#so yeah when I've been on my period for 2 weeks without it showing signs of stopping yeah i kinda want rid of it with meds doc

[kingofscoops]

I hate when doctors talk to you like you don't know anything about the condition you've had since you were a teenager...

[growinguparo]

Thinking once again about the intersection of being aro / perpetually single and the Housing Issue. It is without a doubt the biggest issue I face as an aro person, particularly in fucking Canada.

In my province we have rent control on almost all rental units by default. Annual rent increases are capped at 2.5%, and though I have had landlords in the past try to break that law, they back down when you say "that's literally not legal lmao try again".

In my province we also have a type of lease called a group lease, where multiple people sign on as a group. This is the standard type of lease used in properties with more than one bedroom.

If one person wishes to remove themself from a group lease, that terminates the lease for all of the other tenants in the group. Therefore, in order to continue living in the unit they are already in and may have been in for years, the landlord can choose to force the remaining tenants to reapply, and upon signing a "new lease" they can increase the rent by however much they want. Forget 2.5%, they could double rent with no consequences and still get tenants because that's how desperate people are in Canada.

Seeing as that's fucking insane, I talked to multiple lawyers about it the last time this happened to me, and they all said yeah no, if someone wants to be removed from the lease then the landlord can choose to deny a takeover and force a new lease. You can prevent the issues that come with a new lease if everyone remains on the old lease even if they no longer live there, but that is rather precarious for everyone involved and also makes your landlord hate your guts.

Anytime a new lease is signed, landlords can increase by whatever they want, so renovictions are very common (I've been renovicted as well). With all these easy-to-access loopholes, "rent control" is a joke.

It is New Year's Day and I have received yet another email informing me that since one of my roommates decided to leave at the end of the lease period, our lease will be terminating and showings will begin next week. If any one of us wants to stay, we have to reapply at market rates with a replacement person already in the group ready to sign a new lease, or we have to all remain on the old lease.

I left my parents' home in 2016, and since then I have moved 15-17 times, depending what you count as a move, and lived in 12-13 different places. That's due to a bunch of forced circumstances, including co-op placements and illegal evictions, but many of those moves were because the roommates I was living with decided to move on with their lives, and I had no choice but to move as well.

When I tell people I've moved 15 times in 7 years, they are always shocked. I'm like, how have you NOT though? Having had this conversation many times, I start to ponder what makes me vulnerable to this type of exploitation, and what makes my friends able to avoid some of it.

#1. As a low-income disabled person, I am unable to afford "market rates". This means I'm always tryna get units that are below market rate, and those landlords are invariably very interested in removing their tenants to bring their busted-ass units up to market rate.

#2. I am SINGLE bro. No one is planning their life around living with me. Every time a roommate leaves, I get forced out too. I did have a long-term roommate for a couple years who bounced around 4 places with me, but eventually she moved city - as is her right - and I was forced out again.

Couples also have more options when it comes to affordable housing, particularly if they are willing to share a room. Sharing a room cuts your rent in half. It’s pretty rare to see just one person living in a 1bed because it’s just ludicrously expensive, but for couples it’s a decent option. During the searching stage as well, if you already have someone to live with it’s a lot easier to find places than if you also have to find new roommates (this part is especially brutal for me as a trans person). It is certainly still difficult for couples in the market, I know couples who have ended up homeless as well, but being alone makes you more vulnerable.

The housing crisis is a broad issue affecting literally everyone, but single people are one of the groups that is systematically disadvantaged, making it a significant issue for aros imo. It is the combination of being single and low-income that has made me so vulnerable to housing instability.

Edited with minor corrections

[jedimasterkelly]

Shit happens when you're a woman. A lot of shit. Bad shit. And a lot of the time, you will run into doctors who do not listen to you. Will not care about you, and will not take you seriously.

This story is about the Great Cancer Scare of 2020.

I was 49, and 3 yrs post menopause. I was pleased about that, as it means no more period ever. I could deal with the occasional hot flashes, and the snapping of necks of anyone who dared bother me. Then in May of 2020, after the pandemic fully hit and the University I work at closed and sent all of us to work from home, I got very sick. Not from Covid, thankfully, but something else. I had started bleeding, and it wasn't menstrual blood. It was bright red and HEAVY. I was filling post-natal pads within 2 hours. I called the Women's Clinic where my OB-GYN lived. They couldn't see me until July. WTF! I called my GP, who got me in on an emergency basis, I mean, 3 yrs post-menopausal women don't just spring a leak, you know? My ovarian function had been almost nil for 3 years. He called my OB-GYN and demanded I get seen right away. They made an appointment for 2 weeks later. Keep reading, because it's quite a ride!

Seriously! 2 weeks later!

