#putting this on the coin blog does anyone know what happened?

[circulating-eel]

bruh

tumblr user @crustaceanhascoins down???

[pseudowho]

Hi Mrs Haitch! First let me say that I adore your stories and the way you write the men in your fics. Not only are they hot and enjoyable to read but also they feel real and adult. I don't want to bash on anyone by saying this, but sometimes it's difficult to enjoy fics written by younger people when you're pushing 30 because they portray a different reality. Please, never stop writing!

Before getting into the next part of the ask I'd like to say that this is in no way a demand and I it's not my intention to trauma dump on you. I just felt like talking a little about my experience could provide a bit of context.

I just read the ask about the soft spot and, although I'm not a virgin, I'm a serial victim of bad sex. I would love technical (even if explicit) descriptions on how to find the famed spot. I think is really cool when women in the medical field talk about sexual health, and it could be good having this kind of knowledge on a famous fic blog like yours, since I imagine a lot of fic readers are either virgins or had less than ideal sexual experiences, like me.

I don't want to seem like I'm pressuring you though! I totally understand if you prefer to keep this kind of thing out of your blog. It's just that a while ago I read on another blog from a healthcare professional a post about how sex shouldn't hurt even in the first time and I was blown away (this happened years after I started having sex and after having deemed myself "defective" and doomed to painful sex to the rest of my life)

Sorry for the long ask. Sending lots of hapiness your way <3

Well, if it helps even one person, it is absolutely my pleasure to do so.

I'm sorry for your bad sex. Nothing excuses it, frankly, and I'm a firm believer that most people are profoundly shit at giving vagina-owners orgasms.

(you calling my blog 'famous' does not go unnoticed and I could blush. Shhhh.)

I think age comes with so much beauty. I am a staunch believer in the unifying power of people, and when groups of women support the ducklings of the group, the ducklings are far less likely to be led down the garden path, on what is 'normal' or 'abnormal' or 'good' or 'bad' in sex.

This is why men and the media fear strongly-bonded groups of women so much-- it's almost like we'll talk and start to take note of the real problems. Cats amongst pigeons, right?

Anyway...

Cw and tw: medical discussion, discussion of self-examination

So again, while the location of the g-spot varies in exact location from vagina-owner to vagina-owner, on average it is located 2-3 inches into the vagina, on the anterior vaginal wall.

What I mean by anterior vaginal wall is, if standing and facing forwards, it's the wall of your vagina closest to the front of you, rather than your back.

Picture posted again, for reference!

The g-spot is of variable size, usually the size of a large coin, and it may feel a bit rougher or ridged than other parts of your vagina, but becomes spongier or thicker and plusher when aroused or stimulated.

If you were to get two fingers on your dominant hand, reach inside the vagina up to the base of your fingers, and hook forwards, you should find it.

I suggest for the first time, finding it when you need to pee. This is because, the g-spot sits against the urethral canal (the tube you pee out of), and if you have a full bladder, you'll know you've found the g-spot because it will feel really sensitive and likely increase your urge to pee.

If you happen to orgasm with g-spot and clitoral stimulation while you have urine in your bladder, your chances of "squirting" (which, if you see my previous post, is almost certainly just pee) are much higher. It's a unique experience and you should try it. Put a towel down.

I find a good sized wand vibrator, inserted and positioned just-so, will give great continuous g-spot stimulation while you, or someone else, goes to town elsewhere.

Start combining all of the erogenous zones and it's party time.

As said previously, sensitivity is very variable. Exploring and knowing yourself is key to showing a partner how to pleasure you.

If you have sex with a partner who responds with anything other than "teach me" absolute enthusiasm, when you want to show them what works for you...if they 'try' for a short time, then give up? If they carry on doing their own thing anyway? If they're impatient?

Kick them to the curb. They can go fuck themselves.

Very much love as always,

-- Haitch xxx

[corviisquire]

Creatures have colors!!

Left to Right: @moonchild-in-blue @leonsleftbicep @ghxstly-death

@pear-island

Left to Right: @a-s-levynn @foundationsofdecay @polteergeistt

They have been colored along with making some minor adjustments. If anyone wants anything changed please let me know! These creatures are yours so name them whatever you want, develop lore if ya want, and do whatever you want with them. Possible next batch will probably be made later next week.

Art notes under cut :D

I put some music drops because music inspires me too much.

Moonchild-in-blue: The blues and purples!! Opals and the insides of muscle shells inspired me a lot with the coloring (particularly the stars and moon). There’s another shell that has that shiny blue and green lining on the inside but I can’t remember the name of it. It was a full moon last night but I forgot to take a picture! Thought of you but anyways I loved coloring the lady. It was fun but I first I struggled on deciding if I wanted more blue or purple.

Some songs I listened to a lot while coloring this:

Sweet Disposition - Temper Trap

Moon Child - F16s

The Night Does Not Belong to God - you know who

Leonsleftbicep: Colors go crazy! Idk what your favorite colors are but I chose The Blue. I also incorporated some red (for yummy contrast and complementary colors). I realized this looked very vampire media core. EyAH enjoy the critter!

Some songs I listened to while coloring this:

Blue Monday - Orgy

Military Fashion Show - And One

The Apparition - do I really need to say who?

Ghxstly-death: Per your request, red and black was incorporated! Was inspired by Mohg, Lord of Blood, from Elden ring cause he has cool robes and a trident thingy. I really like how it turned out. Like I’ve been doing with every design is adding the bling and I felt gold would work well.

Was resisting the urge to put the entire One EP right here:

Get The Balance Right! - Depeche Mode

Mascara - Deftones

Jaws - Slep tonka

SEVEN HOUR SHITTER (pearisland/perryisle): You use bright colors in your art all the time so we got the colors goingggg. Little guy reminds me of Pumpkin Patch protagonist or Hollow Knight. Idk. Not much to say except TRIPLE DEATH SLIME BARRAGE!!!

No normal music for you. only Kevin Macleod and Pizza Tower ST.

A-s-levynn: More Dark Sun Gwyndolin inspiration… (you can tell I have my dark souls art books open next to me right now). As requested, tendrils/tentacles were added! I think it improved the design a whole lot because it was originally very symmetrical and the tentacles added just the right amount of asymmetry to balance out the overall look. I’m a huge fromsoft fan (playing Elden Ring, waiting for new DLC, have dark souls 1 remastered but haven’t started it yet, have bloodborne Elden ring and DS1/3 art books) so lots of my art has elements from Fromsoft games (neutron activation).

And just like everyone else, some music for the soul:

Too Late - 311

Scared Together - Silversun Pickups

Dark Signs - eepy coin

Foundationsofdecay: Again, taking more inspiration from your blog, colors and stuff. The design had subconscious influence from the game sky: children of the light. Had lotsa fun coloring it. I don’t know much about you like favorite colors or flowers but I tried my best!

Songs that inspired me:

Let It Happen - Tame Impala

Flux - Bloc Party

Rain - tired currency

Polteergeistt: The oarfish colors… A lot Of these characters have cool blues so I tried to use some teal blues to contrast the red/pink(?). “Nintendo switch core” I’m sobbing. I fixed the feet. Now my Pinterest is filled to the brim with fish images (specifically oarfish, sea jellies, and blue lobsters).

The music!!!!!:

UNDERWATER BOI - Turnstile

The Illness (Teenagers Remix) - GoodBooks

Descending - exhausted dollar

Thank you so much. All of you are such lovely people. 🫂💕🫶

[deadangelzz]

heyyyyy :3

regarding ur ask game u rbed - im super duper interested in DID n have recurring hyperfixations on it (in the most normal way possible i promise i just have a special interest in psychology sobbing)

pls answer literally any questions u like i dont wanna type out every individual one........ thank u ily

(Answers to some questions below the cut! :D)

Just so no assumptions are made, I feel like I should start by saying that our experience isn’t the same as every other systems experience! This is just what our personal experience with being a system is like! I’m sure you’re already aware of that but sometimes it’s not always at the forefront of people’s minds when talking about CDDs…

❤️ - What type of CDD do you have?

We’re a polyfragmented DID system! Polyfragmentation is when a system has an overall more complex structure (easily splitting sometimes from “every day stress”, complex innerworlds/headspaces, more specific roles beyond caretaker or trauma holder, etcetera) than a non-polyfrag system! It’s not a medically recognized term as far as we’re aware but you can find more info about them on tumblr too! A lot of systems like us go more in depth about their experience as a polyfrag system!

📼 - Do you have any non-human alters? If yes, which species are the majority of them?

We have a lot of non-human alters! We have a couple of moth people (if that’s even what you would call them?? even they don’t really seem to know LMAO), a whole bunch of demons for some reason, and some that aren’t really able to be explained and are just kind of nothing and also everything?

🎞️ - Do the alters in your system use more medical coined roles or more community coined roles? Or both/neither? Do you find them useful?

We use a mixture of both! We’ve found that community coined roles help us understand our jobs a lot better and the overall relationship some of the more job-oriented alters have with the system!

🎙️- Does the taste in music vary a lot between different alters?

I would say so! I think we all enjoy the same music but our preferences are also different. Some of us like death metal and on the opposite end of the spectrum some of us love trashy 2000s pop

⚡️ - What does switching feel like for you? Does it vary between alters?

I’m not sure if it really varies between alters but I think for the most part in my experience switching feels like a disconnection from the mind and body. I can’t really keep one train of thought or remember anything that happened after switching

🌱 - Do you have a headspace? If yes, describe it!

We do have a headspace! It’s split up into different neighborhoods or sections where different alters live. As far as I’m aware these aren’t really split up for any real organizational reason anyone can go to and from different sections if they want!

🍫 - How does your system handle in system disagreements in general?

The way we handle it almost entirely depends on the alter. Some alters we put in a get along shirt and some we have to hold them back from doing something stupid /lh

I hope this was informative in some way! It was a lot of fun to answer these!

(also I love your blog so much…hilson posts keep me thriving)

-Stacey, Gwen

[cozyletters]

Snail Mail Wanted

|| ~ Millennial Bookworm & Fangirl ~ || I thought I'd try Tumblr because IG penpal community seems too intimidating. Everyone has such gorgeous letters and I am one very tired millennial who doesn't have time for artistic and scrapbooky-like envelopes and letters. In saying that, however, I do enjoy writing 10 page letters of anything and everything and nothing all in one. The type of letter where, as soon as you see my letter arrive in the mail, you know to put a cup of tea on and get settled in... and it's like I'm there talking your ear off. (Which is hilarious because I'm a massive introvert who doesn't do that in real life. Unless I'm comfortable enough in your presence and you'll get that crackhead goblin energy from me). I do want to say that I would prefer writing with someone between the ages of 23 - 35. I feel like that's a good age bracket to vibe with, as I certainly don't act my age. So if you're expecting a wise, old woman. That ain't me. Wise? No. Old? ...well being 30 does feel old. Obviously I want to state that: Please do not expect fancy letters, or scrapbook-y decorated letters. I don't have the time or budget to maintain that. I just miss simple, long(ish) handwritten letters. That's it. With the added surprise of a few photos sometimes. Whilst I live comfortably, I am still someone on a budget, so sending parcels is just not doable for me, so if that's also what you're expecting...please find someone else. I would love, love, LOVE to be able to send Parcels but it's just not financially feasible. Alright... Now that we kinda know what to expect from my side of things... onto the daunting 'About Me' section! Hi. My Name is Charlotte. I am 30 years old, from Australia. I am a massive fangirl who jumps fandoms every six months or so but circles back to old fandoms too. I have 3 or 4 Tumblr Blogs floating around dedicated to Fanfiction etc for specific fandoms. I love reading! I have my own lil IG bookstagram account. But it's more to keep myself accountable for actually reading, rather than giving forth my opinion/review and annotating stuff (I don't know how to annotate). I've gotten back into reading after losing out on that long-lost hobby of many years ago. I am a creator of characters. I create and write OCs alongside my friend. 'Roleplay', it's called. But in written form. I love to play video games but I totally suck at them. However, it doesn't stop me from playing. I've also been wanting to get back into Animal Crossing to redo my Island but it feels too overwhelming to do that XD I used to do snail mail before Covid but...y'know...Covid happened and life got turned upside down for everyone. And then, I guess, 2023 became that 'healing back-to-normal' phase. So I guess...as we enter 2024, I think I'd like to have a penpal or two. I don't want to be part of anyone's collections. If you have five penpals already, please don't add me to the list. I'd like one or two because it feels like we're building a meaningful friendship, and I'd 100% like that. I would love to find a penpal from Scotland and Greece, but that's also not a necessary requirement. Anywhere is fine! Erm... I don't know what else to write? If I write too much about me, I'll have nothing left to write in letters. If I write too little here...I'll sound boring as hecc! (Which I am, but that's beside the point). OH! I guess...one thing I do enjoy collecting is coin from other countries. So... y'know...Ka-ching! but with coins. Not notes. I know life is expensive. I couldn't send a $10 note to you because... that $10 could be used! Um...What I'm currently into? Hobby-wise: Books! I do play D&D (Dungeons & Dragons). I am into Formula 1, I love my racing boys and have created my own F1 world with my friend (OCs!). I'm also into Band of Brothers, Generation Kill, Top Gun & Top Gun: Maverick. I vibe with those things right now. Okay. I'll stop talking because I don't know how to make myself sound interesting. You can message me here or email at daisyletters93@gmail.com

[mareenavee]

👜😴 and 💢 for the OC asks. The emojis are evolving!

