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melancholicstation · 4 days

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The Socially Active Secretary: Chapter Two

pairing: robert francis kennedy female ❤︎ original character charlotte agapov (secretary!reader)

BOBBY'S ARRIVED...

synopsis: charlotte agapov, a divorcee whom recently moved back to the states after a disastrous lovers quarrel, assumes the secretarial position to the most important man in America, but it is not he who has captured her attention, no. instead, it's his meek younger brother, the runt of the kennedy pack, bobby francis kennedy.

masterlist character mood boards

[1585 words]

taglist: @kennediva @absurdlyvintage @bloxholden35 @astro-vibes-bro @h-l-vlovesvintage @kimcrystal123

Chapter Two

May 2nd, 1962

Charlotte didn't often think of her life in London since her return to the states but it was hard not to in such living conditions. She wondered if her back would flare up due to the lumpy mattress she laid atop, in London she would get nearly daily pilates to her body and mind alive and distracted for her failure and her deteriorating marriage. A marriage which seemed to eat away at the both of them like a moth would do with a particularly lovely woollen shall. With each argument left untouched and dinner plate growing cold by Hugo's indifference, it seemed that nearly constant movement for Charlotte safeguarded her from total delirium.

Now, Charlotte certainly doesn't have the finances for such activities, not with Miss Desmond on 34rd street paying thirty-five dollars for a week worth of classes, it was preposterous to spend such funds on such abstract trivialities.

In the stead of her pilates escapades Charlotte took a certain likening to taking a walk with her insurmountable and seemingly unshakable grief on how her life had shaped up and a good virginia woolf paperback given to her by her grandmother in the early fifties.

Charlotte still had yet to get a callback from the strange job advertisement, not much of a shock to Charlotte's, yet it upset her enough that her mother noticed

"You know dear, I say you take the bus and head up to the cape, you that wonderful summer home that aunt Katherine has? i'm sure she would delighted to see you visit, doesn't have to be forever--just a couple days y'know I-i think it would do you a great deal of good. To get away for a few days?" Her mother expresses in such a tone that Charlotte feels shackled into agreeing.

Maybe a few days of relaxation and time by the sea would do her some good.

So she did.

Aunt Katherine greeted her with warmth and an admittedly delectable beef tartare at dinner time. The home smelt of tulip and hard candies, with incense wafting through the mahogany crack between the floor and all the home doors. And to top it off, Charlotte had the best sleep she's had in millennia.

Due to her inclination for the morning sunrise, Charlotte awoke at around five am, dressed herself and penned a quick note to her aunt assuring her that she was going to check out the famous beach spot her mom had recommended and that she'd be back before she woke up.

As she weaved her way through the sea of people, not too dissimilar in their anarchy as the crashing waves of the coastline, standing in line at the gelato stand, she cursed her choice of footwear. A pair of suede western-style knee high boots, highly practical for perhaps a stroll in balmoral but not such for a walk through Massachusetts beaches.

Charlotte searched the perimeter of the beach, trying to pin point the specific spot from memory that she remembered adored playing in as a young girl. She considered giving up a turning around many times during the adventure, she had always defaulted to giving up once the times got rough. At least she thinks that's what her ex-partners would posture.

But just as she was starting to believe that spot was a figment of her childhood imaginative spirit, she spotted it. There it was. All in its glory, though aged, but all the more beautiful for it. The lighthouse seemed to have had it tough in the years of Charlotte's absence, with its paint still bleach white but now with barnacles attached. Society often treated once beautiful things that have changed as outcasts, but Charlotte found them all the more fascinating for it.

The bleached and weathered wood creaks under her boots as Charlotte tries and fails to salvage the hem of her knit pants from getting muddled by the damp sand nearly encompassing the stairs.

Charlotte then ascends and moves towards the door, painted in a carmine and fixed with a copper hand rusted beyond belief. But just as she fixes her hand around the doorknob, her manicured hands grasping the jagged texture of the handle, she felt a strong resistant. Not unlike a hand grasping the handle on the other side of the vermillion-washed door.

Charlotte immediately backs her hand off the doorhandles and waits for a response, on the nameless figure she proposes is behind the door. She curses herself for being shocked into place and unable to simply leave down the stairs she came from, after all it was just a stupid lighthouse; a childhood fixation of her personal adoration, whoever could be behind the door could be a dangerous person, or simply just an unfriendly one.

However she was left unable to mull over that thought, like she would do with a good glass of 1942 Dom Perignon Brut, when the person on the other side of the door revealed themselves.

And instead, it wasn't a dangerous or unfriendly face. It was categorically the opposite. The person, now directly facing Charlotte's direction, was a young man with soft, kind eyes and a small straight nose holding up a set of worn acetane sunglasses who could've been no older than 40 staring straight back at her, with equal parts surprise and mild shock.

"Oh I-I'm sorry I didn't mean to shock you! I wasn't aware that this old place had much visitors and was simply passing through, I'll leave you to it." the man said in a thin, bordering on blubbering way that was emboldened with an implacable charm. He was beautiful. And stunningly so at that.

"Oh quite the contrary, it's me who should apologise really I-I'm sorry to have disturbed you, y'know it seemed that we were both under the impression that this old place hasn't seen a familiar face in a while I suppose,"

Charlotte says in a attempt at brevity--truth be told ever since her divorce she had been something of a recluse, and it seemed her social skills were a little more than rusty at the moment.

"Quite so"

,he says chuckling and in a tone that has become more cheerful by the second, as he seems to try to communicate that the disturbance has not been an unwelcome one though not through words.

"Y'know it was quite simple of me to think that such a place of beauty would not have other inhibitors" Charlotte shrugs and playfully notes, as she takes in the surroundings.

The pair begin to fawn over the lighthouse, sharing anecdotes of their favourite details of the structure. The stranger's being the small seagull figurine attached to the wooden railing. Charlotte's being the darling shades of coral and azure painted upon the cupola of the lighthouse.

Mid conversation Charlotte shifts and catches the man's attention,

"At the risk of being brazen, could I ask your name?" Charlotte said in a half-whisper.

"No-no not all my names Robert but y'know people just call me Bobby really--sort of a nickname that stuck I guess.",

It's only then that Charlotte makes note of the strong accent bursting from this kindred spirit in the form of a stranger, a strong Boston accent. So strong in fact that the r's sound less like an r and more similar to a h.

"Well I suppose I should act in the same spirit, my name's Charlotte." she said in a tone she hoped came across as airy.

"Very nice to meet you Charlotte." A beat of silence escorts it.

"Well you know I'd hate to disturb your day plans any longer, so I'll get on my own way. It was wonderful to meet you Charlotte, truly" Robert murmured while receding down the wooden stairs while maintaining comfortable eye contact with such grace and untouched elegance that Charlotte thought had prior only been reserved for dignified princess and Hollywood starlets, like Hepburn or Kelly.

But just as Robert had descended the stairs, Charlotte surprises herself, and Robert, as evident by the minuscule rise of his shoulder blades beneath his poplin dress shirt by calling out to him

"Hey don't I know you from somewhere?, I feel like I've seen you on TV or something?"

"This face?, well you see a face like mine is surely not made for television I can tell you that. Goodbye Charlotte, you have a good day now." He laughs with an air of brevity in his tone.

Charlotte finds herself laughing too, without even a direct reason why. The realisation hits her that this is the first time she'd laughed in nearly six month. She had been so focused on survival from her divorce that Charlotte had closed herself off from all frivolity, such as a kind interaction with a similarly kind stranger.

Just as her eye's focus back from the dream state of Charlotte's that had to border on at least ten seconds, Charlotte looks back to where Robert had just stood. And he was gone without a trace.

Well, not entirely without a trace. Though his physical being had left Charlotte could see the imprint of his loafer on the sandy wood of the stairs.

If it weren't for those Charlotte would regard the interaction as a dream sequence, a figment of her fractured, socially-stifled brain.

But it was real. Entirely real and as tangible as the sand passing through her fingers.

Charlotte would go on to repeat those two sentences all the way back to her temporary cape abode.

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darkmaga-retard · 20 days

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David Blackmon

Aug 30, 2024

Longtime readers here will know I am highly skeptical of greenhouse gas theory and the ability of humans to control the earth’s temperatures by using CO2 levels as some sort of thermostat. The very idea of the latter proposition is preposterous on its face, and even if human-caused carbon emissions are having some nominal impact, the positive aspects of adding more plant food and the resulting greening of the earth likely outweigh some miniscule rise in average temperatures.