In the meantime, my GP discovered my thyroid was tanked out, so I was put on Levothyroxine 25mcg. It helped a lot. I started to feel a little bit more human, at least in the brain area. I finally got in to the OB-GYN, and he did a biopsy and trans-vaginal ultrasound. We got the results 2 weeks later and he called me in to go over them. He said I had hyperplasia with atypia. Cells were dividing rapidly, and he was very concerned. He recommended an endometrial ablation, or a full hysterectomy. At 49 he wasn't concerned with me having a sudden maternal urge (I have no kids), so he was fine with either choice. I decided on the hysterectomy, because why not? Endometrium grows back after an ablation, and why bother at my age? Just yank it all and let me get back to my life.

He said he didn't feel safe doing the procedure, since the cells were most likely cancerous and rapidly dividing, so he sent a referral to one of the cancer centers in OKC. I expected a call within a couple of weeks. I mean, really, if I have the early stages of endometrial cancer, they'd call me in immediately, right? Right?

Crickets. Literal crickets for 4 months! I was very concerned, hell, worried I was going to get full blown cancer and these jackasses weren't going to try and help me at all. I called OB-GYN several times during that 4 month period, and was told the cancer center in OKC wasn't returning their calls. I called them numerous times, and could never get a person on the phone.

I was told it was the pandemic. The pandemic was shutting everything down and causing huge backlogs for non-Covid issues to be seen. I told OB-GYN to refer me to the oncologist from Tulsa, who also worked once a month in Stillwater at the SMC Cancer Center. He didn't want to, he wanted me to see the doctor in OKC (who wasn't returning anyone's calls!) I called SMC Cancer Center and asked how soon I could get in with Dr. Thomas. His office called back within 2 hours asking for my chart and biopsy results. I had the Womens Clinic send my information to Dr. Thomas in Tulsa. Within a week, they called and had me on the schedule to see him in Stillwater on his next visit.

This is where the story gets good. And by good, I mean, WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK. Thanks for sticking with me this far.

Got in to see Dr. Thomas. I researched him and learned we have the same Alma Mater. That day, we were both wearing t-shirts from said same Alma Mater. Instant bonding! I also work in Administration at said same Alma Mater, so we spent some time discussing (gossiping) about my department since he had taken classes with a lot of my faculty during his undergrad. Then he got serious and handed me my biopsy report. He told me he was going to assume I wasn't shown this, since I am:

1. A Master's of Science graduate student in Education Leadership - this making me a researcher who knows how to do research, do research, and understand research.

2. Work full time in a Physical Sciences department at a Big 12 University.

3. Edit manuscripts for my Dept. Chair, thus proving I am scientifically literate. You can't edit scientific manuscripts without having a good, solid knowledge of said science. If he's alternating between "adsorb" and "absorb", I have to understand his research in order to correct his manuscript. This is important because his manuscripts have to be peer reviewed before they can be published in a reputable journal.

"Read it to me, out loud," he said.

I started reading from the paper in my professional scientist voice. It didn't take long before I began to falter as I came to the realization I had been lied to.

"Read it again," he said.

This time, I read it with a lot more heat in my voice.

Diagnosis: no hyperplasia with atypia, no abnormal cells detected

Dr. Thomas waited for me to explode. I didn't. I just stared at him in anger and horror. He offered to do another biopsy to make sure, but he suggested I fire my OB-GYN immediately and find someone who actually gives a shit about me.

I was still randomly bleeding, 6-9 weeks at a time, so we agreed on another trans-vaginal ultrasound and biopsy. The attached photo shows he took 3 samples from my uterus. He wanted to be sure.

A little ditty about endometrial biopsies:

They hurt like a motherfucker.

Take 2-3 ibuprofen before you leave the house to go to your procedure.

Relax. It usually only lasts a couple of minutes. The doctor normally takes 1 or 2 samples. Pinch, snip, clip, done.

Not this guy. He wanted to be surely sure.

He went for a 3rd pinch snip clip. My uterus seized up in the most painful spasm I ever had in my life. I almost came off the table. He was seated on a little rolly stool so he shot back away from me before I could connect his head to my foot. He triumphantly held up his little weapon of Uterine Destruction and declared, "Got it!"

"Yeah, you almost got your ass kicked mister," I growled at him.

"It was worth it to get this beauty of a sample."

So, after a biopsy of your uterus, expect some bleeding and cramping. I had severe cramps for 2 days. I was not amused. We're talking laying in bed with a heating pad and ibuprofen every 4 hours kind of cramping.

Got the results back in a couple of weeks. No cancer. No hyperplasia. No abnormal cell growth. He recommended I find a new OB-GYN fast. I decided fuck it, I'm done. I'm never seeing another OB-GYN ever again.

Dr. Thomas said several times he's convinced my issues are endocrinal. I filed that away in the back of my mind.

(if you ever do test positive for cancer and you are in the Tulsa area, I highly recommend Dr. Eric Thomas! Make sure you have a sense of humor with him.)