YOU KNOW WHAT I cannot for the life of me find the key for this ask. I swear I tagged it. I usually do. But even scrolling through my blog has left me without a link back. Maybe the OC emojis evolved right off the website and into the ether. If you have/find the original post, link me in a comment and I'll reblog with a real answer LOL

So I'm going to make it up to you by sharing a snippet that has something to do with the general mood those emojis convey. Perhaps in this case, being tired and annoyed after having traveled somewhere?

From Chapter 19 from, of course, my fic -- The World on Our Shoulders.

“Not everything in this world is as it seems at first glance,” Teldryn said with a shrug. It was what she had said herself, sitting right in this same seat, just yesterday. “That said, I’m going after her.”

“Just be careful, Sero,” Geldis warned. Teldryn nodded and pushed his plate away. It would be best to go pack in case she did indeed manage to get a fair way toward Tel Mithryn on her own. He was ready to go in less than ten minutes, but that was enough for his plans to change drastically. In another veritable whirlwind of ash, Nyenna was already back in the Netch, looking disheveled and furious. She stalked downstairs and tried to pass him on the way to her room, but he stopped her. She set a glowing heart stone down on the table nearby and put her hands on her hips.

“What exactly,” she asked bitterly, “does one have to do in order to not to be swarmed by these ash spawn?” She pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed in utter exasperation. “That and the damned ash storm!? I couldn’t see a thing but the Bulwark out there!”

“I see you’ve been…acquainted…with the ash wastes,” Teldryn said pointedly. She was fuming, face flushed and everything. “I happen to be an expert navigator of them.”

“Yes, I’m sure you are,” she said sarcastically. She gave him a disgusted glare and scooped up the heart stone she’d deposited before stalking away from him toward her room, slamming the door behind her.

“That went about as well as expected,” Geldis said with a snort.

“Give me a moment,” Teldryn sighed. He cracked his knuckles and walked over to her door. Knocked once. Then twice. Geldis only muttered under his breath and turned back to his work.

“Go away!” she said, muffled. Rude, really.

“I know someone else who can help you,” Teldryn said as evenly as he could. The door, much to his surprise, creaked open. She’d let down her hair, which frizzed wildly in every direction. She folded her arms and leveled him with an irritated stare.

“What?” she asked, still seeming a bit short-tempered.

“I’m friends with the smith in the market square. I could introduce you, and maybe he can make you a helmet or a mask or something so you can get through the ash storms more easily,” he said quickly, fully convinced she’d slam the door in his face before he finished talking. She sniffed loudly and stepped out of her room. She’d already shed the metal layer of her armor. One of her sleeves was torn straight through to her undershirt and a long, raised welt circled the exposed skin of her arm. She’d crossed paths with a netch in the storm, it seemed. He’d done that himself more than once.

“Fine,” she grumbled. “Thank you. I’m not going out of town again today, anyway.” He nodded and she closed the door on him again. It was progress. He did feel a little sorry for her troubles, though. He wondered if even the guards had tried to warn her or not. Anyone out there could have seen the signs a storm was brewing. If he’d been awake, he’d have told her, at the very least, though…from what little he could discern about her, she’d probably have gone off on her own anyway. Teldryn sat at the table nearest to her room. Geldis brought over a pot of tea for her, which he wouldn’t take any coin for, even as Teldryn tried to pay for it. In a few moments, Nyenna came out of her room, torn armor in hand, and sat down heavily next to him.

“Thanks for the tea,” she said with a small nod in his direction. Her hair was pulled back away from her face now, but it was still looking pretty wild, especially without her circlet. She was wearing a mage robe with fine teal embroidery, which suited her, he thought. Teldryn cracked the tiniest of smiles and nodded back. Oh no, he wasn’t about to let Geldis take the credit for this act of kindness. This could be part of a second attempt, maybe. He watched as she poured herself a cup, and then glanced up at him and pushed the other mug and the rest of the tea toward him.

“No problem at all,” he drawled. Geldis made an affronted sound up by the bar, but busied himself with drying dishes and mugs as he usually did, and said nothing more. Teldryn waited while she began to stitch the tear in her armor sleeve with heavy black thread. Her eyebrows knit as she concentrated. Her hands moved deftly, and he noticed other similar fixes the more she turned the armor to work on it. He sipped his own tea in relative silence, until she bit the end of her thread after tying it off, and held out the sleeve to check it.

“All set,” she said. Teldryn leaned toward her and instead of moving away from him, she showed off her handiwork. “Not bad, considering the size of the…ehm…thing that I stupidly ran underneath. I can’t believe how much damage they can do when startled!”

“The netch?” Teldryn asked with a chortle.

“Yes! Honestly, I can’t believe I forgot. To be fair, I’d never seen one before. I figured if I followed the shore I’d get to Tel Mithryn without too much trouble… and then when the ash storm hit, I didn’t even know which direction I was walking. I didn’t see the thing until it was too late. Their stings really hurt, actually,” she said, rubbing her arm as if a ghost of the previous pain had flared up. “But it didn’t continue to attack me, really, it just sort of floated further out over the water with two even larger netch.”

“You were lucky they didn’t see you as a threat. Even a raging netch calf can easily kill a man in seconds. I’ve seen it,” Teldryn said somberly.

“I’d have been fine,” Nyenna said dismissively. She folded her armor. Teldryn leaned his elbows on the table and looked at her with a wry grin. She’d said that without much confidence behind it. Just a surety, like it was fact and nothing more. Like no matter what she attempted, something would bring her through it. Perhaps even if she didn’t want that to be the case. Perhaps like some kind of legendary hero…

[fairymint]

SHIPPING INFO. Answer the following for your muse(s) so people know how shipping works on your blog.

What’s your OTP for your muse(s)?

....there's a lot, and the most 'realized' of them atm is trainer Felix x Volo, although admittedly no OTPs are 'active' right now brainwise I've been slowly rotating Zivan and Felix, or Rex and Felix, but those are more vague sexual ideas rather than details;

What are you willing to RP when it comes to shipping?

Most everything, but my writing boundaries are more mun-based; I will not ship/write with you if you constantly churn out single sentence or generic replies-

I am not a fetish or smut/etc. machine that you can just put coins in to redeem. also, I don't care if your muse is shy or a bottom or whatever- you need to learn how to write descriptively to make up for that.

They need to be a good victim, or else it's not fun, and you're making me write a glorified fic in that case. Try to match my energy here.

Unrelatedly, I don't RP on huge image, generic 'open to all' starters; it just feels too close to 'bullshitting on stolen* fanart' than writing a story.

and lastly, I don't write super upsetting topics of active noncon for the benefit of everyone; writing it respectfully or realistically sounds like more work than it's worth. Theoretically possible, and I have a strong stomach, but nah. As for sexual myths, I'm just tired of seeing them and the misinfo pisses me off; not the person writing tho, so I'll ask you to edit your reply with more correct info.

How large does the age gap have to be to make it uncomfortable?

American School range, I suppose? As in, middle school with middle schoolers, high schoolers with high schoolers; 4 years at most. Case by case, as we all know that a lot of growing happens at those ages. (tbh in different countries w/ different school gaps, I'd follow those instead.) However, Kids are not usually the best at relationships IRL, so shit happens and I'm not actually super into 'toy shipping' as it's called, unless it's pretty wholesome. If it's adorable and interaction is reasonable, I'll find it cute. If not, meh.

As far as adults go though, I don't mind age gaps. Lots of teenagers get antsy waiting for the big 18, so are mentally prepared on purpose for the big leap- but just lack experience, which can happen at any age. (especially when sheltered/spoiled.) Relationship problems have all to do with cooperation and situation anyways- things like chores, financial situation, boundaries... I do personally prefer a slow-burn with 18 year olds dating anyone too much older, with small room for exception if they're exceptionally bold and/or responsible. (read: slow burn would feel undoubtedly ooc for them. But my older muses will not take the lead here, so to speak.) That's more about not being a creep than ability to consent.

Are you selective when shipping?

a smidge. I've rejected ships before based on excessive teasing because my muse really wasn't into it, as a pretty serious/stoic/smartass/dominant character that doesn't like to be thrown around playfully.

I think I need to be asked/told that you want to ship if our muses don't have chemistry, that way I can plot some instead. I'm a very 'my muses drive themselves' unless asked otherwise.

But I'm not here to play games, though. If you're a no ship blog, or the character is no ship, the intent is not there, regardless of IC feelings; I'm expecting IC rejection in that case, it's this magical thing called a 'crush'. On a similar note, I'm not comfortable with muse creation biases; If you 'don't ship with OCs/Self Inserts/trans' or any blanket statement, you're starting to make assumptions that will piss me off, and you don't get other ships. I don't follow people with rules like this, so springing it on me during discussion isn't welcome, either.

How far do steamy moments have to go before they’re considered NSFW?

I usually cut it as actual sex acts, and depiction of arousal; that moment when making out devolves into explicitly wanting sex. Suggestive tags usually lie on the border for me; things that people joke about or are allowed on radio/tv.

Does one have to ask to ship with you?

I prefer it, but technically no. If our muses have chemistry and the question pops naturally in replies, I'll count it and likely double-check ooc.

But, y'know, old habits die hard and I have the reflex as a self insert player to always ask first and be clear, if it's coming from my side. I usually let crushes and sexual desire bother my muses while they figure out the logistics of actually acting on them and asking.

I'm delighted if I'm asked before the fact and happy to help, however! Because that's both consent and a prompt/challenge; how to make em get together and like each other/etc.? These ideas sound cute to me.

How often do you like to ship?

it's my comfort zone, but let's be real, I'd interact with my entire dash if i had the time and muse. platonic or otherwise. I theoretically don't give a shit if i ship or not, but will fall into shipping content if i'm feeling lazy. Because I've written it a lot before. comphet i guess???

Are you multiship?

Yes, in the sense that I'm not playing with the whole 'jealous rp partners' thing; I'm poly IRL and not interested in ship wars.

But, I'm fine with things like IC Poly, have my biases, and am okay with commentary that's non-toxic on an ooc level.

Are you ship obsessed or ship more-or-less?

like i said, shipping is my lazy comfort zone; I'll be thinking of ships in bed and ooc when I'm chilling. But attention is good. dynamics are good. no need to be afraid if you're on the platonic and aromantic-interactions boat. We can't all be romantically compatible 24/7.

What is your favourite ship in your current fandom?

I'm not invested enough in my latest games quite yet; I suppose from Mistria, Eiland is cute, and I kinda ship the protag with Juniper as well!

