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onlydylanobrien · 3 years ago

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Dylan O'Brien - NME Magazine Interview

Dylan O’Brien: “I was in this transitional phase – close to a quarter-life crisis”

From YA heartthrob to legitimate leading man – how the 'Maze Runner' star hit his stride after a whirlwind decade

Definitely!” hoots Dylan O’Brien when NME asks if he still has to audition. “I’m not Tom fucking Hanks, bro.” He’s clearly amused by our question, but forgive us for thinking the 29-year-old actor gets cast on reputation alone. A decade into his career, and he’s making an impressive transition from teen TV star and YA franchise hero to charismatic leading man.

New York-born O’Brien cut his teeth on MTV’s hit Teen Wolf series, before landing the lead in the Maze Runner film trilogy based on James Dashner’s hugely popular novels. Leading a band of bright young things that included ex-Skins tearaway Kaya Scodelario, Game Of Thrones’ Thomas Brodie-Sangster and Will Poulter, he honed his craft while racking up nearly a billion dollars at the box office. “My career is a constant acting class,�� says O’Brien. “To be able to do the Maze Runner movies simultaneously with Teen Wolf was amazing in terms of getting in reps and working my [acting] muscle.”

Now for the sometimes tricky bit. Many actors struggle with the post-breakout period, but O’Brien is making it look easy so far. This year’s Netflix hit Love and Monsters proved he can carry an old-school family adventure, and new film Flashback (out next week) reveals an appetite for weirder, more cerebral work. He stars as Fred Fitzell, a young man reluctant to buckle down to life as a nine-to-fiver with a boring corporate job and a long-term girlfriend (Mindhunter‘s Hannah Gross). When he runs into a freaky-looking acquaintance from his teenage years, Fred becomes obsessed with finding an old high-school friend he used to drop a mind-bending experimental drug called Mercury with. It’s difficult to say any more without entering spoiler territory, but Flashback is a wild ride underpinned by the idea that we can exist in several realities at once. Even if you follow every plot twist, you might not fully understand the end. “Oh, it’s definitely a headfuck,” O’Brien agrees. “There’s not totally an answer to figure out. There’s a lot of different things that people can take from it.”

Speaking over Zoom from his LA home, O’Brien is bright, thoughtful and really good fun to talk to, especially when he relaxes into the interview, but he clearly knows where his line between public and private lies. When he first read the Flashback script, written by the film’s director Christopher MacBride, his “mind was blown” by just how much he related to Fred. “I felt like I was in this transitional phase of my life that was, you know, sort of close to a quarter-life crisis type thing,” he says. “For whatever reason, it was like me and this script were meant to be. I remember reading it and thinking: ‘I am this guy right now.'”

“There were a lot of things in my personal life that were neglected for a while”

When we ask why O’Brien felt as though he had reached a “transitional phase”, he gives an answer that’s vague but not exactly evasive. For understandable reasons, he doesn’t mention the incredibly traumatic motorcycle accident he sustained while shooting the final Maze Runner film in March 2016. O’Brien suffered severe trauma to the brain and said in 2017 that he underwent extensive facial reconstructive surgery after the accident “broke most of the right side of my face”. Tellingly, he’s never really revealed what happened on set or how it affected him.

Today, O’Brien dances around the details of the accident and other issues he was dealing with at the time, but doesn’t shy away from discussing his inner conflict. “You know, it was a lot of personal things combined with at-a-point-in-my-career things,” he says after a brief pause. He says he’d have been going through some of this stuff anyway, simply because of his age, but it sounds as though success intensified it all. “It was like this whole fucking storm of shit,” he continues. “I was simultaneously so fulfilled and happy about these, like, otherworldly and surreal things that I had experienced in terms of where my career had brought me. I had all this confidence and fulfilment and beautiful people [in my life] – such amazing things to experience at a young age. But at the same time, there were a lot of things in my personal life that were unchecked and sort of neglected for a while.”

O’Brien says that in time, he realised he had to “stop for a second” and “re-explore how I wanted my life to look going forward”. In fairness, you can see why he needed a breather: his career took off while he was still a teenager. After his family moved from New Jersey to Los Angeles County when he was 12, O’Brien contemplated a career as a sports broadcaster – his Twitter bio still bills him as a “no longer suffering Mets fan” – then began posting YouTube videos as moviekidd826. A funny, slickly edited skit titled ‘How to Prepare for the SAT in 45 seconds’, shared when he was just 17, shows he was a born performer and storyteller. YouTube success led to him getting a manager, but his breakthrough role in Teen Wolf still came out of the blue. At the time, he was treading water at a local community college and taking auditions on the side.

Still, he has since taken a rather fatalistic view of this career-making moment. “It’s totally weird because, when I think about it now, I don’t see how it could have happened any other way. I can’t picture myself doing anything else now,” he told Collider in 2011. “It was really sudden and a little random, and not provoked by anything. It was just out of nowhere. It wasn’t my intentional doing.” Today, O’Brien summarises his skyscraper career trajectory succinctly. “I guess I just graduated high school and started acting,” he says. “And then I felt like I was just flying by the seat of my pants and never got a chance to stop.” Thankfully, straight-out-the-blocks Hollywood success hasn’t taken away his sense of perspective. When I say how easy social media makes it to compare yourself unfavourably to others, O’Brien jumps in: “Yeah, that’s very true. I was watching the Billie Eilish doc the other day, and I was like, I’ve done nothing. I’m not an artist at all!”

“No one thought ‘Love and Monsters’ was going to be good!”

O’Brien is also self-deprecating when he talks about being cast in Flashback, suggesting it happened because he had such an intense connection with Fred. “I was honestly like, ‘Who is watching me right now?’ That is the best way I can describe how I was feeling when I came across this script,” he says. “Chris [MacBride, director] and I had this conversation that went so well in terms of [my] understanding this script that I think he’d sent around a lot and [that] very commonly wasn’t understood. I think Chris has even said that the night before shooting, he suddenly had this thought, like, ‘Wait, do I even think he’s a good actor?'”

Though O’Brien has firmly ring-fenced elements of his private life, he’s actually pretty frank about his acting vehicles. He readily admits he was expecting a snobbish response to Love and Monsters, a CGI-heavy hybrid of post-apocalyptic action and romcom that dropped on Netflix in April and topped the streamer’s daily most-watched list. “It means so much that Love and Monsters has gotten the response that it’s gotten,” O’Brien says. “No one thought this movie was going to be good.” His blunt honesty makes me laugh out loud. “No one did though!” he says in response. “And so, fuck that. You know, most of the people who say something to me about the movie, they’re like: ‘I watched Love and Monsters, and it was… good?’ And honestly, that just cracks me up.” For obvious reasons, we hastily decide not to share our response to the film – namely, that it was a whole lot better than expected.

In Love and Monsters, O’Brien plays Joel, a survivor of a so-called “monsterpocalypse” that has bumped humans to the bottom of the food chain. Though he’s known in his colony as a bit of a coward, Joel sets off on a treacherous 80-mile journey to find his high school sweetheart Aimee (Iron Fist‘s Jessica Henwick), which means evading the hungry clutches of various supersize grizzlies including a giant monster-frog hiding in a suburban pond. It’s a simple but pretty out-there premise that wouldn’t work if O’Brien’s performance was even slightly condescending. Instead, his unselfconscious sincerity really sells a film that has as much in common with the family-oriented Robin Williams movie Night at the Museum as darker fare like The Walking Dead.

His obvious affection for the project really comes across during our interview today. “When I read the script, I just thought it was so sweet and funny and smart and unique, but at the same time reminiscent of all these movies that don’t really get made any more,” he says. That’s a fair point: Love and Monsters is neither a fail-safe superhero movie nor a slice of classy Oscar bait. “And when they were talking about how to market this movie, it was so funny hearing all these conversations like, ‘How do we actually get people to watch it?'” he adds. “But that’s a big part of the reason I wanted to do this movie: because it felt like something I missed seeing.”

“I’m lucky to be surrounded by people who want to make something out of love”

So in a way, Love and Monsters was a risk for an actor seeking to establish himself outside of a bankable movie franchise and a hit TV show. O’Brien has only made four films since his final Maze Runner outing in 2018, and insists he hasn’t been tactical with his choices. “I don’t have anyone saying, ‘We need to get you in an Oscar vehicle’, or any of that kind of shit,” he says. “I’m really lucky to be surrounded by people who think like me: that you should do what you’re drawn to, and make something out of love.”

He’s recently finished shooting a mysterious crime thriller called The Outfit in London with Mark Rylance. Directed and co-written by Graham Moore, who won an Oscar for his screenplay to Alan Turing biopic The Imitation Game, O’Brien calls it “quite possibly one of the most special pieces of writing I’ve ever experienced”. He first read the script on a plane and says he “actually stood up and clapped” when he got to the end. Considering O’Brien probably wasn’t flying Ryanair, this reaction presumably attracted a few baffled glances.

Anyway, it must be pretty intimidating walking onto set with Rylance, a multi-award-winning actor revered by his peers – Al Pacino once said he “speaks Shakespeare as if it was written for him the night before” – but it sounds as though O’Brien took it all in stride. He says he’s confident in his abilities, but admits to having a slight wobble whenever he begins a new project. “I’m always sort of re-questioning everything – like, ‘Can I even act?'” he says. “But I think there’s something very natural about that. I think even Rylance could relate to that feeling. Acting is like starting a new year at school every single time.”

At this point in his career, O’Brien has made peace with the fact that some people will have preconceptions about him based on what he’s known for: Maze Runner and Teen Wolf. “People will put you in a box no matter what,” he says. “There was definitely a time when that would get to me, especially when it felt like somebody had a perspective on me that in my soul, I just felt wasn’t accurate.” Still, there’s no doubt he wants to show us what’s really in his soul with more films like Flashback. “If anything,” he adds bullishly, “it just makes me think: ‘Right, I’m really gonna show them now’.”

‘Flashback’ is out on digital platforms from June 4

#dylan o'brien #love and monsters press #flashback press #the outfit press

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thiswasinevitableid · 3 years ago

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71. you’re famous and you want to hide out in my bookstore which is fine except the stupid paparazzi won’t leave and now there’s a photo of us in the tabloids and they’re printing misinformation and why the fuck won’t you clear this up on your twitter account

Sternclay, NSFW, please!

Here you go! Let's end this round of meet uglies with a bang

The post-holiday slump is always the worst; everyone maxed out their credit cards last month and doesn’t want to buy anything, and the tourists won’t be back until the spring. It’s not that he’s concerned about keeping the lights on; Bookworms is popular and has a prime spot downton. It’s that he’s bored out of his mind.

All his orders for the day are in, everything’s been received and shelved, and he’s running out of things to tidy. If he’s lucky, the clouds that have been threatening a snowstorm since this morning will burst and drive some people to shelter among the stacks.

Dingdong

Thank the lord.

“Welcome to Bookworms, can I help you?”

The man stays by the door, peering through the glass onto the street while pulling off his beanie, “Huh? Oh, uh, nope, just coming in to, uh, get out of the cold.” He turns, and two realizations slap Joseph in the face.

One: this is the hottest man he has ever had the pleasure of seeing.

Two: He’s seen this man dozens of times, just never in person.

Barclay Cobb is a Food Network darling who got his start on Youtube, sharing recipes from vintage cookbooks he found at garage sales. That’s not why he’s starstruck, but it is probably why the taller man is hiding in the craft books alcove and keeps nervously looking his way.

“I won’t tell anyone you’re here, Mr. Cobb.”

“Phew” the man sighs, unzips his jacket, “thanks man. Thought I’d be bundled up enough that no one would spot me while I was out, but I didn’t get my hat on in time coming out of the Chinese place down the block.”

“I love that spot, they have the best beer-braised duck.”

“Yeah, I always stop by when I’m in town, they’re food is worth getting photographed for.”

It’s odd, everything he’s read suggests chef Cobb is friendly and warm when approached by fans in public.

“It’s not that I don’t appreciate that people like my shows but, I, uh, sometimes I just want to eat or walk down the street without someone taking pictures of me.”

“Do you want to head into the back sections? There’s no windows in that half of the store.”

“Sweet, thanks. Uh, would it be cool if I autographed any books of mine you have? I like doing that, means I can send a little business towards smaller stores.”

“Of course. Here, the cookbooks are on this wall.” He slips into his office to grab a sharpie while Barclay pulls a stack of books and sits down on the floor. As the scratching of the pen fills the air, Joseph takes a trip to the paranormal and occult section, coming back with three copies of The Case for Bigfoot.”

“Y’know, not everyone stocks these.” Barclay smiles as he adds the paperbacks to the pile.

“Which is terrible business; you’re just as famous in the cryptozoology community as you are in the foodie one. This is the best book on bigfoot ever written, and I should know; I run a, um, a blog where I review books on paranormal topics.”

“You a true believer?” The cook blows on his signature in the copy of Desserts for All Seasons

“More an optimistic skeptic; your book is perfect because you make your case using actual evidence instead of reporting the same ten, poorly verified stories that everyone includes in their books. And I appreciated that you included recipes from the places you visited; that was a very nice touch.”

“Funny story about that” Barclay freezes as the front door opens. There’s definitely more than one person coming in, and when Joseph pokes his head around the corner he sees fifteen people, all with cameras or phones.

“Shit. You might want to hide in my office for a few minutes.”

By the time the crowd reaches him, Joseph is almost done re-shelving the signed books.

“Good afternoon, let me know if you need help finding anything.”

“Uh, yeah, we do, someone saw Barclay Cobb in your store-”

“Strange, we’ve only had one customer” he winces as someone’s shoulder knocks a hardcover off its display, “I didn’t get a good look at them before they went downstairs.” He tips his head at the staircase to the YA and Graphic Novel sections and is promptly knocked into the shelf as the throng hurries away.

“Come on, I can get you out through the back door” Joseph whispers to the Red Dust on his Soul poster on his office door. Barclay is remarkably quiet for a man his size as they sneak across the floor and let frigid, January air rush into the store.

“Thanks man” Barclay whispers, “I owe you one.” He sets a big hand on Joseph’s shoulder, squeezes it with a wink, then pulls on his hat and disappears into a crowd coming off at the bus stop.

---------------------------------------------------

Joseph always comes in through the back, flipping on lights as he goes, so the sea of bodies pressed to the front windows like a zombie horde surprises him. He knows Barclay tweeted about the signed copies, but this seems like excessive excitement even for a celebrity chef.

“Morning, Joseph--whoa, what the heck?” Aubrey clocks in without taking her eyes off the crowd, “why is everyone here this early.”

“Fan culture. I think.” The registers finish waking up, “I’ll pay holiday rates if you open that door for me.”

Aubrey gives a thumbs up, unlocks the double doors, and is swallowed up so quickly he worries she might have been trampled until she emerges near the greeting cards. Some people swarm the cookbooks, but an alarming number cluster around the counter, all shouting for his attention.

“How long have you been seeing Chef Cobb?”

“What?, I, I’m not-”

“Does he often visit your store?”

“No! He just came by yesterday!” There’s a horrible clatter of all the books on display near the door taking each other out like dominoes.

“Do you fuck in the backroom all the time?”

“Oh come on” He pushes past the man who asked that, deals with shouting all the way to his office and slams the door. A quick Google search for “Barclay Cobb” brings up a blurry photo of them in the alley, Barclays hand on his shoulder, and multiple headlines speculating on why the reclusive chef and author has chosen a nobody bookstore employee (he’s the owner, damn it) as his lover.

Okay, there’s a logical, easy fix to this.

He opens the door enough to speak, whistles so everyone will be quiet and listen to him, “I’m sorry, there’s been a misunderstanding. Mr. Cobb isn’t in any kind of relationship with me; he just came into the store yesterday for some peace and quiet. So, if you’re looking for information about him, this is not the place for it. If you’re looking for the signed books, the cookbooks are there, and the paranormal section is just around that corner.” He gives his best customer service smile as the paparazzi exchange perplexed glances.

“...Is it true he bought you this store?”

“Wh--no! We rent this space.”

“From him?”

“Arggh!” He closes the door, slumps against it and cards his fingers through his hair. As he contemplates closing for the day, he spots a little, copper card on his desk. It’s Barclay’s, which is what he expected, but when he flips it over there’s a message scribbled in pen.

Main St Hotel, room 503, here until Monday.

He pulls out his phone, tells Aubrey she’s allowed to get the crowd out by any means necessary except for fire, and elbows his way out into the winter air.