My GP started pressuring me back in March of 2021 to find a new OB-GYN. The Women's Clinic has several, but they have a fucked up rule you can't switch doctors there. So if you go there, you are stuck with the same doctor and can't move over to his colleague on another floor. I saw my GP again, and asked if he was still best buds with a gynecologist who had his own clinic. He was always full, and not taking new patients, so GP would have to call his buddy to get me in.

Which he did. Buddy-GYN's office called the very next day to schedule me in. He had been sent my chart and was concerned about the long bleeds (6-9 weeks in duration) and why the fuck were they happening after being 3 yrs post-menopause.

I went in for a consult in April of 2021. First thing out of his mouth, "Has anyone ever talked to you before about PCOS?"

I laughed.

I laughed because every GYN I saw over the last 20 years told me I didn't have PCOS, endometriosis, or any sort of hormonal issues. I was just fat, lazy, and a piggy pig pig. I actually had one OB-GYN tell me to go on The Biggest Loser. Fat shamed while sitting there naked on his table after an invasive exam of my female bits. Thanks a lot, asshole.

I told him about that. He informed me he could tell by LOOKING at me I have the classics signs of PCOS. I use an epilator on my crazy man-hairs, so he asked if I was tweezing or waxing. I about fell out of my chair. Nobody ever believed me that I was having to remove crazy thick hairs off my chin and neck all the time. He asked if I ever had ovarian cysts. Affirmative, I was diagnosed with ovarian cysts the first time one exploded back in 1994. He stood there, holding the bridge of his nose and shook his head.

"Well, going by your chief complaints, your abdominal circumference, history of bursting cysts, and no period for 3 years, I am saying you have PCOS."

He went on to discuss my need for an appointment with an endocrine specialist, he was convinced my thyroid tanking out sent my ovaries back into production, and now my hormones are all over the place, most likely, and I needed specialized care.

He must have talked to GP, because I soon got a call from the endo clinic to come in.

This post is already long and tedious, but I am happy to say I finally have 3 doctors who listen to me. My new Endo doc tripled my levothyroxine and scheduled a follow up blood test for next month. Buddy-GYN talked me into a pap smear and cervical exam in July as well. He also wants a mammogram, which I begrudgingly need to schedule so he doesn't chew my ass in July when I walk in with no results. GP is working on my other issues (weight, bad fluid retention, etc...). We discovered from a blood test last Friday my iron levels are dangerously low. I am now on a Rx iron supplement. I've always struggled with anemia, but it never occurred to me or GP to check my iron levels. If you're a woman, and you feel like absolute dog shit and your doctor can't figure out why, have your iron and electrolytes tested. It'll probably take about 3-4 weeks for me to see any results from the iron supplement, but I can already see a reduction in fluid retention.

In September, I have an appointment with Dr. Le at Integris in OKC. He's a bariatric surgeon. I have gained so much weight from having PCOS and Hypothyroidism that I need to drop a lot of fat fast. I'm pretty healthy - I don't have the normal problems obese people tend to have. I'm not diabetic, don't have sleep apnea, my cholesterol levels are good. I am what they call "healthy fat" which seems like an oxymoron. However, it will improve my chances of getting approved for a sleeve gastrectomy.

I turned 50 last week, and had to endure 3 decades of no one listening to me. I feel I lost so many years of my life and I can never get them back. I hope this post reaches a lot of younger women having issues. Keep looking for a doctor who will listen to you. It sucks we have to hunt for these unicorns, but they do exist. I finally have a good team who actually cares about me.

You have a right to be listened to! You have a right to be heard!

I was asked: Who are my doctors?

Dr. Daniel Brown D.O. Stillwater Physicians Clinic

Dr. Yasuto Taguchi M.D. Taguchi Women's Clinic

Dr. Wynter Kipgen M.D. Stillwater Diabetes & Endocrinology

[aelaer]

[1/2] Now this is an actual ask as in asking for help. 👀 I have a problem with Steve and Tony. I spent too much time too early on reading anti/not-friendly post-CW fics about 'Team Cap', and because of that I have been unable to see Tony as a flawed human or Steve as a good person. It's a pattern I've become too familiar with, and even recent stories are often going into that sense. I have been trying for some time now to do something about it, but either the method was bad, or I couldn't

(I tagged a couple people in this post – if you were tagged, the question directed to you is wayyyy at the bottom! Feel free to ignore of course.)

You really hit me with a doozy with this ask. I might offend someone for not thinking the exact same way as them with… everything this topic entails… Steve, Tony, anti-fics. Followers from last year know what happened last time I talked about poor and OOC characterization in fanfic, lmao. Beware The Easily Offended! This Is A Critical Thinking Of Your Hobby Zone! I Am Being Critical Of Specific Types of MCU Fanfic!

