trying to ignore the reservation, the flickering film of — of memories she knew but didn't understand — telling her to turn tail and run. "I think I'd like that."

Something dull in his eyes sparked to life. "Think?"

"I'm still trying to figure it out," Anna said, smiling, and maybe this was enough.

[this-lioness]

Kind of a vent

We have two friends who are a couple. We met this couple because we frequent their local business, and we gradually got more familiar and friendly with them.

I know they would like to be closer friends with us, and we are generally OK with that — they’re nice people and we enjoy bullshitting and joking around with them — but we are a little gun shy because they are at the opposite end of the political spectrum from us. They have casually said things to us that are blatantly racist, but they are the type of people who probably don’t realize it because they have “a black friend”, and they assume that means they’re not REALLY racist. But also the husband shares some absolutely awful shit on his FB so, yeah, sorry dude, you’re a racist.

Like... the wife casually talked about “Jewing someone”, in front of my fucking husband who is half Jewish. And it doesn’t bother him — not in the sense that he feels moved to say anything, he just mentally chalks it up to her being a typical local — but it really bothers ME.

One of the STUPID memes the husband shared was this list of “rules” that people on public assistance should have to abide by, all of which were racist, xenophobic and / or based on common but provably incorrect political lies. Except of course he wouldn’t believe that even if you calmly explained, and the idea of debating someone about their personal politics is so fucking exhausting, I am so tired of talking about anything even remotely political.

And yet I feel like saying, “Hey, I used to depend on public assistance to live. I used to be functionally homeless. Why don’t you look me in the eye and tell me what a useless drain on society I am?  Or is it because when you posted this list you were clearly picturing a bunch of brown people.”

SO ANYWAY, we haven’t bent over backwards to BE better friends with them, we’re just sort of like, “Oh yeah, we’ll totally have to get together to do something some time.”  And it’s slowly getting to be problematic, because I think they are at the point of like... explicitly inviting us to go out and do specific things at specific times.

But like... then what? The more comfortable they get with us, the clearer it’s going to be that we don’t think or believe the way they do, and I’m not interested in smiling politely through somebody’s racist bullshit.

And we can’t exactly invite them to things where our other friends are present. They’re going to know when we host parties and do things. What happens when they wonder why we don’t invite them to our annual New Years party, alongside our pagan, bi, trans, and poly friends?

What do we say? “Sorry, but you’re fucking horrible?” Because technically they are NOT horrible. We know that ultimately they are good people, they just believe terrible, shitty things because that’s how they were raised, and they are surrounded by people who think the same way they do.

Social media memes like to make it sound like it’s so easy to just cut people like this out of your life, but it’s more complicated than that. Adult relationships are full of nuance and also gross inconvenience.

We are already boycotting a restaurant we liked because the owner went over and had a friendly cup of coffee with two dudes having a loud, disgustingly racist conversation over breakfast. We cannot boycott every single business here because the owners are racist. We will have nowhere left to go.

We live in Trumpville. MAGA hats are everywhere. The local high school football team made openly racist comments to a visiting team with mostly black players. Everyone here just assumes you think and believe like them, and it’s shocking when they reveal that to you by saying the sorts of rancid shit they reserve for “their kind.”

I am fine having a friendly but ultimately professionally removed relationship with this couple and nothing more. They want more, and I don’t really have a way to navigate that without offending them, which means either sucking it up and letting them be offensive, or making enemies of them, and then I guess we also don’t get to use their business anymore.

So that’s part of my frustration.

The other part stems from the fact that this husband and wife have always made it very, very clear that their business is separate from their friendships — which is 100% understandable and fair, and we have always been cool with that. They don’t do “favors” for us where their business is concerned and we don’t ask for or expect them to. This is their livelihood, end of story.

Except last week the wife messaged me excitedly and said she had a “project” for me. She wanted me to redesign their logo for them.

I said no problem, worked up some sketches and found one they really like. I’m now in the process of refining it.

She never once mentioned PAYING me for this work. Which... look, I do favors for friends all the time, professional and otherwise, I don’t give a shit. This one’s on me.

Now she just messaged me that she’s got another “artsy fartsy project” and she wants me to design decals for a trailer they just bought.

And she still hasn’t mentioned PAYING me. As if I do this for fun.

Like... this is my fucking job, lady. It goes both ways.

What she DID do was ask if I had a personal logo that they could put on the trailer, to incorporate into the design.

First... this does me no good. I get no business from a logo. “Exposure” having any value to artists or designers is a very well-document professional myth.

Secondly, I know FULL WELL that her husband would NEVER agree to work my logo into the design: it’s rainbow-colored.

Sure enough, when I showed her the logo, her response was, “Cool. So do you mind if we change the colors?”

Yeah.

Now I’m just... annoyed. They still need to get the trailer painted so... what I think I’m going to do is take measurements and say, “Okay, so the design is going to cost $X. Getting the vinyls made will be pricey, so let me know if that works in your budget,” and let her either pay it happily or balk in offense.

Making and keeping friends as an adult is so fucking hard.

EDITED TO ADD: She had posted some nice old vintage photos of women hanging out together, and a comment I made on it vanished. I thought at first it was a FB glitch, but she mentioned seeing it, so now I’m thinking she deleted it because it mentioned lesbians.  Man, come on, I don’t have time for this shit...

[syntaxeme]

Moment’s Silence [VennHusk]

A/N: Oops I started writing this angsty, cathartic, over-expository little thing during No-Nuance November and only just finished it. Anyway, if you want to learn some notable things about Venture and/or her relationship with Husk, here’s your chance! I guess it’s safe to say this takes place sometime later in the Sugar is Sweet timeline.

Word count: 1800

Rating: T

Summary: Venture is used to always being the strong one, but refusing to acknowledge her weaknesses takes a toll on her both mentally and physically. It’s about time someone pointed that out to her.

—   —   — 

While Venture stood in the closet doorway, debating whether she should change before the evening’s festivities, her posture was impeccable, as always. Everything about her appearance was in order, in fact, every hair in place, every garment crisp. She was the very picture of composure.

As always.

Although she’d been on her feet for hours, each step sending pain stabbing through her legs, her stance didn’t shift. Although the upcoming evening of mingling and dancing promised to leave her in utter agony, she didn’t grimace. Beauty is pain. And she’d be damned if she let herself be seen as anything less. Better this than to slither across the ground like a creature, like an animal, like something to be looked down upon. No, she would wear her silks and her furs, her leather and too-high heels—the ones her friends had labeled ‘ridiculous’—and she would walk with ten times the grace of any other woman in the room, and she would let absolutely no hint of distress of weakness show on her face.

Once she’d traded out her coat for a similarly eye-catching gown of cream-colored silk and gone on to decide how to accessorize, there was a knock at her room’s door, followed by a familiar gruff voice: “Hey, Venn? You still gettin’ dressed?”

“In a manner of speaking,” she answered from the closet. “You’re welcome to come in, ya albi. I’ll only be a few minutes more.” The necklace she chose hung lower in the back than in the front, accenting all the skin displayed by her dress’s low back. Meaning she would have to take time to put her hair up as well. If every aspect couldn’t be perfect, she might as well not try at all.

A wolf whistle from behind her drew her attention, and she glanced back to find Husk leaning just inside the closet door, looking her up and down with an appreciative grin. “Goddamn, you look good. Ya sure we hafta go to this party thing? Bet I could keep ya plenty busy up here,” he suggested, and she answered with a patient smile of her own.

“As tempting as that is, I’m afraid I have an obligation to be there. I don’t trust Alastor to hold down the fort—as it were—in my absence, and although Charlie has good intentions, she’s still learning how to conduct herself professionally. They’ll need me.”

Yes, they always did. Although some part of her took immense satisfaction in that knowledge, it also left very little room for error or uncertainty on her part. A great deal of pressure weighed on her shoulders at all times, not only in the hotel but in all of her business endeavors, and she’d already made the executive decision to never let it bow her. No matter how exhausted she was. It simply wasn’t an option.

As she was in the process of tying her long hair into a plait, Husk came closer to wrap his arms around her waist and nuzzled his head against her shoulder, purring softly as he held her. He was dressed as formally as could be expected, complete with tie and suspenders, an effort he likely wouldn’t have made prior to their relationship. She wasn’t holding out much hope that he would dance with her, but simply having him present would be a comfort—which in itself made him an exception among her typical lovers.

“You even give yourself any time to rest since ya came up here?” he asked, his voice only slightly louder than the low rumble coming from his chest. “You been runnin’ around all day; I know your feet hafta be killin’ ya.”

“I’m fine, darling.”

“C’mon, Venn,” he sighed, releasing her to take a step back and leaving her colder for the distance. “Don’t gimme that shit. You already told me how hard it gets walkin’ around like this all the time. Ya gotta give yourself a few minutes to relax or you’re never gonna make it through the night.”