------------------------------------------

Barclay almost purrs when he peers through the peephole in the hotel door; Joseph, as his nametag read, is standing on the carpet, looking twice as handsome as he did yesterday. His cheeks are even a little pink, and Barclay has some thoughts on how to make that blush deepen.

“Hey, glad you found-”

Joseph holds up his phone, screen in Barclays face, “please fix this.”

“Oh fuck.” He ushers him in, “I’m so sorry, I thought they’d stopped doing this shit.”

“No, and they’re fucking up my inventory as a result.”

“On it, lemme text my assistant, she’s good at drafting these kind of messages.”

“Thank the lord. Right, thank you for that, I’ll go now.”

“Wait” Barclay reminds his instincts that blocking the door is rude, “do you wanna stay a few minutes? You look kinda stressed.”

“Because my store is being overrun!” Joseph snaps, then takes a deep breath and straightens his sleeves, “I’m sorry, that wasn’t called for, this morning has just been a mess. And it, um, it’s a little bittersweet to have people thinking I could land a hot chef when I can’t get past a first date with most people. Um, sorry. Too much information. That’s a bad habit of mine.”

Barclay tucks his hands into his pants pockets, “About that. Y’know how I left my card?”

Blue eyes blink, then brighten, “I thought that might be the reason but I dismissed it as wishful thinking.”

“Nope. A guy who's hot, nerdy, and competent enough to sneak me away from the paparazzi? Sign me the fuck up.”

“I’m not opposed to a, um, tryst, but I really, really need to get back to the store, I can’t abandon Aubrey to deal with this mess on her own, that’s not fair, and now we’ll have to reorder things too....” He laughs, a tense sound, “good lord, I get a chance to fuck a celebrity crush and I’m turning it down for work.”

“Hey” Barclay sets his hands on Joseph’s shoulders, “it’s okay. You’re not the first guy to be married to his job. But, uh, out of curiosity, you got any vacation days to spare?”

----------------------------------------------

“This is all yours?” Joseph takes in the sprawling farm as Barclay unlocks the front door of a charmingly rustic house.

“Yep, all the way to the creek and all the way to the road. Might surprise you, but I like my privacy.”

“I’d never have guessed.” He replies with faux shock.

“Smartass.” Barclay kisses his cheek, holds the door open with his shoulder so Joseph can pull his bags inside. He packed as light and efficiently as he could for two weeks away (he’d initially planned on one until Aubrey and Moira ganged up on him and told him he hadn’t taken a real vacation in years so he was taking one now, damn it) but his suitcase is still heavy as he rolls it to the stairs.

“I got that.” Barclay shoulders his own travel bag and hoists Joseph’s in the other hand, carrying them to the second floor like they’re nothing more than pillows.

The week the chef was in Madison, Joseph went to his hotel almost every night. Fell asleep in his bed more than once, when discussions of fusion cuisine or the Fresno Nightcrawler turned into frantic, heated kisses under the covers. It’s only when the cook drops all luggage into the master bedroom that the truth of why he’s on this trip sets in.

“You really invited me all the way here because you think I’m hot.”

“Yeah but no.” Barclay drapes his arms over his shoulders, lips still a little chilly as he kisses them, “brought you here because you’re smart” another kiss, this one on his jaw, “and funny” another, on his nose, “and you’re the biggest bigfoot fan I know.”

“You wrote a book on it!”

“Point stands. And yeah” he pushes Joseph back so he lands on the bed, crawling atop him as he growls, “I invited you here because you’re so hot I wanna pour sugar on you and see if it melts. Now get your pants off; I’ve been thinking about sucking your dick since we left the city.”

------------------------------------------

“How did the whole bigfoot thing start?” Joseph sips his Irish Coffee as Barclay puts his feet into his lap.

“Guess the same way any famous person ends up with two gigs; I was doing the thing I love, then was dicking around on cryptid hunter forums and found out I was also hella good at researching bigfoot. By the time I got really into it, I had enough cash that I could write my book without worrying about going broke. Helps that I’d handed off The Arch and The Lodge and was just the exec chef on them, since then I could travel if I needed to.”

Joseph nods, moves one hand down to rub Barclays foot; in spite of no longer working the kitchens of his five restaurants or having to test recipes for the books right now, he spent most of today on his feet making elaborate meals for two. Joseph teases him that he’s trying to stuff him to the point he can’t leave. Barclay always chuckles and says he doesn’t know how right he is. The last two days, Joseph then wraps his arms around his boyfriend and tells him he’d stay forever if he could.

He’s never thought of himself as romantic; he’s pragmatic, knows that relationships are things built out of time, trial, and error. But god help him, he’s fallen for Barclay like they’re rom-com leads with only ninety minutes to reach their happy ending.

They’re out near the creek--really more of a small river--the next morning, talking about books and speculating on the existence of life on other planets, when a storm sweeps through the trees. As trunks groan and roots pull loose from the snow, Barclay calls, “we better head back.”

He gives a thumbs up. Then the ice under him cracks.

He doesn’t correct course quickly enough, the rest dropping from under him and dunking him in freezing water. It’s deep, too deep to stand, but he’s a decent swimmer and kicks towards the surface. When the shadow covers the opening with a boom, panic threatens to push the rest of his precious breath away.

The tree that fell across the ice is heavy, and no matter how he pushes it won’t give. He bangs on the ice on either side, trying to get it to crack, but his lungs scream and his limbs alert him that the cold will soon shut them down.

He closes his eyes, trying to think, not ready to give up, not with Barclay so close. There’s a groan of wood and frozen water. His mouth opens without permission, desperate for air, and chokes him on frost instead.

-----------------------------------

“...be dead, please don’t be dead, please please please don’t be fucking dead.”

“Nnff.” That’s not what he meant to say, but it seems to calm the voice above him.

“Thank fuck. I’m so sorry, I got to you as fast as I could, do, do you need anything?” Barclay sounds exhausted.

“Cold.” He mutters.

“I’m trying to warm you up gradually, that’s what the first aid book said but, uh, here.” Warm, fuzzy arms draw him into a hug.

Wait.

The first thing he sees when his eyes flutter open are arms covered in reddish-brown fur. When Barclay rubs their cheeks together, it tickles more than his beard usually does.

“Barclay? What the hell is going on?”

“Uh. So.” He’s rolled with ease to face a creature he’s never seen and eyes that he’d know anywhere, “I’m bigfoot. Or, uh, a bigfoot. Maybe that’s kinda obvious now.”

His brain crackles to life, “What better way to stay undiscovered than get famous by giving people the wrong information about you.”

“Some of it’s true. Just not anything people could use to actually find me.”

“Smart, big guy” Joseph pets his face.

“You’re taking this pretty well.”

“I think my system is too shocked to experience more shock.” He shudders, “relatedly, how’d I get out of the river?”

“I lifted the tree off and pulled you free. Took my disguise off to do that and, uh, the fucking thing fell into the water when I got you. So I’m gonna be stuck like this until a friend of mine can get me a new one.”

“No complaints here. You look incredible.” He runs his hands up and down Barclay’s side and chest, warmth seeping into his fingers as he does, “But I’m a little surprised you were willing to risk someone seeing you or me blabbing to someone and trashing your whole life in the process.”

A low rumble as Barclay kisses his forehead, “It’s worth it. I, this is gonna sound so fucking cheesy, but I haven’t felt this way about someone in a long time, and there was no way I was gonna lose you.”

“Oh.” Affection and surprise well up in his throat, pressing down his words so all he can do is nestle closer to the cryptid and let himself be loved.

His mind rebounds quickly from his misadventure. His body would like him to remember it for a while so he doesn’t put it in such jeopardy again any time soon. Instead of helping Barclay with cooking and chores, he lays under the covers while the storm rattles the roof and the cook clangs pots on the lower floor.

Barclay, attentive to a fault, is downright doting now that he’s stuck in bed. He’s never without a hot drink or something to read, and the cryptid is happy to answer the majority of his questions about the finer points of being bigfoot. When it’s bedtime, his boyfriend pulls him atop his massive frame and cuddles him, whispering over and over that he’s glad he’s okay, until they fall asleep.

Today followed much the same pattern, though when dinner time rolls around he gets a fantastic surprise.

“Chocolate fondue?” He peers hopefully at the bed tray in Barclays hands.

“Only the best for you, babe.” The cook sets the burnished wood down on the bedside table, “we lucked out, the berries I bought last week are ripe.”

Joseph reaches for the fork, but Barclay beats him to it.

“You should save your energy. Since you’re, uh, still recovering.”

He shrugs, sets his hands in his lap and opens his mouth for a chocolate dipped raspberry. It doesn’t take long to spy Barclay’s ulterior motive. The cook has a whole wardrobe designed to fit his cryptid form, but it’s having trouble concealing certain things.

“You’re getting off on this.”

“I, uh, I, maybe a little” Barclay blushes under his fur.

Joseph raises an eyebrow, tilts his head at the bulge in Barclay’s pants, “You call that ‘little’?”

A rumbly whine, the fork paused halfway to Joseph’s mouth, “I can’t help it. I’ve got a thing for taking care of partners, especially ones who are all competent and put-together the rest of the time, and you look so good when you eat and, ohfuck.”

Joseph inhales sharply as chocolate hits his exposed upper chest. It’s not hot enough to burn, and he moans as the sensation seeps across his skin. Barclays eyes, wide and ravenous, keep flicking between the splatter and his face.

“Looks like you made a mess, big guy.” Joseph begins undoing the remaining buttons on his pajamas, “you should clean it up.”

“Fuck yeah.” Barclay lunges, mouth first, lapping and sucking at the marked skin as Joseph laughs. Their shirts hit the floor together as he digs his nails into auburn fur. Barclay grunts at the pressure, sits up with a grin, and drips a line of chocolate down the right side of Joseph’s ribs.

“Oops. Better fix that too.”

“Cleanliness is importantAH, ahhnn.” He squirms a bit as Barclay nuzzles his stomach before dragging his tongue up his skin. There’ve been times he mourned the fact T didn’t make him as hairy as some other guys, but right now he’s grateful for the clear canvas Barclay can mark however he pleases.

“A mess can be more fun.” The cook licks his lips, sucks a hickey above his belly button, “and by the time I’m done with you, babe, won’t be a single part of you that isn’t one.”

“Then get to it.” He shoves his pants down, lets Barclay pull them the rest of the way off and fold them. He lays back, resting his arms behind his head, and moans as the cook drizzles chocolate on each hip. Joseph feels like a gourmet dessert and, from the growls between his thighs, Barclay intends to treat him like one.

His boyfriend is always enthusiastic when sucking him off, but tonight he throws finesse out the window in favor of burying his face at the crease of each thigh in turn, licking his hips clean while clawing at his calves and sides. He lifts his head, wipes his mouth with a satisfied grin that shows the points of his teeth, and dives down again.

Joseph yelps with pleasure, the hint of fangs hitting all his buttons, lighting him up like downtown on a dark night. It’s intense, the scratch of fur on skin just different enough from the usual beard to remind him of who’s down there, and his legs try to kick closed. Barclay growls again, holding them open with ease.

“Not until I’m done with you, babe.”

He surrenders to flood of feelings from both outside and within him, Barclay’s sheer delight at his body rendering all his doubts and worries toothless and small, quieting them until all he can think about is incredible creature holding and all he can say is some variation on-

“Barclay, please, right there, lordalmighty that’s good, that’s so good big guy, please.” He squeezes his eyes shut, craving the impending orgasm more than he has words for. Barclay sucks determinedly and huffs, pleased, as Joseph's thighs tense in his hold and his climax chases away the remnants of yesterday's aches.

As his brain insists that really, body, opening our eyes isn’t that hard, there’s a metallic zip and strong legs bracketing his thighs.

“Here I thought you couldn’t look any better.” He murmurs as Barclay gleefully strokes his cock, “as soon as my brain works again, I’m coming up with so many ways to use that gorgeous thing.”

“Can’t, fuck, can't wait to hear ‘em, but I only got one for tonight; I’m gonna use it to cum alllll over that fucking perfect body, fuck, Joseph, you look so good when you’re ruined, fuck.” An impressive amount of cum spatters up his stomach, chest, and neck as Barclay howlgrowlpurrs and then sets his hands carefully on the bed.

Joseph’s whole body is sticky with chocolate, sweat, and cum, and Barclay definitely has at least two of those things mussed into his fur.

“You’re right, big guy, a mess can be fucking amazing.”

That being said, being sticky gets old quick, and soon they’re in the tub, Joseph whistling as he shampoos Barclay’s chest. The cryptid hasn’t stopped purring, and every time he looks Joseph’s way the sound deepens.

“When are you next in the city?”

The cook yawns, “Was gonna check on how the new chef de cuisine is getting on at Kepler in about two week.”

“Would you like to stay with me? It’s not fancy, but it’s close to the Ismuth, so you can get to Kepler on foot without trouble, and there are fewer crowds there this time of year. I suspect paparazzi are also less likely to track you down at some random house than at a hotel. That might make up for my lack of, um, high class amenities.”

“Good point. But I gotta be honest babe; as long as you’re there, that’s all I need to be happy.”

#sternclay #agent stern/ barclay #meet ugly #taz amnesty #terato #monster boyfriend #trans agent stern

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weheartchrisevans · 4 years ago

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BOSTON �� So you're Tim Scott, the Republican senator from South Carolina who opposes Roe v. Wade and wants to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and you get a call from Chris Evans, a Hollywood star and lifelong Democrat who has been blasting President Trump for years. He wants to meet. And film it. And share it on his online platform. Can anybody say "Borat?" “I was very skeptical,” admits Scott. “You can think of the worst-case scenario.”But then Scott heard from other senators. They vouched for Evans, most famous for playing Captain America in a series of films that have grossed more than $1 billion worldwide. The actor also got on the phone with Scott’s staff to make a personal appeal.

It worked. Sometime in 2018, Scott met on camera with Evans in the nation’s capital, and their discussion, which ranged from prison reform to student loans, is one of more than 200 interviews with elected officials published on “A Starting Point,” an online platform the actor helped launch in July. Not long after, Evans appeared on Scott’s Instagram Live. They have plans to do more together.

“While he is a liberal, he was looking to have a real dialogue on important issues,” says Scott. “For me, it’s about wanting to have a conversation with an audience that may not be accustomed to hearing from conservatives and Republicans.”

Evans, actor-director Mark Kassen and entrepreneur Joe Kiani launched “A Starting Point” as a response to what they see as a deeply polarized political climate. They wanted to offer a place for information about issues without a partisan spin. To do that, they knew they needed both parties to participate.

Evans, 39, sat on the patio outside his Boston-area home on a recent afternoon talking about the platform. He wore a black T-shirt and jeans and spent some of the interview chasing around his brown rescue dog. Nearly 100 million people didn’t vote in the 2016 general election, Evans says. That’s more than 40 percent of those who were eligible.He believes the root of this disinterest is the nastiness on both sides of the aisle. Many potential voters simply turn off the news, never mind talking about actual policy.“A Starting Point” is meant to offer a digital home for people to hear from elected officials without having the conversation framed by Tucker Carlson or Rachel Maddow.

“The idea is . . . ‘Listen, you’re in office. I can’t deny the impact you have,’ ” says Evans. “ ‘You can vote on things that affect my life.’ Let this be a landscape of competing ideas, and I’ll sit down with you and I’ll talk with you.”

Or, as Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who has appeared on the site, puts it, “Sometimes, boring is okay. You’re being presented two sides. Everything doesn’t have to be sensational. Sometimes, it can just be good facts.” Evans wasn’t always active in politics. At Lincoln-Sudbury Regional High School, he focused on theater, not student government. And he moved away from home his senior year, working at a casting agency in New York as he pushed for acting gigs. His uncle, Michael E. Capuano, served as a congressman in Massachusetts for 20 years, but other than volunteering on some of his campaign, Evans wasn’t particularly political.

In recent years, he’s read political philosopher Hannah Arendt and feminist Rebecca Solnit’s “The Mother of All Questions” — ex-girlfriend Jenny Slate gave him the latter — and been increasingly upset by Trump’s policies and behavior. He’s come to believe that he can state his own views without creating a conflict with “A Starting Point.” When he and Scott spoke on Instagram, the president wasn’t mentioned. In contrast, recently Evans and other members of the Avengers cast took part in a virtual fundraiser with Democratic vice-presidential nominee Kamala D. Harris.