Please don’t click the read more button if you can’t handle an opinion that might not match yours. Really. I’m fine with discussing different opinions in a mature manner but if you have issues with people saying they don’t like a specific type of plot, this post is not for you. (The read more button doesn’t appear on the original post for followers using the mobile app, but it works on desktop and in all reblogs. If you don’t see a cut and don’t want to read, just skip it, please).

Yeah. Okay. Moving on. Can’t say folks weren’t warned.

I’ve had this in my drafts for several weeks because of the abuse I got the last time I wrote something critical about certain plot points used in fanfic. I was definitely a bit reluctant to look at this specific topic from an analytical and critical look as I remembered that, but hey, it’s really easy for a coward to use a sockpuppet account and throw abuse. It’s harder to be a minority voice with stark opinions contrasting the popular trend. I’m okay with having a minority opinion amongst the MCU fandom.

(PS - you’re welcome to disagree with my opinions, so long as you’re respectful about it. Remember there are individuals behind the screens!)

Concerning Character Flaws

So the thing about really well-written characters is that they are flawed in some manner. Anyone who thinks Tony or Steve exist without flaws – and I mean real flaws, like arrogance, believing they’re always right, short tempers, and other *real* character flaws that both of these characters have – well, if they don’t think they exist with these flaws, how well do they know the character?

You don’t have to know a character well to be a fan of said character – there’s no rules about that – but if you’re going to write fanfic, and that fanfic entails the character you love against a character you don’t particularly like, I’d say any writer looking to do anything resembling a good job would do their due diligence in figuring out the strengths and weaknesses of both characters before writing the characters themselves. These mental lists of characteristics should be equal for both characters. No, “good abs” is not a character strength if you have no physical aspects in the other character strength column. You don’t have to like a character to still write them well.

Even professionals don’t follow this rule when, say, shows get new writers or comics get different writers, so you might consider me silly expecting those dabbling in fan fiction. But yeah, if an author wants me to take a story seriously as something with quality, I expect the characters to resemble themselves in some manner.

(This level of resemblance varies when you purposefully choose for the protagonist to be evil, be in a completely different time period, etc, but authors who do this *well* still get core personality traits solid, even if morality is out the window or the profession is entirely different. I have a lot of examples from the Sherlock fandom of total AUs that pull this off well – haven’t read nearly enough AUs in the MCU to have a good collection here).

But a resemblance of character, of capturing the three-dimensionality of a character, is what anti-fics simply fail to achieve. The characters they’re anti against usually suffer cases of Flanderization, if they’re not completely out of character altogether in showing traits that were never displayed in the canon, ever. I don’t know why anyone would be interested in such stories, myself, and remain baffled at their popularity. Is there some sort of enjoyment in seeing such a 2D rendition of a character in what is otherwise meant as a serious work and provides absolutely no sense of proper conflict between two characters? Not for me; it immediately takes me out of the story and when it gets too much, I abandon the story. It’s just not enjoyable for me. Turning a canon protagonist into a strawman is just lazy writing and offers nothing to the writer’s favorite, preferred character.

Concerning Steve’s and Tony’s Flaws

Every real human being has some sort of personality flaw that is decidedly unattractive. Some people are really good at showing it very rarely (and are some of the best human beings), but with these two characters we see them at their greatest heights and lowest of lows. Ironically, they actually share a lot of the same flaws, but display them in different manners in canon:

Both men believe they are the best man for the job and will do it without consulting someone who could actually fight against it - or go completely against them. Tony with Ultron is the easy example here. He’s the smartest man in the world and can tackle the issue of protecting it on its own. Steve, same issue, and his job is “helping Bucky”. *He’s* the one who can handle Bucky, the only one who can handle him - big thing in both WS and CW. If both of them had utilized their friends and allies a lot more, a lot of issues could have been avoided.

Both men are sometimes hypocritical. Steve promotes teamwork in all his speeches but again with the Bucky situation. Just… everything Bucky, man. Tony signs the Accords and immediately goes against them with what he gives to Peter, who most assuredly did not sign them (tangent: if he HAD joined the Avengers at the end of Homecoming, I have no idea how that would have gone since Peter would have had to reveal his identity to the UN and then there’s the whole ��still a minor’ thing, and yeah, Homecoming’s end scene just makes me go nuts). But anyway, their occasional hypocrisy is one of the most realistic aspects of them because most human beings are hypocritical sometimes.

Both men are sometimes arrogant. Tony’s self-explanatory with his genius-playboy-philanthropist-billionaire. One thing he does not suffer from is low self-esteem in regards to his abilities. His arrogance comes from his genius. Steve’s arrogance lies more in his deep-seeded belief that he is on the moral high ground – and one reason I think a lot of people dislike him so much, because moral superiority is very much a faux pas in this day and age for some millennials and many Gen Z folk. He has a very, very solid sense of what is right and what is wrong, and that rubs some folks the wrong way. Tony is more morally fluid – but he is not by any means immoral.