“Is that a challenge?” she asked dryly as she finished off her plait and tossed it back over her shoulder.

“Why make yourself suffer more just to make a point?” His tone made it clear how unamused he was with her joke. “I know how tough you are, doll. You know it. Everybody downstairs knows it too. Ya don’t hafta prove anything to them.”

“I’m well aware of that. None of my efforts are for their sake at all.” It’s just what I’m used to. “Don’t worry about me, ya albi. I’ve been through much worse.” As she tried to leave the closet, however, Husk moved to block her path, giving her a hard look that said he wasn’t about to let the issue go that easily. Beginning to get a bit frustrated with his insistent concern for her wellbeing, she huffed and went on, “Even if I did need a moment, there isn’t time. The party will start soon, and I’m needed downstairs to help finish preparations.”

“They can live without you for ten minutes. You’ve been workin’ with Charlie on this for weeks, and Al’s gonna be too busy hangin’ off Angel to cause any trouble,” the cat pointed out. Both valid points. Points she had brushed aside to avoid even the possibility of something going wrong, but true nevertheless.

“Why is this so important to you?” she asked quietly.

“’Cause you ain’t gonna bother takin’ care of yourself unless somebody makes you. We both know I can’t do much to help with your work, but I can sure as hell keep ya from runnin’ yourself ragged while ya deal with it.” The frown he wore wasn’t entirely distinctive from the sort he displayed at any other given moment, but there was still a certain softness in his eyes that said his grousing came from a place of concern more than aggravation. After a moment more of holding her ground, Venture let out a defeated sigh.

“Ten minutes,” she conceded, and Husk wasted no time in taking her hand to lead her to the bed. She sat on its edge, and he knelt to help her out of her shoes, stockings, and undergarments, bringing an uncharacteristic flush to her cheeks despite her knowing there was nothing sexual about the gesture—though the smirk he gave her suggested his mind was going somewhere similar. He then seated himself next to her and pulled her into his lap.

It took a moment, but she convinced herself to relax into her natural form, her legs shifting into a serpentine tail, her fangs visibly lengthening, her mane of dark hair morphing into a cobralike hood. She would probably have to redo her braid later, but for the moment, the relief of no longer maintaining her elegant façade overwhelmed any other thoughts. Her flawless posture softened as she leaned into her lover’s chest, and her tail idly curled around him to keep him close.

“Better?” he asked, stroking her arm lightly.

“Yess and no.” She winced at the pronounced hiss in her speech. Her undignified appearance in death must have somehow been a punishment for her actions in life, but she still wasn’t certain of how. But then, the matter of her existing in Hell at all was still a very muddy subject altogether. Best not to think about it too hard. Husk’s purring brought her back to the moment, forcing her to realize just how comfortable they had both gotten already. It really was tempting to stay there with him all night. Dangerously so. “We shouldn’t stay here for too long, darling.”

“You said ten minutes,” he reminded her, not budging from where he sat. “And ya better not be thinkin’ about work right now either.”

“…I just worry—”

“I know, and it’s liable to kill you again if you’re not careful.” Leaning in to press his forehead to hers, he went on, “Nothin’s goin’ wrong right now, doll. Ya don’t have anything to worry about. It’s just you and me. You’re safe.”

The words struck a chord she hadn’t heard in years, calling to mind another moment like this one, another lover thousands of years in the past, another embrace and those same words whispered: You’re safe. She could count on one hand the number of times since then that she’d lowered her guard this way around any other person. To do so was dangerous. She couldn’t afford to look weak. Yet here was someone who cared for her enough to recognize when her ‘strength’ became self-destructive. Enough to make her be gentler with herself. And as long as it was just the two of them, as long as he was the only one to see her this way, she supposed that was acceptable.

Since he was so close already, it was simple enough to lean forward and kiss him. Despite the indelicate state of her mouth at the moment, he didn’t hesitate to take it deeper, wrapping his arm tighter around her shoulders to keep her close. For ten full minutes, she remained right where she was, completely relaxed, thinking of nothing but him and how refreshing it was to be seen, even during moments when she wanted to hide.

When their time was up, she reluctantly drew away and straightened his tie for him. “We should be going, ya albi.”

“Mm. Ya sure?” he tried one last time, leaning down to press his lips to her throat instead. “Bet we could get away with another half-hour or so.”

“Nice try,” Venture answered with a smile, removing herself from her lover’s grasp to retrieve her discarded clothing. Shifting from her natural form to her preferred form required more effort but less time, as she spent so long holding it that it had become second nature by this point.

“Seriously,” Husk asked as she was pulling her stockings back on. “Are you gonna be okay tonight? And don’t fuckin’ tell me ‘I’ll be fine.’”

“But I will. Giving my body a break, even a brief one, makes maintaining this form easier. As much as I hate to admit it, your bullying was helpful.” As she’d suspected, her hair had come down from its braid, but as she started to plait it again, Husk caught her hands to stop her.

“Don’t bother. It looks good like this.”

She frowned and started to explain her reasoning for needing to put it up, but as she began to voice it, she couldn’t help feeling it sounded a bit silly. ‘Need’ seemed like a strong word. There were more important things to worry about. So she let it go and took his arm instead. “I suppose it’s best if I’m downstairs as soon as possible anyway. Shall we?”

“Sure. Just lemme know if you need another break, all right?”

“You know I won’t, darling. But thank you.”

[poetsalive-blog]

On Rebecca Watts’ Essay “The Cult of the Noble Amateur”

(Author’s note: This is a rebuttal to Watts’ essay which can be found here: http://www.pnreview.co.uk/cgi-bin/scribe?item_id=10090 ) After hearing that Rebecca Watts has received abuse for the above article “The Cult of the Noble Amateur,” I decided that constructive discourse was needed. As a poet and critic,  I find it very upsetting that any person would receive abuse let alone a person seeking to have a difficult conversation on the direction of publishing, prizes and popularity. 

 I will begin by saying I disagree with Watts’ arguments that the world pretends poetry is not an art form and that social media has helped dumb it down. However, I do understand her frustrations with turning out technical, complex poems that ask for critical engagement when quick-to-digest pieces seem to garner a lot more attention in the current poetry market. Let me assure everyone though, that there is space for both subgenres of poetry and both are art. 

The problem with poetry, a number of family members tell me, is that they don’t understand poetry. Their memories of poetry are being forced to memorise passages of Shakespeare, Wordsworth and other poets whose work bore no connection to the realities of their everyday. I come from a working class background and I do see the disconnect between high literature and the interests of that demographic. They feel spoken down to and thus, poetry found itself relegated to classrooms as the average person turned away from text that they felt didn’t get them. People like to see themselves in all forms of media and art. It is why increasing the number of minorities and LGBTQ in entertainment is getting a lot of advocacy: these demographics want to see themselves in the forms of entertainment they enjoy. Why shouldn’t they? 

Therefore, when we scour the literary landscape for journals to submit work to, we find a lot of specialist titles; journals for LGBTQ only, women only, language poetry only, poc only thrive alongside bigger publications that display more diversity in order to speak to more demographics. We are fine with this so why not the rise of “spoken word on paper” (or perhaps we could coin this type of poetry “pop poetry)? I’d like to think that poetry has made inroads towards peace with language and prose poetry. Is pop poetry not the next in line to be added to the roster of styles we celebrate? The Ted Hughes Prize is certainly leaning that way. I agree that honesty in poetry is nothing new. It is also true that this is not the first time honesty in poetry has been challenged. 

The Confessionals of the mid-1900s received much criticism for being too prone to, as Robert Phillips phrases it, “ public breast-beating” and narcissism.[1] When Confessionalism came to the forefront of the poetry market, critic Charles Molesworth wrote that the movement was “a degraded version of Romanticism” and that the Confessional poet was a “failed sage.”[2] Robert Bly accused Robert Lowell of “offering his readers nervous excitement rather than poetic excitement.”[3] In the end, the handful of genuine Confessional poets produced poetry that has remained in “the spotlight” even now. Just as we had our Plath and Sexton as young writers, certainly young poets are entitled to the “disarming honesty” of McNish and Tempest’s work (which applies to today’s young concerns) and to see that it is doing and achieving something in the market besides racking up YouTube views. 

In terms of the style of poetry that demands more of its readers, there is still plenty of room and praise. However, does the rise of “spoken word on paper”  / pop poetry mean you will need to do a little more research as to which prizes you submit work to? Of course, but you should be doing that anyway. You should know who the judges are and what interests they have in the moment so that if the Ted Hughes Award is going the way of a style you don’t write, you will know not to submit (and save yourself the fee). There is no shortage of journals, prizes and publishers for poems that utilize higher diction and complexity and enough people submit to these journals that the competition is fierce as ever. 