“I don’t want to all of a sudden become a blank slate,” says Evans. “But my biggest issue right now is just getting people to vote. If I start saying, ‘vote Biden; f Trump,’ my base will like that. But they were already voting for Biden.”

(In September, Evans accidentally posted an image of presumably his penis online and, after deleting it, tweeted: “Now the I have your attention . . . Vote Nov. 3rd!!!”)

Evans began to contemplate the idea that became “A Starting Point” in 2017. He heard something reported on the news — he can’t remember exactly what — and decided to search out information on the Internet. Instead of finding concrete answers, Evans fell down the rabbit hole of opinions and conflicting claims. He began talking about this with Kassen, a friend since he directed Evans in 2011’s “Puncture.” What if they got the information directly from elected officials and presented it without a spin? Kassen, in turn, introduced Evans to Kiani, who had made his fortune through a medical technology company he founded and, of the three, was the most politically involved.

Kiani has donated to dozens of Democratic candidates across the country and earlier this year contributed $750,000 to Unite the Country, a super PAC meant to support Joe Biden. But he appreciated the idea of focusing on something larger than a single race or party initiative. He, Kassen and Evans would fund “A Starting Point,” which has about 18 people on staff.

“There’s no longer ABC, NBC and CBS,” Kiani says. “There’s Fox News and MSNBC. What that means is that we are no longer being censored. We’re self-censoring ourselves. And people go to their own echo chamber and they don’t get any wiser. If you allow both parties to speak, for the same amount of time, without goading them to go on into hyperbole, when people look at both sides’ point of view of both topics, we think most of the time they’ll come to a reasonable conclusion.”

“What people do too often is they get in their silos and they only watch and listen and read what they agree with,” says John Kasich, the former Ohio governor and onetime Republican presidential candidate. “If you go to Chris’s website, you can’t bury yourself in your silo. You get to see the other point of view.” As much as some like to blame Trump for all the conflicts in Washington, Sen. Christopher A. Coons (D-Del.) says he’s watched the tone shifting for decades. He appreciated sitting down with Evans and making regular submissions to “Daily Points,” a place on the platform for commentary no longer than two minutes. During the Supreme Court confirmation hearings, Coons recorded a comment on Judge Amy Coney Barrett and the Affordable Care Act.“ ‘A Starting Point’ needs to be a sustained resource,” Coons says. “Chris often talks about it being ‘Schoolhouse Rock’ for adults.”

It’s not by chance that Evans has personally conducted all of the 200-plus interviews on “A Starting Point” during trips to D.C. Celebrities often try to mobilize the public, whether it’s Eva Longoria, Tracee Ellis Ross and Julia Louis-Dreyfus hosting the Democratic National Convention or Jon Voight recording video clips to praise Trump. But in this case, Evans is using his status in a different way, to entice even the most hesitant Republican to sit down for an even-toned chat. And he’s willing to pose with anyone, even if it means explaining himself on “The Daily Show” after Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas posted a selfie with Evans. (Two attempts to interview Trump brought no response.) Murkowski remembers when Evans came to Capitol Hill for the first time in 2018. She admits she didn’t actually know who he was — she hadn’t yet seen any Marvel movies. She was in the minority.“We meet interesting and important people but, man, when Captain America was in the Senate, it was all the buzz,” she says. “And people were like, ‘Did you get your picture taken?’ I said, ‘Yeah, I sat down and did the interview.’ ‘You did an interview? How did you get an interview with him?’ ”What impressed Murkowski wasn’t his star power. It was the way Evans conducted the interview.“It was relaxing,” she says. “You didn’t feel like you were in front of a reporter who was just waiting for you to say something you would get caught on later. It was a dialogue . . . and we need more dialogue and less gotcha.”

“Starting Points” offers two-minute answers by elected officials in eight topic areas, including education, the environment and the economy. This is where the interviews Evans conducted can be found. “Daily Points” has featured a steady flow of Republicans and Democrats. A third area, “Counterpoints,” hosts short debates between officials on particular subjects. Eric Swalwell, a Democrat from California, debated mail-in voting with Dusty Johnson, the Republican congressman from South Dakota.

“Most Americans can’t name more than five members of the United States House,” says Johnson. “ ‘A Starting Point’ allows thoughtful members to talk to a broader audience than we would normally have.”

The platform’s social media team pushes out potentially newsworthy clips, whether it’s Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) discussing his meeting with Barrett just before he tested positive for the coronavirus, or Angus King, the independent senator from Maine, criticizing Trump for his comments on a potential peaceful transfer of power after November’s election. Kassen notes that the King clip was viewed more than 175,000 times on “A Starting Point’s” Twitter account, compared with the 10,000 who caught in on CNN’s social media platform.

“Because it’s short-form media, we’re engineered to be social,” says Kassen. “As a result, when something catches hold, it’s passed around our audience pretty well.”

The key is to use modern tools to push out content that’s tonally different from what you might find on modern cable news. Or on social media. Which is what Evans hopes leads to more engagement. He’s particularly proud that more than 10,000 people have registered to vote through “A Starting Point” since it went online.

“If the downstream impact or the byproduct of this site is some sort of unity between the parties, great,” says Evans. “But if nobody’s still voting, it doesn’t work. We need people involved.”

#chris evans #mark kassan #joe kiani #a starting point #the washington post #news

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innerchorus · 3 years ago

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a rarepair huh... i havent considered it much because ive been away from arsen for a while now but have you ever considered jaswant/esfan?

Yeah, kind of! (I consider a lot of things as I am definitely multishipper trash!)

But this one I mainly contemplated thanks to a Jaswant/Gieve idea I had where they spend a night together after reaching Peshawar Fortress, and I thought it would be funny to have Isfan see Jaswant leaving the room afterwards — at the time, he didn't know whose room it was, so when at a later point he sees Gieve about to go into the same room he of course challenges him as to why he's entering Jaswant's room... which leads to an awkward realisation when, thanks to Gieve's insinuation (specifically designed to make the rather prudish Isfan a tad uncomfortable, of course), he realises the reason why Jaswant was in Gieve's room that time.

Once he recovers from the embarassment, some curiosity starts to surface. He won't admit to having any interest in Gieve, and so finds his gaze drawn to Jaswant instead, who definitely notices that Isfan is watching him and probably knows what he's contemplating better than Isfan does himself.

I feel like Isfan would never, ever initiate anything here, but if they happened to encounter each other by chance one night in the corridor outside Jaswant's room, who knows?

(I did actually start writing this one but I'm sure I'll never finish it and probably wouldn't have added in the amusing post-credits scene that would have led to all this, so here, you can have it as a freebie.)

I really think I can be convinced to ship basically any pairing if you give me enough time to think about it.

Anyway, because I'm not really sure how relevant this reply is, how about some fanart recs too? You may enjoy artist @vonvomfever on Twitter. Their art features a lot of different ships including plenty of Isfan/Gieve and Gieve/Jaswant but sometimes all three of them are featured together (not overtly shippy but as it's a small fandom sometimes this is the best you're going to get).

Examples here (genderswitch Isfan and Jaswant), 1 2 and 3 (kemonomimi), all three of them here, here and here. If you go back through their posts you can probably find more too.

Other art recs from this artist include rare fanart based on the designs by illustrator Yamada Akihiro! I really love this one featuring Isfan and Gieve (I have a soft spot for OVA!Isfan), and there's also this one of Gieve, and another with various characters here. For 2015 anime Isfan with his hair down, see here. And they also drew a piece with Shapur and Gieve, here.

#arslan senki #the heroic legend of arslan #isfan #jaswant #gieve #sorry if you're here for meta #or intelligent discussion #it's real shipper hours on my blog right now

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megbox · 4 years ago

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2020 Year in Review

Previous Posts: (2019) (2018) (2017) (2016) (2015) (2014) (2013) (2012) (2011)

2020 is a weird year because as the world goes through something collectively extremely traumatic and that is radically changing the structure of our lives, our workplaces, the way we connect socially, our mental health… our response to disease…. SO MUCH ABOUT THE WORLD…. And yet the day-to-day of living in a pandemic is so… mundane. I am privileged enough to have that opinion. I have stayed securely employed and it is privilege for my main reaction to something as intense as this pandemic to be boredom. But really, 2020 was a year of absences. It was a year spent largely alone, in my own company. It was a year that forced me to rest. It was a year that made me feel so terribly lonely but also forced me to get acquainted with myself and enjoy my own company in a new way. And it was a year of running.

I would also like to thank Connor for making this post happen by reminding me to do it and not to break tradition.

January & February

I am combining these months because they were not altogether all that memorable. My resolutions, as I noted on Twitter on January 2, were to 1) Keep running and 2) Learn how to make fresh pasta dough. I can safely say – mission accomplished on both fronts.

On January 14, I had the privilege of presenting a suicide intervention lecture to students at the medical school where my brother goes. By that time, I’d done a million of these presentations so nerves aren’t really a factor (imagine that! Me, no longer remotely afraid of public speaking…), but this one meant a little extra to me. My brother is so highly accomplished, and I am so proud of him, and I enjoyed having an opportunity to show him what I do and make him proud of me. I wore my favourite dress and did my hair all nice and he described it later as “exceptional.” It was a really, really good feeling. The first weekend of February, Ali and I had planned to go to Jasper. We wanted to go for a hike or two, and get super stoned and go to the planetarium. A huge blizzard hit Alberta just before we were supposed to leave, so we ended up having a staycation here in Calgary. We rented a hotel room, went swimming, drank wine, went to Japanese Village, had drinks in the lounge and then later to a punk rock band roulette night at the Palomino and finally crawled into our giant hotel bed and fell asleep to Remember the Titans… of all movies. It was the kind of night where you simultaneously feel 18 and 35 years old.

March

March was when the pandemic really started to become real. I don’t know exactly why, but I did not take the threat of coronavirus very seriously until the last minute. My coworkers would whisper about it in the hallways and I just rolled my eyes. But then, people started deciding they would work from home, the number of us in the office dwindled. The vibe was bad. Nobody could really focus. They held meetings at 8am and 4pm every day just for COVID-19 updates and we all waited with bated breath for them to finally tell us to go home and not come back. I really feel like I didn’t acknowledge the true implications of this virus until we got the official work from home order, and I had to tell my boss, my laptop at home is too old to run this software, I need a work tablet. My first official work from home day was March 23, 2020. I don’t remember much about that time except that the general sense of panic and anxiety made my job a lot busier, and it is hard to do a job like mine from home because it is hard to counsel or reassure clients through anxieties that are hitting you just as hard. I coped with wine, a lot of running, and listening to Ben Gibbard’s afternoon live streams where he would play acoustic versions of Death Cab songs and other covers. He played New Slang by the Shins one night and I burst into tears. I also coped with teaching myself how to make fresh pasta dough, and enjoying what was, at that point in the pandemic, the novelty and fun of Zoom.

April

In the absence of being able to have a party for my birthday, I decided to be obnoxious and do a “challenge” on my Instagram story. I asked my friends to record a distance run and/or walked and send it to me as a birthday present. My actual birthday ended up being a cold and windy and pretty miserable day. I ran 12km myself, came back home and watched both Magic Mike and Magic Mike XXL, and then went to my parents’ to celebrate both Scott and I’s birthdays with our family. My friends dropped off presents to my door and drove past my house and honked and I felt very loved and appreciated. I drank a lot of Prosecco with my brother and we listened to Kacey Musgraves.

It was also in April that I become “acquainted” with my neighborhood running nemesis. I put acquainted in apostrophes because I have never actually spoken to him. On one fateful run in April, I happened to catch up to him on my regular route. This was at the height of the COVID fear and so, while I would usually just pass someone on the sidewalk, I went out into the street. He saw me out of the corner of his eye and SPED UP. WHICH IS SUCH BAD RUNNER ETIQUETTE LIKE DUDE I’M IN THE ROAD LET ME PASS YOU. And then we ended up in this like, all-out 100m-finals-at-the-motherfucking-Olympics sprint challenge when all I was trying to do was go for a leisurely training run. And then I finally passed him, turned a corner and had to like collapse on to my hands and knees to catch my breath. Since then, I see this man running all the time. Sometimes while I am also running, sometimes from my car when I am driving through my neighborhood. He’s like… 16. And we are very competitive with one another. I hope to one day actually say hello to him. I both hate that guy and have to thank him for the motivation.

I ran my first half marathon on April 13, 2020. I was very hungover because I had stayed up quite late with someone on Zoom the night before on a virtual “first date” that had gone much better than anticipated. I don’t know why but I woke up the next morning in such a good mood that I decided I would go for a long, slow run. I got to 18km and figured, what’s 3.1 more? And so, I did it. The first thing I did upon finishing was call my mom. The second thing I did was contemplate calling an Uber to drive me the 2km left to my house. The other notable thing in April is that Maddy moved back from Australia, begrudgingly and a LOT earlier than planned, because of COVID.

May

May was kind of a blur. It was the first month of the Great Virtual Race Across Tennessee, which I signed up for while coming off of the high of actually running a half marathon all by myself. The GVRAT was fucking awesome. It was created by Lazarus Lake, of Barkley Marathons fame. The ask is to run 1022.68km between May 1 and August 31, an average of about 8.3km per day. Well, you could run, walk, or hike. This is the actual distance it would take you to cover the state of Tennessee. Myself and about 20,000 other weirdos from around the world signed up for this challenge. I figured I would never get a chance to run in a Lazarus Lake race for real, and being home all the time opened up a lot more opportunity for training. It was one of the very best things I did for myself in 2020. So May involved a lot of running, because I was fresh and naïve and fully intended to be ahead of the curve. I was running about 10-12 per day, sometimes more, and not taking any rest days.

In between these runs, I spent a lot of time going on long, ambling quarantine walks with Maddy. We would either go for a long walk or she would come over and we would get absolutely hammered in my backyard playing beer pong just to pass the time. We would send snapchats to our exes and make TikToks like 18 year olds. I know we never really said it out loud but having eachother during this time made these months bearable. We were lamenting the loss of a summer, and Maddy’s time in Australia, and all of the expectations we had for ourselves. We were watching our friends in relationships move in together or get closer due to the quarantine. We needed companionship, and stupid things to laugh about, and love, and distraction. And I can genuinely say I would not have gotten through this quarantine period if it weren’t for the nights I spent shooting Pink Whitney and dancing to Party in the USA in my living room with her.

May 13th was my one year anniversary of working at the university. It felt good to have accomplished so many things in that time, and have moved up already in my job, and to have a full-time, permanent contract.

And May 16th was when I ran my second half-marathon as part of a virtual challenge put on by a friend of a friend. My parents came and sat in lawn chairs in the park while I did loops. They cheered me on and filled my water bottle for me when I ran out. They’re my number one supporters and I love having a family that does that kind of shit for me in the face of something arbitrary like a virtual half marathon challenge. I knocked 7 minutes (!) off my original time. Amazing what not being hungover can do for your fitness levels.

June

I don’t remember many important things about June, other than Maddy moving to Banff. It was depressing but I was also happy for her and happy to have an excuse to go out there and visit. I went the very first weekend after she moved. Halfway through June I seriously contemplated quitting the GVRAT. My shins were bruised, I was dreading every single run, and I could not fathom doing it for 2.5 more months. I was dragging behind in the standings and losing my motivation.

I spent a lot of time with friends reading in parks. Sometimes, often, with wine. I met a stranger in Canmore Park and ended up kissing him. He was lovely.

Ali and I had one really good day in June where we went to the Farmer’s Market and then came back to her place and watched Ru Paul’s drag race for like eight straight hours. It was one of those days where we hadn’t seen each other in so long and you just feel totally high off of friendship and absolutely everything is funny and you just can’t stop laughing. I vividly remember it as one of the best days of the year.

July

Again, July kind of passed in a blur. I did a lot of hiking, and a lot of running… keeping up with the GVRAT. I hiked Picklejar Lakes, Castle Mountain, Little Beehive Lookout.

I went to Banff for a weekend to hang out with Maddy. We had a predictably wild weekend with her roommates and friends. We had dinner at Chili’s (hell yeah) and then went to High Rollers for beers and bowling. The “thing to do” at that point for all of these Banff people was to meet at the “rec grounds” aka public firepits and drink. The police would generally leave you alone so long as you weren’t being rowdy. I sat next to an Australian named Josh at a picnic table and later took him back to my hotel room and he gave me the world’s most unbelievable obvious hickey. Maddy and I sweat out the tequila shots the next day with a long ass hike, and then had a nap before her brother came and took us climbing at the Sunshine slabs – an activity I was not very good at but I wanted to be good at. It was the kind of weekend where you feel like, okay, I definitely indulged my wild side. And you drive home just like totally exhausted but smiling. I sent Maddy’s brother a voice note on my way into town thanking him for taking us climbing and saying it was nice to see him.