Both of them have a really solid list of strengths as well. As this ask specifically is looking to find the good in Steve, I specifically Googled pro-Steve articles for you to click at your leisure (and one with both). If you need to go back to canon, I highly recommend rewatching The First Avenger and The Winter Soldier, which introduces Steve brilliantly and then lets Steve grow further in the second film.

(Note: I actually prefer Tony to Steve in terms of personal favoritism, but how a very loud segment of Tony fans have treated other characters has led me to be more vocal about the strengths of others, especially Steve and Wanda. So Tony might be in my top 5, but mean-spirited Tony fans have moved me to be a champion of other characters, if only to show other fans that there are indeed Tony fans that do like the other characters and treat them – and their fans – with respect).

Bringing Balance (to the Universe…) Fanfic-Style

This addresses the second part of your ask in regards to the fanfics. And this is where I started running into trouble, too, mostly because, well, just how many Stephen and Steve fics are there? Yeah, exactly. Stephen’s my main guy. So I did some research, outsourcing, and reading.

Here’s two I knew of before cuz Stephen’s in them in some capacity:

Identity Theft by KitKat992 - it stars Peter and both Tony and Steve play integral parts from what I recall. Good story too, very engaging.

A Dysfunctional Senior Year (series) by ApolloLoki97 - this also stars Peter and has a large Team As Family aspect, so it shows the entire Avengers team as just decent people. My favorite part is naturally part 3 because Stephen comes in that one, haha.

And to find other stories, I went into the Anti-Accords tag. It was nice to find fics that didn’t have such a love of hypocritical authoritarianism. Aannyyyyway.

Making Sense of Chaos by SparkedtoLife - mind the tags. Seriously, it’s heavy duty. Yet another Peter fic because he’s way more popular than my favorite character, qq. Lots of Netflix Marvel characters too! Anyway, deals with not only Tony and Steve really well (and has a different dynamic with Tony that isn’t IronDad, so that was a nice change of pace), it also deals with the Accords situation very realistically. And none of those are even main plot points. If you can handle the very serious, sensitive subject that is the main plot point, I highly recommended it. It’s a very masterfully done work.

Atlas by nanasekei - Stony. Treats all characters with respect and both Tony and Steve as three-dimensional, flawed humans with some serious self doubts. Also highly agree with the author that Thaddeus Ross sucks and is basically one of the biggest people to blame for Everything Going To Shit.

Homecoming by an orphaned account - Some Stucky. This is a lovely one-shot of things I basically wanted to happen when the team got together again but didn’t. Sigggghhh. Everyone is definitely in character in this one, traumas and healing and all. And look, another person realizes that trusting Ross is a really horrible idea.

Locks Not Replaced by Riverdaughter - first this writer has a Tolkien-based username so yay. Anyway, the fic starts off by Tony realizing that he almost killed Steve during the fight with his repulsors, and it was only Bucky that stopped him. Do people seriously think he’d survive a shot to the face with that power? This is one reason the ‘Steve tried to kill Tony’ people piss me the fuck off. What do you think those repulsors shoot, fucking rainbows? Honestly, guys. Anyway, mini rant over. This fic is great. Author comes in with a Cap favoritism but treats Tony well, and honestly Tony turning a blind eye to everything and ignoring Ross is what I like to think happened in canon (he clearly dislikes the guy). And also I love the Robin Hood parallels. Love love love. I think this fic is my favorite of the ones listed in this section.

Meeting Your Heroes by Riverdaughter - naturally after reading that fic I went to explore more and found this gem. She’s not incorrect in saying Tony wasn’t a good mentor at the beginning - I think he had his own growth after Peter’s actions in Homecoming especially (though even through Homecoming he was trying, just… not always successfully lmao). Anyway love these two together. It’s great.

Photograph by slytherclaw420 - A scene we deserved in Endgame and didn’t get. Sigh. Definite IronDad feels here. Hopeful Steve, rebuilding of a friendship.

And uh, an honorable mention of sorts:

Balancing the Scales by MoonFire1 - I’m not recommending this fic for good characterization or plot. It really doesn’t have either. The fic was written in retaliation for the nasty Tony fans completely trashing Steve’s character. You should only read this if you want to see the argument from “the other side” and if you want to see an anti-Tony fic like you’ve seen anti-Steve fics. Don’t harass the author though. This is presented as a counterargument to anti-Steve fiction, for those interested to read the other sides arguments. I don’t like the nature of the fic, but I loathe that “not Steve friendly” has 30 fucking pages of works with tens of thousands of kudos, so one anti-Tony fic (with a comparatively small three pages under that tag) really doesn’t compare. Ugh. I hate the anti culture in this fandom so much. Loathe it. It’s such a nasty energy! Why would you indulge in such negativity? But as I’ve mentioned before, I appreciate authors aware enough to tag it so I can avoid it. I wish that part of fandom culture didn’t exist, but well, can’t change it. Just can criticize the fuck out of it on my blog. Maybe encourage people to think less one-sided in the process if I’m lucky.