Kaur, Tempest and McNish are thus the types of poets for people who would have left poetry behind in secondary school. There is nothing wrong with that. Their style allows the audience to stay engaged in a performance and their use of social media utilizes a platform that the public is addicted to. They are reaching out to the public rather than expecting the public to come to them. In terms of high literature at readings, I’ll use the example of John Ashbery – whose poems are difficult and take work.  Trying to absorb John Ashbery in real time can be quite a task let alone fully “get it.” The books of Kaur and McNish require less strain and as such, watching their work and also having it at hand are akin to reading along song lyrics printed in cd jackets (or cassette tapes if anyone else can remember these) while the music plays. I fail to see how “easy to grasp” equates with bad when it seems to me that the experience is just different. One of the most poignant examples of spoken word poetry being at the right place at the right time was Tony Walsh’s delivery of “This is the Place” at the Manchester Bombing vigil. On paper, the poem lacks what you call “intellectual engagement” and “craft,” but when delivered, Walsh gave the community it what it desperately needed. The performance was powerful, to say the least and I understand the public’s desire, then, to have a written copy of that performance piece which spoke into the grief and fear everyone was experiencing.

 I assume that the demographics that are interested in Kaur and McNish are no different, and because publishers exist to make money (and endure) as much as promote good poetry, there is a profit to be made in that. McNish came to Picador with a ready-made following which translates into guaranteed sales. I can’t, in good faith, knock Picador for taking advantage of McNish’s marketing savvy.  We also cannot assume that an interest in pop poetry and its penchant for clichéd language will negate a person’s potential to venture into other forms that use more technical and creative elements. I certainly began, as a teenager, writing poetry that utilized such overemotional language as “I don’t grieve \ I shatter,”  and have changed so that I now enjoy looking for poetry that challenges me, asks that I spend time with it and get to the root of how it works.   My favorite poet is easily Frank Bidart. But could I have commenced my interest in poetry by reading and engaging with his work – which is unequivocally challenging as it is emotionally visceral? Not a chance; I was not emotionally or intellectually capable. (And I am not arguing that those who prefer accessible poet are not capable. I am stating that I was not capable.) We need to understand poetry can’t speak to one demographic, one level of education or understanding, one prosodic style. There is plenty of room for both McNish and Ashbery and by having an array of “levels” (for lack of a better word), you offer up more variety to the public to draw them into a world that they shut themselves out of because they felt shut out. I would also warn against drawing comparisons between the cult of personality wielded by Trump/Farage and that of the pop poets. I found this to be a very hyperbolic and misguided section of the essay. Trump, in particular, leads a movement bent on spreading misinformation, division, exclusion, prejudice and, at times, violence. To even compare the pernicious nature of Trump’s cult following to that of poets that draw crowds is guilty of “dumbing down” the conversation and depriving it of nuance – the very thing Watts accuses the poetry market of doing. 

As I previous indicated, I do understand the frustration of producing work that challenges a reader only to see it rejected. The business of poetry for most of us, I assume, is a life of “not quite right for us but good luck elsewhere.” Seeing a poet get praised for including poems she wrote at age 8 in her book would rankle even the most welcoming of us. Nonetheless, it is art and it has worth and a purpose. It is up to the individual poet to look at submission guidelines, back issues, and the interests of the editors / judges to make more prudent choices as to where to send work.

 That said, I do think that the article Watts’ wrote is very much needed even though it is a difficult and uncomfortable conversation, especially if prizes like the Ted Hughes prize are going the way of “pop poetry” and away from complex poetry that utilizes the page. 

[1] Robert Phillips, Robert Phillips, The Confessional Poets, (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1973), pp. 1-2

[2] Charles Molesworth, ‘“With Your Own Face On”: The Origins and Consequences of Confessional Poetry,’ in Twentieth Century Literature, 22: 2 (May 1976), 163-178, p 164.

[3] Phillips, p. 16

[renaramblesaboutcomics]

Wednesday Roundup 8.16.2017

Slightly overdue and quite possibly not at all aniticipated, I have at last finished the Wednesday Roundups and have come to give my usual reviews and ratings~

So let’s get into it

DC’s Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows, DC/IDW’s Batman/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures, DC’s Batwoman, Image’s Descender, Marvel’s Generations: Wolverine & All-New Wolverine, DC’s Gotham City Garage, DC’s Justice League of America, DC’s Super Sons, DC’s Wonder Woman

Marvel’s Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows (2016-present) #10 Ryan Stegman, Nate Stockman

It’s amazing how, for close to ten years now, I have felt like Peter Parker -- as I knew him and grew up with him -- has been a shadow of himself in Marvel comics. The potential for his growth, the sense of personal responsibility, everything that I had felt him growing toward while I was an avid Spidey fan felt gone back when I stopped reading because I felt like the illusion had been purposefully broken.

Peter was never going to grow up, he was never going to move forward, and his lifetime of adventures were never going to have consequences that truly stayed and mattered. 

Now, that’s a general disillusionment longterm comic fans all have to face some time, and it’s always going to be felt most severely on those that brought us into the business to begin with, but it’s one I always struggled the most with when it came to Spider-Man. Because the MC2 had sort of given me a “preview” to what his next steps could have been, and how his story could continue as a father and family man. I knew it enriched the parts of Peter I liked rather than took them away. Missing that in current iterations was dreadful.

But, amazingly, and wonderfully, Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your vows seems to provide for me what a decade of previous Spidey books could not. My Peter.

Story: Considering this is a one-and-done story, albeit one obviously leading up to the upcoming arc, it feels like it completely uses its pages and panels to their fullest with no wasted time and no sense of drag. Honestly, the fast pace in this issue is more reminiscent of classic pre-trade comics rather than the current lay of the land which seems more interested in first expanding and dragging stories out. And this manages to do it with three stories wrapped up by the end. 

The main story is about Normie Osborn, his birthday, and what will be his driving motivations to become the next Green Goblin. It’s honestly heartbreaking to see the complexities of a completely bratty kid whose suffering ultimately stems from the anger and frustration of having lost his father at a young age and feeling completely alone and misunderstood because of it. As the main POV character, we honestly get to dig into his rottenness and his tragedy more than most new villains you usually see and I love that as simple as his motivations are, you can really get the sense that it’s believable for a kid to fall into these trappings through his inability to properly grieve. It sets him up to not only be the antithesis of Annie, as I’ve been imagining he would be, but a foil to Peter as well, and that’s pretty fascinating in a character I genuinely feared was going to be pretty one-note.

For the B story we have Peter and Annie May bonding on a father-daughter day. I think this is vital not only because we just came off a Mary Jane focused story but because it’s that relationship that ends up saving them in the end. I love how Peter’s both protective of Annie, but supportive and grateful of her in a way that’s both completely Peter and also the signs of a great parent who is not ashamed to be surpassed by his child and wants her to know when he’s proud. They’re absolutely adorable, and relateable, and I love that Peter has obviously taken after Aunt May and Uncle Ben when it comes to being a parent. Usually it’s seen as “cooler” or “more interesting” to have good guys/childhood heroes grow up to be bad parents even against their characterizations beforehand just because it’s edgy, and I’m just so grateful that Renew Your Vows hasn’t fallen into that. 

The less expanded other subplot in the background is of the Lizard and his son desperately trying to get some sort of Oscorp chemical to save the son from... something. I may need to reread, but I’m fairly certain this will be set up in the future for a continuing storyline but it also works well here to emphasize the importance of parent-child bonds. 

Art: I honestly have been really impressed with the art on this title from the start. It’s very agile and creative while also not stylized to the point of being cartoony. The colors find a nice balance between being bright and having a touch of grunge and texture to it. If you’ve been a fan of the art for the book beforehand, you’re going to keep being a fan because I know I am.

I also want to take a moment and applaud a book for doing the rare thing these days and maintaining its art style and individual character for ten issues. That may not seem like a whole lot, but nowadays it feels like such an accomplishment to just have an artist on two consecutive issues let alone a rotation of artists who at least attempt to adhere to the certain style of the book. 

Characters & Dialogue: I went into Normie more above because he was so central to the plot of this issue, but it stands to be said again that I’m just genuinely floored by how well this comic does with making a layered and rounded villain out of what could have so easily been a stock Evil Child Genius version of Norman Osborn. I mean it was even in the name, and that impresses me so much. I like how there’s a sophistication to his dialogue, but also both his dialogue and running monologue are shorter sentences than you usually see with such educated words, which still makes it feel like the voice of a child. It was a neat little touch.

Peter also is just such a great character in this book. He gets less panel time than Normie, but in that time we see the layers of Peter. He’s protective, he’s funny, he’s supportive, and he’s quick to leap in head first. But while this Peter maintains all the fun of a younger Peter Parker (one that lets his daughter eat a disgusting amount of ice cream to be on her good side), there is a kindness and push toward empathy that seems more nuanced and matured to him than the Peter of old. His final words to Normie are both heartbreaking and full of pathos. He obviously regrets not being able to save his friend, but he’s also recognizing the signs of tragedy repeating itself in Harry’s young son. It’s a great, subtle moment.