August

Okay – August was actually really eventful. Like most of the year’s events happened in August, honestly. A lot of running and hiking. I did Ha Ling Peak for the first time, and we did a 30km hike to Aylmer Pass one day that was a fricken GRIND. I spent the long weekend in Saskatchewan. We went to a cidery, and I ran laps around my Dodo’s acreage, and then we got to visit Wakaw Lake and reunite with our old next-door neighbours. We took the boat out and went tubing and lit fireworks and had an amazing dinner and honestly it was like reliving my childhood in the best, best, best way. I fell asleep on the car ride home.

I went camping with Ali in Sylvan Lake. We got ice cream and cooked fish tacos over the campfire. She told me that Cody had a date planned for the day they took possession of their house, that she wondered if he might ask her to marry him but didn’t want to get her hopes up in case it didn’t happen and ruin what otherwise was supposed to be a celebratory day. Spoiler – he did ask her to marry him  I was running when she called me. I was listening to Epsilon by Kygo, and now when I hear that song I always think of them. I stopped my watch and just openly bawled on the street out of happiness for them.

Steven successfully defended his master’s thesis. We went camping in Waterton to celebrate with Matt, Kennedy, Regan, Scott, and Rie. They brought cake. We did a sunrise hike. I slept in the back of my Ford Escape.

On August 27, Ollie passed away. It was both expected and unexpected. He had been having some issues with seizures. The vet didn’t think it was anything to be too concerned about, he was old and it wasn’t uncommon for them to happen. It happened suddenly. I had a terrible sleep that night, and woke up in a cold sweat somewhere between 3 and 4 am. In the morning, my mom called me and told me the news. He had a giant seizure in the night and was crying and yelping. They woke up and took him to the emergency vet, they made the executive call to put him down to prevent any further suffering. He died right around the time I woke up in the middle of the night. I like to think that was his way of saying goodbye, maybe. I cried all day. Well, let’s be honest, I cried all week. I burst into tears at the mere thought of him. He was such a good and lovely dog. He was so loved by us. He had a good life. It is always sad when we lose pets so early. They bring so much joy to our lives, and still when I go to my parents’ place the first thing I want to do is call for him or pet him. I hope he is running around in whatever the pet afterlife is. I miss him.

And on August 31, I ran my last kilometre of the GVRAT. I finished with 733.78 run, 83.18 hiked, and 205.09 walked.

September

September was a nice break from running. I got to start coming to campus one day a week, on Thursdays, which was good for my mental health and work productivity. I got to spend September long in Vernon with Maeghan and Madison at Michael’s family’s cabin. They took us boating and made us meals and didn’t judge us for drinking margaritas with Michael’s sister literally all day. It was the best. It was the epitome of every summer weekend you dream about. I was so happy I got to go.

I met a boy in September. It’s always September, isn’t it? It feels weird to write about him. Like, that makes him significant. But. He is significant. And I met him in September. And it was unexpected. Last minute. And essentially not a day has gone by since that day in September that I have not thought about him.

I also joined a Calgary Sport and Social Club team with my friends for softball and it started in September. We played two games and then I tore my hamstring running from second to third base. I tore… my hamstring…. Running like 30 metres…. After a summer of literally running 10+ km every day. I… it was the worst day ever. Softball itself was amazing and so fun even though I really do suck at the sport but highly recommend Rec League C-level beer league softball with all of your best friends. There’s just no way that isn’t fun.

October

A lot of pouting about my hamstring, I went to two physio sessions and then decided to just start running again. I’m bad. I’m a bad example. Don’t do what I do… but also…. It worked.

I went to Victoria to visit Sydney over the Thanksgiving weekend. We went to a Thanskgiving potluck party at my old coworker’s place. It was a nice experience to be the new people at a party, to have a room full of new people to meet and who ask you questions about your life. We got really drunk and they tried setting Sydney up with one of their roommate��s brothers, and gave us lipstick to try, and poured us tequila shots. We had such an amazing meal. It was honestly so fun. We laughed in the cab the whole way back about how we were going to need to debrief that evening HARD the next morning. We watched a lot of All Gas No Brakes, and went for dinner and brunch and I limped up Mount Doug with my hamstring. It was a very very chill weekend, like we spent a lot of time just lounging at Sydney’s apartment and doing nothing. Because that is the kind of friends we are. It was so relaxing and lovely. I was sad to leave.

Karla, my roommate, left for New York at the end of October. Her aunt was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer, and she and her mom made the executive move to go there to basically be with her for the end of her life. She wasn’t going to be back until December. I was happy, because it’s nice to have a place to myself, but also sad because Karla is lovely and I knew it was going to be a stressful situation for her.

November / December

I am combining these two months because they have also been largely uneventful. In fact… I don’t know if I could really tell you anything significant that happened. We’ve been in a lockdown. I’ve spent my time playing piano, watching Netflix, listening to podcasts, basically doing all of the things I usually do when I’m bored. Lots of Among Us. Lots of outdoor things… skating… more running. We’ve been in a lockdown since early December. Time has dragged on since then. I spent Christmas with my parents. Scott and Rie stayed isolated, because Scott is in and out of the hospital for school. My mom and I watched shitty Christmas Hallmark movies and made fun of the guys who star in them. We drank a LOT on Christmas Eve and both spent Christmas with a wicked hangover. My dad and I ate edibles and I was launched into the stratosphere. I spent New Year’s Eve with Boy from September. We played beer pong, and card games, and he tried to use a coat hangover to pick the lock on the mysterious room that my landlord keeps locked. We spent most of the night kissing, honestly. I was happy to spend the last moments of the year with him.

2021:

Honestly... at this point... who really knows?

#year in review #text #personal #2020

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lizzybeth1986 · 4 years ago

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This won't make you feel better, but this anon might have an explanation for the problems in Pixelberry's stories: essentially, I think it's because media and fandom culture in general has been hijacked by people with much older value systems, value systems where "whether behavior hurts people or not" was at best a secondary concern. The way Olivia is coddled, for example, does resemble how children used to be expected to be grateful to abusive parents for at least being given food and shelter.

Thank you for the ask anon.

Initially, when you'd sent the first ask, I'd had a different answer planned. Because sure, those kind of mindsets could very possibly factor in on how they treat a certain character type or trope...but it never actually happened with any sort of consistency. There were these invisible unspoken rules that certain characters would get away with breaking, and other characters would be punished for. So if there is no consistency in this treatment, how could I believe that it comes from a value/belief system that the writer holds, and nothing else comes into play?

Which brings me to the second thought you had. It's possible, yes, that the demographic they're hoping to cater to the most are the ones who may benefit the most from seeing white (and perhaps straight) characters thrive above others. The ones who will benefit from black and brown characters being placed on a heirarchy of worth - the most exoticized being the most "worthy" of "good treatment". But PB does benefit from a show of appreciating and celebrating diversity, and they do know it - as you can tell from the posts they were putting out during Black History Month last year:

(Thank you @nikkisha16 for helping me source these!)

This is a "nice gesture"....if we ignore the fact that only three out of the handful of default black characters featured at all. And if we ignore the fact that Griffin from this tiny list was hardly given an opportunity to use his skills in the biggest "disaster relief" diamond scene in the series, just to make more space for the white guy. Or that Luke's "alternative romance" arc was given more attention than the one where the MC chose him - to the point where we didn't get to see his mother (more attention to the alternative arc is often a surefire sign that the team is focusing on another LI and presuming said character as single by default, which is why you'll see more effort in the playthroughs where they're single). If the demographic you aim to please are the ones who may not notice or care about what actually happens to such characters in their respective stories...why this posturing? Why this pretence that you care?

It's not that PB is evilly rubbing their hands and contemplating on which character of colour to screw over today. It's very rarely as cut-and-dried as that. Very often it is just as possible that they don't know, or notice how some of these subconscious beliefs translate into their art. Ignorance of how damaging certain tropes can be for certain communities, and an unknowing favouritism towards certain characters based on their skin tone just as plausible causes for the mess we see in most stories of PB now. And a certain dismissiveness, would account for why it keeps happening despite people pointing out these problems. (I mean, this is the company that issued an apology on Twitter for Drake Walker calling a pink cake girly. And I don't recall them making apologies for anything else thus far)

It takes awareness to understand the cultural weight of some of these tropes and archetypes, and certain kinds of treatment in some cases. It also takes awareness to figure out ways to empower these characters within their stories and arcs! And I do believe for that kind of awareness to emerge in the storyboards and the office meetings...there (possibly? Idk what the PB office is like) would need to be more voices from varying communities in the rooms. For instance, look at this incredible interview by Chelsa Lauderdale on the experience of writing Griffin's character in The Elementalists:

Griffin is the rich, fullfilling character that he is because the writer brought her own experiences and worldview to that character. And you can see glimpses of that promise in so many different black and brown characters when they're given even half a chance. Kiara's ambition and logical bent of mind. Hana's loyalty and struggle to discover who she really is. Sloane's courage in taking on the world while battling an anxiety disorder. Teja's love for her craft and desire to excel in her field. Jax's protectiveness towards the underprivileged. Lily Spencer's humour and playfulness and recognition of those who have less privilege. William's (RoE) recognition of his work-home imbalance and his commitment to change that for this woman he loves. James Ashton's creativity and insecurities. Victoria's wisdom and her experience in the film industry. Aurora's desire to make a name that's her own, so that no one will ever view her as benefiting from her aunt's high position again. But unfortunately, we're often only allowed glimpses for a lot of these characters, rather than whole stories that use these traits as a foundation. Having writers from diverse backgrounds and with diverse experiences - not just a handful but many - with voices that will be embraced and respected, would go a long, long way in both pointing out these blind spots and in enriching the writing and stories themselves. Only a handful of writers cannot be burdened with the task of "educating" an entire company, but a vast team of diverse writers would mean there is an environment where they can more openly question and maybe shoot down more tone-deaf narrative choices.

@massivelysilentchaos made an amazing post about this sometime last year IIRC. A lot may have changed since this post, but there's plenty in it that still applies. More now than ever, I tend to go back to this one paragraph in her post (but please, please read the full thing):

I think a lot of PB’s problems with regard to representation in their writing could be helped by having more diversity on their writing staff. That’s not to say they don’t already have a fairly diverse staff (at least it looks that way from their blog) but some of their narrative choices are tone deaf in a way that tells me they could benefit from more black and brown perspectives on more of their stories. Specifically I’m thinking of the choices to have a book set in Trump country where an eventual protagonist pulls a gun on a potentially black MC or the recent decision to include the detail that Syphax, a black man who spent 8+ years at Lena’s scholae where MC was presumably taught to read and write, can’t read. Both of which were entirely unnecessary to the overall story they’re trying to tell and left a bad taste in mine and many other black fans’ mouths.

To add to this - I can speak, as a South Asian woman who was excited everytime a South Asian character appeared in a series - of Teja Desai getting one solitary scene to address her parents' initial doubts about her becoming a filmmaker, and one solitary scene about being a "woman in a boys club" as a director - which the writers never bothered to connect to her current work ethic - and being presented her as overworked, pressurized, frazzled by the punishing amount of work she was taking on - only for RCD's narrative to turn around and compare her to Marcus von Groot, the mediocre white male whose lack of control over his crew came from his own incompetence and delusions of grandeur (btw, in subsequent books he was written as this adorable funnyman the MC could bond and hang out with). I can talk of Jackie Varma, who was placed in a position where players could pick and choose between her and Bryce (with Bryce having more free scenes), before the narrative wrote her out for a large chunk of the story. Even in Book 2, scenes we get with her explore OUR backgrounds more than hers. Given that getting into medicine or engineering is such a huge deal in our communities, I can just imagine the ways in which that would tie up with Jackie's work ethic. And I know that many desi voices in that room would maybe make those connections and understand how to tie that into these stories.

I'd like to close this post with a quote from Chelsa that I showed you all earlier in this post: "Stories can perpetuate stereotypes or change narratives. That's really up to the people who write them". And perhaps, the people who hire the writers as well.

#long post #ask me #ask lizzy #characters of colour #sorry for the lack of read more guys but placing it in the post the last time was a fucking nightmare. you can block long post or ask lizzy #if that helps

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fatgirlsguidetodating · 4 years ago

Text

My bullying hell.

NOTE: I know this isn’t a dating piece (I’m working on a couple of blog posts at the moment though) but I went walking near my old school, which has been demolished for housing although there’s a fight to make it parkland instead, and it brought back memories. I know most of us get bullied for something. For me that was often my weight but in this case it was more. I think this is why I can be so insecure, and sometimes too sensitive and needy. I contemplated changing initials on the off chance any found my blog or twitter but decided not to. Not once did they display an iota of regret. Even as adults they acted like mean girls do you know what, fuck them.

I know that for many people high school can be hell in parts. I know that many kids have been bullied in school. For me that part was almost the entire year of 8th grade, a year so horrible that I regularly contemplated killing myself, cried myself to sleep most nights, woke in the morning crying because God (despite my not believing in God) hadn't answered my prayers to let me just die, and just generally was completely and utterly miserable and totally alone. I remember one day, with my usual puffy red eyes in the morning, thinking how if it were possible that we only get a certain quota of tears in our lifetime that I must surely have used up a shitload of them. I remember mum, in tears with me, having to practically drag me to school. I remember countless meetings with the school social worker, the year co-ordination, the vice principal and mum. All this was because it had been decreed by the popular girl of the class that I was persona non grata. Nobody was allowed to talk to me in class or out of class- unless it was to say something cruel like about how I was fat. That was allowed. Tripping me over was allowed. Knocking my bag or books over so I had to pick everything up was allowed. Pulling my school dress or skirt up to laugh at my fat arse in front of the boys was allowed. But nice things? No.

There were only 2 people who went against this. On one occasion one of the boys who I had also gone to primary school with asked me if I was ok? Such small words. I managed to nod, unable to speak past the lump in my throat. "Hang in there," he said. "It'll blow over." I had to hide my face behind my then long hair so he- and nobody- saw my tears. That one simple act of kindness meant more than he will ever know.

The second was when one of the girls I used to hang around with before the decree returned a book she borrowed from me. Her little sister had made a mess of the book. She offered to buy me another one to replace it. I said it was fine. I didn't need to be hated anymore than I was. She left me a note inside the book apologising and signing it with xoxo. I remember thinking how hollow it was given she hadn't spoken to me in a few months. But at the same time I appreciated it.

How did this happen? In an absolutely ridiculous fashion.

Something mean was written about me on a table: it said, in essence, my name is X and 1) I want to be TC’s girlfriend (ironic as he was my best friend), 2) GW’sbest friend , 3) I never have showers and I think there MAY have been a fourth one but I can't for the life of me remember what it said. I think I blocked a lot of that year out. My minds way of protecting myself I guess, like people often do for traumatic events.

As an adult I can say they were relatively benign statements but as a 14 year old they weren't. The thing was the popular girl, LA (now LH) decided that I had written them about myself. (Seriously!) Her reasoning: it looked "kinda" like my handwriting (it didn't) and it looked like it was written by my pen (one owned by something like half the class including, ironically, her). Interestingly a few months later one of the popular girls told me that she had seen her coming out of that classroom at one of the break tones not long before it was discovered. I'll never know who did it but the simple fact that the popular girl said it was me meant that naturally the class agreed with her.

So when she said nobody was to talk to me they all just did it. Not a single person stood up for me. I have felt lonely at many, many times in my life (haven't we all) but the loneliness of that one moment will never ever be forgotten. Even now I feel literally sick as I remember that moment. It was like one of those movies where you wake up from a dream and everyone's gone, and you are all alone. Or a dream where you suddenly become invisible and no matter how much you scream and jump up and down and wave your hands you remain invisible.

I had hoped that maybe my friends would have stuck up for me. I would even have taken them doing it not publicly but privately if they were too scared to disobey or too ashamed to be my friend in front of the popular girl and her best friend JB (now JI) my two tormentors. Like still hanging out with me at lunch and recess. The popular girl wouldn't know after all. But no. Even the girls I had hung with pretty much since the start of school when we'd made friends with me followed and I was suddenly cut off from everyone, completely and utterly alone....