I'm a bit of a LambxNarinder fan for the karma-esque, 'mercy is cruel' irony; marrying your biggest threat and User is just funny to me, especially if the relationship itself isn't cruel afterwards. I wanna see the death cat crumble under kindness-

in a meta way, my brain is rotisserie rotating Zivan, Rex, Volo, and Naoya as 'he's hot i'm gay' without much further thought; life's been a bit hectic for fantasy lately.

Finally, how does one ship with you?

Asking me at any point is the most reliable, IC chemistry and asking is possible. Suitable prompts and opens count as asking IC.

As a bonus, feel free to ask anytime about what my muse's opinion of yours is, if that's what helps you decide what to do. I'm honest when it comes to that shit, because it's fun-

Tagged by: stole it!

Tagging: take it!

[clowncaraz-journal]

"The shapeshifting seen in folklore and ancient practice, aka what I assume you are referring to when you say since the beginning of time, is shapeshifting not in the sense of physically changing ones body, but more of a shamanic (for lack of a better word) trance state, akin to spirit flight/astral projection (which I myself, as a witch, practice and experience with.)"

____

This is what I mean when I say you don't exactly have knowledge of our community. The late 2010s is when shifters began to "die out" as a community. A post here legit stops at 2018 because that's when everything actually stopped for a moment (outside of lone blogs on tumblr and other blog sites). That's legit where our history stopped until maybe 2020 to 2022, where our Aminos and Tumblrs began to become active and when I decided to leave the otherkin communities.

The act of shifting as embraced not just the physical but the metaphysical since 2017 and onwards. I have actively aided in including reality shifting and intrasomal shifting, two metaphysical/sensory ways of shifting into physical shifting because of their physical phenomena and experiences. Physical shifting is not this black and white practice, it is freedom and it is a choice. No one is forced to shift or has to shift everyday to be a shifter - no one thinks about shifting 24/7 unless they experience species dysphoria.

Most of the shifters I know actively use metaphysical or sensory practices or shift on multiple layers, not just the hard physical. The hard physical also includes things like psychosomatic changes to full own fur growth. The growth of the community has been developing in other spaces where we have put in the effort to actively change and go back to our "shamanic" roots and accept that not all shifters shift their bones and muscles.

____

"im gonna be blunt: this is horseshit. Its one thing to have a community to share experiences with a disorder and talk about delusions, its another to completely embrace said delusions and hallucinations and pass them off as harmless simply because they make you comfortable. Me growing wings made me comfortable, but it also caused significant harm to me. Comfortable doesn't always equal harmless. I experience hallucinations every now and again to this day, and it would be great, actually, if I didn't! I never said i was shaming anyone for experience delusions, but I certainly stand by what I said in regards to not encouraging delusions."

____

I'd recommend you speak to a zoanthrope as I am only a friend to many of them. I suggest reading @/a-minke-whales-tale and speaking to @/defrostedvertebrae about their part in coining Holothere. you might actually learn more from them than me lol.

____

"I understand people have a subjective reality, but there's also SCIENTIFIC REALITY. BIOLOGICAL REALITY. If one is to deny that, it can open a doorway to self harm, even if one doesn't see it as such. Just because one's subject reality says they can grow wings or physically shift into a wolf doesn't mean it's actually happening, period."

____

No one denies objective reality, which is the biological reality where things happen at a level beyond the body and mind and self. What subjective reality does is fill in the gap that diversifies and the complexity of the mundane, of the everyday. Someone is not dangerous for practicing or engaging in different kinks or relationships than you that contain 24/7 roleplay, so why is someone who mostly experiences these things in their mind, in their somatic body, and by themselves - dangerous to people? Just for expressing the bottled up emotions? What do you think reality checking does to them? Do you think that turns them human?

____

"the more i read this the less I feel you actually sympathize with what I went through at the hands of this community. I would actually GLADLY go back to a time when P-shifters weren't welcome in the community because that actually kept people safe."

____

Sympathy doesn't allow time for babying or coddling the emotions of others, it is entirely about understanding and recognizing the pain - telling another they can feel that pain with them. But I am familiar with pain like this and have been fucked over so many times. Real fact, people think I laugh a lot because I'm an immature child. But I'm an adult and I laugh because it's easier.

I sympathize with your pain. But as I said, sympathy isn't ignorance.

____

"no matter how long physical shifters and the like have been here, it doesn't change the fact that the ideaology behind it causes lasting harm to others, worsens ones mental health, and is inherently actively anti-recovery. I never said for yall to confess to being monsters nor did I accuse yall of being monsters, i simply pointed out the facts that the ideaology itself is harmful... but i mean if the shoe fits be my guest. If alterhuman, as a community, is going to be accepting of these types of ideaologies then i am GLADLY not alterhuman."

____

Who told you we want your help?

Who told you we want to escape or to heal or to rinse off our cultures and our identities? I've met so many diverse people, Ive made people cry by showing them they can be a shifter if they want, so many shifters have been in the community trying to fix the mess that others made before us. who said we want to recover? who said we don't just want community, happiness, joy, love?

why do you think you know what's good for us just because you got hurt by a group that pretended to be one us? im not trying to sound mean or anything, but im being blunt, who told you to come save us?

what makes you think we're sad? what makes you think we're suffering? what makes you think we're not satisfied?

who do you think needs to be saved and why do you infantilize us?

My Experience with P-Shifters & Mythicals, and why I'm Anti Physical IDs for Alterhumanity.

[Massive TW for Cults, Abuse(Including Digital SA, including COCSA), Delusions + Validation/Encouragement of Delusion, and probably more that I cannot for the life of me think of off the top of my head]

Hello, I'm Phoenix, but you can also call me Silverthorn. I've been in the nonhuman community since 2011-2013, and initially got my start in P-Shifter/Mythical communities, the ones of most note being ArdaErellon, GrowingWings4Life(usually just called Grow Wings.), and other adjacent webs.com forums.

I'll be documenting my experience with the community chronologically to the best of my ability, but do be aware that it may be a bit splotchy, as my memory of it all is a little janky due to the trauma and the fact this occured over 10 years ago now. It is of importance to note: I am neurodivergent, I speak from the perspective of someone who has been dealing with undiagnosed autism since childhood, which in turn, did influence my level of understanding of the world. My memory is also a little messed up due to dissociation from childhood trauma.

2011 - 2012: The Start - My start with P-Shifting began in 6th grade, when I was 11. I had met someone, who I will refer to here as Dragon. Dragon was my closest friend, however this was NOT a good thing. I had begun awakening to my inherent nonhumanity, but you know, when you're young, you'll believe in very fantastical things. Dragon was a P-Shifter, and I thought I was too. This is how our friendship really solidified. What easily could have been innocent schoolyard RP became grounds for abuse, manipulation, etc. Dragon convinced me that everyone hated us, and people would actively run away from me because where I went, she followed. Dragon was notoriously an asshole to others, but she used this to convince me that everyone hated me.

2013-2015: Aka "The Peak". 2013 is when I entered the online P-Shifter scene. Now, I had read websites and guides on p-shifting prior to this, but this is when I actually got INVOLVED so to speak. After reading some of the Maximum Ride books, I began experiencing phantom shifts of wings, which in turn lead to me joining GrowingWings4Life (colloquially known as Grow Wings), a forum on webs.com for Avians and other mythicals. I, obviously, began attempting to grow wings. This is where I met my flock. I've named two of them here before, but for the sake of this post I will be using stand in names. I also got my first scoliosis dx at age 13, during a school evaluation. This will come up again in another section of this post.

Aqua was the first one I met, she was basically a sister to me. She was honestly the first REAL friend I had, to the point where we called eachother sis. It was through her where we met the rest of our flock, albeit most of them would separate except for Red. Red was another one of the flock, unlike the other key members (Julio and Cailen. I WILL namedrop them for the bullshit they did. Julio was 18, and I don't remember Cailen's age but I do believe she was older than me, Aqua, and Red. I think maybe 18 but I'm not Positive.), he was also 13, like Aqua and I.

Julio got kicked from the flock for trying to groom Aqua and I over kik (classic 2013 experience I know), and Cailen went separate ways after a breakup with Red (she did some HORRIFIC things to him, which I will not disclose here other than it being SA) Things with the flock started out good at first, I mean why wouldn't it? Of course, we also learned about Awtok. We genuinely believed in them, and in part, were responsible for bringing knowledge of Awtok to Grow Wings out of sheer FEAR for everyone's saftey. Awtok's chokehold on our flock specifically remained.

Enter G32: Another school friend of mine, and self-professed Keyblade master. Though not an avian and p-shifter like the rest of us, he was part of our flock. I do fully blame myself and take responsibility for getting him involved with the flock + the consequences of doing so. He got involved the summer of 2014, but I had known him prior, and trusted him. G32 was someone we went to for advice and whatnot. In a way, despite Red and I being the leaders of the flock (when we started dating in 2014), I'd consider G32 to be the one pulling everyone's strings.

It was through G32, that Red became convinced he was a monster. Again, wont go into full details but this lead him to spiral into full on delusions. I remember him texting me in a state of extreme distress one night because he had "seen" his "true form" in the mirror. Looking back, this was clearly a hallucination. He ended up having MULTIPLE experiences like this. Now, he had been having some experiences akin to this prior to G32's claims about Red's true nature, but it was only after those that things got as bad as they did, such as full on berseker shifts for what his species was. (According to G32 the species was like an offshoot of the heartless from Kingdom Hearts.)

G32 also, on multiple occasions, forged messages from AWTOK, usually through 3DS swapnote, and then also forged messages from other "keyblade masters" who got involved with the flock via fake phone numbers.

Back to Red, because of the sheer amount of abuse he went through, ended up repeating the cycle of abuse with me. What he did to me was not ok. He had, through Cailen's abuse, become to believe he was possessed by a succubus who was Cailen. This began his manipulation of me, going so far as for this "possession" to lead to basically the Succubus threatening to leave me if I did not engage in sexual text-rp/sexting with Red as a way to prove my love & devotion. It eventually stopped, though i cannot remember what caused it to stop. Again, we both were 14 and severely mentally ill. I DO NOT HOLD THIS AGAINST HIM, AND I FORGIVE HIM FOR THIS. WE BOTH WERE VICTIMS.

Now, Red was VERY remorseful of what had happened, though we never actually talked about it or mentioned it after that, though I wish we did. It pretty much was him just apologizing but not specifying the incident (most because I told him not to), and me not actually letting him confess to what had happened. I wish I would have let him speak, but I was a scared child. Like I said, looking back now, and not out of a place of hurt, I can recognize he and I were both victims of abuse.

Come 2015, shit with G32 really hit the fan. From forging messages from other keyblade wielders turning against the flock, threatening to kill us for being traitors by aligning ourselves with Red, and the like, to then, when we stood up for ourselves, claiming it was all fake and a lie he spun, and then back to threatening us with the keyblade wielders after. It got to a point where it almost became a physical altercation on school grounds the following day. It was after this that things fell apart. The flock stuck together but ultimately separated, with the last I've heard from any of them being in 2016.

2016 & Onward: 2016 I still held onto some P-Shifting beliefs, but had begun to break away from them. It was really only come 2018 that I had fully recognized the nature of my beliefs were steeped in delusion, albeit the occasional relapse into p-shifter thoughts does occur to this day. I'd be lying if I'd said I haven't attempted to p-shift despite knowing and accepting it's impossible.

Now, other things not in this timeline that did happen, but I didn't feel were as interwoven with my flock experience:

ArdaErellon - when GrowWings went down, this kinda became one of the main sites people went to. It's not up anymore but I do remember the admin, Tinnuwen, asking people for their IRL locations, like addresses and whatnot, in order to open portals near them so they could travel to the realm of ArdaErellon.

Razgriz Pack & Other Cyberpacks - I got involved with a cyberpack when I was 13, when I didn't want much to do with them they threatened to send their other werewolves after me lol. I Don't remember if it was Razgriz or a different pack that I was involved in, mostly because I didn't spend much time around them.

Why I'm Making This Post:

I make this post because I've seen a resurgence in the P-Shifter & Mythical communities. Moreso, I've seen this become accepted and welcomed into the alterhuman community, which poses a SIGNIFICANT threat to the saftey and wellbeing of others. I've seen people ACTIVELY encouraging and validating delusions of Clinical Lycanthropes/Zoanthropes, claiming that it is harmless. IT IS NOT, I KNOW FROM EXPERIENCE.