Annie doesn’t get as much time as Normie or Peter, but we can see that her skills as a vigilante are advancing quite nicely, but her confidence is still stunted slightly. At least, it is around her father, who is of course her biggest inspiration and biggest hero. Even when she saves him, she is cautious to be excited about it, both because she’s concerned for him and also because she is concerned about making mistakes. Ultimately she’s adorable and full of sugar so I don’t think there’s anything not to love. 

DC/IDW’s Batman/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2016-2017) Matthew Manning, Jon Sommariva

Honestly I don’t know why I’m being rewarded lately with my favorite franchises getting amazing official crossovers, but I am, and I’m so happy about it. IDW and DC have been collaborating quite a bit for the past couple of years -- with IDW getting to release those original Mister Miracle omnibuses and now getting all these crossovers with arguably their biggest property to date and DC’s biggest property to date. Twice. 

The thing is, I was a pretty big fan of the first Batman/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles crossover by Tynion and I wasn’t really all that sure what to expect with this new crossover and whether or not it’d repeat the same steps or if it’d be able to capture either the DCAU or the TMNT2012′s tones in the process of telling its story. 

Fortunately, today’s all about me getting squarely handed my butt with these surprises!

Story: My concerns about this retreading the meet-and-greet storyline of Tynion’s crossover were pretty much immediately dashed thanks in no small part to Manning absolutely nailing the tones of the two cartoons right from the start. There’s monsters, there’s mayhem, there’s an actual mystery to solve (holy crap remember when Batman used to solve mysteries) and the badassness of the Shredder was on display without allowing him to make a cakewalk of the Rogues Gallery. 

I just loved how everything was able to tie together with these two continuities so neatly, and how it made it just that much more interesting for the ultimate reveal of who was behind the whole even, even if it was hinted at from the very first issue. It was a great mystery story of following the clues until we got to the end.

Oh wait. No. It didn’t get to the end because the story wrapped up in issue five of this six issue series And I’ll be honest... this really baffles me to the point of almost taking me out of my praising mood. 

Like... I’m not going to say that this was perfect at all until #6, but it was well paced, well choreographed, and it made full use of a huge cast of characters with lots of neat crossover potential satisfied nearly on every front -- we got Bats in NYC and we got Turtles in Gotham, we got respective villains in both. It was an incredibly solid, fun crossover that had a very satisfying conclusion. And then another issue. 

Obviously they wanted to expand on this story more. The Gotham Rogues shined the most for the first five issues, really driving the plot on all sides, and then #6 had the Kraangs taking advantage of the previous mayhem to enact their own invasion of Gotham. And there were obviously a lot of years that passed in between -- obviously in Gotham since we moved from B:TAS to TNBA, but also the Turtles while eternally teenagers seemed a bit older, and I don’t think it was a mistake on Manning’s part that April or Karai or any of the other growing Hamato clan’s members didn’t come through the portal with them. With a series that is still very much airing, they just couldn’t risk too much continuity plot holes since who knows what’s happening next. 

And I really get that, but if that’s the case, then perhaps the first storyline should have been 3/4 issues, and then allow this second storyline to have at least more than 1 issue. The way it stands now it seems more like a cruel epilogue teasing a future crossover continuation than an ending to what was otherwise a super solid and tightly written crossover. 

Art: The art was fantastic. Seriously, not only were both of the very different animated series’ styles represented in the art, but it was still very much its own blend. Everything felt cohesive without being overly off model from the original designs... Okay Barbara had some pretty strange anatomy in a few panels. Or pages. More than a few. Look, we have to do something about boob sock costumes especially if she’s going to be standing right next to April -- who’s her size and not that much younger than her -- who proves that this artist has at least seen someone wearing a sport bra before. 

But other than that, I really liked the art and I believed the colors REALLY popped. And I have to also thank this publication for having the common human decency of putting the covers between the issues which the collected version of Tynion’s crossover did not have in the least. 

Characters & Dialogue: Obviously a crossover is going to boil down all characters to the characteristics fans identify them with the most both for recognizability and so that we have the fun of seeing favorite characters bouncing off each other through a crossover. What’s the Joker like with Shredder, what’s Raphael like on fear gas, what’s Batman’s exchanges with Leonardo like. 

That’s the fun of a crossover and I don’t really expect noncanon crossover comics to dive into a character study and provide any type of growth throughout the issues. It’s good fun.

That being said... I’ve never been a huge fan of Don’s girl craziness in the TMNT 2012 series but could let it pass for his genuine affection for April that is beyond “oh wow a girl!!!”, they have a genuine relationship. But having him drooling over Barbara all the time just makes me annoyed. 

And also means that we can add Donatello of the freakin’ Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to the never ending list of characters in comics who have hooked up with or fallen in love with Barbara Gordon. Let the woman live, people.

Other than personal nitpicks, though, the characters are great and it felt like the best of what I love from both of these cartoons brought together.

DC’s Batwoman (2017-present) #6 Marguerite Bennett, James Tynion IV, Renato Arlem, Adriano Lucas

Oh, my long standing annoyances, will you ever allow me the peace of just enjoying a story instead of giving me a reflexive groan to the heavens each time I start reading tropes I don’t like. Like Bad End Future flash forwards where everything is fascist and terrible? 

Maybe. Depends on how gay things are allowed to be. So let’s get into it -- can Marguerite Bennett’s ability to write almost anything to my liking, can she make a Same As It Never Was Future Tense The Savage Time Futures End 2099 Watchmen Current America that I’ll appreciate reading?

No. But the effort is incredibly commendable!

Story: As is probably gathered by my response here to begin with, I’m not easily won over by this “darkest timelines” filler stories be it in comics or movies or television episodes. It just rarely affects the current storyline of the characters, will be retconned or lead to huge plot holes in the future, or just in general has nothing particularly fun or interesting to say. 

And I’ll be honest, current times just make me that much less interested in fascism being used in my escapist media. Like. Guys I just want to watch superheroes punch Nazis, not my lesbian Jewish superheroes help begin some sort of fascist totalitarian state with way too much Nazi imagery like good lord. 

Anyway, there were things that I found interesting from the start. Kate seems to be trying to dismantle the system she is guilty of starting, Jason is... honestly he’s somehow the Dick Grayson of Batman Beyond 2.0 and working with Kate so that’s weird. 

Somehow, beyond all common sense, Harvey Bullock is still alive? 

I do like Renee as Commissioner but as sweet as it is to have older lesbians in a comic... *long suffering sigh* Look, I might be sensitive to this because I just watched Atomic Blonde or maybe because I’ve always been pretty uncomfortable with the treatment Renee has gotten compared to Kate but... There’s just something supremely off putting to me that a brown woman is portrayed as having the long standing unrequited love and can’t move on to find her own happiness and then dies for the tragedy of the white woman. 

We really have to look at these patterns and start questioning things here. 

Also Tim is evil Batman. Again. Stop doing that, Tim. I barely put up with it during “Titans Tomorrow”, and I don’t nearly have that much of a relationship with your current incarnation that I had with that Tim. Just saying. Watch your butt, Birdboy.

Art: The art is very good. There’s a few fun action splash pages, I thought the panels were organized and flowed really well, and best of all I really enjoyed the fact that Gotham actually had color to it for once. 

Too many times artists seem to think that Gotham can only work in shades of gray, but I found the cityscapes a lot more interesting and popping with this style. So that’s encouraging that we may once again get a change in how Gotham looks.

Characters & Dialogue: Bennett is quickly becoming one of my favorite writers so far as characters go -- I’ve enjoyed almost all her work from both DC and Marvel and she maintains that here. I don’t know how much input Tynion has on the Batwoman scripts right now to earn that writing credit but being more familiar with Bennett’s work now I really felt this story was more hers than his. 

That being said, and as strong as the characterization is, I’ve always felt that Bennett does have a tendency to write internal monologues from characters with this distant narration that feels cold and impersonal to the story being told. That works here, given the circumstances and how this is supposed to feel alien and unfamiliar to the Kate we have been reading in the previous issues. But I would argue that it’d work better if most of the internal monologuing and narration didn’t come off that way in other stories. 

Image’s Descender (2015-present) #23 Jeff Lemire, Dustin Nguyen

Man is Image killing it with their creator owned line. It’s hard to imagine what sci-fi could really elevate the genre in comics more than the likes of Saga but it absolutely feels like Descender is aiming squarely for that spot, taking the more cerebral route of an AI or Blade Runner which is needed more in comics in a way that’s still approachable. But other than nerds like me, does it manage that approachability?

Couldn’t tell you since I am a nerd like me, so I’ll just lay out my perspective.