Besides, if the earth really is warming, climate “scientists” wouldn’t need to team up with government bureaucrats to commit so much obvious, outright fraud with the past temperature records and rigging the current readings by placing official measurement sites in or adjacent to known heat islands.

The other problem I’ve often written and talked about is that the Democrat obsession with plant food has had the perverse effect of destroying actual, real environmentalism. Rather than focus on real forms of actual pollution, Democrats in the both the Obama/Biden and Biden/Harris administrations have taken their eyes off that ball and have also actively worsened many environmental problems in the name of advancing their chosen, rent-seeking wind, solar, and EV industries.

In a tweet published on X Thursday, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. echoes many of the same themes I’ve talked about here over the years.

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poshfind · 2 months

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Check out this listing I just added to my Poshmark closet: Bobby and Jackie: A Love Story Hardcover Book by C. David Heymann.

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misspearly1 · 2 years

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Millers Retreat

Chapter Three

Chp1 || Chp2 || Chp3 || Chp4 || Chp 5 ||

Pairing: Joel Miller x Y/N (f!reader)

WC: 4k

Warnings: Not a whole lot for warnings. A little bit of Fluff. Definitely angsty vibes & dark themes surrounding the story to 'Bobby' which in turn makes the Miller's a little sad. There's not a whole lot mention Y/N in thus one peeps, more focus on The Miller brothers.

AN: Okay, in regards to the warnings above, this fic is practically a look into the work that Tommy and Joel are doing, it's not all doom and gloom, the angsty stuff is towards the end. I promise we will get to all of the fluffy/smutty parts in the next chapter. Hope you enjoy, my lovelies <33

It’s currently day three into Joel’s and Tommy’s ‘fishing trip’, their last day, and the work still continues, but let’s look back at what they’ve accomplished so far.

Day One

On the first day, it took the brothers a lot longer than they anticipated to get the thick green vines off the two stationary homes properly, even then, the dug well and the surrounding area was heavily covered too, so that took up even more of their time.

Tommy had come across an old newspaper clipping inside the overgrowth, dated back twenty years ago with the heading of ‘Evacuation Procedures Now Underway; death toll in the thousands.’

The brothers looked at that clipping and remembered that some towns and cities got a heads up before the virus hit, unfortunately most didn’t. And it seems as though the town nearby got that heads up and considering Bobby had the newspaper clipping here, Joel wondered if the man left with his family when it was advised.

This place certainly looked like someone had left in a hurry, or as if a storm of infected had blown through it. Pocketing that clipping along with the postcard that he found on the tree, Joel and Tommy shoved their thoughts aside for now and got back to work.

After they had hacked away at every possible blockage covering the caravans, the older Miller put on his garden gloves and began piling it all up to be discarded, grabbing handfuls in his hands and transporting it to a large pile just outside of camp.

As the area around the caravans started to become clearer, he noticed something else under one of them. It was a book, a journal. Pulling it out and reading the cover, Robert Kennedy, the diary belonged to none other than Bobby himself.

Joel didn’t bother opening it up to read the contents inside, but he didn’t throw it away either, instead, he left it to one side to maybe read later and got back to work again. Once his task at hand was dealt with, they both moved on to thoroughly searching all four caravans, to gather up everything that is useful.

One of the caravans that was under the ivy was locked tight and the brothers couldn’t get it open. It was nearing midnight and they left it for now, deciding that they would come back to it the next day.

They both felt accomplished for all the work they had done today, especially after seeing all the difference they have made. Today, they had found three artefacts of information about Bobby and this caravan site, cleared up all the ivy and rubbish in the camp, uncovered the water well, which was sealed, and the place was looking a hell of a lot better since this morning.

So, at eleven pm at night, Tommy and Joel finally sat down after tending to the horses.

Joel did end up getting that chair from Tommy. He sat on it, feet kicked up on the table with a smug smirk to his face and a small fire in the middle of camp. They were tired and hungry, exhausted after the day's activities but it could either only get worse or easier from this point onwards.

Tommy grabbed the bubbling pot from the fire over to where his brother was sitting, he had cooked some tinned meaty soups, quick and easy to whip up and eat along with a few cut up slices of bread that he brought from home.

They both ate in silence, underestimating how hungry they actually are and while soup can sometimes be boring, this soup tasted delicious. After they ate, Joel grabbed his walkie to have a quick goodnight call with his girl, Y/N.

“Baby, it’s me Joel. Are you awake?” He started off the conversation, standing up from his chair and patting his brother on the shoulder to say goodnight then headed into one of the only two habitable caravans in camp.

“Hey, love, yeah I am. Barely, but I’m awake,” her voice croaked through the walkie tiredly after a few moments. Joel didn’t mean to leave it so late at night, he and his brother got carried away with the work, wanting to get a huge chunk done on their first day.

“I’m sorry, girl, I didn’t wake you up did I?” He plopped down on the edge of the bed, kicking off his shoes and tossing himself back with a wide smile across his face. It was comfy and her voice was homey to his ears. Joel missed Y/N at that moment and he expressed that to her in between a yawn, “I’m laying down right now, wish you were here with me darlin.”

There was a couple seconds that passed before she came back through the walkie, giggling, “You made me yawn too, but no, you didn’t wake me,” Joel smiled on this side, waiting for her to reposition herself in bed after clearly hearing her shuffle around in the sheets, “I miss you too, handsome. How’s it going out there?”

Doing the same thing as Y/N, Joel repositioned himself in his bed and got under the covers, wishing that he could tell her exactly how things are going out here, but he lied again, “Really good. We caught some steelhead and ate it tonight for dinner. How’s things over there?” He tried to steer the topic of conversation.

Y/N, as well as Joel, was in a position of wanting to tell the truth, but she made a promise to Maria not to say anything yet about Tommy, and she lied too, “The usual, baby. Tea with Maria this morning, I cleared up some of the weeds from the garden and fed the plants,” Joel listened to her voice trailing off about all the things she has done today, making him miss home that much more.

Bringing his hand up behind his head, he rested the walkie on his chest with closed eyes, smiling whilst picturing her face telling him all of this. She finished off with a question, asking Joel if he is staying safe out here, to which he replied saying, “Always, babydoll.”

They chatted more over the radio, sinking further into the mattress and warming up under the covers, until Y/N yawned again and Joel looked at his watch, seeing as the time was nearing one am now, he suggested that they get themselves to sleep.

It took a further half hour for either of them to finish up the call, not wanting to be the last one to say goodnight and after setting the walkie down by his side, he thought that the conversation was over with, but his lady wanted to have the last say and her sweet voice crackled through, whispering, “I love you, Joel Miller.”

He chuckled to himself, mumbling into the covers that he loves her too and turned over to get some sleep. If he picked up that walkie, they wouldn’t ever get off the call, he knows that as well as her.

Day Two

On day two of their trip, Joel and Tommy started their day with bagging up all of the rubbish that was left in a pile at the side of camp and taking it far enough away. Just a quick fix for now, but they do need to find a solid way to rid the rubbish properly for future vacations.

It was roughly a fifteen minute walk outside of camp that they took, coming across a spot to lay out the piles of rubbish that they were dragging along, it was a large clearing inside the thick canopy of trees, and as the men came to a stop, they thought the wave-like sound was from the wind blowing, but it wasn’t. It was water.

Leaving the rubbish where they stood, Joel and Tommy followed the sounds until they came across a river but that wasn’t all they found. The brothers were overjoyed to also find a waterfall. They’ve uncovered another water source, a place to bathe and a place to have fun.

Making the most out of this discovery, the two of them decided to take a dip. They could only clean themselves with a rag and some bottled water yesterday, so today, they’re going to take a bath in the river and get themselves thoroughly cleaned.

After they were stripped down to just their underwear, they quickly headed inside the water and laughed when the other one hooted with the cool temperature.

It was cold at first and Tommy yowled boisterously, eliciting his older brother to laugh at him, but he too found it cold and he thought that the best option was to yell out childishly before throwing himself under completely.

With the sun at its peak in the sky above, it took seconds for either of them to feel the warmth and soon, the chill was gone. Joel popped up from the surface, looking up to the top of the waterfall and wondering if the water was deep enough below to jump in.

Swimming up the river and checking it out for himself, he dove back under the surface and swam below the riverbed. Joel couldn’t even see the bottom, he swam and swam until he finally felt the rocks, and he estimated it to be around fifteen to twenty foot deep.

Coming back up again, he could hear Tommy yelling for him and he hurriedly yelled back, “I’m ok. Just checking how deep.”

