#renjamin is gonna be so happy about this

[vacantgodling]

i'm ren (or vacant), writing as R.A.A. and this is my main writing blog!

this is a catch all space for me to post about all things writing which will include things like snippets from my many wips; live writing updates as i craft prose; horny and meme posting about my ocs; meta about the themes of my wips, their plots, and writing in general; as well as me just talking about whatever else comes to mind regarding my interests as well as talking with friends.

you can pretty much find me mostly here or on bluesky (though because it is a twitter clone i am much, much less talkative. the war flashbacks are still hard to get over apparently). you can also read my fandom writing on ao3 (though i’m taking a bit of a hiatus from it right now). if you read anything i’d highly suggest reading cage.

i don't have asks on currently, but feel free to interact with me in other ways like messaging, rbing my posts, or @'ing me. thanks for stopping by :3c

:MY WIPS:

to see a full (mostly) list of my wips, i made a handy-ish list that lists all the main things that i'm working on and their (mostly current) importance in my ever-rotating roster HERE!

however, there are a few wips that i am mostly going to be talking about more often than not, and i've taken the liberty of making a few scrapbook-esque posters in canva to illustrate their main points. so, without further ado:

BETWIXT THUMB & FOREFINGER (BTAF) -> wip intro

THE FALL OF GALERE BOOK 1: PARAMOUR -> wip intro

HE WHO SMITES THE SUN -> wip intro

:NAVIGATION:

ren writing -> all of my writing in one place

ren poems -> all of my poems in one place

ren art -> all my art

talking -> musings and personal thoughts

about renjamin -> insight to me / who i am

ren analysis -> when i get meta about my wips

ren mix -> a treasure trove of my music taste

ren polls -> any polls i make

ren reads -> for my ramblings and analysis as i try to get back into books

ren hot cakes -> when i'm firing shots in the house to keep the mortgage prices down

ren plays -> video game rantings and ravings

friends tag -> talking with friends or boosting my friends work

others work -> boosting other writeblrs work

hall of fame -> praise / things that make me happy that i want to keep

ren is jopping on main -> for the rare occasions where i talk about kpop

ren rabbit hole -> i like history and mythology and the ancient world and i Will ramble about it

ren fights linguistics -> i'm starting to try and conlang!! it will be hard!!

writing in review -> for my end of the year lookback at wtf i was doing writing wise that year :) usually done in november bc december is a bad month for me usually

events -> gonna start keeping track of the writing events that i want to try and do

[kawaiijohn]

Currently foaming at the mouth over crossover fics with so much potential I vibrate and clip through the walls

[bisexualamy]

Nadiya, Lup, Here There Be Gerblins, Petals to the Metal, Lenny, Tres Horny Boys, Lunar Interlude, and of course, Remmy

Yes yes yes thank you!

Nadiya: Be proud – talk about something you’re good at.

I have to put in the obligatory goofy one of, at this point, I can pretty much identify every font that comes with default Microsoft Word (2007 and back, I stopped using Word during high school and don’t own it) on sight, plus some extras that aren’t in the defaults but I use a lot in design projects.

The not goofy one is I’m very good at just... articulating myself I think is the best way to put it. It used to just come out in the fact that I’m a good writer, and I’m trying to own that more because I used to own it when I was younger and then decided I shouldn’t be so public about it because it came off as arrogant. But now it’s also coming out in the fact that like, I’m a surprisingly confident public speaker for someone who can be very insecure, and I’ve had a lot of people tell me that I have good emotional intelligence, which is a very high compliment to me. I’ve always been good at sort of, identifying what I’m feeling and explaining it to myself, but only recently have I been able to put those feelings into words and explanations that other people can understand too.

Lup: You are so loved and love in return – gush about at least one sibling, friend, or partner.

I’m so fucking grateful for the fact that I have a bunch of friends now that really just love me unconditionally. I’ve talked about it a few times on this blog but I was also talking about it with my parents now that I’m home, of how I had a very rough freshman year of college and my close friends would’ve been totally justified in taking a step back from me and didn’t. Like, the majority of those people don’t use tumblr, and the ones that do know who they are and I don’t feel super comfortable @ing them.

I don’t mean this in a way of like “you should stick by your friends no matter what” because I think it’s very important to recognize when you, personally, need to take care of yourself and stop prioritizing other people above yourself. I think it takes a specific kind of person to compartmentalize other people’s emotions away from your own life experiences, and know when to step in and when to say no, and I’m super grateful that I have a core group of people that were able to do that with me freshman year. I don’t know if I would be as healthy as I am now without having those wonderful people in my life.

Here There Be Gerblins: Embrace nostalgia – what was your first encounter with a loved one?