Story: It feels like for over 20 issues now we have been building to the point where all of these factions of characters would meet and their plots would begin to overlap, which makes it all the more just shocking that we’re at that point. It’s definitely a huge task given the sheer number of characters in the cast at this point, but I am also incredibly tempted to say that because we’re in the middle of this “chapter” (and yes I’m saying that a lot this week) you really feel the lack of a beginning or ending on this one. We have so many characters we’re following at one time that there’s not really any other way to tell this story but in fractions. And as enjoyable as that is, it means you either have to sacrifice POVs every couple of issues, or you have to drag out tension for each plot across multiple issues. And we’re doing the latter.

Now I don’t want that to come across as a condemnation, it’s just a fact of the way this story’s being told. And personally I don’t think that makes individual issues as rewarding as it is to read a whole chapter in succession. And yet, I can also say with confidence that what I do love about this story and how I’m hooked on finding out what happens next, I personally feel invested enough to buy per issue rather than wait for trade, at least for now. So perhaps I’m too analytical on this issue right now. After all, I’m not having difficulty remembering from issue to issue what each group’s plot is or what danger we left them off at the time before, and it’s usually when that begins to blur that I feel a comic is worth waiting until the trade. 

Art: I am a huge fan of Dustin Nguyen, as always, but I’m once more burdened with the question in my own mind “is the water colors fitting for this harsh, slick, futuristic setting” and I just still can’t say that I feel that it is. It’s beautiful, and as someone who has been reading comics with Nguyen’s style since all the way back during the Winick run on Batman, it’s impressive how far his style has developed and how much he’s honed his craft. But that doesn’t mean that specifically the choice to make this a textured water color comic rather than a digital comic was the best aesthetic choice, and I know at this point I am beating a dead horse with that opinion, but it’s just what strikes me as so off putting each issue. Especially since we are in a science fiction story, taking place almost entirely in outer space, and yet the majority of backgrounds as well as space between panels is white. It’s just a real disconnect that I can’t tell yet if it’s being inventive or going to eventually have a symbolic meaning with the story. 

Guess I’ll have to wait and see with everyone else!

Characters & Dialogue: Another difficulty with this kind of storytelling and seeing every character for a few pages each issue is that there’s not a whole lot of time to really advance characterization unless it’s over the span of a whole chapter. So I have to imagine that things that seem small in the moment -- Tim-21′s escape, the doctor saving Telsa, Effie telling the Nagoki what he “wanted to hear” will all have vast implications in the upcoming issues, but it’s not something I can dissect as it is now. 

That being said, I really do love all these characters and I love how lovable they can be while still understanding how they can view each other as utter monsters due to their own pasts and motivations. It’s pretty amazing work on Lemire’s part. 

Marvel’s Generations: Wolverine & All-New Wolverine (2017) #1 Tom Taylor, Ramon Rosanas

Somehow, someway it snuck up on me over the past year or so that Tom Taylor just has absolutely made my life better with his contribution to comics. Like, that’s a weird epiphany to have in the middle of a Wednesday night, but my friends on Discord with me last week got to witness it in real time. I love Taylor’s writing, and most importantly I love how he writes Laura, I love everything about her under his pen and I’m glad to have back-to-back weeks of his Wolverine. 

This week... with a TWIST!

Story: So what’s happening in the Marvel universe right now? Couldn’t tell you. I imagine the timey wimey shit for Secret Empire has allowed for this crossover within a crossover within a summer event but I have no actual context other than I wanted to pick this, the Ms. Marvel, and the Spider-Man comics up. Because that’s how I role. I have wisely stuck to my guns throughout this summer and only read Marvel titles which, y’know, fucked off into space for a whole summer-long arc rather than stay around for Nazi Apology feat. Steve Rogers of Earth-whatever. I’ve been much happier for it!

The point is, we get a crossover with Wolverine and Wolverine. A Logan from before he knew Laura, and a Laura who... looks like she’s in her X-Force uniform for some reason? Uh. Again I’m completely going in blind on this one I have no context, but we’ll assume it’s a pre-All-New Wolverine in spite of titles because she doesn’t seem to have any problem murdering people and that’s like a whole Thing in All-New and I can’t imagine Taylor, who’s writing it, would like... forget that. 

Anyway, it’s an excuse for a team up where Laura is helping Logan same Amiko from being kidnapped by the Hand and gives her some life advice while getting some much needed life advice of his own. And it’s as simple as that and yet not simple at all. Like most of Taylor’s stuff, the embrace of the general comic book premises belies a much deeper purpose that you can look for, and this is all about Laura and Logan’s relationship, or at least the relationship they both wish could have been. It’s closure in a way, for Laura to receive an open hug from a Logan that’s still very much her Logan, but is not yet as jaded as to not give her a much needed hug. 

Oh, Logan. Whenever you eventually reincarnate yourself back into the main Marvel Universe as yourself and not a clone or another universe’s son or another universe’s angry grandpa or as another long lost son or as another clone or as a dying salamander, I hope you keep this message to heart.

Art: It’s wonderful. I mean the anatomy’s great, the colors are muted but still varied, there’s some real tone to Laura that some artists don’t give her enough of. I could nitpick a few things like costumes (woops already did) or that Logan didn’t meet my personal Hairy Enough for Wolverine requirement, but the main criticism I’m really going to have here is that this had a very simple panel structure for the majority of its pages which could use some more variation, especially for action scenes. But then again the best scenes weren’t action but were of the characters actually interacting so I think simple panels for simple things is more than appropriate.

Characters & Dialogue: I’ll be the first to admit that Logan’s not really my guy. I don’t go out of my way to read a lot of Wolverine where he’s not in a team book or a crossover or a team-up or another team book or another crossover or a tv show or another team book. And I have a lot of frustration with him in the majority of those. It’s kinda my thing with Bruce Wayne -- when I love him, I love him, when I don’t, I really don’t. 

But, to me... this was good! It was maybe even great. Strangely dynamic for Logan and it was just overall interesting to see Logan written by Taylor and it not being from Laura’s perspective. I’m so used to his voice for Laura that the gruffer, less nonsense and more weary tone from Logan was surprising and fitting. And it made the final pages just that much more poignant.

And of course Taylor’s Laura is just my tastes to a T. So everything’s good by my account. 

DC’s Gotham City Garage (2017-present) #1 Jackson Lanzing, Collin Kelly, Brian Ching

I had no idea this book was coming out. I had never seen advertisements for it. I had no idea what to expect. And what I got was Robo Cop meets Fury Road meets Road Warrior meets DC Bombshells. And maybe Blade Runner. 

Given that this is a digital first and I wasn’t really sure what to expect and I still have... no idea where this could be going or what it’s based off of other than those statues that used to be sold by DC with everyone on motorbikes and the mentality of “hey people like Bombshells! Let’s try this statue collection too!” with apparently no memory of how that worked out for them with Ame-Comi Girls. 

Did I mention this is trying to repeat the lightning in a bottle of Bombshells? I feel like that can’t... really be... overstated. 

Story: uhhhhhh Well. This is tough to nail down because as a Digital First it’s very short and I also have no idea what’s going on so my judgments here are... lacking, let’s say. And I have nothing but questions. Like. Why is it in Gotham and fascists are Batman themed while Lex Luthor is in control. Why is Kara adopted by Jim Gordon. Why is there a picture of Barbara and Kara together but no mention of Babs in Kara’s monologues or so on. Why are humans robots and robots humans. Are humans robots at all. How did Jim know about Kara’s super powers if she’s never been in the sun before. 

I k now I’m just listing questions but that’s basically everything that happened to me while I was reading and I just... have no answers to give you. 

I just think we can all agree that Big Barda does, indeed, wear a mohawk just like she wears everything else: like a boss.

Art: It’s fine. I mean, digital comics are always a bit rougher around the edges due to their incredibly tight update schedules and I always try to account for that. And it’s a cute, inoffensive style that definitely is going to try to undercut the no doubt supremely scanty clothing of the... garage...girl...people. And I liked how dull and gray toned everything around Kara looked in the Garden while outside there was almost a sort of sepia tone but the real colors came in with the... garage....girl...people. But even then, there are little visual cues throughout, like Kara’s own colorful accents despite wearing “assimilated” clothing. No doubt that’s going to be gone soon when she joins the...

Again, I can’t express enough about how much I don’t know what’s going on.

Characters & Dialogue: We really only have Kara as a character right now and while she definitely has a voice, it’s not really one that I would say stands out in the crowd of YA character types. I’m not trying to be dismissive of that -- I actually think that Kara has always worked best as one of the Youths’ outlets in comics, but it’s basically just. Too early to really give my feel on things. 

Basically I feel like I wasted everyone’s time with this review lol

DC’s Justice League of America (2016-present) Vol. 1 Steve Orlando, Ivan Reis, Andy MacDonald

I have some huge reservations about this title, but after really thoroughly enjoying the Road to Justice League of America Rebirth storyline that came before this, and loving the majority of the lineup as much as I did, I was ready to give this comic some time to really find its feet. Not to mention I’ve enjoyed Orlando’s work in the past. But now we have to see how well lofty expectations hold up.