“Deep enough to jump off?” The younger man asked, to which his elder brother replied, “yeah, it’s deep enough.”

Swimming back down to his original position, Joel and Tommy indulged in the water for five more minutes, before getting back out and sitting on the side, using the heat and the light of the sun trickling through the trees to dry them off.

They should have brought towels, but they didn’t even contemplate on finding a river out here, either way, it didn’t take them long to dry off as they chatted together in the sunlight.

“This is great, isn’t it? Maria, Ellie and Y/N are gonna love it,” Tommy chirped, while shaking his head like a shaggy dog, droplets splashing everywhere from his blonde long hair.

He reminisced about all the times he used to do this stuff when he was younger with Joel. The memories that they made together. It makes Tommy giddy to make more with his wife, with his brother and his daughter, and maybe even some kids of his own one day.

Getting ahead of himself, he thought about some of the things he could add to this place too, some more tables and chairs, maybe built a little hut of some sort for his family to get dried and dressed properly and privately, with towels.

Joel smiled after seeing his brother clearly in a happy train of thought. He watched the water roll up the side of the riverbank in which he sat upon and nodded to Tommy, “yeah. They’re going to love this place.”

After a couple moments of silence, both brothers just enjoying the comforting peace of nature, Joel stood and grabbed his clothes that were draped over a branch, “They’re going to love it when it’s done, so let's get back to it, bro.”

Taking a mental note of this location and how to find it to himself, Joel began getting himself dressed and Tommy did the same. They headed back to camp and got back to work. Cutting down trees with the chainsaw and then cutting them into smaller pieces after that.

They are going to use this wood in the future for fires or crafting new tables and chairs, mostly for now it’s just clearing the place up and making it look new. That task alone took them well into the evening.

Those trees weren’t so little and the brothers had to be safe about it too of course. When he was satisfied that they had enough wood and had cut down enough trees, Joel started clearing away all of the remaining debris from the dug well.

Thankfully the cover was still placed over the top, otherwise it would be contaminated by now after twenty years. It needed to be cleaned off with water before they opened it, so Joel and his brother had to unravel the bucket from the rope and use it to collect water from the river.

They remembered finding a couple large empty canisters from searching the caravans yesterday, so they grabbed them as well. Finding two long sticks with some rope, they attached the canisters to each of them, along with the single bucket to make it easy when carrying back.

That took some time to do, Joel’s body aches with hard labour, he hasn’t worked this much since his younger days alongside Tommy on the construction site. He liked it. It felt productive and purposeful, but boy did he feel his age.

Secretly, he felt better knowing that Tommy was feeling his age too. He may be the eldest but he ain’t the only old guy here either. Just as if the young man knew what he was thinking about, Tommy shook his head and tutted, “I know. I gotta stay in shape.”

Joel, once again, found himself laughing and bonding some more over this project with his brother.

When they got back to camp, Tommy took half of the water they retrieved to the fire to boil while Joel grabbed some of the cleaning items. With a brush held in hand, he swept away all of the dirt and grime on the outside of the well.

The brick was stained green, which shouldn’t cause much of a problem, but still, he wanted to clean everything just to be sure. It was dusty as hell, covered in green soot that caused him to sneeze a couple times too.

When the water was boiled, Tommy brought it over and used the clean water to wipe everything down. Now that that was out of the way, the both of them started sliding the concrete top off halfway. Joel was thrilled and even a little surprised to see water inside.

Using the remaining water from the canisters that they collected, they used hot water, bleach and scrubbers to clean the caravans thoroughly. Leaving the one that was locked to last, which they still need to get round to opening.

By the time the two men came to that particular caravan to clean - after cleaning the outside and inside of the other three - dark skies had already rolled in but they wanted to try and get it open before calling it a night just yet.

Tommy climbed up on the side to reach the latch for the sunroof but as soon as he peered through the foggy window, the man slung himself back with a fright, “Joel, someone is in there!”

“What?!” Joel fretted. Climbing up the side of the caravan just like Tommy did, he came up beside him and wiped away the dust with a rag. Looking inside, he grimaced and held a hand onto his stomach, “he’s dead. Whoever it is, they’re dead.”

Turning around and looking at his brother, Joel shook his head, “Don’t open this thing up, I think that’s Bobby in there.” The older Miller didn’t want to disturb this caravan, as it is in fact, a tombstone.

Jumping back down to the ground below, Tommy had an inkling to look around for something, maybe another clue to tell them that the corpse lying in the bed inside, is in fact Robert Kennedy.

“Joel, c’mere,” He called out to his brother after walking around the back and holding a flashlight up to the writing that was written along the side.

Tommy felt sick with grief, almost too much grief when Joel came round and read the words out loud, “I’m sorry to whoever finds me like this, I couldn’t wait for their return any longer. To Jenny and my kids, I love you in this life and the next.”

That corpse inside the caravan is Bobby, and his family never made it to their six week vacation, probably didn’t even make it to the airport.

Day 3

That brings us to now. On their third and final day of their restoration project.

After they found Bobby in the caravan last night, both of the men felt too unsettled to carry on with their work at that moment. They needed to take care of him, respectfully.

Taking themselves to bed, Joel only had a quick chat with his lady compared to the night before and after he said goodnight, and that he loves her, he turned over to get some shut eye. Their sleep in the caravan last night was emotionally uncomfortable.

The silence was relaxing, just an occasional bird here or there making its call but the notion of knowing what is sitting beside them just a couple feet away was eerie and depressing. Joel needed to move that caravan away from camp, but he wanted to be respectful to Bobby.

Today is their last day to get as much done as they possibly can before making their way home in the early hours of the morning tomorrow. Three nights is all they could buy themselves and it’s time to get back home to their families.

Waking up extra early today at five am, Joel left Tommy in bed for a little bit longer while he went outside to see what was left to do for the day, but instead, he took a seat at the table after making himself a cup of coffee and decided to read Bobby’s journal, to better understand the fellow.

He smiled and even laughed at some points from what the man wrote. Telling the tale of the happiest events in life with his wife and children. There were pictures too. Joel saw what Bobby looked like and he could feel the joy he held through a simple photograph.

Dark haired, dark beard, small and stocky, the man wore the biggest smile Joel has ever seen. He was standing beside his wife, presumably Jenny, and two young kids. One girl and one boy.

Jenny had red hair, fair skin tone with visible freckles, her smile just as big as her husbands, the kids just the same. All of them looked like your typical happy family and Joel could feel the love they had when looking at each of their faces.

Flicking over to the next page, he came across Bobby’s entries days before the outbreak.

~ 09.15.13 - I've just got here, at the campsite and I’m so excited. I can’t wait for the kids to arrive and see it too. I miss my Jenny a lot but she’s up in Colorado at the moment to bring her parents down here too. Let’s get this place set up for them.

Joel’s eyebrows rose with surprise when reading the first passage, poor Bobby only wanted to rent this place out for the summer for his family and decided to come out early to get it prepared while his wife retrieved her parents.

The man wouldn’t have imagined that the world would come to an end not even then days after. Curiosity pulled on Joel to read more, to learn how Bobby’s fate came to be.

~ 09.20.13 - This place is amazing, there's a waterfall nearby and the kids are coming out in six days, so that’s the first place I’m taking them. I got a postcard from Jenny today, the date is set, the 26th is when they fly out here. I paid for the deluxe package, not realizing that it comes with four caravans. Maybe I’ll let the kids have one each. Maybe.

There’s an ache in Joel’s chest while reading. He envisions Bobby through his words. The man sounded like a great father, a great husband and great son in law who only wanted the best for his family.

~ 09.21.13 - I went into town today, more and more people seem to be leaving because of this virus that’s hit the eastern seaboard of America. Hm weird. I should call Jenny and see if her flight is still good to go just in case.

~ 09.21.13 - Update, I called her, flights are all good.

Joel takes the newspaper clipping out of his pocket and looks at the date written on the bottom, it states, 09.23.13. Two days after this passage Bobby had put into his journal, which has a sizable gap until his next. He flicked over to the next page and the date that was written, surprised Joel. Bobby hadn’t written in almost two years.

~ 09.26.15 - I haven’t seen this journal since I last wrote in it, two years ago, and what a two years it has been. My family never arrived. The day of their flight, was the day the world ended, the day my world ended. I left camp as soon as I heard on the radio that people were being evacuated and I went straight for the airport, to try and get home. Everything was locked down. Jenny wasn’t picking up her phone. So I drove. I drove home, but my home wasn’t there anymore - my family wasn't there. Now two years on, I still can’t find them. I have been searching everyday and found my way back to this place. I don’t know why but I just kinda feel them here with me.