But there’s probably more good characterization Steve fics to be found, so I am forcefully recruiting two people via tag:

If you’re looking to dabble into Stony fics with good-guy-Steve, if anyone would know of any, I’d imagine it’d be @babywarg.

You don’t know this person, but @cairistiona7 has actually known me the longest of anyone here on tumblr (half my life! HALF! She even knows my real name :P She betaed a LOTR work of mine a decade ago I ended up never fully publishing… thanks again for all your help there…). Anyway, she’s a big Bucky fan, and Bucky friendships is the best thing. So if anyone would know any wholesome Bucky and Steve stories, it’d be her. (Or really I’d take any of your recs, Cair, as I’ll probably enjoy them as well).

I hope this was helpful to you md, and that I didn’t piss off too many of my followers in the process of answering this lol.

[aint-no-highschool-au]

The Repressed Nerd And The Anxious Prep:

"I debated Logan Picani in lit class today!!!!! and he debated back!!!!!!!"

That was the text Virgil got Immediately as the lesson ended.

"r u OK?"

He sent right back. Knowing his excitable friend, he wouldn't be surprised if Patton was about to faint right now. Which might sound a little harsh but it was simply out of concern.

"not really, I feel like I'm gonna faint!"

Yep, it was as bad as Virgil had feared.

"he stared right at me Vee! He looked directly into my eyes, I couldn't fucking breath!!!!!!"

Oh no, it was worse than Virgil had feared.

"it's okay, where are you?"

"I'll be there with cookies and a water bottle in 2 minutes."

"im walking to my locker."

"great."

"Jesus Christ Logan Picani could step on me and I would thank him"

"that's nice but if you text me anything else that you want him to do to you you're paying for the eye bleach that I'll have to use afterwards."

"how are you the prude between the two of us again?"

"not a prude, just demisexual. Sorry pat, we can't all be horny 24/7"

"more like 22/7, you can't be horny when you're doing homework it's physically impossible. Instant mood killer."

Virgil reached the locker and saw Patton leaning against it as if his body was too heavy for him to stay upright. He shoved a bag of cookies and a bottle of water in his direction and Patton accepted both greatfuly.

Patton drank the water bottle nearly to the end, and then started happily, if still a bit nervously eating the cookies.

"what's your next class?" Virgil asked

"P.E." Patton replied with a defeated tone.

"yikes."

"yeah, exactly. Well at least I have Roman to keep me company on the bench..."

"Roman Sanders? Since when does he even bother to show up to gym class?"

"since he found out I like Logan. We've been using that class to talk about him. Well we talk about other things too but you know me, I talk about Logan a lot."

"seriously? How long has this been going on?"

"the past two weeks I think? Why?"

"why? Really Pat?? At no point in these two weeks did it occur to you that I might want to know about the fact that you're suddenly friends with my enemy???" Virgil was more shocked than he was angry, but he was still a little angry, which made Patton tremble in his place.

Immediately recognizing his mistake Virgil took a deep breath to calm himself down.

"sorry Pat, that was too harsh. I'm not mad at you I just, wish you would have told me sooner is all. I don't know how I feel about you and Roman being friends but it's not my call anyway so, it doesn't really matter."

Patton calmed down as well and blinked in surprise.

"wow, Picani has really been helping you deal with your anxiety huh?"

"yeah, I think him being friends with my dad is the best thing that ever happened to my mental health."

"well, I forgive you. You were overwhelmed and I suppose I could've told you sooner or at least not drop the information on you out of nowhere."

"it's alright, just as long as you don't force me to tolerate the edgy bitch."

"hehe... Well actually, it's funny that you mention it-"

"oh God Pat what did you do?" Virgil asked, more reluctantly accepting of his fate now than angry and aggressive like he was before.

"I invited him to sit with us at lunch today? And before you say anything you should know that I did it for two very good reasons! One, he's bringing Logan with him and because there's four of us to carry a conversation, I'll never have the chance to make a fool of myself in front of him. Hopefully. And two, you know how Dezi and Remus always try to get you to join their table?"

"and have sucseeded a few times, yes. It's only what i dread every lunch period, why do you bring it up?"

"well, when you're sitting with just me I don't really have the guts to say anything, those two already don't like me and they run the whole school. But if you were sitting with all three of us, we could back you up together! It's the perfect plan!"

"...you've really put a lot of thought into this, haven't you?"

"pleeeeease Virgil?? I really want us to all just get along for once. Is it really such a bad thing if I have more than one friend for the first time in my life?"

"well no, of course not! But does it have to be Roman?"

"you know, you and Roman have a lot in common. You'd get along really well if you just gave each other a chance."

"fine! But only for you pop star. And don't expect me and the prince of darkness to go skipping around in a field of flowers together afterwards, this is the only chance I'm willing to give that drama nerd."