Story: I’ll be honest with you, the most distracting part of this entire project is that Bruce is like... bankrolling 40 different superhero teams right now with none of them being the Outsiders and I find that shocking and unusual. Especially since there’s already a Justice League, Bruce seems to be making this particular team all about “second chances” and...Lobo’s on it. 

But to my surprise, this was actually addressed by the story. Not answered by any means, but the characters for the most part seem very self-aware of the oddness of their team given Dinah and Frost’s conversation with each other on the subject. They allude to there must be some reason that Bruce has decided on the team that he has if he’s willing to go through all of this trouble. 

Especially Lobo. Who is on a Justice League team. This is... Well it’s a thing, for sure. 

Throughout this volume all of the cast gets major moments to shine, I felt like, and the relationships were explored to quite an extent, but this falls into the problem that so many other comic books from DC does too, and that is that no moment can be too great or grand... without Batman immediately showing you up, taking credit for the situation, or just completely dismissing it out of hand. Oh, classic Batdickery.

Art: I actually felt the art was very good under both main artists on this title. It’s very house standard, in that it’s very much trying to replicate the Jim Lee standard style that almost all the DC line was all but forced to produce at the start of the New52. But it’s still fun and I enjoy the costume designs for everyone, especially Vixen who seems to have my favorite costume I’ve seen on her yet.

Characters & Dialogue: This is a huge cast, so the ability to focus on any character... other than Batman, I’m sure for regulars to comics this is the furthest thing from a surprise. Still, there are some genuinely unexpected relationships, most of my favorites revolving around Ryan Choi. 

Most of these characterizations aren’t going to be groundbreaking for any of the characters, but of course this is also the only place where you can get most of these characters anymore, which sucks especially if they’re some of your favorites. So there’s that. 

DC’s Super Sons (2017-present) #7 Peter J. Tomasi, Jorge Jimenez, Alejandro Sanchez

The real question of the ages is, does there exist a title that is having more fun with its premise right now than Super Sons? And honestly, I don’t think the answer to that question is “yes” because Super Sons is a complete riot every issue and it continues to invite everyone along for the ride. It’s honestly really impressive. 

This issue continues with Jon meeting Damian’s Teen Titans and getting his foot through the door for a real team up. And that’s exactly what the world needs.

Story: We have another mid-storyline issue here but once more we have one that knows how to make a single issue feel really encompassing. We have Jon joining the Titans, proving himself to everyone but Damian (who’s just a grouch and old and it’s hilarious that he looks like Old Man Bruce from Batman Beyond), and really beginning to finally fight back against some of Damian’s nastier moments. 

It’s simple, but it works because of that simplicity and fun. The premise is easy to follow and I can easily see a new fan picking this issue up as their first comic and being engaged from start to finish. 

And then we even get left on a cliffhanger that is beyond just “uh oh bad guys!” We just learned that Damian’s treatment of Jon and his insistence that they’re “training” is at least partially because Lois is behind it. 

Mind. blown. Way to go, Maaaahhhhmmm!! 

Art: I have absolutely fallen in love with Jorge Jimenez’s art on this series. It’s so unique and fun. I love how fantastic the colors work with the bright storytelling, the way action scenes really do seem diverse and varied. But most of all I love that it’s just so expressive for Damian and Jon, their adorable faces make a great range of emotion and look endlessly endearing. 

Characters & Dialogue: This is mostly Jon-centric, though Damian gets some good moments too. And for Jon, what his character needs and has needed for a while now is confidence and a belief in himself. He wants praise from Damian and other superheroes, but even in the moments where he gets that, it’s clear that his father’s words about needing to help people are at the core of his real desires, and that’s what has carried him this far. 

And while I do think that Damian’s prickliness is lovely and a trait which should never go away, it’s honestly really encouraging to know that, for at least this story arc, a good amount of his treatment toward Jon has been revealed to be because he feels responsible for Jon at Lois’ request, and I love that about Damian. It’s a similarly frustrating trait he shares with his father, I must say. 

DC’s Wonder Woman (2016-present) #28 Shea Fontana, David Messina, Romulo Fajardo Jr.

Just as I wasn’t really hesitant to call out Rucka’s run on this title, I held nothing back in the last issue when it came to my reservations about the current storyline and whether or not Fontana’s voice would really capture the essence of what had made not only the previous run so great but had made Wonder Woman so great throughout it. 

Reservations are gone because I’m officially on board with this run and feel like we have regained the momentum and understanding of Diana’s character that I had dearly missed, specifically her relationships and how much she treasures them to her literal fault. But let’s not give it all away.

Story: Like I’ve said many times before, the midsection of any ongoing storyline is going to be difficult because there’s this real lack of a beginning and ending to it most of the time, and one of the strengths that I praised Greg Rucka for in previous Roundups and reviews on this blog is his ability to know how to make a comic feel like a completed arc of its own while feeding into a greater narrative, which is something of a dying art even among the greats in comic book writing today. While I wouldn’t say there’s necessarily resolution in this issue, Fontana proves that she understands how to make a single issue story work. 

Diana has a bounty on her head, something that doesn’t seem to really surprise or upset her that much, as it shouldn’t since not only is she Wonder Woman but she has a bit of a stubbornness to her that is a fairly defining feature. What drives Diana here and therefore the drama of this storyline is actually her guilt over how her presence can endanger others -- an interesting continuation of Steve’s worries back in Wonder Woman: Steve Trevor (2017) I reviewed earlier this year. Not only that, but she has a genuine guilt and fear that she will eventually survive the ones she loves most outside of Themyscira -- Steve, Etta, and assumedly all the other people she has come to cherish. 

That’s a far more interesting perspective on Diana’s fears and character than almost any writer has tapped into before and it’s honestly kind of shocking that it’s taken so long for that source of internal conflict to be focused on as it is here. 

There’s a lot of levity to subside the emotional turmoil, and of course great action in which both Diana and Etta get great moments. But as I said, as the middle of a story, there’s not really a solid end here so much as a TO BE CONTINUED sorta feel, as to be expected. But I loved the arc we got to see in drama being presented for Diana’s relationship with Etta, it coming out in the open, and them attempting to address it before being interrupted by bullets all within a single issue. Good good work!

Art: I was worried about the art for this run as much as I was about the writing but I am always pleasantly surprised to have my fears proven wrong. because this was some great art. I don’t think the artist worked well with Etta’s hair texture (or knew what to do with her hair in general) and there was at least one panel where the colorist.... unfortunately swapped color palettes on Etta and whitewashed her to Diana’s skin color. It’s stuff I’d hope they would look out for. 

I do love the variations in body types and NOSES especially in this issue, though. I always look out for that in comic books, especially ones that feature lots of women and I was incredibly surprised by that. Though I wish so much that Diana would be allowed to have her curls again. 

Of course, I’m biased in that account, though.

Characters & Dialogue: Since Diana and Etta’s characters drove the plot for most of this, there’s only a few little moments I want to cover that weren’t mentioned with the story summary. Diana’s compassionate and forgiving nature was consistent throughout -- her mourning of the doctor, her tenderness toward Etta, her fear of endangering others, and even her compassion for the hemophiliac sniper that almost gunned them down. 

I love how badass Etta’s allowed to be in her current incarnation, I love that her grudges and anger are not only justified but aren’t minimized or looked down on by Diana even though it’s a huge difference in opinions between them. And I love the comfort she has around Diana and wants to do her best around her as well. 

Also I want to thank Fontana for remembering that Diana is vegan, like I just about teared up because holy crap, she GETS it, she GETS Diana.

There was a surprising amount of variation this week, which I hadn’t really been expecting given that the majority were DC books to begin with. But picking favorites is fortunately not hard when you’ve got a Class-A contender in the ring punching my lights out with feels. So for my single issues of the week I have to go with Generations: Wolverine & All-New Wolverine

Between our two trades, I had the most un and joy from reading Batman/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles which would seemingly be for super obvious reasons.

But I thought all the comics were great this week and highly recommend you check them out! Of course I’d love to hear back from you – agree with me? Disagree? Think I missed any comics I should’ve picked up? I’d love to hear from you.

Before you go, however, I need to share that I am in a bit of a financial crunch for a multitude of reasons, not the least of which being the medical bills I’m paying for my dog, Eve, who experienced a catastrophic dog fight and underwent surgery just yesterday actually.

As such, I really would appreciate if you enjoy my content or are interested in helping me out, please check out either my Patreon or PayPal. Every bit helps and I couldn’t thank you enough for enjoying and supporting my content.

You could also support me by going to my main blog, @renaroo, where I’ll soon be listing prices and more for art and writing commissions.

RenaRoo Patreon

RenaRoo PayPal

[getoffthesoapbox]

I have a question and I want to hear your take on it. How is it that we can look at Zero's desire to make Yuuki smile and say it's for "love" but the same can't be said for Yuuki?