Joel had found himself hunched over, head practically in the book reading Bobby’s words. This is someone's life, yet it feels like a novel, like it simply cannot be real, but it is. Joel has seen these things in his life and he has lived through this man's loss.

His heart aches for Bobby, and for himself, but he must read on, to find out what had happened to him.

~ 12.25.15 - It’s Christmas today and I got stumbling down drunk before the sun came up. Why the fuck not? It’s not that I give a shit about what happens to me anymore. So fuck it. Let’s get drunk.

I’ve been staying in one of the caravans, trying to live I guess but I can’t go into the others, they were for my family. I can't handle the pain so I’m going to have a drink instead.

Where are they?

Why can’t I find them?

I can’t do this anymore.

Joel read every entry, each without dates, and slowly saw this man losing his mind. Totally overwhelmed with the loss of his family, which he understands. The next entry that Joel read from Bobby, was his last.

~ 09.26.16 - It’s been three years since I last saw my family alive, since I last kissed my wife and kids on the forehead. Three years marks the day that the world ended and took the people that I love most with it. If this journal finds anyone then this is my last message. I want to be with my family. Is it wrong for a father to want to be with his kids? A husband to be with his wife?

This camp was meant for a family and there is none here. Goodbye.

Joel stared down at the words on the page, a gut wrenching ache sitting in his stomach, transporting him back to those days that he lost Sarah. Bobby lost his whole world, and Joel feels that.

He didn’t know at what point his breathing became erratic during his daze, but a hand clamping down onto his shoulder pulled him from it.

Tommy took the book from him and pulled Joel in for a hug. Clasping his hand to the back of his head and holding him tight, the young man hugged his elder brother and assured him without words.

It was raw, emotional and needed. Very much needed, Joel appreciated the embrace - more than Tommy would ever know.

Tagging

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#Joel Miller #Joel Miller imagine #Joel Miller request #Joel Miller fic #joel miller fanfiction #Joel Miller x y/n #Joel Miller x you #Joel Miller x reader #Joel Miller x female reader #joel miller x f!reader #Joel Miller angst #Joel Miller fluff #Joel Miller smut #follow 👑 share ❤️ enjoy 🍑#enjoyreaders #pearlyfics

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dangerousstrawberryshark · 3 years

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VOTE! (NOT FOR A FIC BUT A CHARACTER/CELEBRITY)

So, I'm gonna cancel the yandere series, I really like this one (The Pharaoh x male reader). And because I have never seen one that involves Pharaoh x male reader.

Same rules:

PICK ONE CHARACTER! (Don't say [Character 1] or [Character 2] you must pick or I'll choose for you

You MUST put it in the comments. If you can't type in the comments or you want to stay anonymous, send me an ask with your vote and I'll add it in the comments.

Edward Cullen

Carlisle Cullen

Jasper Hale

Emmett Cullen

Jacob Black

Caius

Aro

Marcus

Demetri

Sam Uley

Garett

Tony Stark

Peter Parker (Bumping up his age)

Steve Rogers

Bucky Barnes

Thor Odinson

Clint Barton

Pietro Maximoff

Scott Lang

Bruce Banner

Dr. Strange

Loki

Venom

Deadpool

Helmut Zemo

Falcon

Izuku Midoriya

Dabi

Katsuki Bakugou

Mirio Togata

Tenya Lida

All Might

Enji Todoroki/Endeavor

Hawks

Eijiro Kirishima

Shoto Todoriki

Chris Hemsworth

Chris Evans

Robert Downey Jr.

Shawn Mendes

Tom Holland

Jeremy Renner

Sebastian Stan

Henry Cavill

Zac Efron

Colby Brock

Brennen Taylor

Sebastian Stan

Jensen Ackles

Jared Padalecki

Anthony Mackey

Aaron Taylor Johnson

Misha Collins

Jeffrey Dean Morgan

Matt Cohen

Bryan Dechart

Joe Manganiello

Pedro Pascal

Kim Nam-Joon/RM

Kim Seok-JIn

Min Yoongi

Jung Ho-Seok

Park Ji-Min

Kim Tae-Hyung

Jeon Jung-Kook.

James McAvoy

Ryan Reynolds

Robert Pattinson

Hugh Jackman

Johnny Depp

Scott Eastwood

Jared Leto

Ben Affleck

Ewan McGregor

Channing Tatum

Luke Evans

Tom Hiddleston

Dean Winchester

Sam Winchester

Castiel

John Winchester

Lucifer

Crowley

Jack Kline

Young John (Michael)

Dean (Michael)

Adam (Micheal)

Archie Andrews

Jughead Jones

Reggie Mantle

Kevin Keller

Hiram Lodge

Malachai

F. P. Jones

Fangs Fogarty

Eren Jaeger

Levi Ackerman

Erwin Smith

Jean Kirstein

Reiner Braun

Kenny Ackerman

Bertolt Hoover

Clark Kent/Superman

Bruce Wayne/Batman

Arthur Curry/Aquaman

Billy Batson/Shazam (Bumping up his age)

Hal Jordan/Green Lantern

Dick Grayson

Jason Todd

Damian Wayne

Tim Drake

Barry Allen/The Flash

Oliver Queen/Green Arrow

Captain Cold

Captain Atom

Chris Redfield

Leon S. Kennedy

Albert Wesker

Carlos Oliveira

Ethan Winters

Karl Heisenberg

Piers Nivans

Mr. X

Cole Young

Johnny Cage

Scorpion

Kui Liang

Damon Salvatore

Stefan Salvatore

Klaus Mikaelson

Elijah Mikaelson

Kol Mikaelson

Jeremy Gilbert

Tyler Lockwood

Matt Donovan

Tobio Kageyama

Kei Tuskishima

Toru Oikawa

Tetsuro Kuroo

Asahi Azumane

Daichi Sawamura

Wakatoshi Ushijima

Hajime Iwaizumi

Kotaro Bokuto

Satoru Gojo

Kento Nanami

Aoi Todo

Toji Fushiguro

Ryomen Sukuna

Brahms Heelshire

Jason Voorhees

Michael Myers

Stu Matcher

Billy Loomis

Hannibal Lector

Will Graham

Norman Bates

Pyramid head

Sweeney Todd.

Bobby Drake

Scott Summers

Logan Howlett

Erik Lehnsherr

Young Professor X

Scott Mccall

Derek Hale

Peter Hale

Chris Argent

Andy Barber

Ransom Drysdale

Geralt of Rivia

Ian

Mickey

Collin Shea

Johnny Storm

Jake Jensen

Ari Levinson

Tanner Grayton

RK800 (CONNOR)

RK900 (NINES?)

Gavin Reed

#vote #x male reader #male reader #male reader insert #male reader imagine

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honestlypeter · 4 years

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The Angel of Queens - Prologue

pairing: peter parker x fem!reader

warnings: end game kinda (sorry guys), angsty, indirect ment. of suicide, ment. elderly passing, ment. homelessness, i don’t know how diane sawyer works

word count: 965

author’s note: aight this is the beginning of a series i’ve been working on. i haven’t written for this account in years, so i’m v nervous about posting this. i hope you guys enjoy it <3

They called her The Angel of Queens.

The Angel wasn’t quite a superhero per say. She didn’t fight crimes, or battle aliens. No, she was just simply there for those who needed her. When The Angel made her first appearance, right after The Decimation (later renamed The Blip), people were scared. To be fair, who wouldn’t be? A figure dressed in all white wearing a large, matching hooded cape (uhm, Grim Reaper much?) spotted coming out of a small nursing home in the middle of the night and then finding out the next day that two of the elderly patient’s residing there passed away overnight? That’s kind of terrifying.

However, the public learned quickly that the hooded figure wasn’t the harbinger of death, but in fact brought comfort to those who needed it. The dying elderly with no family to spend their last moments with, homeless people in tents under overpasses, people staring down at the waters from the edge of the Robert F. Kennedy Bridge.

So, of course, those who encountered her started talking about their experiences.

“It was the six month anniversary of my daughter’s death,” a middle aged man on the television began, “Lainey, uh, she was all I had and The Decimation took her from me. I didn’t have the energy to live anymore, so I decided that I wouldn’t. That I couldn’t. Not without my baby. And just as I was about to take that step off my apartment building I heard my daughter’s laughter and I-I froze.”