I hate flirting specifically because I cannot pick up on the subtly that’s intrinsic to it, and I would really much rather people just come up to me and be like “I like you; let’s date” because I feel like it saves a lot of time and emotional distress. And people don’t believe me when I say this because I’m very good at reading people, but for some reason flirting specifically is a blind spot for me. My point is that when they don’t believe me I always tell the story of how I started dating one of my best friends from high school. This isn’t technically a first encounter but it is sort of, the start of a relationship, and it’s really cute so I’m gonna tell it anyway.

He’s a year above me and we were very close friends throughout the two years we knew each other before he graduated, and then when we went to college and I was a senior we still kept in close contact. And my mom kept telling me he was flirting with me (he at one point made me a sword for a cosplay I never ended up finishing, just because he “wanted a project” and he had a wood shop in his basement) but I didn’t buy it because I assumed he’d just say something.

Anyway May of my senior year of high school he came back after his freshman year and we were hanging out a bunch and over at a mutual friend’s house and cuddling on the couch and I promise you, my internal monologue was “wow isn’t it incredible that two bi/pan guys can just be gay with each other on a couch in a platonic way” because I’m fucking clueless. And he walked me to my car when we went to leave and gave me a hug, and this was still my internal monologue up until he kissed my forehead and I went “.......wait a second. Is that platonic?” Because again, I’m so so so bad at picking up on this shit.

It got brought up like five days later and we ended up dating for a few months but after I was in college for a bit I realized I don’t like long distance relationships and we had a super civil breakup. We still talk somewhat regularly and I consider us good friends still. He knows this story and he finds it hilarious because I’ve always been very very bad at picking up on flirting, which is what finally just led to him being more direct. Case and point: I found out like, literally a few months ago that not only was he flirting with me that summer, but he was into me for at least a year before that. The sword was flirting (I know, shocking). My mom was right.

Petals to the Metal: Sometimes we need to let loose – when have you done something you shouldn’t have because it made you happy?

Unhealthy coping mechanisms that I’ve kicked or am trying to kick don’t really have a place in a thread about positivity, so instead I’m gonna go really stereotypical Art Student™. I love trespassing in places to take photographs. I’ve never like, gone to a place that I REALLY shouldn’t have been, but I have wandered around some abandoned places that were totally intended to be locked or off limits. 

Photography makes me really happy, even the process of editing the photos in post-production is very calming for me, so I try to do it when I can. Probably the most dangerous place I’ve ever done this is on live train tracks? Live in the sense that like, trains run up and down them on the daily (they’re not electrified) and I still walk along/on them, because I figured that if a train was coming I’d hear it. I, no joke, am doing this again in two days, and scheduled a photoshoot with someone on these train tracks, because the aesthetic is really nice (especially in the snow) and I’ve done it twice before, so maybe I’m a little cocky. My sister mentioned to me that I should check the train schedule and coordinate around it this time, which honestly, I probably should.

Lenny: “You may remember, you subscribed to the cylinder of the month club” – what is something you are well-known (or notorious) for?

The fonts thing definitely. I regularly get messages from people asking me to identify fonts for them. Also I say some really ridiculous things occasionally that I’ve not yet lived down. I’m not going to revive them by repeating them here. ALSO “what is Ren short for” is a game that has continued past my legal name change and will probably continue into infinity. Answers are getting increasingly creative, though Renjamin is definitely the most popular and has evolved into something people actually, regularly address me as.

Tres Horny Boys: “Nobody ever say that out loud ever again please” – what is your worst nickname?

Someone once realized that you can make a Ronald Regan pun off of “what is Ren short for” and it didn’t last because all my friends are Gays™ but that’s gotta be the worst answer to this game.

Lunar Interlude: “I hand Leon the token” – how do you make your friends laugh?

So for the longest time I was convinced I was just Not Funny At All until I started doing improv my junior year of high school and was (to me, shockingly) good at it, and then I realized it was more of a lack of confidence than anything else. This is going to sound really stilted and empirical, but doing improv off and on for a few years and performing in front of lots of different kinds of people and audiences has made me really aware of the techniques people use to make people laugh, and has given me a sort of “shorthand” for how to, in most cases, land a joke. This is not a discovery on my part: there are 100s of podcasts and books on this stuff (I literally just finished a design project on this), but it’s a lot easier for me to understand something if I’ve experienced it.

Inside jokes are always a way that my friends and I laugh with each other, but beyond that, the golden rule for me is that specificity always gets a laugh above a general statement. If your funny comment is really tailored to your audience or in general just contains a super specific detail (3.5 minutes versus a few minutes) people find it funnier. I haven’t quite figured out why yet, though. Honestly though, I’m friends with a ton of creative people, and the times we laugh the most is just when we banter in the same space together without shooting each other down. I’m trying my best to stop shooting down comments people make, no matter how ridiculous, as long as I’m not uncomfortable. Jokes tend to build on each other and so if you’re in a supportive, funny environment, things just get funnier.

Remmy: Love is a motivator – who do you want to make proud?