I think I’m probably the wrong person to talk to about this, since I’m not a proponent of this in isolation. =P I personally believe Hino has separated “happiness” from “love” in this story because of how Yuuki responds to both Kaname and Zero, and so I don’t believe one proves the other or vice versa. But I’ll give you my take on this business, anyway.

I don’t believe that just “wishing” for someone’s happiness automatically means you’re expressing your love for them or even making them happy. It’s just a clue that you care about the person. You need to prove your wish with action in order for it to count. (Honestly I feel like I’m in the twilight zone right now–this is such a basic Zeki argument I’m making–that actions speak louder than words–that I’m in shock I have to make this argument to fellow Zekis.)

Zero did most of his “wishing for Yuuki’s happiness” in the context of wanting her to receive what she wanted–which was, in his estimation, a relationship with Kaname (and this held true all the way to Night 92 and honestly even into VKM with his confession in VKM 8 about wanting to get Kaname back for her). While this is a “loving” thing to do, it’s not “love” by itself, and it doesn’t indicate Zero’s personal wish to be a source of happiness for Yuuki. We have to use different clues about Zero’s actions to prove he actually loves Yuuki and wants to fulfill her happiness himself. We get this from other context clues: he kisses her, he expresses his love for her, he expresses a desire to have a life with her. That’s why Zero’s expressions ring more “true” than Yuuki’s right now. He puts his wish into action. 

Yuuki on the other hand has “wishes” that she doesn’t act on. We have two scenes of Yuuki’s wish this chapter. One is from early in Ai’s life, and one is from 50 years later. Okay, so if you want me to buy Yuuki’s “love” for Zero right now based on the happiness = love argument, we need to pick this apart.

Yuuki says she wishes Zero’s smile could last when Ai is born. Then, as we just learned in VKM 9, she spends forty+ years leaving this man (who supposedly she wants to smile forever) to fall further and further into a depression that she knows how to ease (he tells her in VKM 9 he’d like to be like Aidou and Yori and asks how much longer he has to wait) but refuses to (she literally tells him she won’t change anything). This lasts for forty+ years. Yuuki’s “wish” and her “actions,” unlike Zero’s, don’t match. Zero is receiving mixed signals from Yuuki which are making him unhappy to the point of depression. You can’t just look at Yuuki in VKM 10 in isolation. You have to compare her to how she is in all the VKM chapters. And we know from the other chapters that she refuses to clarify her feelings for Zero (VKM 1, VKM 5, VKM 7, VKM 9), which is the exact opposite of what Zero does. 

Not only that, but once Zero and Yuuki finally “restart,” Yuuki still doesn’t add anything other than her “wish”. Zero is still doing the legwork in the relationship, still having to guide her, still having to pry information out of her. Her “wish” is also couched platonically. It’s not about her personally wanting to give him happiness as the woman who loves him, it’s about her feeling sorry for that kind boy who had some hard knocks in life and wanting better for him. I mean that’s great in isolation, but without some romantic context to back it up, you can’t exactly prove great romantic love there. Yuuki felt bad for Kaname’s hard knocks in life too, lol. Zero’s response to her confession about the bracelet is pretty telling too. He’s serious, and his eyes are downcast. He’s not flattered, happy, or encouraged by what she’s just said. You’d think if her wish for his happiness was this great loving gesture, he’d be a little…you know…happy? Just food for thought.

Like I just don’t know how to get it across that the two situations are vastly different and that to remove all of the nuance just because the word “happy” is used blows my mind. This is part of analyzing a story. We know these two will eventually find happiness and hopefully mutual love (maybe), but right now it’s supposed to ring hollow from Yuuki’s side. This is basic writing 101. That’s the very reason Hino wrote this chapter directly after the last one! It’s like when Yuuki used to talk about how much she loved Kaname but then would race after Zero or stand against Kaname to protect Zero back in arc 1. Her actions and words didn’t match back then, just like they don’t match now. 

If Yuuki’s actions were consistent with her wishes, I wouldn’t have a problem with her thoughts and feelings this chapter. Unfortunately, they’re not, and I’m going to call her on it just like I did in the original series. (As I said about that cute Ichihime crossover with the first Zeki scene from VKM 10 fanart I reblogged earlier, the scenes in isolation are cute and romantic. But in the context of what we’ve seen so far from VK and VKM they are not and that’s where my problem lies with the scenes. Yuuki’s history with Kaname and Zero renders a scene that should be cute as repulsive in a way that the same scene isn’t rendered when it’s with a pairing without all the damn baggage.) Does this mean I think she loves Kaname instead? No, but it does mean I think she’s not giving her all to her relationship with Zero and that that does need to be addressed. Until it is, I’m not going to gush over her. 

And that, as they say, is that. Long story short, my friend, for me as a reader I need more than a stray “wish” to prove love and affection. People have murderous thoughts they don’t act on, does that make them murderers? Same thing is true here. If you don’t act on your loving thoughts, and you do the exact opposite of them, then you’re not exactly acting loving, are you? 

Sorry, I don’t mean to snark at you, but I’m fairly fed up with all of this. I’m only still reading this story because Hino dangled the cure in my face–she has not redeemed Zeki as far as I’m concerned. I’m not here for the fandom’s feel good times, and I’m not interested in gushing over how cute a pairing that’s in major trouble looks. I like to leave all that to Zeki detractors. I saw more than my fair share of that insanity back during the KM arc. Instead, I’m here to get closure on a story that has been a huge and exhausting investment of my time, money, and life and I want some real payoff in the form of what I was promised by the narrative. I’m not here to fangirl, I’m not here to enjoy fluff. I’m here to get what I earned by being such a staunch supporter of this series for 12 freaking years. 

I’m sorry to hijack your ask for my frustrations, and I’m sorry if I caused you any offense. I hope you can forgive me, and please understand that I want the best story possible for a pairing that I don’t want to see destroyed and am in great fear of watching it decay into something I never wanted it to be. I am terrified that at the end of VKM I will wish it had never been written, and that is not what I want. I despised the original series ending to the core of my being, and if VKM makes that ending look preferable, I think we have a serious problem on our hands. 

Thanks for reading if you made it this far, and for listening, and if you’d like a gentler response, I’d suggest visiting my good friend @soulisthirsty. =)

Thanks for dropping by. 

[ciaclouddearding-blog]

The dating specialist texting

Texting Rules Dating I created a free video series to help you end dating frustration forever.  Service members do not have to pay for internet connections, food or travel expenses etc.  Texting while dating reddit texting is often the preferred method in a relationship.  Unforutnately, there isn't much you can do.  Online dating systems use websites or mobile phone apps to connect possible romantic or sexual partners.  Women, please stop being so naïve and gullible.  The most important rule is to make sure the people involved actually want to be set up;.

Texting Rules Dating That said, if you're Snapping back and forth and there is no real side dish of thoughtful texts or meaningful attempts at plans, you might be caught in the not-friend-not-yet-a-girlfriend zone.  You Show Little To No Emotion Via Your Vocabulary Either you are really not feeling this person, or you are both struggling when it comes to the text game.  It probably also means that they've been communicating effectively with you, and you want to return the favor.  Another problem with writing long texts as a substitute for conversation is that a lot of nuances get lost in text messages.  Texting is great if it comes to wishing someone good luck, checking in, or asking about a time to meet for your date.  So why do so many of us do it? First off, it's good that you like this person.  And don't even get me started on the painful, anxiety-inducing time spent in pure agony waiting for a response.

#IHateDating: Playing the Dating Texting Mind Game Boudreaux showed the world that an American woman could establish and run a company, and she also caused a revolution in the underwear industry.  So how do we increase the chances that our messages are getting across in the right tone? The meeting can be in-person or live as well as separated by time or space such as by telephone or email or chat-based.  Or does he text you during the day, genuinely asking how your day is going? Jack had no luck even after he threatened to publish the photos of Sabrina unconscious and bloody at the accident scene.  You want to be available, but not desperate.  However, sometimes ghosting is the simple solution to an online dating match gone bad.  Days are busy, life is hard, texting is annoying, and maybe you're both just not that into doing it.  Also, a hot tip I just learned: I started turning on my text preview so that I see the actual text of any text messages I get when my home screen is locked.

Texting while dating In order to find the perfect balance here, try to make the ratio roughly 2:1.  Cannot access his bank account.  Dating is a stage of romantic relationships in humans whereby two people meet socially with the aim of each assessing the other's suitability as a prospective partner in an intimate relationship or is a form of courtship, consisting of social activities done by the couple.  Cameron: Anything that means they were thinking of me e.  Finally, if you want a free dating site with very basic functionality and compatibility with the retrofit system, and physical appearance is not your main concern.

Nick the Dating Specialist Texting All the how to text guys guidelines are just that, guidelines.  Shit I thought as I turned over, afraid I had missed him.  This meant, arranging picnics, dinners, going bowling, etc.  Victoria was resentful that Victor passed her over and mentored Nick to take over Newman one day, while Nick was unable to forgive Victor for being too close to his wife, Sharon. You know pretty quickly if someone is into you or if you are into them.  To summarize the findings, here is the most important graph.