My wing delusions were encouraged, and we avians took any criticism of our attempts as threats and people just wanting to be assholes. Because of the repeated validation of my "physical" wing growth, i actively avoided getting treatment for my scoliosis for over 2 years. Like i said earlier in this post, during an exam at school, they felt my spine was curved. However, because I fully believed I was growing wings, I REFUSED to let my family take me to the doctor, refused to let them get x-rays of me, for fear that they'd discover my wings, because I was a terrified CHILD. This lead to my spine becoming so severely curved that I was at risk of my lungs collapsing. I fear to see what would have happened to me had I not eventually gotten surgery in 2015. The point is, the beliefs involved with subcultures such as p-shifters, holotheres, mythicals, etc. is inherently harmful. The denial to accept ones biological humanity, and the laws of physics that come with it, is a saftey risk. When people speak out about their experiences, they get dogpiled by the physical therian community, and victim blamed. When we explain why these things are harmful, we get accused of a whole slew of things, such as trying to make humans like us, or bring ableist by saying that encouraging delusion is harmful.

Me, Red, and Aqua should NOT have had to live out our teen years in fear of AWTOK, in fear of uncontrollable shifts, in fear of hunters, etc. We should have been able to have our formative teen years be normal. My friend Sundew, also known as @aesthetikins , was there when I was going through all of this, as we met in highschool. E knows first hand the amount of damage this stuff did to me, as again, e was there when it happened.

This is also the one time I feel OK to be That Guy and put this in the tags of the harmful groups I'm talking about, because maybe, JUST MAYBE, it'll save someone else from going through shit like what I went through. Edit: this is ok to reblog, and i actually encourage it

[mcytkinconfessions]

ah, sorry, i should've asked. an irl is similar to a kin on the surface, but they're rlly not the same

but its more of a 'i am this character this character is me' than a kin is

and ppl with d/as (delusional associations) coined and use the term irl most, im not rlly qualified to explain what a d/a is, struggling to explain an irl as is lmao

i uh, not sure how to tag, but just swap in the phrase irl where you'd usually put kin

I’m going to try and keep this polite. Let me be clear that my anger is not directed at you, but at the misinformation rampant in our community. I want this confession blog to be a safe place. I want to help and give back to a community I genuinely love being a part of.

I was hoping I wouldn’t have to deal with DA stuff here yet, that I’d have a plan when it did come up. Wishful thinking on my part I suppose.

As far as anyone who I’ve spoken to can tell, DA refers to one of two things:

Alterhumans who don’t have much experience in the community who have been told time and time again that to believe that they are a character with such conviction they must be experiencing delusions. To the point where they believe it.

Alterhumans whos identities are informed by their delusions. In which case using a term that doesn’t include any reference to delusion makes sense, since the medical term is “Delusional Misidentification”. Delusional Attachment as a term does not make sense in this context.

While I’m here I want to say that if “i am this character this character is me” is not how you would describe your kintype, then it is not a kintype by definition.

A kintype is not inherently a past life. A past life is not inherently a kintype. Spiritual kintypes are not always past lives. Kintypes are not inherently spiritual in nature.

You can have a kintype caused by delusions. Like that’s a valid way to be ‘kin. An identity caused by delusion can be not a kintype, but honestly that comes down to personal experience. Something can be a kintype for funky brain reasons.

You don’t have to know why something is a kintype.

A kintype isn’t memories and sourcemates and phantom limbs. A kintype is something you look at and go “Yeah, that’s me.” at a fundamental level. And if you could remove it from yourself, you wouldn’t be you anymore. There’s a reason so many transgender otherkin describe being otherkin as a lot like being trans, it’s one of the best comparisons we have.

I got another anon today:

[ID: I'm gonna be honest the whole IRL and D/A thing still confuses me and honestly makes me uncomfortable. Like. No, this is me. And now anytime I have the urge to send out a sourcecall I get worried because. What if kff respond? What if I get led on again into believing someone that's lying? I'm gullible enough as is, I'm scared of someone just. Yea. Plus what if they end up thinking I'm delusional? I'm not but... it's happened before where people think I'm taking this "too seriously" or that I'm just a "delusional attachment". I'm just. Scared of the rejection from people that I see my old friends in? I'm scared of the disappointment.]

This is the harm DAs and IRLs are doing to the otherkin community. This is why misinformation hurts us. This is a story you hear time and time again.

We’re all tired and hurting and I cannot, in good conscience, post anything from a DA or IRL. If you want it posting either don’t specify and I’ll tag it as ‘kin, or actually do some research into the alterhuman community like you should have done to begin with and come back when you know better.

I don’t blame IRLs and DAs for this, to clarify, this is because of kin-for-fun who refused to listen when they were told they weren’t ‘kin and created a community so large it drowned out the actual otherkin community before we even knew what hit us, that have made everyone think ‘kin is just relating to a character. That look at the otherkin community as it used to be and say “We don’t kin in a weird way like them”, who ignore 50+ years of community history.

This hurts the people who are ‘kin who don’t know what the words really mean, who have been kept from our community by this misinformation and may never find that history. It hurts people with delusions who are shoved into this whole DA thing too, because they can’t find their people either.

I’m going to include resources on identities caused by delusions on my glossary page, which I’m currently working on and should be posted in the next few days. I do know it can be extremely hard to know where to start with the whole research thing when it comes to alterhumanity.

For the ask I’ve screenshotted here I’m going to give you a separate answer.

-T

[onesweetworld18]

I posted 16,023 times in 2022

That's 2,502 more posts than 2021!

1,020 posts created (6%)

15,003 posts reblogged (94%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@lovingstheantidote

@hldailyupdate

@yourgoldenview

@allwaswell16

@dailytomlinson

I tagged 3,385 of my posts in 2022

#wow - 45 posts

#pta mom - 29 posts

#i love this - 28 posts

#i love him - 24 posts

#this is amazing - 23 posts

#oh my god - 23 posts

#omg - 17 posts

#this - 17 posts

#yes - 17 posts

#louis tomlinson - 17 posts

Longest Tag: 122 characters

#if harry’s favorite group of people is his merry band of white men managers i think i would stab myself with a steak knife

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

I will do a post-show write up, but I think this sums it up the best. I asked my mom after the show which of the three that she has seen did she like the best (Harry, Niall, or Louis) and she said, “I think Louis. They are all very good. Niall really like the music and is very talented, Harry puts on a show, but Louis is all heart. You can tell he’s all heart.”

And like if that doesn’t explain Louis I don’t know what does.

421 notes - Posted February 13, 2022

#4

Ok, a few notes on the Louis show.

I was in the VIP viewing area so I was right in front of where he came on. Security kicked EVERYONE out aside from press. Like Elie Goulding’s crew even had to move to the back of my section. His whole team (Matt and Mark managers) and people who look like they were in the BMG camp were there and behind me.

The way Louis walks with the absolute BDE energy is insane. Seeing it in person is just truly, truly unreal to witness. He truly is a wonderful person to just admire.

Josh runs around everywhere and sings as he is filming.

Krystal is shorter than I thought she would be!

People did the “woo woo woo” thing Harry does during his shows and the people from Elise’s crew were so so confused so I had to explain why that was happening. They found it odd (as did I.)

While Louis wasn’t overly chatty, he was so fucking amazing and had the crowd in the palm of his hand. Everyone was into him and basically him alone. I truly don’t know if anyone came specifically for another artist. (Speaking as an Oldie™️) who is Young Gravy and why is he a thing? He was disgusting.

Oli got stopped for trying to go backstage. My friend goes “what does he do?” And I explained his role and she found it amazing.

I love Louis so much. Bigger Than Me sounds so good live. It’s just going to get better.

They played Harry like 5 times before/during the sets.

I love him. I love him. I love him!

There was also a huge ad for his album on the screens as we were leaving!

See the full post

450 notes - Posted September 16, 2022

#3

Sometimes I’m reminded of Louis going to Barcelona and Harry showing up with the Barcelona coin bracelet just as soon as Louis came back and like I need to lie down. Must be the mold.

459 notes - Posted November 2, 2022

#2

Coachella was an opportunity for the general public and (mostly) non or casual fans to see Harry. These are the people who read the headlines, believe what they are told, and (probably) believe the womanizing het narrative they’ve been sold. But instead of playing it safe, instead of toeing the line, Harry didn’t play. He said rainbow sequin jumpsuit and gay cowboy fantasy with my initials on the ass. These people saw the Harry we have known for 10 plus years. The flamboyant, supportive, funny, talented, flamboyant, goober he is. I hope that at least a small percentage of these people will leave and go “that was gay. That wasn’t the dude I’ve been told about” and question the narrative they’re forced. He isn’t that, and I’m really glad Harry got to prance in front of 100,000 people and be the Harry we know and love. I hope everyone else catches on that HARRY is enough.

829 notes - Posted April 23, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

Harry having a pretentious music festival forced to sing and listed to “What Makes You Beautiful” a song and fan base that has been constantly disparaged and overlooked by music snobs and executives is probably the best and biggest flex ever.

1,099 notes - Posted April 16, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[mickgaydolenz]

first of all-HEY YOU CHANGED YOUR BLOG YOU CONFUSED ME and second of all-here's my dream

I was at the library, but I wanted some lemonade and told myself I didn't want any the library was selling so I walked all the way from the library in the city to the market in my neighborhood which took forever, and once I got close I started smoking a cigarette. like. I pulled out an entire pack and started smoking, and when I was going in a butt-it-out and put it behind my ear because I didn't want anyone to think I was some gross smoker, just a regular one. and I got to the lemonades and I looked for the cheapest one which was I wanna say two twenty-five (sorry not good with remembering numbers in my dream) and I pulled out some change and did the math so I grabbed the lemonade and the girl ringing me up was so pretty😭😭 like. it is not fair how beautiful this girl was. and I had a cigarette on my ear with a mullet buying lemonade with pocket coins. I should've gotten knocked out fr. then next thing I know I'm WORKING there about to do my first shift all alone and the guy told me that the door didn't lock anymore, but I still kept asking him for a key so I can close it down eventually, but he just kept talking over me, and then when everyone was gone I lit up another cigarette and started smoking all of the lights went out, then they came back on and a CLOWN ANIMATRONIC WAS IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROOM STARING AT ME so I kinda froze. like. what does one do in a situation like this. soon enough I grow some balls and put the animatronic in the alley and did everything. like I helped customers and stuff. then at the end of the night when I was closing down I was taking out the trash and the animatronic was gone....and I was smoking AGAIN and I looked around for the clown, THEN SOMETHING FROM BEHIND GRABBED ME AND BEGAN PULLING ME INTO THE DARK STORE BY MY HEAD??? I don't know how but I get away and run all the way to the library where I meet up with the librarian and start begging him to help me, but he just looked at me and went. "you're smoking in a library. get out." ???? how tf did I manage to not lose the cigarette in my mouth???? then I started going home but I kept seeing the clown everywhere and when I got home it began banging on my windows and then I woke up

aren't fever-dreams just fun.

👀👀👀👀👀👀👀 raya what. in the actual. fuck???? love that you just casually were a smoker the whole dream though ���. that legit is a truly vile nightmare though, i would actually just kms in the dream if that was what was happening to me. i’m absolutely not getting slow stalked by a clown animatronic, no fucking thank you 💀. fun fact though, that exact situation would be my twin’s dream. they fucking love clowns and have always wanted to be haunted in some way…..

[demonslayedher]

Hello! I don't know if you've been asked about this before but I love your analysis and reflections and I'd love to know all your thoughts about Zennezu if you don't mind 👀⚡🎀 Thanks so much for this blog!! 😊💝

Thank you again for your patience, as well as your comments on my fics and stuff in the meantime (even on Bird Fic, kya~ thank you <3). All my thoughts, hmmmmn…. Well, clearly I am a fluffy ZenNezu shipper and ship-content creator now, but I sure didn’t start that way. This may be long and rambling and mixed between analysis and personal taste. (Actually, it turned into almost 4000 words.)