There are some things that stand out from the next eight or so months, things beyond the pain and loneliness. Moments where the bullying was worse than the usual daily taunts. Like the time they soaked a bunch of tampons in water so they became nice and big and ran around the corner and threw them all at me. Because I found a spot to sit and have my lunch all alone day in day out. Technically, being at the front side of the school, near the road, it was out of bounds but I didn't care. On rainy days I got a bit wet but I didn't care- I even thought well maybe I'll get pneumonia and even if I don't get lucky enough to die from it I could get some time off school, away from my living hell. Sometimes I'd eat quickly- prompting comments from the girls about how fat people like me ate too quick- and then go to the library to hide in a corner and read. Being a bookworm over those eight or so months I got through even more books that I ever imagined I could.

I was trying to eat healthy (I was on a diet which, lets face it, I have been on for most of my life!) and I often had those little tubs of two fruits in my lunch. The girls would sneak around and laugh at my lunch. I'd be tripped over, had leftover bits of food thrown at me, was called fat and ugly so many times that even now I say it about myself and actually mean it. One day after PE I discovered my watch had been stolen from the box we put all our special items in. It was a Mickey Mouse watch I got from Disneyland that played music. I was devastated. These girls that I speak of were- surprisingly- not my two tormentors, the instigator of it all, but my former friends. I think that these girls, and the few boys who sometimes hung out with them, were actually crueler to me than the popular girl and her friend. I could never understand that. I still don't.

For almost eight months my mum battled with the school to have me moved to another form but they kept saying that the numbers were at maximum in each form. I offered at one point to take a lie detector test to prove I hadn't written those things. I spent way too many hours in the social workers office in tears.

At one point all of a sudden one of the boys started being nice to me. I lapped up the kindness, kind of like how an abused dog will still always want their masters approval. Every kind word was like a balm on my soul. He'd come and sit with me sometimes at lunch and we would talk and laugh. It was only when someone slipped a note in my locker- I suspect the girl who returned the book- telling me that he had been given a dare by the two tormentors to get me to sleep with him. Needless to say the next time he came to see me I said to him "I know what you're doing. I know it's a dare and you've been telling them everything I said!" (Probably one of the only times in my life I stood up for myself.) He didn't even look ashamed or guilty, he laughed and said "well I wouldn't sleep with a fat four eyes like you for no reason. You are pretty dumb for believing it." Perhaps the saddest thing was the fact that I contemplated not telling him I knew. Oh I wouldn't have gone so far as to sleep with him knowing what I knew but to just continue the ruse for awhile because he provided the only conversation in school hours, the only kindness, in all the pain and loneliness. But, ultimately, I knew being alone was better than living a lie.

My persona non grata status didn't extend to just my class. All the popular kids knew not to talk to me and to make fun of me or even spit on me if I walked past. One of them even tripped me up on the top of the stairs so I went flying down them, landing on my side so hard it was bruised and hard to breathe for ages. I never told on them. I knew that "dobbing" would just make my life worse. Though how they could have made it worse than that I will never know.

The worst moment was when I actually did attempt to kill myself. This is something I haven't ever told a single soul. My mum only found out I had wanted to kill myself a few months ago- not that I attempted it a couple of times- and she was devastated. But I never told her at the time because I saw how much it pained her to see me so unhappy. I couldn't burden her anymore. The night it happened was a Sunday night, the night before school started again for the new term. I was pretty naive. It was pre-Internet which, in retrospect is probably a good thing because had Google existed back then I would have found a way to do it. I took a packet and a half of Panadol. I thought surely that was enough. It wasn't. Not only did I not die, but I simply woke up the next morning feeling like absolute shit.

The turning point came about seven months in. A chance encounter in the library with one of the girls I'd gone to primary school with and I told her about what my life was like. She was horrified and said I could come and hang with her friends sometimes. Not all the time, she said, because they wouldn't like that but sometimes. I probably should have thought it a strange offer but needless to say at the time a little bit was better than nothing. So maybe two or three times a week at lunch mainly I would go and hang with them. I didn't really say much. I had always been shy but my ordeal had made me even more so. When people came up behind me and stuck crap down the back of my top or yelled "boo fatty four eyes" suddenly I would jump a mile. If I saw one of my two tormentors or any of their friends I would instantly start shaking waiting for what they would do or say this time. They soon learnt they didn't even need to speak, just look at me, and I'd be affected. So when my school friend said to me that I couldn't really hang out with them anymore because the others thought I was stuck up (because I didn't speak much) I didn't feel much emotion. It seemed to me that it was perfectly right. Why WOULDN'T they reject me too? Who would even WANT to be friends with someone like me?

Finally, FINALLY, after eight months battling the school by mum they let me move classes. Not to the form I wanted to go in as by then I had made a couple of friends through my childhood male best friend who lived a few houses up and I had known since we were three and who I spent most weekends and school holidays with along with my brother and his younger sister who were in the same year, but a new one nonetheless.

It was the middle of second period, I think, that I was moved. The class were in the science block so I'm guessing it was a science class but I can't quite remember. The year level co-ordinator took me in there and just said, "X is in this class now. She's been given the class schedule." Of course everyone turned to look at me curiously. I slipped into a seat in the back of the room and put my head down. At the desk next along from me were three girls. At one point they said my name and I looked up and asked "yes?" I was given a withering look. "I wasn't talking to you. X here has the same name as you." I was told.

The next period those three girls asked me to sit with them and asked plenty of questions. But then after lunch they told me they'd spoken to my main tormentor and knew who I was and what I did. Great, I remember thinking, I could never ever leave it behind me!

But, slowly, over the remaining few months in the year I began to make friends. There were four girls in my form who became my friends- to this day one of them remains one of my best friends- and from another form there were another two. The six of them hung around together and, as time went on, I became part of their group. There were another few girls in the form who sometimes came to hang out with us.

I was with two of them (both had the same name and it also coincidentally happened to be the name of my main tormentor) one day walking across the courtyard when my tormentor and her best friend (the girl who had been one of my close friends for years before this all happened and who's friendship with me seemed to threaten my main tormentor for some reason before the table incident) suddenly appeared. Apparently someone had written something in chalk in the girls toilet near the year ten common room (or it may have been year twelve then, I can't remember when the merger happened) about her and I was blamed. One of the girls stood up for me, pointing out there were many with her name including my two new friends. But no. It was definitely about her because it had her last initial or name. She tried to get in my face, telling me she knew it was me and I had mental problems etc but my two new friends basically stood in front of her. They were a bit tough and told her that she'd have to go through them to get to me. She chose to walk away.

Though she did get the popular girls in my class to make extra fun of me for a bit but all of a sudden it was water off a ducks back because I had my new friends. They did try and get them to abandon me, telling them what I had done but I'd already told them my side and all the pain- though I had edited it because it was too raw to tell the whole truth, in all its intricate and painful details that soon- and the attempts failed.

Soon it was summer and I spent much of it with my new friends.

In the next school year my old friends and my tormentors still would make smart comments or something when I walked past but the more I ignored it, the more I showed no reaction, the less they did it though it never totally stopped throughout my whole time at high school.

Teenagers can be cruel and girls I think the cruelest of the bunch. Sure teenage boys can be cruel too but girls are bitchy and that is much worse in my opinion. Boys might have a fight and then it's done with. Girls will just bitch and snipe and make you miserable. My tormentors never said sorry, never acknowledged I didn't do it. I occasionally see their names pop up as comments on mutual friends posts on Facebook and I look at their profiles and see how perfect their lives seem. Both are married, one has two kids, one has one. I wonder, when I see them, how it's fair that they get the perfect life and I don't. There is no sign of karma having ever gone their way for what they did to me. As for the girls who were my friends before the decree, I'm Facebook friends with a couple of them. We never really spoke again at school. But, with school far behind us and time dulling some of the bad memories and letting most people look back at their school days as the halcyon days of youth, and remember the good times not the bad, a couple of them are friends on Facebook. Only one have I ever really caught up with but another two I do talk to sometimes on there.

I do believe that, to this day, it has affected me. Just writing this is affecting me: for instance I'm feeling a bit sick, my hands are a bit shaky, and I feel like I want to have a bit of a cry. (Yes- I still have tears left despite those eight long months. The human body can be, I think, up to 65% water. I swear back then my percentage was much lower because of my nightly crying myself to sleep.) But I feel good having written this, having gotten one of my stories off my chest. Sure there are others in my life I may talk about in the future but this is one that shaped me. For instance I know I can be a bit of a needy friend, wanting to see friends more often, wondering when I haven't heard from them in a certain amount of time if I've been replaced or done something to make them angry or upset. I take things way too personally, am far too sensitive about things said or done, I overthink things. And I have no self-confidence at all. I don't see the good in me. Outside or in. When someone gives me a compliment my first reaction is to laugh at them. Especially if they say something positive about my body. I look at them and I say, "are you blind?"

If you take anything from my story please let it be this: kindness doesn't cost a thing and just a little bit can truly make a major difference in someone's life. Bullying- whether it's a child, teenager or even an adult- can really fuck someone's life up. And words- like fat four eyes- can do just as much damage, in fact I would argue MORE than hands. Words CAN hurt. Words can linger in a person's mind years and years after they have been said. They can affect the way they live their life and choices they make. They can reverberate in a person's brain for years. So please be kind. And if you are lucky enough to have kids teach them that too. Because- especially with the proliferation of social media in our lives- words can lead to people taking their lives. That stupid little childhood singsong retort to insults "sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me" is a load of utter bullshit. Words- just like actions- can kill. Bullying can kill.

#bullying #mybullyinghell #dontbeabully #itcankill #kindnessmatters

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destiny-smasher · 5 years ago

Audio

(Music by Samantha Pena, soudncloud user spena1989) Not gonna lie, I'm at a point with All Wounds where I'm like...oof, I wasn't able to envision everything I wanted to a few years back (by a long shot) but I'm kinda...wanting to be done with it. Even though I don't want to be done with it. 😅All Wounds was created from the get-go to be a visual novel - that's why the initial demo released so early into the project's life. My original intent was to go back and forth between fic and VN. But my original intent was also to end the story during the Portland road trip (Chapter 7). And while you could certainly make a case that the story is technically stronger up until that point, and becomes less potent and more dragged out for it's post-time-skip stuff, the latter stuff was also just...a lot more fun to write. And when I look back, if I had committed to the visual novel as intended, we'd not have gotten, like, ANY of that post-time-skip stuff, which includes Other Max being as fully fleshed out as she became. She'd have been stuck being a ghost in Max's head, pretty much. At this point, though, it's been so long, the fic I made INSTEAD of working on the visual novel is SO long, interest in the project peaked back while it was being written, working on this by myself is DAMN exhausting in terms of time spent, emotion and mentality drained, etc. Whenever I go back and listen to all of the amazing music made by people in the LiS it reinspires me to keep working on All Wounds but that's had diminishing returns as my life has changed drastically this past year. I love Max and Chloe. But, tbh, I just moved to a new country and got married, and I love my wife more than Max and Chloe? ^_^;; I’m not depressed and stuck in retail hell anymore, relying on staying up late working on a LiS fan project to channel that depression. I don't wanna completely shut the door on the visual novel and there's a chance I may still try to keep pushing to at least get to that road trip and maybe fudge it a bit. After all, a LOT of work has been done to the project that isn’t apparently or accessible in the public version; and I was able to add pretty well presented versions of Chapters 3 and 4 recently. So it’s entirely possible I could at least push it a little bit further if I end up inspired to do so. Either way, regardless, I still want to try some kind of epilogue, end-cap, etc, maybe even in VN form (Jenny and I had envisioned an epilogue where the characters play DnD). Max and Chloe mean the world to me, and exploring a version of events where both endings of the original game are expanded and tied together felt very cathartic. I'd rather that exist in SOME form (fic) than none at all; I think I'd still have done things this way a second time. But All Wounds inherently was a story about processing pain and grief and trauma and figuring out how to cope with it and heal and move on. And when I was at such low points, that made sense to write and steep myself in. But now? It just kinda doesn't. More than anything, though, is the fact that it's still a fan project - one that has had a lot of its interest evaporated for multiple reasons. The game’s ending is over four years old now; a prequel AND a sequel have both come out, further fragmenting the fandom; people have moved on. And it’s easy for outsiders to not realize how emotionally exhausting and sometimes painful All Wounds was, has been, and can still be for me to work on. Even things like pieces of music or art made by people who hurt me, who I hurt, that shit isn’t easy to work with. I could be spending all of this effort and energy on something less emotionally painful that isn't complete in ANY form AND is original. It feels bad to seriously consider dropping it when I'm sure there are still SOME people out there waiting for it, but I have other stories that I really need to work on. I can't keep myself locked in this cage forever when the work is such an unreasonable mountain to surpass. What I HAVE created is a fleshed out and substantial story and a chunk of it imagined in VN format which all kind of acts as a love letter to PriceField as well as an ultimately cathartic way to leave that original game to rest, I hope. Going forward I really think I'd like for Arcadian Rhythms to function as my one sole fanfic project I do inbetween original works, with one-shots or other bits (like the Butterfly Soup fic) just being other, far less intensive ways of working out those kinds of inspiration. It would probably do me better to also not talk about what I'm working on (aside from AR I suppose) in much depth or detail until I have something finished to really show for it. 😓 So if you want to see what I’ve been able to make of the visual novel so far, you can find that here.If you want to read the prose fic version of the story, which was finished quite some time ago (and which is where I want to update with an epilogue eventually), you can find that here. My newer fandom project, Arcadian Rhythms, which actually does feature Life is Strange characters, can be checked out here. You can follow our Patreon over here - we’ve been on hiatus as we deal with immigration but that should be all sorted soon. Regardless, any major updates to projects will be getting posted there once we’re back up and running. And you can follow me on Twitter over here; or just check back on my personal Tumblr here as I’m sure any meaningful thing I complete, fanfic or otherwise, will get posted here. So to clarify, current creative plans for the future on my own time: - original fiction projects (I’ve actually started work on an original VN for ex.) - Arcadian Rhythms for fun - some kind of epilogue for All Wounds - some kind of conclusion to Runners at the Corners (Butterfly Soup)

Interest in AW severely declined after the fic was done, no one else seems interested in working on it, either, it'd be SO MUCH work still. Sunken cost fallacy is a thing and tbh that’s part of why I even pushed myself to finish the update I did a few weeks ago. I am sorry to anyone who’s been waiting all this time for it - what I managed to produce is still a multi-hour visual novel, and I am still contemplating trying to at least get it to the end of the pre-time-skip. At the very least, there is still a complete story that can be read in fic form, the project just floated up and away from a reasonable grasp for one person, mainly because I just...wrote way more than I originally intended to. When I started work on this prokect, I also didn’t expect to fall in love, struggle to make ends meet, move across an ocean, and get married. And as important as All Wounds has been to me, I did at least finish telling the story I started, and the story it became, but I’ve learned all I can from it at this point and am so tired of trying to drag it out on my own. In the same way All Wounds sees Max and Chloe needing to accept their losses and let themselves move forward despite not everything going how they wanted, I guess I have to do the same with this project. Max and Chloe start a new future together, and it’s that time in my life where I probably should start doing the same. I need to start focusing on telling my own stories with my own characters more than I have been, as well as making more space for this new future with my new wife. And to All Wounds, the most difficult project I’ve worked on to date, as someone I once knew once sang, "I know, I know I made so many promises I know I left you such a mess; Gotta let go, gotta let go, and move on Been walking in a circle for too long"

And as another musician put it,

“Come and see the light of day out in the open It’s like I’m waking from a dream, oh Many days since I have seen the end unfolded Many times that I’ve looked back on all the times that we have had”

#lis allwounds

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cogitaeworks · 5 years ago

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I saw the other ask for GO smut. Just curious, is it cannon that Az and/or Crowley are asexual? Even if it’s a head cannon, I respect your choice not to draw anything you are uncomfortable with. I just have only seen the show. Not much of a reader. But I was wondering if it’s in the book or something? Either way, it’s fir to do only what is comfortable for yourself, and I’m new to the fandom just curious. Hope this doesn’t sound rude or a-phobic.