Guys Reveal How Their Texting Habits Change When They Like You The dating script that you should be a fully feature script that is easily customizable and easily extensible only then you will be able to compete with your existing competitors.  Taylor to switch their babies, then Nick arrived, and Adam escaped out the window.  Related: Can you spot the signs of a military dating scammer? At the end of the school year Ray and I fooled our friend, Tom, by making him think we were dating.  Not long afterward, Victor and Ashley divorced when she got fed up with his preoccupation with Nikki.  If he is interested in you, he will 100% reach out.  Television edit Numerous television reality and game shows, past and current, address dating.

Dating specialist texting Our panel of eligible male millennials: Names have been changed.  When I was in middle school if you liked someone you had to pick up your landline phone, call their home number, and speak to their mom to ask if they were even available.  Your text chemistry with a Bumble match you haven't even met yet could be fire when compared to your chemistry with someone you dated for years, and that still doesn't necessarily mean Bumble boo is the person for you.  Single But Dating: A Field Guide to Dating in the Digital Age - Kindle edition by Nikki,.  Two days ago, he called me and said he needs money so he can come home.  Therefore you would think twice before doing that, which would give you an actual chance to miss each other and allow the feelings to develop.  Any texts that might be passive agressive, asking for attention or manipulative should be kept out.

The Rules Of Texting (Explained By Guys) Sign Up; While their text message exchanges may have been natural,.  If they ask you for money -- even a loan, this is a scam.  Trust yourself and stop communicating now before he asks you for money.  We already knew Meghan Markle had prior relationships before meeting is it a man or woman Prince Harry-- but we didn't know just how lovey-dovey she was with her old boyfriends until now Daveprot is a dating coach, entrepreneur, and world traveler.  What is your favorite text to get from a girl? Sure, you can use emojis, but without seeing your body language or hearing the tone of your voice, a lot can get lost over text and there is a ton of space for misinterpretation.  Liars love to claim they are in Delta Force, Army Rangers, Navy Seals or Special Ops.  Then, there's the whole process of trying to craft yet another perfect message.

[tig-donovan-blog]

On Grace and Beauty and Not-Those, Also

I spent yesterday morning reading interviews with Jenny Zhang.

My writing courage was decimated earlier this week, which is okay. That made it a normal day in the write life. It happened because I finished The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro, a book that I neither thought was structurally satisfying nor whose style I necessarily liked overall, but whose last 20 pages absolutely decimated me. It made me remember the kind of thing I want to do, and have no idea how to do, as a writer. Those are good feelings. They give the impression of a sudden springboard, a new starting-off point. I like moments like those.

But I never know how to start again after a reckoning like that. Reading other writers talk about writing pulls me out of that lack of confidence. Jenny Zhang talks a lot about subverting certain narrative structures: omitting the conflation of progression with growth, among others. I’m putting words in her mouth. Here is what she actually says:

I’m writing against oversimplification, I’m writing against crude stereotypes…. I’m not interested in perfect villains and perfect victims. I didn’t want my characters to have to be “good” immigrants in order to be worthy of having their stories told. Their stories cannot be reduced to: we came, we suffered, we persevered. In these stories, the American dream, if achieved at all, is achieved at great cost, only after immense casualties. There are entire stories that can be told in the humble interstices of the more well-known stories about immigrants and young girls. The English canon is full of vile protagonists, narcissists, con-men, despicable anti-heroes, but once we turn the gaze to what is considered “ethnic” literature or “immigrant” literature, we are less willing to be challenged. I wanted these stories to be truthful about the misery of immigrating and starting over, but I also wanted these stories to be plump with humor, adventure, and daring. Some of these characters are too confident to be lost to a singular narrative of victimhood. Other characters are too overflowing with familial love to be purely pitied. Some of these characters victimize others but are too young to be fully held accountable; nonetheless, they commit acts that are too heinous to be forgivable. It’s easy to root for the helpless and the wretched, but in real life, we aren’t cleanly divided into good vs. bad, giving vs. needy. Everyone is flawed, but some of us are punished lethally for it, and others get away with it ad infinitum. The characters in these stories pay dearly for their missteps, but they are also afforded opportunities. I wanted to create narratives that resist crass moralizing and instead demand to be engaged on a more difficult, nuanced level. [x]

Wow. That really gets to the heart of what writing is for me—to tell stories that are complicated, about complicated people, that deal with the notions of justice and mercy but don’t necessarily fall on an easy judgment.

It also gets to the heart of what leads me to peel away a little bit from certain reader-oriented spaces, where I carry a perception, either real or imagined, that there is a fairly large contingent of readers who are sometimes less or altogether not interested in complicated characters or characterizations. They prefer a world where justice and mercy are upheld as paramount—and this is completely fine. Sometimes these transformative values are the point of a story or of its interpretation. Stories are and often should be transformative; it can bring discord, discomfort, discriminations and traumas to a resolving chord, to something that does not hurt so much.

I feel myself, in my writing, both writing dissatisfactory situations and the flawed characters in them and trying to bring them solace, unsure how to do both. When characters try to reckon with the complicated nature of themselves and their pasts, when they fight for peace whether they “deserve” it (objectively or subjectively) or not… these are two concerns that don’t fit so neatly together, and often the outcome of my stories balance dissatisfaction and catharsis in a way that makes even me feel unresolved. In trying to balance two concerns, I worry I do neither satisfactorily. Sometimes a reader floats by who makes it clear that my writing is not what they wanted to read. This is okay! I am aware that my writing is not everyone’s cup of tea. God knows my taste is sometimes excruciatingly narrow. I believe in a freedom to read and freedom to abandon. Writing can be experimental, and sometimes experiments fail. That reality is as value-neutral as abandoning a story because it doesn’t do what you’d hoped or expected it to.

Sometimes, though, I reread some of my old stuff and realize I’ve been trying to do the same thing over and over and over, and I realize I’m obsessed with this balancing of the vulgarity of life with hope about its future. I look at characters who are hard and who are four-alarm fires and indecipherable scribbles of emotion who are actively fusing TNT to the piles of bridges in preparation to destruct their whole lives in pursuit of whatever truth they’re trying to find, and I think, exactly. I want the best for them, but God, I love their flaws. Sometimes a character’s journey is fraught; people’s journeys are fraught. Sometimes these bonfire people scream and fuck up someone else’s life and have to try to piece together what happened later, whether they’re gonna try to redeem themselves for it or not. They’re just trying to get to the next place where they can stop for a second and peer a little bit ahead and try to find the next platform to climb to, and that is both the exact story I’m trying to tell and the same story that leaves an unsatisfied feeling in my life when not everything about their journey gets resolved.

Jenny Zhang, again:

I think grace is something you had to work for, something you had to labor and learn, and practice. And I thought beauty was something inherited. [x]

I think the thing I am trying to put into words is the grace of ugly journeys. Sometimes the people on them are ugly as hell, too. Sometimes they fuck up and do horrible things along the way. I’m not writing about bad people; I’m just writing about people, sometimes quite good people, who sometimes do bad or ugly things. I think there can be grace in that, even when there’s no fucking beauty.

But sometimes there’s beauty, too. Sometimes it’s a matter of finding beauty in the ashes, between those scribbling lines. I make that finding my business. Sometimes it takes a while for my characters to find it, too. I have very little desire to write about things with no redemptive features; there are enough things like that. But sometimes the balance looks bad on the face of it. Sometimes it does not look beautiful, or good, or easy to understand. The thing that frustrates me is when I, when my work, is not given enough of a chance to explain.

I think of The Buried Giant, which confused me for 315 pages until the last 20 made me understand, and hope to be afforded, much of the time, at least that much trust. Unfortunately for me but fortunately for readers, that is not my prerogative. Readers are free to curate and adore and abandon whatever they want. I am also not convinced I’m good enough yet at the kind of balance that deserves to be given a chance. I have to make the payoff worth it; I struggle with the values of this. I have to tell a story actually worth the cost of the journey. I’m still learning, often imperfectly. Some experiments fail. They must. I have to make peace with that, too.

It has to become okay to me if, even when I succeed at what I’m trying to do, the way I try to balance these concerns isn’t people’s cup of tea. I think I’m starting to find gratitude for the people who show frustration with, or misunderstanding of or lack of resonance with, what I write about. It says that I am, in part, succeeding at telling a complicated story, at trying to sell a journey that is not always generous to the people who are on it. This is good feedback, too. These words can afford grace, even if ugly.

A Kazuo Ishiguro quote often occurs to me: “Stories are about one person saying to another: This is the way it feels to me. Can you understand what I’m saying? Does it also feel this way to you?” [x]

This is how humanity feels to me. Does it also feel this way to you? I hope, some of the time, it does. I hope to become better at telling the kind of story that feels real enough to say yes about.