"the feeling's mutual, you preppy pest-al prick." Roman said as he appeared behind the conversing friends. He turned his head to Patton and his entire demeanor changed, his face lighting up and, was that a smile?

Virgil couldn't believe his eyes but Roman seemed...happy. and if he was happy to see Patton maybe they did have something in common, at least enough to tolerate each other for one lunch period.

"hello, puffball! Here's that bow tie I promised you, it would look much better on you anyway."

The Goth held out a sparkly grey bow tie for Patton to take, smiling with a kind of charm Virgil had never seen in him before. Is this what he was like around the people he genuinely cared for? Virgil had to admit, it was rather endearing, maybe even cute...

Wait what?

"well, I'll see you two at lunch!" Roman stepped back and turned around with a dramatic flourish.

Just then, Virgil saw that someone had stuck a "kick me" sign on Roman's back, a dumb prank. He had half a mind to just let him walk around with it, but having seen this softer side to him, he felt sympathetic towards the dramatic Goth for once.

"wait!" Virgil called to him.

"oh? Is the prince of darkness wanted in the company of a his royal shyness?" Roman snarked, turning his head slightly to look at him but not his whole body.

"you wish, princey. Just thought we should get rid of this dumb sign on your back, seeing as you're not wearing your cape today to hide it." Virgil snarked right back as he ripped the sign from his shirt.

"oh. um, alright then." Roman blushed, feeling like a clumsy fool, but also greatful. Gratitude? To his arch nemesis?? The mere thought was enough to make him blush even harder, but he swallowed his pride and did the polite and honorable thing.

"thank you, Virgil. Any lesser man would have let me walk around with that sign all day. Amd now I know why I've been kicked five times on my way here."

"yikes, humans are trash." Virgil said without really thinking much of it, but it made Roman giggle. ~he giggles?!?~ Virgil thought in amazement.

"yes, they are. Which is why it was very noble of you to help me without being asked."

"don't mention it. Anyway, you better get to class you dork, or eles Patton won't have anyone to talk to."

Just as he said that, the bell rang for the next class.

"right! Well, I'll see you two later." he made his dramatic exit a more humble one this time, shyly smiling at Virgil.

Virgil found himself staring off in the distance to where Roman was heading.

"somebody's got a cruuuuuush~" Patton teased him cheerily, smiling wide.

"what? No I don't! He's my enemy, I barely even tolerate him. I just... I just thought it wasn't fair that he got pranked like that. As a matter of fact, I'm the only one who should get to prank him because he's my enemy!"

Patton snorted, entirely unconvinced.

"okay, whatever helps you sleep at night." Patton said as he walked away to his class with Roman.

"see you at lunch, Vee!"

Virgil was so screwed.

[thisnerdsadventures]

a 2021 update

Ah, so I have forgotten to update in a million years, per usual

~ Random thought section ~

I woke up this morning and read this tweet thread about Alice Wu's director's note for her movie The Half of It. It's streaming on Netflix, and I highly encourage to go watch it, it's probably one of my favorite movies from the past few years. Anyways, she talks about how she produced the film while digesting the heartbreak of a friendship breakup - the whole thread hit me on a different level, but here's a quote that really hit home for me, especially a month from graduation: "The end of the film is each of their beginnings. And for my characters, I can think of no happier ending." We spend a lot of time worrying about the end of things and the uncertainty of things to come. Yet, there was a time where we worried about the exact same things for the very chapter we are now so nervous about leaving.

1. I'm nervous about leaving school and starting the..... rest of my life???

2. I'm nervous that my friends will slowly fade away. I'm nervous that they'll get on with their lives and I'll be slowly still trying to get my bearings, stuck in limbo.

3. I'm nervous that starting adulthood will be difficult because there are no more college orientations, no more awkward freshman dinners, perfect opportunities to meet new friends who are just as nervous as you are.

In writing this out, I felt a sense of deja-vu, like I had written these words before. So I just looked back at some of my posts right before entering college, and lo and behold:

08-18-2016: Today I said goodbye to one of my closer friends, and i realized that without even knowing it, Sunday’s party was the last time I would see some of my closest friends. It’s awful that way, that you don’t even know it’s the last time until it’s passed, and you’re left to pick up the the end of a chapter of a relationship from the scraps of an unexpected and improper farewell.

I feel like I’m in a weird twilight zone between college and high school where my present friends are all beginning to fade away to move on in their lives, and I’m yet to really meet anyone in my class yet, so at the moment,,,,,,there really isn’t anyone.

I wrote this less than a week from moving to Boston, and it's so shocking to me that I also experienced the "unexpected and improper farewell" part in senior year. It's almost the exact same thing that happened in COVID and is continuing to happen. You never know when the last time you might see someone might be, except instead of consolidated over the course of one pre-college summer, it's over the course of more than a year, the time that this pandemic has been going for.