Hi! No it doesn’t sound like that at all! And oh boy, sorry, this is going to be a loooong post because I’m a huge Gaiman fan.In the @neil-gaiman GO books and from what I understood, they are canonically non-binary and asexual BUT that’s narrowing their issues. They don’t contemplate the same POV on sexuality that humans do, and the same happens in the series where they are shown through costume design and scriptwriting that they aren’t binary or male-sexualized. This was said in interviews by Neil since the 90s and also he (sadly) has to confirm this on his twitter over and over again, sometimes people being rude to him with no need just because Crowley and Aziraphale and the celestials in general don’t respond to the queerbait phenomena. Angels according to the book are celestial beings who choose to take a certain form to roam the earth, but they don’t identify as their body itself, and so they don’t have a definitive genitalia, sexuality or specified gender. Angels also don’t like sex, or don’t find it necessary at all. It’s not a sin but they find it hard to consummate, some cases find it downright unpleasant or gross, but with effort they can try and indulge if curious enough (but it’s not usual from what I understood and from what was written, regardless of gender or situation). About their canonical state of being and totally going into spoiler territory, Aziraphale and Crowley are celestial beings “made of love” who most of the time present themselves as males, but don’t identify as men. Crowley is not a “demon” in the incubus terms per se, and after he fell, you still see in the books that he remains an entity of his own, which somehow explains why he is so naive and friendly by the “demonic” standards. Same happens to Aziraphale, who even though takes longer to start questioning out loud, ends up following a similar path to Crowley. In their state of being they don’t enter in the parameters of human sexuality because they only take humanoid shape and present in a certain way depending on ocasion; they aren’t human, so we can’t say that they are definitely one way or the other. So when people call them “gay” they just don’t understand the world building Gaiman laid out about the gems- I MEAN ANGELS not having a true sexuality. (Eat your heart out Rebecca Sugar, jk I love you). In the book these things are explicit, but in the series you can see this in most of their scenes, like in the third episode when Crowley wears a female veil and tunic in the Crucifixion scene, or when he has forehead/temple curls and an ornament on his head that are proper to roman women, and also Crowley never referred to Crowley as “he” during the entire episode. Another thing is that even though most of the entities are refered to as “he” or “him”, many of them choose to have a female body to manifest on their realms. So it’s all down to what they fancy, because their body is like a tool for their final goals. So yeah, in the books angels and celestials in general don’t have gender or sexuality in human terms, and the series does it’s job in showing-not-telling about the canon of the books.The problem is, Crowley and Aziraphale don’t see their respective bodies as mere tools. They finds themselves attatched to them, they like humanity and their weird gender customs that they don’t fully understand, which is why they choose and change the way they present themselves when given the chance, like when Crowley decides to be a Nanny after watching Mary Poppins when he could have chosen any other role to go into. They don’t identify as male, they simply present themselves in a certain way, and in the books its even written down all of this which hints why it’s so funny in the books when someone confuses Aziraphale as gay-ish, because he is not a man in reality.So, Aziraphale and Crowley because of their canonical state as celestial beings, asexual and non-binary, it would seem that its all queerbait in the series, right? Nope. Why? Because that’s how asexuality, demisexuality, and non-binary people love. They don’t NEED certain typical elements or know the genitalia or follow gender norms to know that they are in love, they don’t need physical contact to show how much their beloved means to them. They don’t need the formalities or “follow the steps and reach base one” or even be in a couple-y relationship to feel and show love. Some prefer certain formalities, some don’t. And in Aziraphale’s and Crowley’s case, aside from all of this applying to them (plus a powerful friendship that lasted milenia which consolidates their bond even stronger), they didn’t fall in love with each other right away. In the books its shown that Crowley is the first one of the two, but their relationship is more subtle in the books than in the series. They both fell in love with the world, their manners and concepts and even the human flaws to the point to be ready to die for it, and in sharing that love for the world, they also found themselves loving each other, as both friends and soulmates if you’d like. Protecting the world means protecting the other as well, because there can’t be a Crowley without an Aziraphale, or an Aziraphale without a Crowley, and there can’t a THEM without the WORLD. Which is why in the series finale when they toast, they don’t say “to us” or “to you”. They say “To the World” with the most lovestruck face ever. That’s them in a nutshell in the books and in the series. Just two creatures who find themselves in the grey area of existence, questioning everything (one more often than the other that’s slightly in denial most of the time), don’t canonically identify as male or female, and also don’t follow the physical need many people do.Which is why I choose not to draw NSFW of them, because it’s one of those weird cases where, hey, the A is represented canonically and properly. I don’t have anything against the artwork or fanfics though, just prefer to keep it light. (and I’m in the A myself so, there is that haha).I hope this rant wasn’t too dense!

#good omens #rant #demisexuality #asexuality #non binary #ask #aziraphale #crowley #neil gaiman

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goconstructionleads · 4 years ago

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Free Construction Leads For The Taking

I beginning late explained the massiveness of being happy to pay for leads, in any case if your spending plan fundamentally won't permit it right now you should comprehend that there are approaches to manage get free improvement leads. Such comes down to utilizing your imaginative mind, making your own chances, and being restless to contribute a touch of your time. Truly try to consider some new possibilities and you will concoct some striking contemplation's for getting no-cost leads. Here are a couple to kick you off:

1. Start a blog. Right when you hear the word 'blogger' you may consider authoritative issues or redirection yet it's a medium that has gotten powerfully significant for financial specialists any place on over the world. It's certainly not difficult to fire up a free blog at blogger.com and you can be up and making surprisingly fast.

2. Collecting a free site. On the off chance that you don't have a site for your affiliation yet, by then what the hell would you say you are keeping it together for? A reliably growing number of individuals are utilizing the web to discover close by temporary authorities and association pros and it's protected to communicate that the Yellow Pages will be dead inside five to ten years. You can without a truly astounding stretch structure a free site with no html information by utilizing Google Sites. You would then have the alternative to utilize your web address in the aggregate of your free online profiles like the Google Business Center or Yahoo Local. Additionally try to have a spot on your site where individuals can give you their email address. You can get a tremendous proportion of these by promising to give uncommon cutoff focuses and plans to their inbox. By then you have a monstrous, free once-over of potential clients that you can attack with deals messages at whatever point you have to. On the off chance that you find that you get a kick out of causing your site by then proposition to assemble allowed to or straightforwardness regions for other non-battling lawfully restricting pros in your city and basically put a relationship on every one that fixations back to your site.

3. Relationship on Google Plus, Facebook, Twitter, and other online media protests. These objections are not, presently simply the domain of young people and understudies – they are free displaying stages essentially clutching be mauled for your great position. Set up accounts with a comparable number of them as you can stay aware of (utilizing your affiliation name as the title) and truly attempt to place some essentialness in it. Make accomplice records, present huge data relating on your business, and give broken proposals to your quick overview. You'll discover loads of different relationship in your city who are doing in like way and couldn't imagine anything better than to orchestrate with you and work on commonly beneficial affiliations and lead trading.

4. Get free postings with online help suggestion protests like Angie's List, Merchant Circle, and Super Pages. Ask clients who were content with your work to sign onto these regions and put in a few incredible words about your affiliation. Such online awards will go miles in sending you one free progression lead after another that is unquestionably not difficult to change over into paying positions.

5. Make DIY or illuminating narratives for YouTube and close by interface access stations. On the off chance that you can make a short and messing about related video and post it on YouTube you may very well be floored how much near to presentation it can get you. In the occasion that you're fortunate it could stream around the web and inside seven days you could have your business name, number, and web address before truly unlimited individuals (an amazing piece of them near to who could utilize your association). Free business construction leads for brief experts are simply staying by to be found on the web – you fundamentally need to go for at any rate a lot of online brand introduction on comparative number of various stages as could be typical. You could in like way make some short and useful accounts about home improvement and submit them to your nearby association access station. Sometimes they'll put them broadcasting dynamically to expend the space, and it's every now and again free.

6. Make and deal with a nearby relationship of association authorities. Set up a site called "Supervisor Service Professionals of (your city here) Club". All individuals from the club would consent to get the message out basically the various individuals' associations to their clients. So Plumber Joe would essentially send painting prompts Painter Bob and the converse path around. It would be totally free for people. This is an awesome strategy to use each other's improvement for ordinary piece of breathing space.

7. Get to your neighborhood TV stations on snow days and requesting that they review your business for the ticker outline of shut relationship at the base of the TV screen, regardless of whether you don't have workers or whether you plan on being open notwithstanding. Why? Since you just got your business name before about a tremendous section of a million people futile, that is the clarification. You can achieve something generally equivalent to for radio broadcasts. It's hard to tell the amount of free improvement potential customers you can move away from this strategy. This current one's outskirts moral in any case I surrender it to you whether you'd need to add it to your best stuff.

8. Structure an article for or requesting to be met by your neighborhood association paper. Association paper editors are conventionally really unhinged for charming stories and content, and they'd likely be open to scattering the article you just explained upgrading and the significance of keeping wakeful with the latest. Unmistakably around the fulfillment of the article would be your name, number, and web address for all in the association to see (futile, plainly). Or on the other hand on the off chance that you have a spellbinding story to light up or your business is as for accomplish such an achievement try to get them to pass on an essayist and picture taker. Who knows, in the occasion that you're fortunate you may very well hit the essential page in the next week's transformation!

9. Have a turn by they way you work your business that will draw neighborhood media thought. For instance, you could begin a redesigning business that is stated and worked solely by ladies. Or then again obviously you could work out a plan framework where you manufacture new augmentations as a final product of vehicles, vessels, or different vehicles instead of money. Or then again obviously you could get known as the headway relationship around that solitary volunteers military veterans. You get the point. Have a catch. Have a story. Be unique. In a short time enough a TV or paper author will find a few solutions concerning it and choose to utilize you story on a moderate news day. Only one notice on the chamber or in the paper and you'll certainly be swimming in free headway work leads.

10. Give free DIY classes and workshops at your business condition once consistently. You've certainly seen that Home Depot offers free DIY classes constantly, in any case they're not simply doing it because of the liberality of their spirits. They comprehend that by a wide margin a large portion of the individuals in those classes will by then go for a walk through the store and buy all the crucial materials on the spot. A relative thought could work for your association business. On the off chance that you have a private improvement affiliation you could offer Saturday classes on everything from painting to tiling to drywall, the thought being that the vast majority of them would rapidly understand that they have neither the well being nor the craving to take on their home redoing undertakings. Plainly there you'd be, starting late standing arranged to offer your associations for select.

11. Contribute your abilities to superb missions and watch the free progression offer leads move in. There are dependably openings accessible to offer your opportunity to fair motivation. You could help hoard a house for Habitat for Humanity, you could offer a few hours seven days of free work to seniors at your gathering, or you could help make the set for your neighborhood association theater. Such things dependably offer you the opportunity to move your business and get your name out there, regardless of whether it be in a printed release or just through easygoing. Individuals will survey you and your acts of kindness at whatever point they need their storm cellar changed or deck re- amassed.

12. Contact neighborhood real estate agents and let them comprehend that you'd like the chance to support their customers. Right when you set up a relationship with one real estate professional inside an affiliation it can regularly incite work with others in an equivalent firm.

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thosch3i · 5 years ago

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8, 12, 17, 29, 33, 49 💕

8) Where do you take your inspiration from? Hmmm honestly a Very Good Question LOL. Literally every single fic I’ve written so far has had, like, a prompt--from Weilan Week to Tumblr prompts (to the two anons in my inbox, I will get to you guys I’m so sorry I know it’s been more than a month) to the Sundial Exchange (not yet posted) and then the priest fanzine (...still working on that too), so I just...build on from that. I do have some other ideas I’m working on, which were...either inspired by like, some things I saw on Twitter, or other fanfic I’ve read (there was a hilarious Guardian fic I read on Lofter where novel/drama Zhao Yunlan swapped bodies, and now I kinda wanna do something similar but with novel/drama Shen Wei--also if anyone’s interested here’s all eight chapters, most recent at the top since this is a tag search, and also it’s unfinished but it’s still plenty funny). In general, the answer is...”all over the place”?

12) Who is your favourite character to write for? Why? Zhao Yunlan, usually in more humor-tangent things. Because he can really be so goddamn funny. His thirst knows no end. Plus I can project my adoration for Shen Wei onto him. The only problem is that he really, really, tends to fuck up my outlines because he’s just so...out there. But honestly, I really like Shen Wei too, just because his character is so...carefully put together on the outside, but he really does feel things very intensely. Though sometimes that makes things harder too. Weilan in general lmao.

17) Post a line from a WIP that you’re working on. Okay so I wanted to post a line from this Kunlun/ghost king thing but it’s got an 80% chance of being my fic for the priest zine and I probably shouldn’t put anything of it out there before that’s done so here’s a snippet from the android Shen Wei DBH AU that I also put on twitter earlier lol:

Zhao Yunlan’s eyes flutter shut, and he turns his head on Shen Wei’s lap ever-so-slightly into the pleasant sensation of fingers running through his hair and down his scalp. His expression relaxes marginally, but the hint of a frown remains. “You wouldn’t lie to me, would you?”

Through an extraordinary feat of willpower, Shen Wei’s hand does not pause in its ministrations. “I will never lie to you, and I will never hurt you,” he says, his voice soft but no less profound. When he says this, his LED flickers a damning red.

For several long seconds, Zhao Yunlan is quiet. Finally: “As long as you say so, I believe you.”

Shen Wei, too lost in his contemplations, only “hmms” softly in acknowledgment, never noticing that Zhao Yunlan had kept his eyes open to a faint slit the entire conversation.

29) Do you have a story that you feel doesn’t get as much love as you’d like? Hmmm not particularly? My only non-crack attempt at writing canon-compliant dramaverse fanfic three first kisses (and two last ones) is decently low when I sort by kudos, since everything below that is for a rarepair or relate to not yet translated novel chapters, or Shen San...but it’s also the first Guardian fic I wrote so I can’t speak to its quality LOL. But I am a little surprised that Nameless (a soulmate AU) isn’t quite as popular as a couple fics that I literally wrote while half-asleep in a time-crunched panic ahaha especially because that one’s one of my favorites? But I’m biased towards soulmate AUs.

33) What’s the biggest compliment you’ve gotten? Ohhh hmmmm...any compliment regarding characterization, generally! Especially since sometimes I feel like I struggle with...keeping, like, tone consistent while trying to stay in character? I have no idea if that makes sense. Basically characterization compliments, yeah. Also if I ever make anyone cry. Good compliments.

49) Can you remember the first fic you read? What was it about? Oh boy. Most likely this was a Percy Jackson & the Olympians fic, but I definitely do not recall what it was about. Probably one of those Percabeth after the war things, or “PJO characters read the books and react to them” things. I was probably...10 then? I’ve been reading fanfiction for half my life omg ahahaha

#ask #willowcatkinblossom #shouting into the void #ty for the ask!

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noreasonjustbored · 5 years ago

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Absence Makes the Heart Grow Jealous

Part 1:

Charlotte and Henry started dating a few months before their high school graduation. Everyone thought that it was a bad idea for them to begin a relationship because they were already set to go to separate colleges. Henry decided to attend the local community college, so that he could still be Kid Danger, and Charlotte would be a few hours away at Stanford on a full ride.

Before deciding to take the risk, they agreed that it wouldn’t work if both parties were not 110% committed. Knowing that they both wanted to make ‘them’ work above all else helped them to persevere through the rough patches. In the beginning the miles apart placed a strain on their relationship since they were so used to seeing each other every day. But they adjusted, they really put in the time and effort needed keep their relationship afloat. The distance eventually forced them to have better communication skills. They learned to articulate how they were feeling more concisely since they couldn’t read each other’s body language through text.

Since starting school they had both grown up a lot more. Charlotte decided to make the most of her college experience. She absolutely focused on her academics, but she wasn’t afraid to hit up a frat party every once in a while. She really found her stride in clothing design and would sometimes even sport her own looks to these events. Her wardrobe as a whole was more diversified. While her new clothes were far from risqué, she did show a little skin more often than not. She was overall a more confident and open person.

Henry was maturing in his own ways as well. He was taking over more responsibility when it came to the superhero business and the regular business. He would go out on missions alone frequently and only requested Ray for backup when absolutely necessary. Henry was really coming into his own as a hero. He was even considering rebranding himself and retiring his Kid Danger moniker for good. He couldn't yet decide between Man Danger, Sir Danger or Mr. Danger. He would have to workshop the name a little more.

It had been almost a year since Charlotte and Henry became official. In that time, they learned a lot about each other. Individually and as a couple. Charlotte learned that Henry was extremely needy and possessive and jealous. Henry learned that Charlotte was not.