The man paused, taking in a shaky breath, “She was there! She had to be, but when I turned around I just saw The Angel of Queens standing a few feet behind me. The… the thing is, I wasn’t upset when I saw her and not my daughter, because I just felt… happy. For the first time in months I was happy. I was so confused, because where was my little girl? Why wasn’t I devastated like I should have been? And it was like she just read my mind, ‘cause she sat down on the edge of the building, pat the spot next to her and went, ‘Life gets a little easier when a memory that used to be happy becomes happy again.’

“So I sat, and she asked me about my daughter, and I did what I haven’t been able to do in a long time— I spoke freely about her. And as I talked about Lainey with The Angel I didn’t feel the darkness that usually came when I thought about her— it felt like I was finally getting the help I needed. But I was scared, because I knew the feeling wouldn’t last forever. I would go back to the cold darkness again. It was inevitable. So I told The Angel my fear without really meaning to. And not because she forced me to or anything, but because I knew I could.

“I think about her response every day. She said, ‘When winter comes and I get cold, I put on more layers. When I’m surrounded in too much darkness, I light a candle. Sounds easy enough, right?’ and I nodded and she continued with, ‘This obviously won’t be exactly like that. Nothing about this is easy. But this moment, these feelings, they are not fleeting, they are a beginning, and when the time is right, you’ll be able to put on a Mets sweatshirt, light a pumpkin scented candle, and finally be able to breathe.’

“And that whole time— I didn’t even notice this while it was happening— she walked with me from the edge of the building to the door to my apartment. The Angel then gave me a hug that reminded me of my daughter’s and told me, ‘Lainey will be back to give you a proper hug,’ and then she let me go and walked away,” the man finished, tears threatening to spill. He looked down at the ground, clearly trying to compose himself.

“So, what it sounds like to me is that The Angel believes those who perished in The Decimation will return?” Diane Sawyer asked, leaning forward in her chair.

The man managed to reply with a quiet, “Yes,” that wouldn’t have been heard had it not been for the mic attached to him.

Diane hummed, tapping her pen against her chin, “And do you believe that she’s right?”

The man looked up, his once forlorn expression now replaced with genuine hope, “I do. I mean, she knew we were a Mets family, she knew Lainey’s favorite candle scent, why wouldn’t she know this?”

The camera was back on Diane Sawyer and as she opened her mouth to speak, she was stopped by the TV shutting off.

“F.R.I.D.A.Y? Compile whatever information is out there about The Angel of Queens.”

“Of course, Mr. Stark.”

“What a coincidence, huh, Tony?” Happy said, glancing into the rearview mirror to check on his friend as they pulled up to the familiar apartment complex.

“Yeah,” Tony mumbled, getting out of the car, “What a coincidence.”

With that, he shut the car door a little harder than he normally did and made his way to the apartment right across from where the Parkers lived. Well, used to live.

Too distracted by staring down the haunting door, Tony didn’t notice a thirteen year old girl opening her front door until she cleared her throat. That startled the billionaire, him quickly turning around, facing the child who was looking at him with glossy eyes. Is she… crying? Tony thought, the corner of his lips turning downward. He never knew what to do with upset children. Little did he know that her eyes were just a mere reflection of his.

Before Tony could get a word out, the girl beat him to it.

“How did you know Peter Parker?”

#my work #peter parker series #peter parker one shot #peter parker imagine #peter parker x reader #peter parker angst

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thegeekerynj · 4 years

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An Occasional Attempt to Read, Discuss and Review the Wonders of Comics By: John Rafferty, cranky old man, and Fan of All Things Comics

Fat Guy’s WABAC Machine (with apologies to Jay Ward)

Green Lantern / Green Arrow 76 - 87 (1970 - 1971)

Writer: Dennis O’Neil Artist: Neal Adams

That's right, Lantern... apologize. Grovel in front of that walking mummy.

You call yourself a hero! Chum, you don't even qualify as a man. You're no more than a puppet... and the Guardians pull your strings.

Listen... forget about chasing around the galaxy! And remember America. It's a good country... beautiful... fertile... and terribly sick! There are children dying, honest people cowering in fear, disillusioned kids ripping up campuses. On the streets of Memphis a good Black man died... and in Los Angeles, a good white man fell.

Something is wrong. Something is killing us all! Some hideous moral cancer is rotting our very souls.

[Addresses the Guardians, pointing an accusing finger] And you... sitting on your mudball, preening like a smug tomcat. How dare you presume to meddle in the affairs of humanity, when human beings are no more than statistics to you and your crew.

Come off your perch. Touch, taste, laugh, and cry! Learn where we're at... and why!’ 1970. I wasn’t yet 11 years old.

I had witnessed Kent State on the television, the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Robert Kennedy, and how many thousands in Viet Nam.

Then, I picked up Green Lantern / Green Arrow 76...

Gone were the silly Boxing Glove arrows, the Siren arrows, the Itching Powder arrows. We are introduced to a socially conscious Oliver Queen, “Woke’ before woke was a thing... the Social Justice Warrior he continues to be today.

Thus were we introduced to the amazing writing writing style go Denny O’Neil. He pulled no punches, pulled the day’s issues into the story, and made the story surrealistically real... a gutpunch, if you will, to the reader’s conscience, a kickstart to the youth of America’s zeitgeist.

Any comic fan from this era can name one story from this run of comics, whether because they they remember the stories, the punches leaving memories that the reader carried with them through their lived, or they remembered the artwork. The incredible, wondrous work of Neal Adams, who didn’t just illustrate these stories, he brought them to life.

The story itself, was a simple one, GL saves a man from being beaten by a crowd.

Then, he finds out from GA, the man he saved was a slumlord, and the people attacking him were his tenants, because he wouldn’t fix the basic needs in the building...

Pandemonium ensues.

This run of comics, ends with issues 86-87, issues which Denny O’Neil was recognized for two years ago.

The stories, ‘Snowbirds Don’t Fly’, addressed the heroin problem America, from the most unlikely of places, a hero’s family.

A little preachy by today’s standards, but still on point, describing the drug problem for much of American youth, and American Parents. I found myself rereading this a number of times through my life, three times in particular... when my children were growing old enough to make these decisions, and I was old enough to not recognize the issues.

I cannot recommend these issues enough. DC has recently collected them, I would wholeheartedly suggest reading them. Their like will never be seen again, especially now.

You see, Denny O’Neil passed away on Friday. His last story, that I know of, was a neat little story in the new Joker 80th Anniversary issue. His Legacy, his masterworks must be read.

Honor the memory of our of the GIANTS in Comics Writing, and read these stories. Thank you.

#denny o'neil #neal adams #comic books #comics #dc comics #green lantern #green arrow #speedy #hal jordan #oliver queen #rip denny o'neil

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nofomoartworld · 7 years

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Hyperallergic: A Retrospective of Andrew Wyeth, a Painter Both Loved and Loathed

Andrew Wyeth, “Anna Christina” (1967) tempera on panel, 21 ½ x 23 ½ in. jointly owned by the Brandywine River Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, anonymous gifts, 2002 (© 2017 Andrew Wyeth/Artists Rights Society (ARS))

CHADDS FORD, Pa. — Riddle me this: Is the Whitney Biennial a real Whitney Biennial if it goes without protest? In 1960, back when the exhibition was held annually, Edward Hopper urged Andrew Wyeth to sign his letter protesting the near exclusion of realist painting. The artist declined, distancing himself from the New York art world’s socio-political arguments, content with what was in front of him, like Giorgio Morandi with his bottles. Yet, from the late ’60s on, Wyeth would be labeled a reactionary — which is rather like taking issue with a rock for not taking issue with you — and conservative, overlooking John F. Kennedy honoring him in 1963 with a Medal of Freedom for depicting “verities and delights of everyday life” in the “great humanist tradition.” To this day his East Coast critics spend a surprising amount of energy dismissing his relevance.

Jerry Saltz’s 2009 obituary on Wyeth begins by claiming “almost no one in the art world ever thought of or cared much about [him]” thereby slighting Alfred Barr, Elaine de Kooning, and Henri Cartier-Bresson, for starters. More, Robert Hughes did a 180 switch, lauding the painter after his death. “[I]n over three decades in the art world, I have never heard one artist, art student, teacher, critic, collector, or curator mention his name,” Saltz goes on. One wonders whether he missed his wife Roberta Smith’s 1998 New York Times review “New Light on Wyeth’s Outer and Inner Landscapes” on Wyeth’s Whitney Museum show. Was he also completely unaware of photographer Collier Schorr’s obsession with Wyeth’s Helga pictures? “Wyeth was considered so conservative,” Saltz continues, “that even the Metropolitan Museum of Art declined an offer to exhibit his work.” No. The first one-person exhibition the Met ever gave to a living American artist was “Two World’s of Andrew Wyeth: Kuerners and Olsons” curated by director Thomas Hoving in 1976, previewed by Grace Glueck and reviewed by Hilton Kramer in The New York Times, where more argument ensued.

Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw doesn’t ignore art history in her recent piece “Andrew Wyeth’s Black Paintings,” published in the exhibition catalogue for the Brandywine River Museum of Art’s present retrospective on the painter; she rewrites it. It’s not apparent she saw her claimed point of departure: the 2001 “Andrew Wyeth: Close Friends” exhibition of seventy-four works he made of his African-American friends and neighbors over a seventy-year span. But in Shaw’s retelling, Wyeth is a racist oppressor who exploited poor blacks for his own artistic ends. “My issue is more with my field, rather than with the paintings,” Ted Loos cites her as saying, which implies a personal agenda guiding her efforts. It’s helpful to understand this motive, because doing so gives context to the reliably derogatory insinuations and defamatory takes on Wyeth and his art — all free of responsible research.

Shaw makes much of Wyeth’s lifelong black friend and frequent model David Lawrence’s nickname “Doo-Doo,” (which the Wyeth family spelled “Dodo”) to insinuate Wyeth gave him this disparaging moniker. Unmentioned is who dubbed him this — Dodo’s cousin, mom, the mailman? — and that it was only decades later (in the 1950s) “doo-doo” picked up its scatological connotations. So, for the record, Wyeth did not in fact call his best friend “shit.” But Shaw did substantially misrepresent two people’s lives by getting the etymology of six letters wrong. It may seem trivial to address this, but one must select examples of her speculative trivialities when their accumulation is the whole of her piece.

Shaw holds up Senna Moore as the most artistically violated of his models, especially in “Dryad” (2000/2007), where the painter darkens her skin to envelop her within a tree’s shadow. (Dryads are mythological beings that live inside trees.) The incurious takeaway is, in Wyeth’s paintings, “black bodies could be eliminated entirely.” Despite her simplistic reading, Shaw indicates no knowledge that Senna Moore is actually alive — and perhaps available for an interview (as is a male model). In opting out of this exchange, to quote the writer’s own words, Shaw “eliminated entirely” the very black female voice she arrogated herself to speak on behalf of. Knowing none of Wyeth’s models or the artist, Shaw could, to recall her accusation, “exert a great deal of control over how [s]he imagined them.”

Andrew Wyeth painting “Vivian”; still from Andrew Wyeth: Self-Portrait (Snow Hill), directed by Bo Bartlett

In Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania over 100 works by Andrew Wyeth are on display at the Brandywine for Andrew Wyeth: In Retrospect, a comprehensive exhibition covering works from 1936 to his last in 2008, titled “Goodbye.” An agrarian in an age of war, living “farm to table” in contemporary parlance, his subjects — neighbors, the fields, woods, and streams, dilapidated houses, interiors mixed with still lifes, scandalizing nudes, shorelines, boats, and boots — have potential to inspire and disgust, weary and delight, according to the viewer and often the era’s politics.

Were Wyeth not so beloved by the general public, it’s unlikely the critics — mostly writing in the popular press — would have been so committed to scorning him. The policing of borders separating fine art from illustration was first-order, boring business for critics whose opinions on Wyeth were evidently ignored, if they registered at all with collectors and postcard-buyers alike. Surveys conducted in 1973 and 2006, years bookending Wyeth’s most tarred and feathered moments in the press, evidenced no alteration in the museum-going public’s approval: 86% for “enjoyment” of his paintings, according to exhibition exit polls by Wanda M. Corn and Lynda M. O’Leary. Wyeth sought to make images widely intelligible and by succeeding in that, rendered third-party mediation largely irrelevant, surely a sore spot for professional mouthpieces of taste. This meant authoritative interpretation of his art was his own, exemplified by Thomas Hoving’s choice to interview the artist for the 1976 exhibition catalogue, rather than commission essays.

Wyeth, elsewhere, writes: “I think one’s art goes as far and as deep as one’s love goes. I see no reason for painting but that. If I have anything to offer, it is my emotional contact with the place where I live and the people [I know].

This quote is slightly revolting in its sentimentality. We rid ourselves of softer emotions in 20th-century art. But “deep love” is not saccharine if we imagine that Wyeth had been a poet, novelist, or essayist. Think of beauty, for example.

“At some point in life the world’s beauty becomes enough. You don’t need to photograph, paint or even remember it. It is enough.”

Okay, that one’s by Toni Morrison. See? It’s nice. It’s a literary attitude, perhaps, that’s needed to enter the world of Andrew Wyeth, which is not to say it’s easy. Francis Weiss, in the academic reader Rethinking Andrew Wyeth, posits Robert Frost as akin to Wyeth in artistic aim. “You and I have something in common,” Frost wrote Wyeth, “that almost makes me one wonder if we hadn’t influenced each other, been brought up in the same family.” They both aimed their art at the common viewer, eschewing urbane tastes, crafting work within a familiar tradition.

Despite the criticism claiming Wyeth’s weathered pastorals were escapist, the works are, like Frost’s poems, a space for darker dreaming and experiencing alienation, isolation, and a distinctly 20th-century form of anxiety. “At its most aesthetically convincing,” Donald Kuspit holds, “Wyeth’s art brings us to consciousness of the body’s existence — bodiliness as such, bodiliness as the essence of existence.” This seems right. All of his works, at least from the late 1940s on, are relentlessly focused at an observational level, almost cruel at times, while suffused with a range of moods, from the austere to the theatrical, as if visual facts were a container for fictions. Or, invoking the novelist Émile Zola’s words: “a corner of creation seen through a temperament.”

The Japanese see abstract meanings too. In the new catalogue for the Brandywine exhibition, Shuji Takahashi reveals why Wyeth’s work is collected in Japan more than in any other country but this one, and why Wyeth felt more understood there. His paintings reflect “the Japanese sense of life and death, a belief … that people are part of the great cycle of nature.” The tempera “Thin Ice” (1969) in the show is the most abstract piece, and is exhibited in America for the first time in decades. The orange and brown leaves in a stream under an ice sheet suggest a painter who could’ve been an accomplished abstract artist had he not found the genre dull.

The Japanese never succumbed to the form of western modernity Wyeth’s art rejects, that is, the separation of truth from beauty. Here, what is beautiful cannot be true, and what is true cannot be beautiful. Europe caught this earlier, with the First World War — hence Dadaism — and then this view rose in the United States with WWII. Jackson Pollock and the Abstract Expressionist’s bent toward self-obliteration was incommensurable with a tenacious realism holding forth that humans are inherently dignified. Pop Art then successfully brought back realist imagery, but only by exhausting the meaning of the images’ referents. It’s striking to note Wyeth’s painting of Tom Clark in “Chester County” (1962) was made the same year Warhol introduced his serialized images of Campbell’ Soup. Wyeth was pursuing the human affect in his paintings that Pop Art was laying to rest.

When Robert Rosenblum said in 1977 that Andrew Wyeth was both the most overrated and underrated living American artist, he had it right. The “best” and “worst” artist would’ve been better candidates, but in accounting for collective perceptions, Wyeth did divide. This friction is playing out at the Museum of Modern Art right now. “Christina’s World” (1938), the famous painting of crippled Christina crawling up a hill toward home, was acquired as a work then considered categorically modern, surrealist. But as its popularity grew with the public, the museum’s curatorial thrust instead went toward Abstract-Expressionism, forcing MoMA into its present fix. It keeps the painting at home to do the heavy lifting — it’s their Mona Lisa for ticket sales and merchandising — but rejects displaying it as a great work of art. It’s rarely lent, citing concerns about its condition, a claim contradicted by their relegating it to the heavily trafficked hallway, to be appreciated en route to the toilet. Thus the rub: the museum’s curators let visitors know Wyeth is not a canonical artist, to be put in an legitimate gallery space, while also being substantially reliant on his work for financial support.

The artist’s watercolor landscapes are often considered his best works, or to his dedicated detractors, the least bad — which might in part be due to their purported affinity to Abstract Expressionism. Regardless, they are great works. There are no physical, mental, or material intermediaries between the artist’s spirit and his image. Wyeth’s brush does not represent the subject; it discovers it. The painting is a visual artifact and its process of making are the result of an experiential whole of pointed intention. Mistaking his facility as bravura, which is often done with these works, is like mistaking the beauty in an athlete’s skill — hard won by discipline — for ease.

