#that doesn't inherently mean you're on the obligation list

[cesium-sheep]

we were talking about approaches to presents yesterday cuz my step-grandma did die a couple days ago (rip lady whose name I did not know and whose son does not really matter to me) and it's like well shit guess I'd better make my stepdad an extra present then, and matt was throwing out ideas like "well maybe we could find out her birthstone and make it the same color or something" and I was just bluntly like "I do not care that much about this man." and he said something about how the amount of thought he puts into his gifts is about him and his own reputation as much as (or more than) the recipient, and later I was able to put together that like, yes, for sure, I will always put thought into my gifts, but it's a question of effort. I never give someone a gift that's truly "whatever fuck you gift basket" even when I do give people gift baskets, because I still think a lot about what I'm choosing and why. even last year when everyone got craft fair leftovers I thought about who got what and why.

but because I make almost all my gifts, different people rate different amounts of effort. like, if you have a parent die or some other Shit Year stuff going on I'll probably make something extra warm that year, but if you're normally only on the list out of obligation rather than fondness it's going to be basic and made with yarn I had left over. if you're extra niceys to me I'll probably try to make you something extra if I can. also obviously my partners are the top of the christmas effort list because they're the people that are most involved in my life, even if it looks a little less weighted than many people's christmases just because the full effort list is uhhhh larger than average. (this is heavily simplified from how it used to be before I obtained the means to make socks with relative ease, thereby providing a "base gift" that can be given to almost everyone/anyone. obviously people that can't receive socks get worked out slightly differently, though the base principle is the same.)

the comparison I used is that like, matt may go to the mall to shop for anyone, but he would only go to a specialty store out of his way for certain people. the amount of thought is the same, but the amount of effort changes.

look I know there's still a month left of halloween but I've been having a fuck of a time for uhhhhhhhh A While and christmas and gifts therefor are Important to me.

[only-mostlydead]

Hello. Today is my 30th birthday, and I am in bed recovering from surgery. To entertain myself, I wrote up a list of 30 things I'm glad I learned before I turned 30, and now I'm sharing it with you. Take what resonates, leave what doesn't.

30 Things I'm Glad I Learned Before I Turned 30

You can decline to be weighed at the doctor's office. Seriously. Unless they're dosing meds or need to report it to your insurance for something, you can say no thanks. And if they have to weigh you, you can request that they don't tell you the number.

Fed is better than not fed. There are days when my stomach won't tolerate anything except cheese puffs, so I eat the damn cheese puffs, without judgment. Feed yourself the best you can, and know that this will look different every day

Eventually, people will always tell you who they really are. Believe them the first time (this one comes from my mom).

Not living up to family expectations is very often a good thing. Your life needs to make you happy. You are your own person with no obligation to be what they want you to be.

Having a creative hobby that you're not "good" at is important. For me, it's watercolors. I do them because they bring me joy, not because I'm trying to be good at them. That's not to say that I don't love what I paint - I do. But there's no pressure for it to be anything other than fun.

Your job doesn't have to be fulfilling - it can just be a fundraiser for the things in your life that do bring you fulfillment.

Mental health is every bit as important as physical health. Don't neglect either.

When you have nothing to be sorry for, say thank you instead. Thank you for listening instead of sorry I bothered you, thank you for helping me instead of sorry I needed help. I'm not always good at this one.

Throw away the clothing with holes. You deserve clothing that doesn't have holes.

Your clothes are meant to fit you, not the other way around. Your body is the thing that carries you through your life. Clothes that don't fit are just scraps of fabric who aren't meeting their performance goals.

Everything is figure out-able. This one also comes from my mom.

Laziness doesn't really exist; it's almost always a response to something else (burnout, low self-esteem, etc).

Being your most authentic self is scary. It's also 100% worth it. Life has gotten better every time I've been even a tiny bit more myself.

There is no timetable for when you should hit certain milestones. You are not behind. You are on your own time.

Femininity means whatever I want it to mean, not what society tells me it means. Everything I do is feminine because I say it is, and no one can tell me otherwise.

Your job doesn't care about you. If you disappeared from the face of the earth, they would replace you immediately. You should bring them the same energy. You're the only one who will look out for you.

Use your PTO. Every damn second of it. When I started my current job, I was told that no one used all of their time off. I do. Every year.

Dieting literally does not work. Scientifically. Reading up on the Minnesota Starvation Experiment, Famine Response, and why BMI is literally sexist, racist bullshit changed my life.

Doctors might be experts in their respective fields, but they are not experts in what it's like to live in your body. Whenever possible, find one who makes you an active participant in your care plan.

Wear whatever the hell you want. Life is too short to worry what other people will think.

Live theatre, good meals, and beautiful tattoos are always worth the money.

Anger isn't inherently bad. Most of the time, it's your signal that something is wrong. This is the most impactful thing my therapist ever taught me as an ex-vangelical who grew up hearing that anger was a sin.

Don't put down the things that bring others joy. If they're not hurting you, themself, or anyone else, why waste your energy?

You cannot miss out on the things that are meant for you. If you miss it, it wasn't meant for you, and you should probably be grateful you missed it.

If I'm too much, go find less.

You are always responsible for your actions. Diagnoses, negative life experiences, and the like might explain bad behavior, but it doesn't excuse it. You are responsible for you.

Your feelings are always valid, but they are not always correct.

Go outside. Every day if you can. Even if it's for 30 seconds. Go get some fresh air on your face and look at a tree. If you can't make it outside, open a window, even just for a minute. Your brain will thank you.