Sometimes it bothered Henry that Charlotte was so nonchalant about people hitting on him. They had once been on a date where the waitress flirted with Henry the ENTIRE time. She was even so bold to leave her number on the receipt with a winky face next to her name. Charlotte didn’t even bat an eyelash. And he knows that Char noticed, she was way too observant not to pick on the very obvious server. She didn’t make any comments about it during or after the dinner.

He, on the other hand was always claiming her in front of random people. He couldn’t leave her alone for two seconds without coming back to some schmuck shooting their shot. Guy after guy were constantly getting curved by his beautiful girlfriend. That didn’t stop Henry from making his place known. A glare and a not so subtle hand around her waist or shoulder usually did the trick. He just wanted to drive home to these dudes that they had zero chance, not with his Char.

Henry figured that he should be happy that she was so secure in their relationship. And he was happy, but maybe he would like to see a little jealousy every once in a while. Charlotte had such a casual attitude towards the attention he got from other women, and sometimes men, that it felt like she didn’t care at all. He knew that he had already hit the jackpot with Charlotte, she was truly one of the best things to happen to him. He just wanted to feel as if the same was true for her.

Their first anniversary would fall during spring break so he convinced Charlotte to let him plan the entire week. She was hesitant to leave everything in his hands but conceded after a few days of pleading and pouting over FaceTime. She almost couldn’t believe how quickly she caved after seeing Henry’s adorable puppy dog expression. She did always find it hard to resist those beautiful brown eyes. Especially when combined with his hopeful begging to, “Just trust me babe. Pleeeaase.” Charlotte folded like fresh laundry.

Henry decided that they would go to New York for their break. Charlotte loved musicals and fashion, both of which there was an abundance of in New York. He decided that he would take her to a Broadway show, a concert and a runway show. He was ambitious.

During his research for the trip Henry discovered that the first installment of the official New York Fashion Week was hosted every February. They had already missed it but there were usually a series of smaller, more accessible shows in the month or so following. He was able to secure them seats at a show with an up-and-coming brand that seemed to fit Charlotte’s new style.

During his deep dive into fashion shows, plays and all the other events happening during their break, Henry saw that the Boo Man Group had shows in the city that same week. Charlotte loved them plus it would make up for that one year on her birthday that she missed their performance because of superhero shenanigans.

When trying to get tickets online he discovered that the group was sold out the entire time they would be in New York. Sighing in defeat, Henry was about to click off the browser when he noticed that the Boo Man Group weren’t doing a solo performance. They actually were just the opening act for none other than...Double G!

A tiny spark of hope bloomed in his chest when he realized that he just might have a connect to get into the concert after all. He figured it was a long shot but he quickly pulled out his phone and searched in the contacts. Once he found the name he was looking for, he immediately hit the call button.

Biting the corner of his bottom lip in anticipation, he hoped that she still had the same phone number and would pick up. Tapping his fingers on his thigh nervously Henry listened to the ringing tone and was just about to disconnect the line when he heard a raspy, “Hello?”

“Hey. Babe?” Henry asked.

Babe squinted down at her phone in confusion and cleared her throat. “Henry?”

“Yeah. I’m sorry, did I wake you up? I completely forgot about the time difference between California and New York.” Henry said while glancing at his clock on his beside table. 9:02 pm. It would be after midnight over there. Oops, thought Henry.

“Uhhh yeah, that’s okay though. I’m up now, what’s going on?” Babe wondered while sitting up in bed. She hadn’t talked to Henry in over a year, unless you counted his extremely scarce retweets on Twitter or a rare comment under her posts on Instagram.

“I was wondering if you could help me get tickets to one of Double Gs shows in March?” Henry asked hesitantly while scratching the back of his neck.

“Uuuuuhh” was Babe’s reply.

“It’s totally okay if you can’t help me out. I figured I would at least ask because all the dates were sold out. And I know you are close to his family. You know what? Forget I brought it up” Henry said in a rush.

“Henry it’s okay, I’m still half asleep and I was just contemplating if I would be able to get you tickets. Chill.” Babe replied with a small laugh.

“Sorry. I’m a little high strung right now. I’m trying to plan a spring break to remember and these tickets would definitely get me one step closer.”

“I’ll tell you what, I’ll check with Trip tomorrow at work. He pretty much has access to all his dad’s shows. I can probably hook you up with backstage passes, VIP, the whole thing.”

“Really? Oh my gosh, thank you so much. I can’t believe it” Henry exclaimed excitedly.

“Yeah just text me tomorrow with the details. What days you’ll be in town, number of tickets, whatever else” she said while yawning.

“Ok, ok will do. Thanks again. I really owe you one Babe” Henry said sincerely.

“Don’t mention it, I’ll be happy to collect on a favor from Kid Danger” Babe teasingly retorted.

“Well, have a good night. I’ll let you get back to sleep. Talk to you later.”

“Talk to you later” Babe replies before hanging up her phone.

A large smile covered his face when he thought about all the fun they were going to have. Spring Break couldn’t come fast enough.

Henry was so busy arranging the trip that he barely had any extra time. He and Char usually FaceTimed every night but recently that had decreased to two or three times a week. On top of all the trip planning, he was out on more late night crime alerts than usual. It seemed as if every villain in Swellview had suddenly gotten the motivation to enact their little schemes all at once. Like they all decided that they needed to complete their plots for total domination before Spring Break. Maybe they were going on vacation too.

Henry was busy consolidating his budget one afternoon when he got a video chat request. Looking up from the document that he was reading he searched under all the pages spread out on his desk for his phone. He finally located it under a credit card statement that he had printed. Looking at the screen he involuntarily smiled when he saw the contact picture. Pressing accept, he was greeted by the glowing umber skin of his gorgeous girlfriend.

"Hey Love" Henry greeted with a dazzling smile.

"Hey Handsome. I was just calling to see how you were doing on budget day" Charlotte responded.

Furrowing his brows and squinting slightly, Henry chuckled. "How'd you know it was budget day?"

"Well I know you've been working on being more fiscally responsible after I explained that good credit wasn't just for 'crusty old dudes'. Plus your card balance is due tomorrow and you always wait until the last minute to figure out your bills."

"Wow, aren't you quite the detective?" Henry sassed lightly.

"Yes. Yes I am. Also, you put it in our shared calendar with a frowny face beside it." Charlotte smirked.

"Oh yeah, I remember that now. That was after the third time I had pushed it off for later. I decided to put it in the joint calendar because I knew you would hold me accountable if I didn't do it."

"Smart plan. You know I can help if you need anything."

"Yeah, actually I have a question about interest rates. How do you-" Henry paused.

Charlotte could see Henry looking at his phone in contemplation while biting the corner of his bottom lip. “Uh, baby?" Charlotte inquired after few seconds of silence.

"Hey, I'm actually getting an important call, let me call you back later okay?"

"Oh ok, don't forget to tell me...your question about interest" she trailed off when he she realized that he had already clicked over to the other line.

Strange thought Charlotte.

He reluctantly interrupted his conversation with Char because Babe was calling him back. He needed to know if she was able to secure the tickets for them. But, he decided it would be a good idea not to tell Charlotte who was calling. He didn't want her to figure out the surprise location and a clue like that could give it away. She wouldn't be able to guess where they were going since she didn't know that he was talking to Babe. What other reason would Henry have to speak to the New York native?

Henry spent the next few weeks coordinating with Babe about his Epic Spring Break Trip. She helped him get the concert tickets and extra perks but she also gave him advice about what other events would be in town that week. She provided the inside scoop about all the cool local spots in their area. She also helped him pick which Broadway show they thought he and Charlotte might like the best. She assisted with picking what hotel would work best with his budget. Babe was basically his travel agent without any pay.

When everything was finalized and shaping up to be the best spring break of all time, Henry called Babe to ask her what he could do in order to repay her for all the assistance. She responded that she was more than happy to help and if she thought of anything, she would let him know. He told that he would help her with whatever, whenever and let her know that it had been great catching up with her over the last few weeks.

Henry had previously only considered her a nuisance based off the impression she made when they first met. Now he thought of her as, at the very least, a good acquaintance. Maybe even a friend. Time seemed to have mellowed her out significantly. He might even consider accepting her friend requests on his private social media pages. He followed her profiles but she had seemed like she would be hella annoying online so he held off on letting her follow him back.

As the vacation approached, Henry got more and more nervous. He went back in forth in his head about if Charlotte was going to hate everything that he planned. Unnecessary thoughts plagued his mind. What if her interests had changed? What if she hates Boo Man Group now? What if doesn’t like fashion anymore? What if she doesn’t even like ME anymore?

His fears were quickly assuaged on the day before they were set to leave for New York. He, Ray and Schowz were all standing around talking while they hula-hooped. He had just dropped his hoop for the thousandth time when Charlotte came into the ManCave. She immediately dropped all of her luggage after stepping off the elevator and catapulted into his arms. He hugged her back tightly and when he pulled back to look at her face he could see the love shining in her eyes. He let out a sigh of contentment while holding her in his arms. Then they proceeded to have the most intense, toe curling, lip tingling kiss that they had ever shared.

Their passionate, borderline inappropriate kiss came to an abrupt halt when they heard an airhorn sound off loudly right into their ears. They hadn’t seen each other since New Year’s day, could you really blame them for getting swept up into the moment? Quickly jumping apart they looked around to notice that Ray and Schwoz were staring at them incredulously.

“Geez guys, did you remember to breathe?” Ray exclaimed.

“Yeah it looked like you were both trying to suffocate each other with your tongues.” Schwoz snidely commented.

Charlotte looked embarrassed to have lost her inhibitions in front of the pair and weakly called out “Shut up!” while rubbing her arms awkwardly.

Henry chuckled and pulled his mortified girlfriend into his arms again and gave her a simple kiss on the forehead.

“What are you doing here babe? I thought I was going to pick you up from school on the way to the airport tomorrow morning?”

“You were but I wanted to surprise you. You’ve spent so much time planning this trip that I feel like we haven’t spoken much lately.”

“Awwww...you missed little ole' me? I’m honored” Henry responded jokingly.

Charlotte hit him lightly on the arm. “I mostly missed Jasper” she says with a smirk. “Where is he by the way? I wanted to see him before we left. I thought he was coming home for break?"

“Jasper was invited to some kind of exclusive bucket convention last minute so he’s actually in Wisconsin right now.”

“Oh. That’s weird, but totally Jasper. I also missed those two goofballs, but don’t tell them that.”

“Your secret is safe with me.” Henry said lowly while bending down to give Charlotte another kiss. Before they could even brush lips, the air horn let out three quick spurts too close for comfort courtesy of Ray.

“Uh uh uh. No more of that in here. I don’t like to be reminded of how single I am.”

“And stop hogging Charlotte!” Schowz said while pulling Henry away to bestow a brief hug upon her.

“I missed you! You know these idiots can barely comprehend what I’m saying most days” Schowz lamented.

“That's because of your silly accent and you know it!” Ray cuts in while pushing Schowz away with a palm to his face.

He gives Charlotte a quick hug as well and says, “Welcome back Brains. I didn’t miss you at all.”

“Love you too Ray” Charlotte says with a smile.

They spend the whole day in the ManCave watching movies and catching up on life. This place was her home away from home and she wouldn’t it change it for the world.

#charlotte page #henry hart #henry danger #chenry #Ray Manchester #schwoz schwartz #charlotte bolton #kid danger #riele downs #jace norman #babe carano #game shakers #cree cicchino

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wakasagayhime · 6 years ago

Text

very long, very personal post

tldr, im still not drawing but here’s a detailed account of everything that’s happened in case anyone is confused or misinformed

alright. let me start out by saying i’m not going back to art just yet. it still hurts to do anything art related and i’m still trying to find a way to heal from all of this. i need some kind of professional help first, and i don’t know how long it’ll take afterwards for me to begin feeling like myself again. i don’t even know if i’ll be able to get any kind of professional help at the moment; my university’s counseling center told me, in short, that i’m so mentally ill that their services would not be enough for me and i’d have to look elsewhere (which is reasonable, tbh, they’re almost always completely booked so it’s difficult to actually even talk to someone there in the first place, i only got to talk to them to begin with because i nearly killed myself one night after having the most intense panic attack of my life where i felt like i was actually in the process of dying) and as if that weren’t enough, if you follow me on twitter you’d know that my mom finally left my stepdad, but this means that we no longer really have a home to call our own and are now living with some of my mom’s friends. on the bright side, miso is a lot freer and gets to explore the house as he pleases, but on the downside money is tight and my mom is trying her best to find a place to live while working two jobs and trying to help pay for my tuition. long story short, i want some kind of professional help badly, but all the bullshit that’s been happening in my life makes that difficult.

anyway, i understand that i’ve worried a lot of people through all of this, and i’m sorry. i truly, genuinely am sorry for everything that’s been going on. i blame a lot of it on myself not being strong enough. if i were stronger, i wouldn’t care about some stupid internet trolls, or some random grown man in florida stalking all my social media. if i were stronger, i could take my life back. i wouldn’t feel the need to constantly contemplate suicide, or to torture my own body by starving because of my physical form feeling like the only thing i have left to be in control of. if i had only been stronger, like my old stupidly foolish overconfident 16 year old self who got into fucking STEVEN UNIVERSE DISCOURSE of all things, maybe i wouldn’t care. even when it first happened to me, after the initial shock and hiatus, i was pretty much back to normal almost instantly. but this kind of trauma is sneaky and will gradually eat away at you more and more while you pretend to be ok, and then eventually you reach a breaking point and it’s taken over your life. that’s why i’m still obsessing over that day two years later. that’s why i can’t be left alone on december 13th this year, or else i know for a fact i will harm myself in some way. (don’t worry about that though, burger is going to hang out with me that day and i’ll be fine.) still, even though i keep telling myself my past self was stronger, i do know that she really wasn’t. she was still struggling with depression, anxiety, and self harm issues. maybe it just manifested differently for a while. maybe she felt unstoppable at some point in time because she finally found a girlfriend and got a cat. i got into so many fights that weren’t worth my time or energy at all, and part of me wishes i could be that confident again, but i also know that was my downfall to begin with.

i have followers who haven’t been around for longer than a year or maybe less than two, so i might as well give everyone a true, thorough rundown of what happened leading up to that day, the day of, and after.

i’m sure a lot of you who are worried about me at the moment have seen the recent callout for colboh and his involvement in what happened. i’ll be honest--i don’t know the full extent of his involvement, and i want to believe his foolishness ends at not leaving artists who have blocked him alone and uploading their shit to booru sites when they explicitly state not to. so let’s just start there. i honestly don’t remember if it was before or after i first blocked him, but he uploaded one of my NSFW drawings to danbooru when i first shared my NSFW blog. (PROTIP: if you’re a minor, don’t share your NSFW art with anyone. don’t care if you’re 17, i was about to turn 17 myself. it will bite you in the ass. as such, some of this is my fault.) i quickly contacted danbooru asking them to delete it, and they did--but that artwork subsequently ended up on gelbooru as well, and i was unsuccessful in my efforts to remove my art from there.

fast forward to december 13th, 2016. it was a normal morning. i was getting ready for school, but also being dumb and lazing around in bed browsing tumblr. i saw a post from a blog that shares Funny 4chan Screencaps. my art was in it. the art was of a very muscular yuugi, a drawing i was proud of, especially in how much gay energy i thought it radiated--but this drawing was being used in one of those typical “here’s a touhou, i wanna fuck her! am i right guys? let’s talk about how badly we want to fuck her” threads. seeing my art used for this was appalling. my first mistake was reblogging the post and saying how it was wrong, and how my art shouldn’t ever be used for such a purpose. my second mistake was making a text post AND tweets expressing my disgust at the situation, thinking no one who frequented /jp/ would ever see, sure that it would be a big waste of their time to concern themselves with some random dumb “”sjw”” artist. i also probably shouldn’t have specifically called them “gross neckbeards,” in doing so i absolutely struck a nerve with basement dwellers everywhere. i got to school and during my second period class, suddenly felt a strange urge to look at /jp/. why i did that, i still don’t really know. maybe i was expecting hate. maybe i was trying to see if they used my art for something gross again. i don’t know. either way, that moment changed everything forever. i saw the screencap of my tweets posted for everyone in their circlejerk to see. even worse--i looked in the thread, and someone had also posted the NSFW art colboh had uploaded to danbooru, mocking it and calling me a hypocrite for drawing two girls having sex while also saying i don’t like my art being used for those kinds of threads. this is what truly ignited the amount of hate i saw directed towards me in the threads. i got called a bitch, a drama whore, got told to kill myself, and in one reply etched into my mind forever, someone said something along the lines of “we should all call her local gang and have them rape her, she just needs a good dicking.” there were multiple threads, too; i don’t know how many, but there was another one about me after the first one was deleted, in which someone edited a typical fat balding NTR hentai doujin style man into art i made of kagerou nosebleeding at wakasagihime. more disparaging comments were made. in both threads, people expressed their hatred and dislike of my art, some calling it garbage, some just saying it’s “bad,” etc. some people said the threads were unnecessary and rude, but they were a kind few in a cesspool of violence.