So. First a little background. I usually am not much of a shipper. The very few OTPs I have all ended in horrific tragedy, and when romance is a big focus of something I’m otherwise enjoying I usually end up not paying much attention to it in favor of all the other elements I like. This is so much more the case when you can tell they’re going to wind up happily ever after. So what happened to make me so soft and fuzzy about the Kimetsu ships, when I otherwise usually don’t have an appetite for happy fluffy romantic endings?

Three major factors: 1. I’m obsessed. 2. I love these characters and want to see anything and everything about them. 3. Romance wasn’t actually a big element at all in canon, so it left me with an appetite and curiosity for it.

Even though I figured from long ago that ZenNezu would be end game, initially I was somewhere between indifferent and put-off. As much as I love Zenitsu, and I acknowledge that Ufotable the added the “run around and chase Nezuko” bit and removed the part with Zenitsu adoringly talking to Nezuko through her box, and as much as he can be defended for being lonely rather a pervert, the fact still stands that his level of appreciation for girls makes the characters around him uncomfortable. His most cringe-worthy lines at the Butterfly Mansion are all straight from the manga, and even though he was easily one of my favorite characters by the end of my initial watch of the series, I was very put off by his “girls are all queens” surface-level comments and more disturbing pleasure he took in the presence of girls (especially when he could physically interact with them), not to mention his pathetic introduction bothering a complete stranger and displaying that he doesn’t actually take girls’ feelings into consideration.

All this made me inwardly groan, feeling bad for Nezuko, figuring they were going to wind up together because she’s a saint who can find the patience to deal with someone like that, as he clearly wasn’t going to be desirable to any of the rest of the female cast. Enjoying the series well enough despite this, it didn’t bother me terribly much, pairings happen, whatever, I have a history of ignoring them. But one day, well and deep into caring about this whole cast like they’re all my children, I realized something. Isn’t… isn’t it cute how they both get their strength from taking naps? W-wouldn’t it be cute to see them innocently take naps together? Naps to protect each other? Oh. Oh-h-h-h-h. Oh dear. Oh no, it’s cute. Oh no. OH NO.

And that was how my warming up to this pairing started, it very quickly grew into “I love these children and I want them to be happy, being with Nezuko will make Zenitsu very, very happy, I love seeing him happy, happy Zenitsu” but was still a little reserved about Nezuko. Zenitsu was going to make her happy, right? It wasn’t just going to be a case of Nezuko having gotten fond of him over the course of everything they’ve been though, he is actually going to be her taste and make her heart go “kyun” right? Oh Nezuko, oh saintly Nezuko…

Let’s take a moment to pause here and think chronologically, though, as well as analyze their personalities and tastes. Neither of them are particularly picky, we can start there. Aside from fussy busy-bodies like Aoi, as long as it’s a girl, any girl is Zenitsu’s type. He’s desperate, and he’s painted the whole of girl-kind in pretty similar, not always realistic rosy colors. Even though he’s been used and abused by so many girls in his past, it’s his desire to believe that each new one he meets will fit that rosy imaginary color he paints over them that he chooses to let himself be duped, because he really is that lonely. I’ll give him that, sure, he’s a healthy young man with an interest in physical touch, but his dream in Mugen Ressha gives a good indication of what he’s really looking for: companionship, someone who likes spending time with him, someone who will find him useful and believe in him and look to him for protection, someone who likes him enough to spare him the physical intimacy of simply holding his hand. This is all an extension of what Zenitsu desires as whole, hoping he can better himself enough to be reliable and valued in general. Picturing it in the form of a significant other is one very vivid way to focus all those feelings, resulting in that rosy ideal which Zenitsu probably knows in his heart of hearts is too good to be true. That’s why he probably doesn’t think he’s ever going to find it, and therefore why he’s all over any slightest chance of attaining it.

My gosh, if being abandoned over and over isn’t enough, the fact that none of the girls he dated in the past were ever willing to even hold his hand hurts so much.

Nezuko, though, grew up in a secure family with a good relationship to observe between her parents. She probably always envisioned growing up to be like her mother, the quintessential “good wife, wise mother” (a phrase coined later on in the Taisho period to idealize the traditional roles of a woman). She cooks and cleans and sews and the first fanbook even tells us she was good at using an abacus, so she can handle family finances like a pro. Her traditional values probably made her tastes pretty standard, hoping for a reliable protector, but also someone who might be as kind as her father and her brother. But as for what makes her heart go doki-doki? The extra comic at the end of volume 3 tells us that she does long since have a type, it’s a person who’s like a Hisha.

Hisha: a chess/Shougi piece that can move an unlimited number of spaces in horizontal and vertical directions, and is crowned a dragon when it enters enemy territory.

So, yes, this is the part where we all smile and point at Gotouge and say, “I see what you did there, Wani-sensei.”

I find this reassuring; it tells me that Nezuko can find her heart squeezed at how cool Zenitsu is instead of just coming around and liking him because she was flattered by his affection and learned to see how nice he is and stuff. There are plenty of nice Demon Slayers who are strong and cool protectors, but that ZING that Zenitsu has (when he’s asleep) is something that can make her heart race. I’m all for this. I hinge so much of my ZenNezu feelings on this Hisha comment.

The second fanbook states that Nezuko initially had trouble sorting out her memories, and because Zenitsu gave her two such different impressions, it felt like memories of two different people, but over time the memories overlapped to form one complete person. We could say that she and Zenitsu had two first meetings.

Initially, when she was in the box, her little demon heart did go doki-doki; it was the first time a boy besides her brother had protected her, so even though Oniichan is Number One in her heart for the general duration of canon, this encounter was sure to leave a flattering impression. However, when they met face to face that night, he was just some confusing dandelion yelling and screaming about weird stuff, and then he was just a confusing (and possible bothersome) dandelion wanting to hang around her and give her flowers and stuff. It’s anyone’s guess just how “there” Nezuko was at this stage, as she does seem to gain back more of her own will and thought processes over the course of the series, rather than being guided by very, very simple rules to govern her behavior.

Zenitsu feel in love at first sight, and the second fanbook tells us he asked Tanjiro about her human personality, seeing as she wasn’t fully there. He was initially doubtful that anyone so perfect as Nezuko could exist and figured Tanjiro must had been biased and therefore exaggerating, but can we blame Zenitsu for being a smidge guarded? He’s been let down a lot, after all.

We know from Taisho Secrets and side novels that Zenitsu spent a lot of time with Nezuko during their long recovery at the Butterfly Mansion. Even how much more thought we see Nezuko display in the Train arc, she probably underwent a lot of mental development in this time, and my guess is that due to how much he interacted with her, this is probably when Zenitsu went from being a strange dandelion to a strange companion. She probably focused more on the goldfish and the pretty flowers (which he did take her to see!) and any flattering mention of her brother, though. Zenitsu, I’m relieved to say, seemed to genuinely care about what would make Nezuko happy instead of selfishly assuming something like “she likes me too, she wants to marry me.” But knowing Zenitsu, he probably assumed that her willingness to spend time with him was an indication of being willing to talk marriage once she was more herself again, though.

Let’s pause here and put on our Oniichan goggles, though. Early on, Tanjiro has to insist to just about everyone that Nezuko is still her own person with her own thoughts and feelings. Being a demon has taken a lot of her freedom to act on her true nature away from her, but he knows she’s still in there and he treats her like an equal human being. He had to watch over and over as people see his sister and only think, “demon.”

And then there’s his friend Zenitsu, who looks at her and thinks, “girl. Girl! Girl. Girl. Sweet girl, adorable girl, best girl in the world.” And maybe that’s a little bothersome, but yes, someone gets it!! Someone understands! Even though Tanjiro’s initial concerns are keeping Nezuko from being bothered by unwelcome advances, as long as Zenitsu is willing to respect that Nezuko is not entirely able to speak for herself now, he seems pretty approving of Zenitsu (provided Nezuko decides she likes him back). I’d like to think there was an unspoken promise between bros on what boundaries to follow. Besides that, Tanjiro believes in Zenitsu a lot more than Zenitsu believes in himself, so Tanjiro probably wasn’t worried about the “strong protector” role a future husband should fulfil. Or at least, Tanjiro doesn’t seem concerned once he gets to know Zenitsu, he’d have rejected Zenitsu flat-out on that first meeting. Zenitsu, you are so lucky Tanjiro is so forgiving.

However, for as much as Zenitsu sees Nezuko as “GIRL!! Girl, girl, girl!”, he’s still got his rosy vision that conveniently clouds out any disturbing realities. She is, after all, a demon.

This is something Zenitsu never actually had the chance to struggle with, and I would have really liked to see him challenged by that reality a bit more. He never witnessed Nezuko’s berserker mode, nor did he ever see her struggle to keep from eating someone, he wasn’t even awake to watch her fight like a violent animal/angry toddler on the train. Had there been a scene of Zenitsu forced to face how terrifying she had potential to be, it would had really sold his commitment to Nezuko specifically, instead of only Nezuko as his most likely girlfriend candidate.

On the train, Nezuko has the good fortune of seeing another side of Zenitsu, getting one hell of a doki-doki moment. As she’s gaining more self-awareness back, it probably made those doki-dokis more complex too. While I understand there wasn’t a good opportunity to fit in the pace of the story, I love that Taisho Secret of her concerned about him before he wakes up. Instead of him just being that boy who shows her pretty things and says nice things about her Oniichan, this is when he starts becoming something a little more unique among all the people whom little demon Nezuko has bet and who have been nice to her.

In the months that follow, we don’t get much deviation from this slow development. Zenitsu’s feelings toward Nezuko don’t really change at all, but there’s another thing about this ship: neither one chose the other over anybody else. They sort of just came together, Zenitsu gets hooked on one girl at a time, but what if someone had come along with an interest in him? At what point would he had given up on Nezuko? Probably pretty quickly, if someone was serious enough about him. It wouldn’t have been a break up either, since he was still in the pursuing stages (might be more of a break-up conversation with Tanjiro, who had been tacitly supportive).

Actually, for most of the remainder of the series, the affection that Nezuko and Zenitsu build for each other is done when they’re apart, dwelling on their thoughts of each other. For Nezuko, we see this come out after the Swordsmith Village arc in her sunlit elation to see him again, and her efforts to greet him. She very clearly recognizes him and is happy to see him, a big difference compared to how she was more elated by the sight of a fishbowl before. In Zenitsu’s case, this deepening of his affections and running away with his thoughts and feelings results him declaring once and for all, this is her. He’s found her. This is the girl who he will be committed to his whole life, in his heart she is already his wife.

When human!Nezuko is gaining her memories back, her first impressions are of the boy showing her pretty things and giving her flowers, someone who probably has a crush on her, rather than thinking back to someone who she may have had a crush on. (Those cool impressions probably hit her later, I’m assuming, given the stress of the moment.) Romance is not immediately on her mind, though she does quickly recall having friendly affection for this boy for has always been so sweet to her. And Nezuko, handling his surprising level of affection gracefully, helps Zenitsu off the battlefield while he’s in terrible pain (though she probably was too, my poor girl, that fight with demon!Tanjiro was so rough). But honestly, not only is she probably too overwhelmed by everything to think much about romance, but she probably doesn’t take Zenitsu very seriously initially. She knows he’s got a tendency to overexaggerate, and it’s nice that he’s so sweet to her, but since he acts all fluffy and silly around her she probably thinks he’s not being that serious either. Furthermore, she’s got a lot of people to suddenly care about, Zenitsu has a lot to contend with for trying to get special attention. Hell, Zenitsu was probably awake and causing a racket while she was frantic with worry that comatose Giyuu might die. While she did remake Jiichan’s haori to fit Zenitsu’s later, see spent her time in the hospital mending Giyuu’s haori (Nezuko, baby, doesn’t your hand hurt though!?). While Zenitsu was swept up in happy “Nezuko is human now, we’re totally gonna get married” feels, he probably didn’t even notice that he was only one slice in a very big pie of memories that Nezuko suddenly found in her lap and had to slowly chew and digest.