Given that so much handwringing has been generated about Wyeth for at least the last fifty years, his work is already interesting. The criticisms against him are more rich, varied, and contradictory than any other artist of the 20th century, with him being both lascivious and sexually repressed, impossibly fantastical and boringly descriptive, embarrassingly sentimental and oppressively racist, idyllic and depressed, undeservedly famous and nobody at all. The reasons to like him are less fanciful and few. He was a good guy, made likable pictures, and was a fantastic painter with a rare deftness of touch, able to make innumerable paintings of the same hill and never repeat himself, nail a subject in six seconds or six months, paint from imagination a picture more convincing than a photograph, keep brushes wet for 75 years, and have it in him to paint a “Goodbye” when he knows it’s time to go.

Andrew Wyeth: In Retrospect continues at the Brandywine River Museum of Art (1 Hoffman’s Mill Road, Chadds Ford, PA) through September 17, 2017.

The post A Retrospective of Andrew Wyeth, a Painter Both Loved and Loathed appeared first on Hyperallergic.

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aion-rsa · 8 years

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15 Times A U.S. President Showed Up in Marvel Comics

Love him or hate him, as of January 20, 2017 Donald J. Trump has officially become the 45th President of the United States of America. However, what you may not have known is that this will also make President Trump the leader of the Marvel Comics Universe’s America.

RELATED: SALES OF MARCH SOAR AFTER DONALD TRUMP INSULTS JOHN LEWIS

Since the company’s humble beginnings as Timely comics, Marvel has made something of a tradition out of honoring American Presidents by featuring them in their comics. Though their appearances are sometimes little more than cameos or passing topical references, some of our nation’s leaders have been key figures for full issues or even in entire story arcs! Since we’ve just begun a new Presidency, there’s no better time for us to look back at 15 of the times an American President made an appearance in a Marvel comic.

DEADPOOL KILLS 31 ZOMBIFIED US PRESIDENTS

Back in 2012, as part of their MARVEL NOW initiative, Marvel relaunched Deadpool with a new #1 helmed by the creative team of writers Brian Posehn and Gerry Duggan, along with artist Tony Moore and colorist Val Staples. The book’s first arc (issues #1-6), appropriately called “Dead Presidents,” finds Deadpool being called in by S.H.I.E.L.D. to fight and kill reanimated versions of 31 US Presidents, spanning from George Washington to Ronald Regan.

Necromancer, a magical former member of S.H.I.E.L.D. with the ability to bring living creatures back to life, decides to reanimate all of the former Presidents of the United States in hopes that their guidance can save America from itself. This plan completely backfires when his magic not only corrupts the former Presidents, but also gives them superpowers. After deciding the best course of action is to destroy the country and start fresh, Deadpool (along with the ghost of Benjamin Franklin) is called in to take them all out and save America. It’s also worth mentioning that 39th President Jimmy Carter also makes an appearance in issue #1, even though he’s still very much alive.

FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT CALLS FOR BACK-UP

The 32nd President of the United States, Franklin Delano Roosevelt began making appearances in Marvel comics all the way back in 1940 when Marvel was still known as Timely Comics. His first appearance was in issue #10 of Timely’s first series “Marvel Mystery Comics,” a book that featured multiple stories about some of Marvel’s earliest characters like Namor the Sub-Mariner, and the original (robotic) Human Torch.

FDR made his comic debut, in a story penciled by artist Steve Dahlman, that follows Electro (not to be confused with the Spider-Man villain), a Robot created by Professor Philo Zogolowski and funded by the US Government, to fight crime and corruption. When the villainous Cuban scientist Dr. Bruno Varoz develops a synthetic blood formula that allows him to reanimate human corpses, he creates an army of the undead and sends them to attack major American cities. When conventional means fail, President Roosevelt calls in Professor Zog and Electro to deal with Varoz. After defeating his armies and tossing him in a vat of acid, Zogolowski is personally congratulated by FDR for defending his country.

HARRY TRUMAN GETS KIDNAPPED

In a story by Stan Lee and Mike Sekowsky featured in issue #34 of “Human Torch Comics,” President Harry Truman is kidnapped by a two-dimensional being known as B4, who is the leader of his two-dimensional world of Flatula.

The issue begins with the original Human Torch and his sidekick, Sun Girl, watching a baseball game together, when suddenly the ball flattens and disappears mid-pitch. The game is then interrupted by the breaking news that the President has also vanished while addressing the public. Eventually the Torch figures out what’s going on and the duo travel to Philadelphia in time to see the words on the Declaration of Independence disappear. As the Liberty Bell starts to flatten itself, Human Torch and Sun Girl grab on, transporting themselves to Flatula.

After being captured by the locals and taken to B4, the Torch and Sun Girl are taken to a zoo holding everything stolen from the 3-dimensional world. When the Torch finally Flames on, he discovers that since fire is 3-dimensional, he and Sun Girl are immune to the effects of the flat dimension. They then burn everything between them and the zoo before freeing the captives and returning home with B4 as their prisoner so that the Flatulans can never kidnap anyone again.

DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER GETS KIDNAPPED

In “What If?” #9, by writer Don Glut and artist Alan Kupperbuerg, Iron Man calls a meeting with Avengers members Captain America, Thor, Vision, and Beast to show them his newest invention, a dimensional viewer. He explains that the device allows them to see a video feed of an alternate Earth where another group of heroes somewhat similar to the five of them also founded a superhero team called The Avengers, albeit in the 1950s.

F.B.I. agent Jimmy Woo recruits Marvel Boy, 3-D Man, Gorilla Man, the Human Robot and the goddess Venus to rescue President Dwight D. Eisenhower from the supervillain Yellow Claw and his Masters of Evil-style team of villains made up of the hero’s individual nemeses. After completing their mission, President Eisenhower disbands the team, believing that learning about super-powered beings like The Avengers would send the public into a panic. The “Avengers” agree and disband until a time when their world needs them again.

MERLIN TRIES TO STEAL AMERICA FROM JOHN F. KENNEDY

In his last contemporary appearance in a Marvel comic, and just a few short weeks before his assassination, President John F. Kennedy almost has the country stolen right from under him by Merlin the Wizard in “Journey into Mystery” #96, by writers Stan Lee and Robert Bernstein, and artist Joe Sinnott. We learn that Merlin is in fact a mutant who used his powers of telepathy, levitation, and teleportation to fake magic.

Shortly after using his powers to send a missile test off course, Merlin teleports himself to Washington D.C. and storms the White House intending to take control of the country from JFK. Thor and Merlin duke it out on the White House lawn with Merlin using the Washington Monument as a giant spear, and animated the Lincoln Memorial statue with his “magic” for back up. Realizing their powers were pretty evenly matched, Thor decides to throw a Hail Mary and turn back into his old alter ego, Dr. Donald Blake, in an attempt to convince Merlin that he’s a shapeshifter with countless more powerful forms. Merlin buys Thor’s tall tale, so Thor commands him to return to his sarcophagus for another 1,000 years.

LYNDON B. JOHNSON PARDONS BRUCE BANNER

President Lyndon B. Johnson really had his hands full as the President of Marvel’s America. While he was in office S.H.I.E.L.D. was founded, he reunited Nick Fury and the Howling Commandoes, and Kang the Conqueror nearly took over the planet. He was also a fairly prominent figure during a few Hulk storylines back when the character was gracing the pages of “Tales to Astonish.”

In issue #64, written by Leon Lazarus and drawn by Carl Burgos, Bruce Banner finds himself locked up in a government prison after allegedly attempting to steal an invention he created for the army. Bruce is moved to Washington D.C. for a trial, and receives a visit from Rick Jones who tries to convince Bruce to reveal himself as the Hulk. Bruce refuses, believing that exposing himself could put America at risk if their enemies learned who he was and how he got his powers. He remarks that he could only expose his identity to someone who he knew would never let the information get out. This gives Rick the idea to pay a visit to none other than President Lyndon B. Johnson himself. After flashing his official Avengers card, he gets an audience with the President and earns Bruce Banner a pardon.

RICHARD NIXON STAGES A COUP

You may know he was also the Commander-in-Chief during Galactus’ assault on Earth, but are you aware that President Richard Nixon also acted as Number One, the leader of the Secret Empire? Originally a satellite organization of HYDRA, by the time Nixon is their leader, the Secret Empire is an independent group seeking to overthrow the American Government by capturing mutants (including notable X-Men like Beast, Angel, and Ice Man) and channeling their powers into a flying saucer-like super-weapon.