And I hate that I said the "fade away and move on" thing verbatim, literally nearly five years ago. To be honest though, it's true, a lot of them did fade away and move on. But so did I, I wasn't left behind. To some extent, I was the one who did a lot of the moving away. And like many things in life, a couple of us continue to hang around, and maybe our friendships cycled in and out over college, but have come around again after a few years. I guess those are the ones that you know will stick around. The limbo period between chapters is a hard one, and it's nice to know that present-day me isn't the only one who has felt this. It's nice to know that past me met so many incredible people so fast, that I forgot this limbo period happened.

I know this part is getting a little long, but there's just a couple more snippets I want to share:

08-13-2016: I recently read Marina Keegan’s essay The Opposite of Loneliness, and one line resonated with me a lot: We’re so young. It seems silly and almost pretentious for me to think that this party would be so final, and yet it does, even though we have decades upon decades to build and connect or reconnect.

We’re so young, but that doesn’t stop the understanding that we are going to a new chapter in our lives and that it’s going to redefine our relationships. I hope it doesn’t change them too much.

I suppose much of the anxiety of going to college results from having to build my own community from the ground up again.... I tell myself the pieces will fall together and everything will be ok, but it doesn’t stop the increasing anxiety from, well, increasing.

I loved this collection of essays, if you haven't read it, I recommend you do. In moving around for so many years, I haven't been able to keep a lot of books in my possession, but I kept this one because that essay really hit home for me, and continues to, no matter what part of life I'm currently experiencing.

I think moving to college did change my relationships. But change is not a bad thing - your childhood friendships, the few of them that survive, end up strengthening and growing into adult friendships. And in the end, isn't that better than not changing at all? I'm hoping that a few of my college friendships will do that too - we'll go from college friends to family friends, and my kids will call them "Aunt" and "Uncle" and they'll grow up watching their parents talk for hours in the front yard before finally getting in the car and leaving for home.

08-13-2016: But hey, this is part of what I signed up for, I knew I wasn’t going to have much of an initial safety net, but I’m sure I’ll survive. We, as humans, always find a way to adapt right?

I think I survived and adapted. Not in the way I saw things going, but we can never really fully predict things, can we? One day, I'll learn to give myself a safety net for the next chapter, I'm sure. Today's not that day though.

Going back to her director's note, there was one more thing that just struck an emotional chord for me:

Fun fact, Alice Wu actually went to MIT for a bit before transferring to Stanford, and then she became a software engineer at Microsoft! I relate a little too much to her. Maybe one day I too will dump coding for my art form. But for now, in this above example, I relate far too much. I worked on my album, Imperfect, a little too obsessively this past winter while trying to digest the throes of heartbreak from one of my own friendships that ended. I still don't know if there was an ending for that friendship. I think I've spent a lot of time trying to put off the end, like a TV series that just keeps adding more and more seasons. Regardless of whether it needs to end or not (which I have not decided and will continue not to do so), I spent a lot of time thinking about who I was before and after that friendship, and I've concluded that a lot of who I am now, what my life looks like now is a result of that friendship. I'll give you a hint: I really like who I am now, compared to who I was before, and it showed me a lot of parts of life and friendship that I never expected would happen. That friendship was (is?) one of the most beautiful things that has happened to me in my life.

Let's finish off this reflective post with a quote from Khalil Gibran, that's kinda related to that point about how transformative the past can be, and how we're far better off in future chapters of our lives because of it.

When you part from your friend, you grieve not;

For that which you love most in him may be clearer in his absence, as the mountain to the climber is clearer from the plain.

Again, if you haven't read his collection of poems, you should absolutely 100% drop whatever you're doing right now and do so! Wow, I really just assigned an entire reading list in this post.

I hope in making this movie, Alice found peace. I would hesitate to say that I found peace when making my album. I wrote a lot of songs about the heartbreak I felt from that whole experience. But the last song I wrote, "Best Friends," ends the whole thing on a positive note, that at the end of the day, I remember how my friends (past and present) literally saved my life and how things are looking a little better, and whatever happens, I hope my best friends will be there waiting for me, whoever they end up being.

- OK I PROMISE I DIDN'T SET OUT TO BE 100% SO EMO -

But yeah, I haven't really been doing much otherwise? I guess just tryna stay alive, I've been cooking a lot and cooking a lot of good good food, I did apply to an MBA program, I got my COVID vaccine (second shot this week!), I am excited to announce I am publishing a paper in my MEng lab, which is a really big accomplishment imo, I am thriving in my (1) econ class that I kept, even though I didn't realize we had readings assigned like for the past month, I went to try pastries from this Turkish bakery, I biked, probably, 15 miles over the past month, I've read at least 4 or 5 books this year so far, and am hoping to knock another one out today. Currently dying because trying to finish my thesis in like . a week, which is looking a little challenging, but I'm sure it'll happen!!!??