So… this brings us to the extra post-canon comic in the second fanbook, which I initially did not like very much back when it came out in February. I’ve come around a lot to it, but what really hit me at first was “oh no, Nezuko really is only going to accept this marriage because she’s a saint, he’s not being desirable at all.”

But, treating it with a little more patience and sympathy for Zenitsu… he’s just gotten what he’s always wanted, of course he’s going to stop striving a bit and get blissfully carried away in it. And Nezuko, the ever sweet, isn’t going to stop him.

Some of the other commentary in the fanbook states that Zenitsu, for a time, found himself terrified of how girls could be sweet to his face while hiding their true thoughts about him. But, finding that Nezuko was not at all two-faced, he nearly “died and went to heaven” as the exaggeration goes. He doesn’t like to work hard in the first place (but does, because it will make people like Jiichan proud), so getting away with being spoiled is too big of a temptation to resist. Nezuko is sensitive to what makes the people around her happy or uncomfortable, so she never makes any request of Zenitsu. She’s so grateful to have their new little family that her happiness is everyone else’s happiness, she doesn’t really desire a heartthrob romance, even if being a wife and mother is an eventual goal. And, without being under any pressure to make someone proud, Zenitsu gets swept away and indulges.

Thank you, Tanjiro, for putting a stop to this.

He’s still rooting for Zenitsu, since this is his friend and he knows it would make his friend happy to wind up with Nezuko, but he’s setting himself up for failure, or setting Nezuko up to be cheated out on a good match at this rate (if she were to accept out of being nice). Very, very thankfully, Zenitsu responds well to pressure. By this point Nezuko has gotten so used to sweet but indulgent Zenitsu that he seems she totally accepted that his Hisha side didn’t exist anymore, if it even existed in the first place.

Good for Zenitsu asking for her response a year later (when they’d be getting to the legal marriage ages for the Taisho period anyway), he knew he still had shaping up to do to earn her affection. And Nezuko probably needed time to build some admiration for him again, since the doki-dokis were so gone. Even if he couldn’t use that super cool Thunder Breath anymore, it would probably catch her attention to see him strive again, to put effort into being manly, specifically for her. It wasn’t just the Thunder Breath that gave her doki-dokis, it was the Hisha knight-like attitude too, whether asleep and acting on his inner potential, or awake and bravely defending her based on his own goodness and faith.

I hope that in their married life, Zenitsu will retain that sort of manliness in being a provider for her, even he does get indulged a lot at home.

Now for how this plays into some of my fanwork and headcanons:

You know how I said all my OTPs were tragedies? Yeah, I love a good dose of angst. I did start writing a single-scene fic one time of injured Zenitsu desperately trying to cover Nezuko from the sun while waiting for Tanjiro to find them, and in Nezuko’s panic about the sun she starts losing her self-control over her appetite, and Zenitsu is forced to confront that the girl he loves could very easily kill him. I never finished it, though, and it was embarrassingly self-indulgent.

For my big favorite AU of a monster fanfic, I did add more ZenNezu on the massive edit, because by this point I just enjoy ZenNezu so much that I wanted more of it. But!! What I really like about working with it in this fic is that there’s a conflict: Demon!Tanjiro. In this canon divergence, Human!Nezuko and Zenitsu get to interact more than they ever did while she was a demon, and they both already have affection for each other, but the lingering fact that Tanjiro is technically their enemy gives me some tension and angst to work with.

Yes, I wrote a One Shot of Zenitsu and Nezuko as fresh new parents, but it was a bit of a dark dive into Zenitsu’s feelings of inadequacy. But domesticity comes with some inevitable fluff anyway, and likewise it felt embarrassing indulgent, and I can’t write fluff without a little bittersweetness. M…maybe the reason I’m not a shipper is because I’m easily flustered???

I’d like to think that Zenitsu got a desk job that he worked hard at because he wants to be a provider, and Nezuko does find his hard work attractive. I headcanon it was at an electric company, because hahahaha, electricity. I’d like to think he had a long career in that company (and although his colleagues know him for having a bit of an extreme personality and being obsessed with his wife, they sometimes catch glimpses of a very, very strong side of Zenitsu—like, scarily strong), and that when he’s old and retired in the Postwar Economic Miracle, he buys a fancy camera to take pictures of Nezuko (instead of “say cheese” it’s “Thunderclap and Flash!”), and he takes Nezuko to Paris because that’s the romantic thing to do. Also, I don’t like moustaches as a rule, but I totally approve of old man Zenitsu having a fluffy moustache.

World War Two, though… I’d like to think that if his job had him in the city, he was extremely reliable when it came to protecting his family in case of bombing. I’d also like to think that this was when the Kamado family moved to the city, because Nezuko was worried about Kanao and her nieces and nephews, so Zenitsu made sure they were all together. Inosuke might had taken the opposite route and taken his family to the mountains to shelter out there in the wild.

AAAAHHHH, listen to me being so self-indulgent with headcanons, I pride myself on sticking close to canon in my fanwork, I will never produce this, AAAAHHHH, I’m embarrassed~~~~I---I’m not a shipper! No! I don’t have a shipper’s bone in my body! Who needs romance, it means nothing to me, I don’t get swept up in happy fantasies about young newlywed Zenitsu and Nezuko, really I don’t, I take what canon gives me and I stick with it, I’m here for bromance and comradery and fights to the death, I—I don’t need disgusting fluffy feelings, ew, ew, no, really-----ahhh, too flustered, too flustered, too flustered, no, no, no, no, no, no, WHEN DID I BECOME A SHIPPER, nnnnnnnnhhhhjjjj

Which is all to say that Zenitsu and Nezuko as a pairing really grew on me, even though it is essentially a fluffy happy pairing that only got surface-level interaction and was never seriously challenged. It’s got some shadows lurking in there, especially diving into Zenitsu’s heart, but in general this was a slow build-up of mutual affection between two characters with pretty simple desires of their own, and most of all, a desire to see each other happy. That makes it a good comfort ship.

And they’re both are sleepyheads, hNNNGGGHHHhhhhHHHHHHHHHHH

[preemshots]

johnny + the nomads lore

alright, i know this is a screenshots blog but i'm going to go ahead and start dropping some juicy lore tidbits as i dig them up. part of what i'm doing outside of just photo diarying is shard hunting, and BOY is there a lot the game likes to hide in those little shards for idiots like me who like to read so we can write unnecessarily accurate fanfiction! 

full disclosure, i know jack shit about the TTRPG/cyberpunk 2020 rulebook except what i read in the wikis. 

so here’s my lore roundup so far of everything i know about johnny joining the nomads

we know johnny likes to narrate v’s quest objectives. here’s the first mention where he says it himself: 

during the voodoo boys quest "transmission" there's a shard in the maglev tunnels beside the ice bath, presumably from brigitte's research into johnny in the first place:

okay, so the timeline is this: johnny joins the nomads after trying and failing to rescue alt. johnny hides out in the badlands for some years. then he and rogue come back to night city and nuke arasaka tower help alt escape the arasaka subnet by uploading liberator to their network once and for all.

this ultimately makes sense. in alt’s flashback, we meet santiago, who is a nomad/connected to nomads, joins rogue and johnny when they're trying to get alt back, and eventually becomes the leader of the aldecaldos. 

part of santiago’s TTRPG lore is that he, johnny, and rogue have to lay low in the badlands with nomads after they storm arasaka headquarters (i am aware the game takes many liberties with the original lore so who knows the full accuracy of anything from the original rulebooks)

ENDING spoilers: in the rogue+johnny storming AHQ ending, it's revealed that rogue has a son while they're prepping for the job. if you eavesdrop on her calling him while you're at the afterlife, you hear her tell her son to (paraphrasing here) "pull over and look at the stars", which immediately made my brain go to: nomad, badlands, santiago = dad? maybe. (santiago also canonically has a son according to the TTRPG lore)

this immediately reminded me of another interesting shard that i believe you can find in multiple locations around night city: “"what REALLY happened in arasaka tower?“

i love this dang shard. at first i thought it was just a cute conspiracy with some juicy gossip (and i love how 99% of the shards that mention johnny in this game are reminding us that he's not a real rebel, he's a poser) but it brings some interesting shit together

one: it tells us where johnny got his hands on the nukes! he and the nomads jumped a militech convoy and jacked some bombs! 

which is never directly explained, even as saburo arasaka is interrogating him shortly before using soulkiller. very nice of johnny to protect his homies like that. 

...or maybe he didn’t. saburo emphasizes that the dead don’t lie like the living do, and we don’t know what exactly arasaka did to johnny’s construct in mikoshi. 

it also explains why the obvious media narrative is that militech nuked arasaka, a nice neat political bow to the end of the fourth corpo wars, which is an entire section of the TTRPG lore that makes my eyes cross when i read it. 

it also makes the star/nomads ending extremely interesting, because i originally believed it was the ending where V’s journey deviates the most from rewalking johnny’s path... which also has weird implications if the johnny’s nomad era is being kept from v. 

(this also leads into my belief that the star ending/the devil ending are narratively two sides of the same coin, but that’s a WHOLE ANOTHER POST for another day.)

TWO, just straight up the fact that they turned the raid where they actually obtained the nukes into an action flick BD that pretty much ANYONE could watch. who the hell was doing that?? 

well, who else other than the guy who johnny (optionally) punched the shit out of for filming alt's death: thompson, media guy, and according to rogue, “bad luck”. because you know, recording your crimes is straight up evidence that can be used against you.

during the alt flashback we meet thompson, and just after that in cyberspace before meeting alt, johnny tells v that he has no idea what happened to him and that they never worked together again. 

oh, johnny, you lying bastard man

this is blatantly untrue, and if V even had two braincells and better memory than a goldfish they'd know this--in the first flashback sequence where johnny and rogue nuke arasaka tower, thompson is on the comms as they ride the AV towards AHQ, questioning their plans and use of violence. 

which leaves me with some questions, like where the fuck is thompson, why does johnny keep lying about this, why doesn't johnny say almost anything about how you interact with the aldecaldo clan nonstop throughout the game when he himself may have been a member of the family for some time?? is he continuing to protect the nomad clan that saved his ass? we know that a lot of his flashbacks are unreliable at best, that johnny changes shit up as desired when presenting V with his memories.

in 2077, you can also find that there’s a remake of “badlands raid” in the shard “new release braindances” that is pretty much everywhere. that shard doesn’t add much, but does mention something along the lines of “many people don’t know the ending of the original” which probably means johnny punched thompson out for filming again, or something. 

my running theories: rogue ditched santiago and the aldecaldos with johnny and thompson to nuke arasaka tower, and when johnny died she was stuck looking for (heavily implied by johnny here:) corpo sellout ways to survive.

adam smasher obviously has something to do with this since johnny/rogue's vendetta against the guy isn't entirely clear beyond the smokescreen of "he killed johnny and he sucks". i have done 0 research into this though i'm tired of typing okay

i obviously cannot be certain i have found everything related to this in the game as i’m not even done with this playthrough where i’m trying to pay attention, but i hope this is fun for someone else to dig into. 

enjoy, fellow silverhand freaks

EDIT: additional findings

ALRIGHT I HAVE DONE MORE DIGGING AND I AM BACK WITH MORE NOMAD/JOHNNY FINDINGS. these ones are kind of a bummer but VERY interesting.

there’s a shard called “excerpts from a history of the nomads by bb pires” that goes into detail about how nomads came to be

there’s an interesting quote in it: It's hard to imagine a group less inclined to wandering than farmers, but in fact they were the ones who sparked the age of nomads. Natural catastrophes, crops ravaged by bioplagues, armed conflicts and martial law allowing corporations to speculate and privatize land - all this forced them into a life on the road.

when you ask johnny why he wants to take down arasaka, he begins by referencing this himself!!

it’s a little awkward to imagine a nomad V doesn’t also know what he’s referencing, but hey, V is the fool because we are as players and that’s only one life path... so sure.

johnny also has unique dialogue during this scene about a nomad origin V, telling them that he’s been trying to understand how V thinks, and came to the conclusion that “their family was a crutch” and essentially made them stupid because they always had a safety net (lmao johnny calling v privileged basically)

BUT this also may reference why johnny would find it confusing as hell that V doesn’t immediately share the views he does when nomads, in terms of values, seem to be more aligned with johnny than V is. but once again V is the fool for a reason and this is all my own speculation so YOU KNOW.