In “Captain America” #175, written by Steve Englehart and drawn by Sal Buscema, we see Cap, The Falcon, Cyclops, and Jean Grey (still acting as Marvel Girl) are able to defeat the members of the Secret Empire, but Nixon escapes into the White House before being corned in the Oval Office by Cap. Rather than accepting his capture, Number One removes his mask, revealing his identity to Cap (but not the reader) as a high ranking government official before committing suicide. Though we don’t see Nixon’s face, the implication was so clear that Marvel tried to distance themselves from the story’s connection to the Watergate scandal in the issue’s letters section. However, writer Steve Englehart has since come out and said he absolutely intended Number One to be President Nixon.

GERALD FORD IS ALMOST ASSASSINATED

In “Incredible Hulk” #185, by writer Len Wein and artist Herb Trimpe, President Gerald Ford is scheduled to visit the Hulkbuster Base to congratulate Colonel Glenn Talbot on escaping from Russian captivity. It just so happens that Colonel John Armbruster has also captured Bruce Banner, tranquilized him, and locked him up deep beneath the Hulkbuster Base. When President Ford arrives at the base later that day, he’s shown around by Talbot, General “Thunderbolt” Ross, and Ross’ daughter Betty. Ross takes the President down to where Banner is being held to brag about his capture, and Bruce even mocks Ford by calling him Vice-President (Ford was VP until Nixon’s resignation, if you recall).

As the trio shows the President around the base, Armbruster learns from a secret report that Talbot’s “escape” was actually a plot by the Russians, and that the man they believe to be Talbot is in fact a Russian spy with a bomb implanted in his chest who was sent to kill President Ford. Without warning, Armbruster bursts into the room and tackles “Talbot” over the edge of a railing. The spy’s body then explodes, killing both of them in the blast.

JIMMY CARTER (AND GERALD FORD) RUN AGAINST HOWARD THE DUCK

In the Marvel Universe, the 1976 Presidential race was between incumbent President Gerald Ford, the man who defeated him, President Jimmy Carter, and…Howard the Duck. While working as a security guard for the fringe “All-Night” Party, Howard learns the group’s leader has recently dropped out and they’re looking for a new candidate. After he discovers a bomb’s been placed in the crowd, Howard rushes on stage during the new candidate’s speech and manages to save everyone by sacrificing the event’s giant cake to smother the bomb, and the group immediately names Howard their new candidate.

Despite numerous attempts on his life and disagreements with members of his party, Howard manages to craft a solid platform. He vows to crack down on pollution, cut military spending, give amnesty to draft-dodgers, strive for bipartisanism and improve education. While neither Presidents Carter nor Ford take Howard seriously, he still manages to poll with 30% of Americans saying they’d vote for him (although 48% said they would kill him), before a doctored photo of Howard taking a bath with his sidekick Beverly begins a sex scandal in “Howard the Duck” #8, written by Steve Gerber and drawn by Gene Colan, that quickly ends his Presidential bid.

RONALD REGAN FIGHTS CAPTAIN AMERICA

“Captain America” #344, written by Mark Gruenwald and drawn by Kieron Dwyer, tells a story where the supervillain Viper (later known as Madame Hydra) poisons Washington D.C.’s water supply with a mutagenic agent that causes people to hallucinate and turn into “Snake-Men.” President Ronald Regan is one of the many people affected by the toxin, and Steve Rogers (then acting as The Captain) fights him inside the Oval Office.

Ronald Regan strips down to his underwear as he succumbs to the mutagen, gaining scales and super powers. He then attacks Cap, who is forced to evade rather than fight back in order to keep from killing the President. Luckily for both of them, Regan sweats enough during their brawl to work the toxin out of his system, and he quickly loses his scales and returns to his human form. We’re shown that he at least temporarily retains his sharpened canines, but unfortunately Regan’s days as superhuman seem to end here.

GEORGE H.W. BUSH HAS PLAUSIBLE DENIABILITY

Our 41st President, George H.W. Bush, makes arguably the least significant appearances of all the Presidents on this list. That being said, he did make a handful of fairly notable cameos in the first volume of “Iron Man” during the late ’80s and early ’90s.

He made his debut in the Marvel Universe in “Iron Man” #247, written by David Michelinie and Bob Layton, who also acted as a penciler for the issue. President Bush briefly appears on television to claim he had no knowledge of collusion between the F.B.I. and the crime syndicate known as the Maggia. He later returned to the book in “Iron Man” #277, by writer John Byrne and artist Paul Ryan, when he’s alerted that hidden missile silos across the Midwest have launched nuclear warheads straight at Russia as part of a Soviet plot to begin World War III (Iron Man and Black Widow intervene and save the day, though).

BILL CLINTON EXILES CAPTAIN AMERICA

President Bill Clinton is featured prominently in the four-issue miniseries celebrating Cap’s 50th anniversary, “Captain America: Man Without a Country.” His first appearance in the arc is in “Captain America” issue #450, by writer Mark Waid and artist Ron Garney, when President Clinton charges Cap with treason and exiles him from U.S. soil.

After meeting with Sharon Carter in London and getting a new uniform without the stars and stripes, the duo travel to Moldovia, where the villain Machinesmith has built an Argus Cannon to try and force a conflict with the U.S. While trying to invade the base where the cannon is being held, Cap and Sharon get captured and taken to Machinesmith, who then explains that he’s stolen the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier’s override codes. He directs the carrier to crash into a nearby mountain while he teleports to Camp David to assassinate the President. Cap is ultimately able to foil the Machinesmith and save President Clinton, earning his thanks and the reinstatement of his citizenship and title as Captain America.

GEORGE W. BUSH PASSES THE SUPERHUMAN REGISTRATION ACT

Marvel’s 2006 “Civil War” event kicks off when the New Warriors, a group of superheroes with their own reality show, take on a group of villains way out of their league in a quest for ratings instead of calling in the Avengers. Among the villains they attack is Nitro who during the conflict, explodes and kills over 600 people (including 60 children). Tony Stark is accused of being responsible for the culture of superheroes (due to him bankrolling The Avengers) by one of the children’s parents, so he decides it’s time for him to get involved.

In response to growing public demand for greater accountability from superheroes, President George W. Bush meets with Stark, Reed Richards and Hank Pym in “Civil War” #1, by writer Mark Millar and artist Steve McNiven, to develop the Superhuman Registration Act. He expresses his concern that Captain America is the figurehead for the rebellion, and asserts that they will need their own figurehead before Iron Man steps forward to tell him that they will deal with Cap.

THE CHAMELEON TRIES TO REPLACE BARACK OBAMA

In “Amazing Spider-Man” #583, written by Mark Waid and drawn by Barry Kitson, the supervillain known as the Chameleon attempts to impersonate and kidnap President Barack Obama on his Inauguration Day so that he can take his place as the next President of the United States. The real Obama manages to escape and his Vice-President – Joe Biden drives – him to the inauguration to stop the Chameleon.

Peter Parker is also in D.C. trying to sneak into the inauguration without a press pass. Just as he’s about to be arrested for trespassing, Senator John McCain recognizes Peter as a photographer for the Daily Bugle and gets one for him. Once inside, Peter sees that two Obamas have arrived to the inauguration, so he becomes Spider-Man and exposes the imposter by asking the two of them a series of questions that only the true President Obama would know how to answer.

DONALD TRUMP THREATENS TO SUE LUKE CAGE

President Donald Trump’s appearance on this list is unique because, due to his celebrity status prior to the election, he’s the only President whose appearance happened before his actual Presidency. In what is arguably the least flattering appearance on this list, Trump is briefly shown getting into a conflict with Luke Cage in “New Avengers” issue #47, written by Brian Michael Bendis and drawn by Billy Tan and Michael Gaydos.

When Trump’s limousine is blocking the way of an ambulance trying to respond to an emergency, Luke Cage lifts the vehicle out of the way before carelessly dropping it back on the street. Trump jumps out and threatens Luke with a lawsuit, but Cage responds by slamming his hands on the hood and screaming at him to “Get (his) ass back in the car!” This causes Trump to retreat to his limo and rolling up the window as a crowd of civilians applaud.

Which Marvel series do you want to see President Trump show up in first? Let us know in the comments!

The post 15 Times A U.S. President Showed Up in Marvel Comics appeared first on CBR.com.

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