It might sound like a cop out but myself. I used to really hate that concept, but I’ve been recently finding a lot of power in self-improvement. I try really hard to incorporate mindfullness and reflection into my life, and recognizing that I’m in a better place (academically, socially, emotionally, etc) then where I was in the past makes me feel really content.

Like, obviously I like when people appreciate the work I do, and the support of my friends and family is very important to me, but I try not to specifically improve to make others proud of me. The person I’m guaranteed to spend my entire life with is myself, so I should make sure I’m proud of myself first.

[vacantgodling]

re. about

ren (or rimz for cool kids). he/him. twenty five. black. queer. neurodivergent.

i'm redoing this because i'm losing steam (thanks work) and i'm pulling back on a lot of projects to mostly focus on things that make me personally happy. as is the nature of my brain, i will still jump back and forth between projects when i lose the flow for another, but i’ve narrowed my important wips down to just three main ones. other projects are currently being shelved, or put to the side as half baked ideas that i still need to keep in the oven before i introduce them to anyone formally.

(so if you don’t see a wip listed in the wips tab, it’s either shelved indefinitely or i want to work on it on my own for a bit. you can ask me about my other wips if you know/remember them but i can’t guarantee i’ll answer about them at this time. this also doesn’t mean i won’t ramble about them when i feel like it.)

important sideblogs = no pressure to follow just fyi

@babylonsfalling -> all my fandom and other nonsense goes here

@todazzlingreading -> this is a personal checklist for things i want to read by y’all that i don’t have time or spoons to get to at the moment i see it. once i read a post there i’ll delete it from that blog and rb it over here with any comments in the tags :3

to find my art commissions, please look here: https://www.tumblr.com/vacantgodling/715216537870532608/commissions-are-open

re. disclaimers / interaction

i mainly write fantasy; it’s a broad overarching label that covers all of my interests and it’s my first love in writing. horror and horror adjacent elements always make an appearance in my works. i emphasize complex mlm relationships and male leads, and romance is a great love of mine as you’ll notice from the king of my current wips. worldbuilding is also a great love of mine. i also love writing smut and talking about my characters having sex.

as such some disclaimers: following me is a very much curate your own experience. i don’t want to hold back talking about adult and mature themes so if you’re uncomfortable with anything i talk about i’d just suggest you unfollow lol nothing personal.

i’m open to asks and talking about anything but there’s no pressure. anons are always cool. i’m probably not gonna do writing based tag games too too much bc writing has been nonexistent lately but character asks or ramble ones i will do :)

also, as a personal ask: please do not refer to any of my characters as babygirl or girlie(s). shit makes me squick thanks.

re. main wips

linked are the main tags & once i finish the wip intros for paramour and tcol (revamping them) i’ll link them as well. feel free to ask to be on the taglist for any of these (i’m going to do better with these) — taglists will be activated for all writing and official posts. this won’t include ask games or random babbling.

PARAMOUR || “saved” from an imminent social death through arranged marriage, HYACINTHUS SHRAPNEL is whisked away to The Chateau aux Aisles D’or, where an unlikely sexual relationship with his butler AMON leads to far more than he bargained for.

THE CHRONICLES OF LATHSBURY (check out the crash course HERE) || The Aegean Guild of Explorers, led by the mysterious newcomer to Lathsbury Madja Fandel welcomes its newest contingent after the guild bid: PIPER FAIRWIND a MBW with a fighting spirit and desire for money and glory, DEUX UNDERSHIELD a naive protector seeking answers for her brother’s spurn, SANDRA “SAN” DEARBORN a vicious hunter with a chip on their shoulder, CLEAR BRIGHTENDALE a medic with a host of dark secrets, and FORTE SYMPHONIA a ranger seeking his own destiny, are as ready as they’ll ever be to enter the fray, to conquer the mysterious and dangerous LABYRINTH. Forces that have been in motion since before their lives even began are finally reaching their peak, and the five of them will have to use everything they’ve learned and then some to stay alive.

re. navigation

talking -> musings and personal thoughts

about renjamin -> insight to me / who i am

ren analysis -> when i get meta about my wips

ren mix -> a treasure trove of my music taste

ren polls -> any polls i make

ren reads -> for my ramblings and analysis as i try to get back into books

friends tag -> talking with friends or boosting my friends work

others work -> boosting other writeblrs work

hall of fame -> praise / things that make me happy that i want to keep

ren writing -> all of my writing in one place

ren poems -> all of my poems in one place

ren fic -> all of my fandom related writing in one place

ren art -> all my art

q eh you eh -> queue

sex mention -> tag for any sexual content.

worldbuilding -> all of my worldbuilding notes across all my wips

find the word tag -> for this game specifically so i can find it

last line tag -> for this game specifically so i can find it

ren hot cakes -> specifically for my overly opinionated opinions

writing recap -> tracking my writing journey so i can hold myself accountable