MORE IMPORTANTLY, at the end of chippin’ in, when you ask johnny what he meant by letting down his friends... santiago is named directly

i thought this was interesting since the only glimpse of their relationship that we get is seeing johnny meeting santiago via the alt flashback for the first time.

so now it’s obvious that while johnny and rogue were with the nomads their friendship developed, and johnny went on to disappoint santiago in some way by being his normal dickhead self

but HOW? how did he disappoint santiago? is santiago even still alive?? did smasher kill santiago and is this why rogue mentions during chippin’ in that she wants smasher to “settle a score” moreso than avenge johnny??

the only additional hints i have are from this shard, which you can find at the aldecaldos camp: “nomads at ground zero”

i’m just gonna transcribe here and bold for emphasis:

It was no secret that Night Corp offered generous pay and, in some cases, free cyberware and biomonitor upgrades to anyone willing to help clean up the crater of radioactive rubble at AHQ ground zero. Some firsthand accounts recall the incessant ticking of Geiger counters, like the loud buzz of cicadas in summer. In retrospect, we can only guess how many "crater cleaners" lost their lives to radiation sickness shortly thereafter. Both the city government and Night Corp have claimed casualties were kept to a minimum, while providing no official statistics to substantiate the claim. That being said, they have never been under pressure to release such figures. After all, most rescue, engineering, and rubble cleanup teams were not local Night Citizens, but nomads. Surprised you didn't know? Don't be. It is a fact many history courses tend to overlook. The city employed hundreds of nomad mercenaries, primarily from clans in Aldecaldo nation. These nomads were hungry for gainful work and the city needed experts who were not only experienced but brave enough to knowingly put their lives on the line - all so Arasaka could one day erect another tower in its place. But history is not without its sense of irony. These nomads, who so deliberately live outside our so-called "system," came to its very rescue. Not for the first time. And not for the last.

a main theme we find in this game is the idea that the system of corps and exploitation cannot be stopped by grandiose rebellious gestures--no amount of samurai songs, assassinating mayors, or even planting nukes in towers will change things. yet johnny, his friends and mercs at atlantis in the 2020s, including rogue, chose to rebel any way they could, thinking it better than not. johnny criticizes her lack of rebellious spirit CONSTANTLY in 2077.

but ultimately, johnny, trapped in mikoshi, didn’t get to see the outcome of what detonating the AHQ nukes did to night city’s fragile ecosystem. rogue, however, did--and likely watched their former allies, the aldecaldos, be forced to take dangerous work at AHQ’s ground zero (from lack of other opportunities as detailed in this shard), then die from radiation sickness throughout the following decades, all as a result of what she and johnny did to try and fight the system. and she also watched all the former mercenaries of atlantis be hunted down by arasaka.

so rogue sees firsthand what the cost of rebellion is and johnny doesn’t. and nomads, considered the most free of any of the factions we encounter in the game, are the cost.

[willow-salix]

Why hello there

Is there anything you would recommend a babi witch like myself studying that has been missed from my list :>

Mah list (so far):

○ Witch vs Pagan vs Wicca

○ Types of witches

○ Grey witch

○ Black witch

○ Crystals + Properties

○ Sacred geometry

○ Pentacle + Pentagram

○ Sigils

○ Protection

○ Moon phases

○ Sabbats

○ Types of salts

○ Respecting nature

○ Graveyard etiquette

○ Spirit guides

○ Divination (runes, Tarot, Coins, etc)

○ Casting a circle

○ Candle magick

○ Colour magick

○ Closed practice appropriation

○ Herbs

○ Astrology

○ Tree of life

○ Auras

○ The five clairs

○ Energy/visualisation magick

○ History of starseeds

○ Astral projection

○ Methods of meditation

○ Grounding

○ Plant magick

Ooh OK! Here goes.

First and foremost, as a witch of twenty plus years, the most important thing I can tell you is to be yourself. If this is a belief system and way of life that you want for life it has to fit in with you and your personality.

Forget everything you see on Instagram, tictok or Pinterest, it's not about the aesthetic, it's about you.

There is no room for witch shaming on my blog.

And by that I mean that EVERYONE works in different ways, at a different pace and to different levels. Never compare yourself to anyone else or how they work. Never think that you aren't doing enough or that you aren't progressing enough.

You are on your own path and that is the right one for you, so you do it your own way. You want to stop and smell the flowers? Do it. You want to dip your feet in that stream? Go for it! You want to stop and rest for a bit? Best idea ever!

You should never feel pressured to do anything that you aren't ready for or aren't comfortable with. That includes such things as blood magic, working with deity you don't feel a connection with, working skyclad, doing any kind of sexual magic or anything that makes you feel off about it. It's YOUR craft.

Be kind to yourself, don't have expectations and don't ever think you aren't good enough or worthy.

This includes making your craft unique to you. Visualisation is one of the witches most poweful tools, the magic doesn't come from the expensive athame, insence or candles, its in the heart of the witch. The power comes from you. And visualisation is your key to that but so is choosing how to make it work for you.

Take me for example, I'm this loveable thundernerd witch, so that reflects in my craft.

In circle (mediumship development) we did a meditation and I was directed to the beach. So what beach did I go to...

"There's a lovely beach, I can feel the salt water on my skin, I can smell the salt in the air, there's a light breeze that's rustling the leaves on the palm trees all around me and in the distance I can hear the faint sound of someone playing the piano."

Hell yeah I was there. That's my happy place!

I need to ascend to a higher level of consciousness? Am I taking that golden winding staircase or am I calling John for the space elevator? What do you think I'm gonna choose?

I need to go lower, below the earth to go into trance? Hell I'm taking Alan's seat down.

Make it work for you.

Working with charms, that's a very important thing for me. I have lucky charms, trinkets and things everywhere. And they don't have to be pagan. I put a spell on my car to keep me safe and the car safe. Then I charged up a little TAG John and Virgil, they live in my car, Virgil is my co-pilot John is my navigator. They help me feel calm and safe.

Energy weaving is a big thing, I always do it that any energy I raise for something that doesn't already have a predetermined purpose, say for example it's full moon and I'm bouncing around outside, everything I raise I direct out to the earth as healing. I'll raise my arms to the heavens and say : I send this energy out to anyone or anything that needs it right now, I send my love and healing into the wind and trust that it will be taken to where it can do the mslt good.

Talking to other witches about how they do things and how they work is sooooo important. That's why I'm not in a tradition ( alexandrian, gardnerian etc) because I don't like having just one way to do things. That doesn't work for most people, they just won't admit it.

Trying different things to find a way that works for you is so much nicer and healthier than struggling to work the one way that you've been taught. So read, a lot, watch a lot of reputable youtubers (I recommend Tylluan Penry, she's amazing, a grandmother witch and a good friend of mine) and make your own choices. And remember that nothing is set in stone, we are ever evolving and every changing, if you feel the urge to try something new and work a different way, do it. You don't have to stick with it.

An astral altar, sooo important but something I don't see many people talking about. An astral altar is something you build in meditation.

You have your happy place, somewhere you feel safe and calm and protected (Tracy Island and the beach for me or my Nan and Grandads house as I remember it before they passed away) but it could be anywhere, a woodland, a house, a stream, a playground you used to love. Anything or anywhere.

Here you find a nice place that you like and you dream up /visualise your altar base, like a nice table, a tree stump, and rock, anything. And here you place all the items you might need, all the things you've dreamed about that you can't afford or the things you have in real life. And you place them all there. You keep that space, you charge it up, you spend time there and then, any time you are away form home or can't get to your altar in the real world for any reason, you have somewhere to go, somewhere to work and some where to commune.

Tools, I didn't see that on the list but might have missed it.

Anything can be a tool. That's the biggest lesson of all. Our pagan ancestors would have used whatever they had to hand, no tools were single use or bought for the purpose of their craft. A cauldron was cooked in all week, a knife is used to chop everything and then used to direct energy.

These days we have the resources (and don't have to hide) to be able to have specific tools that we use only for our craft, but they don't have to be expensive. Go to a thrift store or buy cheap on eBay, a letter opener is an athame, a single wine glass can be a chalice, a pretty bowl is your offering bowl, a single plate is an offering plate, mismatched candle stick holders. All valid and will work just as well. The tools are a focus, they are NOT the source of our power.

Another tip, make witchcraft part of your every day life. Make it as natural and normal as everything else you do. It's part of your life and should be treated as such.

Making coffee in the morning? Set your intentions for the day and focus on it as you make it. You want to draw positivity? Stir doesil (clockwise) that's attracting. Want to rid yourself of the bad mood you had yesterday? Stir widdershins (counterclockwise) that's banishing. Not got anything? Stir a pentagram and call it good.

Sigils, doodle them everywhere (if you want a quick lesson on how to draw them and make up your own, let me know). Charm the shit out of everything.

Whisper a food blessing before you make food or eat. Bring that abundance in.

Trail your fingers along a wall or bushes to feel the energy as you walk.

Everything is magical to a witch.

Read mythology stories, it helps us learn and helps us connect to the stories of our pantheons and deity.

And heres the biggest thing I can tell you. Don't worry about getting things wrong. It's how we learn and honestly there is no such thing as wrong as long as your intentions are right.

Wording of spells doesn't matter, the intention and feeling behind them does.

You can do a cleansing by saying : Blessed spirit, Father God, mother goddess, I ask that you bless this house/tool /space and help drive out any negativity. Spirits that reside, if you're good you may stay, if you wish me halm, then please leave.

Nothing wrong with that.

Or you do a me: Mother Goddess, Father God, I'm back. Help me out here please, I need to cleanse this shit. Yo, spirits, good guys, ya chill, bad shit, get the fuck out! I'm the witch I'm in charge, do as you're told *claps hands all over the place and follows up with a cloud of vape smokes because my intention is in my breath and I'm blowing that negativity away*

And last but not least. I'm sure you've heard "Ever mind the rule of three, what you send out comes back to thee" That's very true, try to only send out good if you can. But you're human and it won't always happen, you'll have bad thoughts and negative emotions, that's normal and fine. Just don't do it with nastiness in your heart.

"and if it harms none, do what you will."

There's a line here most people don't know... "do no harm. But take no shit."

Because the one person most witches forget to look out for is themselves. Being good, doing good and being positive is great, but not at the expense of yourself. If it harms you, don't do it.

Love and light, and bright blessings to you. X

[skzshortcake]

helluuu, can i request a minho bookstore! au, but its enemies to lovers and the "okay, maybe im crazy but did i just hear you say that out loud?" (14) or the "is that the best you can do?" (12) prompt? 🤲💓 thank youuu (and i wanted to say that i really appreciate your blog and what you write!!!! 🥺)

member: minho

prompt: #14 “okay, maybe i’m crazy but did I just hear you say that out loud?” + #12 “is that the best you can do?”

au: bookstore

trope: enemies to lovers

warnings: some angst if you look really hard. i’m really bad at writing minho, i’m so sorry, I did my best! if you have any tips feel free to tell me! 

---

god. anyone but him. please, not now.

the universe really wasn’t on your side when you saw minho walk through the doors of the bookstore you worked part-time at. 

“please don’t look at me. please don’t look at me. please please please.” your mind was moving a million lightyears an hour.

his judging gaze flicked over to you after he browsed the books on the front table. did he even like to read? isn’t he a computer science major? does he think reading a fantasy book is going to make him smarter than me?

“I didn’t know you worked here! so nice to see you.” he faked politeness “would you mind helping me find a certain book, doll?”

doll. he called me “doll”.

“of course.” you try to turn your sneer into a smile. maybe if he was feeling generous he would leave a couple coins in the “tips” jar that was forever empty at the front desk.