You can leave. Hate the fitness class? Leave. Party too loud? Leave. Doctor not listening? L e a v e. As the famous tumblr post goes, if it sucks, hit da bricks!

You need nothing days. Days where you intentionally do absolutely nothing and feel zero guilt for that. Sit in bed, binge a Netflix show, eat some snacks, and don't think about all the things you're not doing. Let yourself rest, dammit.

[pro-ship-self-ships]

Do you have any advice for someone who would prefer to be OK with sharing f/os but can't help but feel really bad every time they see someone else self ships with the same (popular) character? Like I want to be able to tolerate it at least but several times I've been looking at blogs only to take. metaphorically, psychic damage upon seeing my f/o on someone else's f/o list. I'm not saying everyone has to aspire to be OK with sharing, I just want to be able to browse fandom and selfship spaces myself without being so susceptible to the mental pain that seems to come up with seeing a f/o is shared. I've mostly been able to accept canonxcanon ships with my f/os at least, but when another real human being is involved, my mood takes a dive and I don't know how to stop it. They're a popular character, so I can't expect *not* to see ships with them. I just need some way to cope that isn't just staying off the internet.

I do apologize for how late this is, but because of that, i hope you're having a happy halloween if you celebrate!

as for your concerns about being worried about other people self-shipping, let's start with a simple fact: you believe this feeling is inherently a problem. I happen to be of the opposite conviction, that which says that is not inherently a problem. On its face, its not really something that needs to be changed. If you feel absolutely uncomfortable, you have the power to block people. that is the power of the internet after all: you are not obligated to give every single person the light of day. I block like its no one's business, sometimes for seemingly arbitrary reasons.

However, if you do want to acclimate yourself to the idea of sharing an f/o, i offer two juxtaposing methods that might help: blocking and talking. Sometimes, you need to block someone for a little bit before you might be comfortable seeing their internet presence. This might be more permanent in the case where a person also doesn't like sharing as well. However, if you know the person is comfortable with sharing an f/o, feel free to reach out to them. I know talking to people can be scary, but it can be worth it. Just because someone has a relationship with your f/o doesn't mean that what you have with them isn't special. All relationships are unique in that capacity, and it can be quite wonderful. Who knows, you might also find a new friend in general fandom.

I will leave you with this final message: Your f/o cares about you and loves you and that's ultimately what matters.

[spiders-hth-is-an-outlier]

I know I've complained about this before, and I know the correct answer is "people can actually think whatever they want about silly TV shows," but my god does it stick in my craw every single time there's a concerted fandom push to assert that Dean is canonically uncomfortable with masculinity --> forced to perform masculinity --> arguably not actually a man at all, as proven by something about the way he performs or interacts with masculinity.

Like, right now the going thing from a blogger I generally like is a series of long and heartfelt posts that stem from a thesis -- presented without examples! -- of how you really see Dean "come alive" and "light up" and seem at home with himself when he's interacting with female-coded things, which proves his "fascination with femininity" and makes him ripe for a nonbinary/transfem reading.

And like. I do not think anyone's transness has to be proven or justified by submitting a long enough list of Gendered Interests, I do not think it works that way at all. But -- for the sake of argument -- here is the list I came up with of things that canonically make Dean come alive/light up/appear to be having an absolute shitload of fun without any apparent sense of feeling obligated to display interest:

1) famous cowboys in history 2) professional wrestling 3) Scooby-Doo 4) 80s slasher movies and their deep lore 5) arguably in many cases, rich food (burgers, pie, bacon)

These are all things that, if your thesis is "masculinity is ill-fitting and uncomfortable for the Real Dean Winchester," you kind of have to -- account for. You have to make these either false, performative interests -- a very weird, contra-canonical reading, I think! -- or you have to say that these are things that Dean doesn't experience as male-coded, so they don't trigger any dysphoria for him -- also a pretty quirky reading, I think.

Spn fandom *loves* to be like, "remember that time a pop song came on the radio and he just left it on?" or "remember that time Sam said Dean watched chick flicks and Dean didn't argue?" -- but like, in what universe do things like that constitute Who Dean Is, but the entire episodes revolving around his actual passionate interests are just Obviously Fake because -- reasons? Because he's just so afraid to admit the truth about his gender, whether he's alone or in front of others, that he's gaslit himself into thinking he likes pro wrestling for protection?

When we see Dean's literal dreams, he's in a strip club or he's fishing, both Traditionally Masculine places of refuge from stress; his figurative dreams are expressed at various points as 1) guitarist 2) mechanic 3) honky-tonk bartender, not one of which would ever get your masculinity questioned under even the most draconian patriarchal conditions. In order to posit that Dean has a profound discomfort with masculinity that shapes his character and his life, you have to argue that literally every part of Dean, his words and actions and heroes and hopes and even his very subconscious are all covering for a truth that he never gives expression to in 15 years, at which point neither canon nor characterization have any meaning whatsoever anymore.

Again. I know I've said this but. There's no version of this that doesn't come off as auditing Dean's actual expressed sense of gender identity and judging it false under a kind of One Drop Rule, where you can Act Like A Real Man 90% of the time, but you're still under suspicion because it wasn't 100. No matter how much you mean that affirmingly -- no matter how much you think it would be great for Dean not to be a real man! -- the premise itself is so inherently fucked up, so irrevocably wired to the notion that masculinity and manhood are always conditional states and that anyone can bring a counterclaim at any time.