i don’t know who started these threads. i can’t assume anything about anyone, but whoever did this was definitely looking through all my social media out of bitterness and hatred, or perhaps even following me on both my tumblr and twitter considering the timing of the threads immediately after i complained. it eats at me that i most likely will never know who did this to me. i’ll never know who hated me so much that they decided to completely destroy my self esteem. if whoever it is who did all of this is reading this and feels any ounce of remorse, i’m begging them to reveal themselves and why they did it, but i know the chances of that happening are incredibly slim. someone, i can’t remember who, maybe it was queenly, told me they hope someday i reach a point where i don’t have to worry about that because i won’t care in general, but i still don’t know if i’ll ever reach a point where i stop caring about all of this.

like i mentioned earlier, after this all first happened, i was destroyed. the next day, my school’s GSA happened to have a vote for whose art would be on the club t-shirts, mine or someone else’s. mine lost. i broke down completely--anywhere i went, i wasn’t good enough, not for anyone. for days, there was a constant feeling of horror and fear in my chest, something i’ve only ever felt so intensely when one of these threads resurfaces or i suddenly relive my trauma due to other things triggering me. i took a hiatus that lasted a few weeks, i believe i came back sometime before the new year. i thought i was ok, and i pretended like i could go back to being myself. but as time went on, and i continued living with the weight of that day on my back, i became weaker and weaker. i stopped drawing as frequently as i used to. my final year of high school started and i ended up falling into such a deep depression that i constantly skipped school and eventually attempted suicide in november 2017. the suicide note i wrote cites that day as being one of the main things leading me to my decision, telling whoever did this to me that i hoped in my passing they’d have to live knowing what they did to me. my attempt only failed because i swore to take every pill left in the bottle and there were only four pills. had it been full, i’m not really sure what would have happened. i was sent to a mental institute afterwards for a week. being there was the absolute definition of hell. i was alone. i cried myself to sleep every night. they claimed to be a place where people were improved and got help, but i did not get any help at all. they basically imprisoned me for trying to kill myself. when i got out, i was only glad to be alive because i just wanted to be able to talk to my friends, my family, and my girlfriend again. it still shocks me that i was able to graduate from high school considering how much school i skipped before and after my suicide attempt.

sometime before that school year ended, i became extremely upset one afternoon and decided to run away from home. i had what happened to me and what was said about me that day running through my head. i tweeted that i hoped maybe in running away i’d end up being raped like they wanted, like how i deserved. someone who i considered a friend replied to this with, “fuck you.” after all of this was taken care of and i was safe at home, i responded that i was sorry, that i wasn’t thinking right when i made the tweet. she responded that i was, and blocked me. i tried to explain that i said what i did because of the threads about me on /jp/ and the one response threatening rape, but this was disregarded and, seemingly, ignored. a few days later, the former friend in question started sending me anon hate on tumblr, asking me why i want attention so badly, accusing me of making light of actual rape victims by saying such a thing. i explained myself, but to no avail. i blocked her on tumblr, and left it at that. but then, at the end of the school year, when i was proud of myself for finally getting through high school without killing myself or failing or anything, i stumbled upon the second thread. the date the thread was created lined up exactly with the time between me running away from home and me receiving anon hate. she can try to act like she didn’t make the thread all she wants, but i’m not an idiot. the replies were also eerily similar--people in the replies remembered me, a year and a half after the original thread. some replies mentioned me having attempted suicide months before. some mentioned my NSFW art again. i had a massive breakdown and nearly drowned myself in the pond down the road. it was a wet, rainy night, and i sat on a bench by the pond sobbing loudly, trying to find some way to want to keep living. but i couldn’t. i might have gone through with it if it hadn’t been for burger coming and talking to me and giving me a ride home.

entering college, i thought things would be easier. in a way, they are. i have more freedom with classes. this semester, i attended almost all of my classes, almost every day, just with the exception of me being sick some days and me accidentally oversleeping once, and then one day when i just didn’t feel like it. but things continued to get worse for me--i developed an eating disorder for many reasons, one being the time i spent a year prior depressed caused me to gain a significant amount of weight, and the other being i had sworn off self harm in the form of cutting. i found that i was able to get the same gratification from starving myself. at one point, it turned into a game of sorts, where i tried to see how long i could go without eating anything. my record was a little over 72 hours. being constantly hungry or in pain this way felt like something i deserved in a way, but also something to distract me from the pain of realizing i was losing my love for art. i was in denial about it for months. i tried to keep drawing, but everything i drew upset me, saddened me, and even angered me. i looked at anything i made and only felt disgust. it was the one thing i used to love doing more than anything, and now i only felt shame.

in november, i acknowledged this and decided to quit for good. recently, i discovered colboh had uploaded more of my NSFW art to gelbooru, even though i specifically stated on my blog to never upload my NSFW art to image sharing sites, specifically right after he uploaded my art the first time. by the time i found this, i had already sworn off art for good, but looking at the comments on my art on gelbooru (and rule 34--i guess they’re connected upload-wise like danbooru?) filled me with so much sadness and shame, not because they criticized my art, but because they said horrible things about my depiction of kagerou. for those who don’t know, i headcanon kagerou as a trans woman, and one thing i do not regret about my time as an artist is how that depiction has helped numerous trans women feel good about themselves and their bodies. seeing so many disgusting comments deliberately misgendering her and making other transphobic remarks hurt me on a completely new level. my trans friends have been such a source of strength for me through all of this and seeing that made me feel disgusted, especially with myself. i felt like i had failed them. i had made so many trans women happy, only to see a man i blocked two years ago had uploaded my art to porn sites, tagging it with dehumanizing words like “f*ta” that i specifically tell people never to refer to my art with, displaying that art for the exact same crowds of people that ruined everything december 13th 2016 to continue to pick apart. one comment even told me to kill myself, effectively bringing back every memory of that day.

speaking of that, another thing i want to touch on now that i’m up to speed with the details of everything that’s happened related to the original threads two years ago, is kagerou. i’m positive you all know that i really love kagerou imaizumi, and that she’s my favorite touhou character. it’s embarrassing to say, but she’s brought me so much comfort through all of this. sometimes if i’m sad, i’ll imagine her giving me a big hug, or i’ll look at cute pictures i have saved of her, or something along those lines. it’s pretty cringy for a fictional character to make me happy, i know, but i’ve grown so attached to her and she really means a lot to me. and another thing that made me want to swear off art is because she’s loved by so many others that i don’t think my depictions of her do her any good. i’m constantly compared to other artists, and it’s never good. even in the threads, i’m told i should be more like those other artists and these things wouldn’t happen to me. i am not allowed to love kagerou imaizumi. i draw her as a hairy trans lesbian, and that disgusts people. hell, the fact that i draw lesbians in general disgusts people, which sure fucking sucks because i constantly hate myself for not being attracted to men and being able to draw happy lesbians made me feel better about myself. but i’ve ruined kagerou for so many people, especially with my stupid kagewaka bullshit. maybe that’s why those artists unfollowed me. maybe it’s a combination of that and my constant breakdowns becoming far too annoying. i think all the popular artists who used to like me and then unfollowed/softblocked me are really glad to see that i’ve given up. and that’s something else that saddens me too--even as an artist, in my own community of touhou artists, i often feel like i’m lesser, and that i don’t belong. maybe it’s because i’m so foolishly outspoken about my opinions that they dislike me. maybe it’s because i’m a woman, and a lesbian at that. i don’t really know why they hate me so much. i wish i could belong somewhere.

and i think that’s what it all boils down to in the end. i’ve lost all sense of belonging. when i was 14 and people started noticing my art for the first time, i finally felt like i had something. like i belonged somewhere. after being bullied through middle school and having to deal with abusive friends and an abusive dad, it meant the world to me that i finally had something. but it didn’t last long at all. it all came crashing down, not just because of others, but because of me. i was the one who was cocky, getting into fights that weren’t worth it. i was the one who provoked people and made them hate me. i was the one who complained about /jp/ posting my art in their threads. i know people want to believe that i’m a saint, but i’m not. i have myself to blame too. i at least want everyone to understand this, above all else. there was so much i could have done differently to prevent this all from happening, but i didn’t. i was stupid and naive. i was a massive fucking idiot, and now look where i am. i lost everything. i thought i had friends, i lost them. i thought i loved art, i lost that. i thought other really talented nice people liked me, i even lost that. all i have now is an empty shell of my former self. i don’t know what to do with it. i don’t know how i’m going to rebuild myself. it’s so painful to have to keep living like this. i don’t know if there’s any fixing me at this point. i’ve lost so much, i feel permanently broken.

but despite all of that, despite everything i’ve been through, i still receive so much love and support from my followers and friends and it means so much to me. it means the world to me and has kept me going through all of this. knowing that people care about me and want to see me get better and improve makes me want to try to fix myself even if i am broken beyond repair. i just want to thank you all for being that source of strength for me. these past few years have been so hard for me and time and time again i still get love and encouragement from so many people. from the bottom of my heart, thank you. there is nothing more precious to me than those moments when i feel like i do truly belong, when i feel loved, when i feel like i’m not alone after all. for those moments, i’ll keep trying. even if these threads keep continuing and breaking me further, i’ll keep trying. even if every last artist in this fandom comes to hate me and my shitty art, i’ll keep trying. it’s still painful to draw right now and i have a long way to go before i can share art with anyone again, but for you all, i’m going to keep trying my best. at the end of the day, i know everyone’s encouragement and love is worth far more than hate threads urging me to kill myself.

i’m sorry how long and personal and unnecessary this is, but i felt like i had to set things straight. if you read all of this, i applaud you. if you just kinda skimmed through to read the last paragraph, i also appreciate it. again, thank you.

#glub glub #suicide //#self harm //#disordered eating //#rape //

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checanty · 6 years ago

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so two questions (love your work for the record. you've become one of my primary inspirations over the years! thank you for exposing us to your talent :D ) with the issues surrounding social media at the moment - cancel culture, censorship, algorithm issues etc. How do you feel this is currently affecting current and upcoming talent? Do you think it will get better or worse and why? for my second question - how can one have a relatively humble career in freelance without the social media fame?

Thank youuu!!

Okay, okay, question one: First up regarding the censorship I can’t really say very much since I’m not doing any photography with nudity or any pornographic artwork. I know non sexual artistic nudety does sometimes get flagged, but usually those decisions get gevised if you ask. It’s annoying, but nothing career deciding. I also started sharing my artwork on a website where pornographic (and gore) content was always inaccessible to minors, so this whole thing doesn’t seem particularly outlandish to me. You’ll find your audience, but have to sell ‘under the counter’, you know? Cancel culture on the other hand … it doesn’t really affect me because I’m not usually spreading my opinions far and wide on the internet and my artwork isn’t exactly divisive. Now back in my youth on Animexx (that German website with the adult filter. Where every artwork you uploaded had to be approved by a human being by the way.) I did write and post some questionable things. Hell, I did a whole comic based on a super cringeworthy premise which was rather ableist and contained at least one rape joke. There’s a reason you won’t find it on the internet anymore. I didn’t see it as problematic when I was 15, despite people gently trying to explain to me why it was (In hindsight I understand and am grateful for those folks. But they were patient. they were adults talking to a child. You know.) There’s a lot of stuff I thought was cool and edgy at 15 or even 18 that would make me take a serious double take nowadays. I’d like to think I’ve grown since then. I’d like to think I’m still growing and I’m very aware that a lot of what I think now might have to be seriously re-evaluated a few years from now. Heck, sometimes I catch myself saying stuff and realize it’s messed up a second later.So I’m a bit afraid for young artists out there getting torn apart over stupid (and also harmful) things they say and create. Or artists getting torn apart other stuff they said or created years ago. Like, call them out, yes. but. People can grow. Especially teenagers are not exactly the product of an environment of their choice. It took some depression and alienation (it was horrible, but also, ah, character building?) from my friends to realize some of their jokes were not actually funny and being a sadist is not a cool thing to call yourself. Like the human brain isn’t done rewiring until your mid to late twenties. Let people evolve. On the other people growing up more involved in social media and ‘cancel culture’ might be used to being smarter about what they say and maybe also a tiny bit less ignorent because they have reason and all the options to educate themselves? There are a lot of pretty amazing teens around. Maybe I was just super slow. (Sometimes I try to imagine being on Tumblr earlier in life and it’s usually a mix of ‘I would have been a better person and all those mental health resources would have helped me so much’ and ‘Nah, I was a brat and would have been eaten alive.’ It’s kind of like people are complicated.)Algorithm issues are horrible, they’re even making a difference for established artists who rely on social media to sell their stuff. BUT. If people do great work and share it, it usually still ends up getting seen.Also, it’s all already different from when I started out. If I was 18 years old today I might look at this ancient 25 year old lady and tell her to stop whining because she can’t deal with all that modern stuff. I don’t want to underestimate the young folks. They’re often underestimated. (Yes, I think teenage me was often horrible and stupid and arrogant, but in other matters pretty smart and actually funny and capable. It’s like you can be a lot of things. Like I’m still all those things and others.)I have no idea what is going to happen. I guess it can always get worse. But if it does get worse we don’t really need to bother with the social media for promotion any more and can go back to blogging on our websites again.It’s doubtful Zuckerberg is going to make Facebook or Instagram ‘better’ again. If anything there’s probably be something new. I mean Patreon and Twitch are already kind of new developments and they work great for some folks! That’s lot of income they wouldn’t have had otherwise! There’s always some good, some bad happening. You get what you get and then figure out to make it work for yourself :/I’m going to let this stand as an answer to your first question because I can already feel myself contemplating in the back of my mind if I actually agree with myself on everything said so far. It seemed right at the time! I’m not doing this ‘opinions on the internet’ game very much for a reason :DQuestion number 2: THIS IS EASY!First up, you can have a great career in freelance without social media fame. Not speaking from experience, but it’s possible. (’fame’ I consider something like 100k plus Instagram/FB or anything followers)Social media fame is important in two cases: When you make most of your money selling small products (say prints, books, but also membership stuff like Patreon) and need to reach a huge audience to sell enough to live on. (because maybe 5% of your audience actually buys things.) And when you actually want to make money being an influencer. There are times where clients hire you as an illustrator AND some sort of influencer because they want to make use of your fan base, but that’s like back in the old days when a famous artist gets hires because they’re already well known to the fans/bring their own fans to the product. That would be a nice position to be in, but it’s not exactly standard procedure.When you’re a freelance illustrator you’re not selling small things to a huge audience. You want a few hopefully high paying jobs. Most clients hire you because you’re good and reliable and fit their budget. They need the art. Not your fans. They don’t care about your fans.And you know, most social media followers will not want or be able to hire you for a 300,00-10.000,00 USD (or more. I guess if you go into advertising you can get more.) job. You need to be more selective. Do the networking thing. Be seen by the right people. How? Well, do your research! Look at who might need your work and send them nice e-mails, postcards, whatever. Have a nice portfolio website. If they’re part of a community, become part of that. Now, social media are still useful for let’s say art directors to find you. But having a small artists all working in the same genre as you do the chances that if they share your work an AD also working in the same genre might be following *them* and see your artwork like this is much higher than if folks not in the ‘business’ share your work even if there is a higher number of them. It’s quality vs quantity thing. One reason I like Twitter is because a lot of writers hang out there. Writers might not be responsible for chosing cover artists (most of the time), but self publishers are. And do like doing cover artworks for self publishers. And writers are friends with other writers and other artists and editors and publishing people and so on and so on. So no, no social media fame needed to succeed, BUT try to be known in the right circles. And be nice and reliable so people hire you again and tell their friends. It happens. Also, yes I’m definitely procrastinating right now. I should be working on the table of contents for my mermaid book.

#ask

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