“i’m looking for a little something called “algorithms to live by”. do you know where that might be?” he glanced over at you as you walked over to the far right side of the store. you did your best to not look him in the eyes. if you looked at his pretty face for too long you might just fall, that is, if you didn’t already. you didn’t want to give him the time of day, it would probably just get to his head and he would hold his 4.0 grade over your head a bit more.

“i’ve read that book before. it’s over here.” you say in a monotone voice, reaching up and picking the book off of the high shelf that you just put it on just a week ago.

“aww. too short?” he smirked, raising an eyebrow.

“is that the best you can do? you’re choosing to insult my height. real mature.” you shove the book lightly into his chest and swiftly walking past him over to the front desk, the lingering feeling of you bumping into his arm left him feeling a little fluttery.

“stupid boy.” you mumble as you sit down in the worn out spinning desk chair again, you pretend to read something on the computer in an attempt to mask the butterflies from getting so close to him. 

but he’s just minho? why did you have such a problem?

maybe that was it. it was just minho.

“okay, maybe i’m crazy but did I just hear you say that out loud?” he strides over to you, slightly leaning over the desk to look you in the eye.

oh no. his hand was on the desk. why was he so close? why do I feel embarrassed? my face must be heating up now, is he noticing it? why does this feel so familiar?

“yes. I did. I called you a “stupid boy”. because you are.” your timid voice gains some confidence.

he leans back, not breaking eye contact. “just a “stupid boy”, huh? you sure about that, babe? last time I checked I was just slightly above your grade in class.”

“it’s not about the grade, minho. it’s about how you’re so annoying around me. you’re not like this around anyone else. no, i’m not oblivious. I notice things like that. what is so different about me?” you rant to him, your eyes suddenly finding the corner where the paint on the walls met the molding very interesting. the paint looked chipped at the bottom, and it didn’t completely line up perfectly.

back to minho. you didn’t want to be that direct, but you were pretty fed up with him at this point.

“I didn’t know you felt that way.” 

silence for a moment.

“i’m sorry.”

“what-”

“i’m sorry. I never meant to be mean. I just thought a little bit of competition would be funny. I didn’t know it was too much. you should have told me sooner.”

you’re taken aback, was he really apologizing? was this the same minho that winked at you every time tests were handed back? the one that always acted as if quizzes were a race to the finish line?

“I accept your apology. thank you, minh-”

“you see... the reason I was so... extra, is because I kinda think you’re cute. you’re cute when you’re mad. so I-uh, I probably pushed you too much. i’m sorry.”

he wasn’t looking you in the eye at this point. he held the book in his arms, slightly rocking back and forth on his heels. his glasses slightly fell down his perfectly-sloped nose, and the sweatshirt he wore looked really comfortable. you wondered if it smelled like him.

“I think you’re cute too.” you blurt out, and the chipped paint was interesting again. the sweatshirt and glasses look must have solidified your opinion. you liked him. 

why? because it’s just minho.

“so we’re agreed.” he looks back at you and laughs. “give me another moment to browse, then i’ll pay for the book.” and there he went.

you sat at the desk, staring at the same word on the computer to try and process what just happened. “incoming books” it read. 

a couple minutes later minho walked back up to the front table, looking more shy and timid than you’ve ever seen him.

“you look a little nervous.” you point out, giving him a comforting smile to show that things were okay after the previous conversation. you scanned the one book. “$18.59 please.”

“i’m not nervous.” he laughs and gives you a gorgeous smile, glad things had returned to normal. he was so enchanting... 

“okay then.” you grin as he hands you a $20 bill. you give him the extra change and he drops it all in the tip jar, even pulling out a $10 bill and a small folded paper that was dropped into the jar too.

he winks on the way out, smiling at how flabbergasted you looked.

the door shut. mrs. cadrillion walked back in to the main room.

“who was that darling boy? a friend from school?” she asked, moving another pile of books back into her office. 

“a friend... yeah...” you answer her as if you’re on autopilot.

friends. how weird did that sound? it didn’t feel right... you pulled out the $10 bill and note as soon as she closed the door again.

“my number is 289 xxx 5714 <3. call me :) -stupid boy”

you feel even more butterflies, and you quickly glance around the store before you pull out your phone and send a very confident text.

“hey, stupid boy. it’s me. you need to apologize for stealing my heart during work hours. I could get fired for that, ya know.”

you wait a minute, and then a minute more. you get a little worried that the text was too flashy for a moment, until your phone lights up.

“sure thing. how about I take you out for coffee as an apology. maybe if you need more of an apology I can be your “stupid boyfriend.”

there were the butterflies again. stupid boy.

“take me out for coffee first and then we’ll see ;)”

but you already knew your decision.

[afishlearningpoetry]

Hi! I've loved Sherlock since 2012 but I'm new in the Johnlock fandom. Your meta is one of my favorite! I totally agree that S4 is John's story/blog/alibi etc, but I wanted to ask you: if this time Sherlock is working with John to take Mary down, why is John jealous? How can he think Sherlock has feelings for her, if Sherlock wants her dead? Also: how do you think John faked his suicide? Is there a body? Maybe it's David's? I really hope it is all John's plan! It would be so smart and badass.

Hi, thank you so much.

It's funny you ask that first question because this (John's enduring jealousy) is a thing that was established the series 3 finale in 2014, and the particular scene in which it culminates is so convincing that it's not an exaggeration to say that currently almost no one knows what actually happened in it, which is in large part due to how manipulative Sherlock acts to John in the latter half of that episode, and also how people believe Mary's stated intentions (especially after her death, which was supposed to make her look like a saint, which definitely worked on viewers) and and underestimate John's intelligence.

Just to recap for anyone else: John's jealousy is conceived when Sherlock and John enter Magnussen's office and Sherlock deduces that the smell of perfume is Claire de Lune, which is the perfume Mary uses. This also comes right after the scene outside the elevator to his office, where Sherlock manipulates Janine into letting them in. John says, "But Sherlock, she loves you," and Sherlock says, "Yes, as I said –– human error," as John looks on, terrified. Later in the episode, John confronts Mary and says that the first thing Sherlock said when he woke up was her name. When Sherlock disappears from the hospital after being shot, in part because he doesn't want to be questioned by the police after who shot him, because he's trying to protect Mary to protect John, Lestrade asks John why he would disappear, and who he would be protecting from whatever happened in Magnussen's office. John asks the same thing, and then looks at Mary's perfume, which is sitting on the table next to him (he doesn’t even consider Sherlock is protecting him). To summarize, he assumes Sherlock is protecting Mary because he secretly loves her and that they had an affair, which in his mind is only confirmed later in the episode when John learns Mary was (is) an assassin, because John draws a correlation between him assuming Sherlock loved Irene and now Mary, to Sherlock being a sociopath and only being able to care about other sociopaths who enable him, which also means he could never love John. He says during the loft scene where they treat Mary as a client, “You two should have gotten married.” There's some comfort in the idea that Sherlock isn't capable of love to begin with, it's another thing to see this. (Something cool about its shape is it's echoed in Mary's wedding earrings, which are hearts with a hole in them, as well as the coin she shoots; "I will burn the heart out of you.")

So there are a couple explanations why John would still be jealous, even after him and Sherlock team up to stop her. The most simple is that it doesn't even matter to John that he's trying to kill her now, because he's convinced he's a sociopath for the majority of series 4, so he doesn't have any lingering feelings about turning against her now because he doesn't care about other people in that way. John isn't jealous to the extent that he wants whatever their relationship was (at least consciously -- there's a lot to talk about how he makes his subconscious insert of Eurus into a brazenly over the top sociopath that Sherlock has to learn how to love, but even then, John still locks himself into a sibling relationship where he's caged up and they can only see each other when there's glass between them to stop him from attacking him), so much as that there was any initial love/connection or sexual affair between them. Throughout TST, Sherlock follows a trail of breadcrumbs he thinks will lead him to Moriarty, but actually leads him to Mary, so the real events of that episode involved him realizing the two of them are working together (if he didn't already realize this at the end of TAB -- there's debate whether he is or if it's still subconscious, but either way he's right on the edge).

So John wants to stop Moriarty, or Mary for working for him (she's working with him, but they wouldn't know this yet, because it's being saved for the series 5 reveal), which compounds his anger at her betrayal, but he doesn't know that right away. He already has enough motivation before that because he still thinks they had an affair. Sherlock doesn't have sex with Janine, but John thinks he did. John doesn't even understand what that kind of relationship would be like, if there are any emotional feelings involved, which is why he asks, "So how does it work, you and the woman?" at the end of TLD. His jealousy is also magnified by the idea that he fell for a sociopath in Sherlock, so a lot of it is just swelling self-hatred that John can't escape, that keeps growing and growing until he's choking on it by series 4, so it still doesn't matter Sherlock is trying to kill her now. In the teaser for series 4 they were both drowning.

If anything, their covert mission being focused around her means that John probably can't stop thinking about it. If Sherlock loved her then he could he do this now?

Then he looks at himself, and he starts thinking about how whether or not he ever loved Mary to begin with, and then he thinks about how Mary was supposed to be different, and oh John actually fell for a sociopath for a second time just like Sherlock, so is he any different? Of course he should know that he is, even if he's wrong about Sherlock, but then he starts thinking about how his love for Sherlock actually makes him a monster, and that his love for him isn't real either because it could never be the same thing as him loving a woman, or maybe he could never love anyone to begin with, not really, and that maybe John himself isn't real either, maybe he isn't even a real person, or a person who should stick around at all. But no no no, first he has to stop Mary. He has to stay around to stop Mary. His goal for the first two episodes of series 4 isn't about trying to fuck Sherlock anymore, it's all about stopping her.

Of course we know that he can't stop thinking about it, because not only does he write Mary and Sherlock having a perfect relationship that doesn't exist where John is considered more worthless than a dog (calling back to Moriarty calling John Sherlock's pet by the pool in TGG), the cheating subplot established two episodes ago (and clarified by Sherlock in TAB, which is another explanation, but he isn't even aware that John thinks they had an affair), isn't addressed at all, even on the surface text/blog level in series 4. It's just dropped completely, which went over the heads of most viewers watching because they didn't even pick up on or remember it from before (fitting because it's not mentioned in John's blogs in series 3 to begin with iirc). John does this to absolve both himself and Sherlock, because there's no way he could resolve it without offering motivations for either Sherlock or himself to kill her. He finds ways to sublimate it though, because he has to make them flawed so it's a believable event. So to answer: John's jealousy is a huge, invisible, growing monster sitting at the heart of series 4 and everything that happens in it. It's largely irrational and trying to ask him why he would even think any of this would just make him retreat further into denial of the truth: that Sherlock loves him, which he's deeply afraid of.

When Sherlock manipulates John into thinking that Mary shot him non-fatally in order to cover for herself while saving his life, he's lying, because he literally died lmao. But he decides not to let John in on the secret, which is a huge mistake, and John can see through what he's doing and that Sherlock is using him, but he plays along in order to take Mary down. Sherlock underestimates John, so it's only fitting that Sherlock underestimates John again when he fakes his suicide, because John doesn't let Sherlock in on his secret, in part so he can know what he felt during and after the fall, because all of this is about the fall (and John tries to communicate with Sherlock while Mary is manipulating him, as we see at the end of TST with John’s note that is also dropped from the plot completely) (Sherlock does let John in on their plot to stop Mary sometime after the loft scene, but by that time John's already operating on his own to some degree, because Sherlock still isn't letting him in on the biggest secret of all that would explain everything to John). So because John is mastering the level of deception Irene, Sherlock, Moriarty and Mary (and Emelia Ricoletti) showed him over the course of the show, he would also leave a body behind. He would have planned it extensively, and part of that is by manipulating public opinion. He even gets really blatant with his prose and has himself sitting in front of a carpet of blood (calling back to how Sherlock sees the pile of blood before Mrs. Carmichael, explained here). You already saw this post but he would also need a body to draw Mary out of hiding by making the suicide convincing, which he also does by writing so many suicidal themes into series 4 so that when news gets out and people in-universe (and real life) react to his death, they put the clues together, which is like a double deception in order to make it seem impossible that he could have faked it. (#tw suicide)

So these plot points have been ongoing for seven years now lol and they’ll be key to series 5.