#the linguist in me is overjoyed

[crabsnpersimmons]

now i KNOW i have anxiety when i'm playing a horror game and what scares me ISN'T the ghosts or the jumpscares

but the fear of making the wrong choice*

*and there are no wrong choices

[phlondeshavemorefun]

core memories from TIT Berlin

spoilers under the cut!

screaming "taschenlichtprojektor"

Scheiße becoming ScheiBBBBBBe becoming BBBBBBBBB (i'm afraid i can't explain this)

the photo evidence of them sharing clothes... and dan saying it doesn't count if it's only inside the house. sure honey

mention of capita£ester selling socks with norman on them after he died and "someone in this room right now is wearing dead fish socks" (it was me! i was wearing the norman socks!)

linguistics fact with phil!! as a linguistics nerd I was overjoyed

the whole boxing sequence of course but especially the part afterwards with the audio of them undressing. was that necessary, was it really

someone's confession that they got engaged to their straight boyfriend and hadn't told anyone yet (unexpectedly wholesome!)

someone else's confession that they pegged one of their ex's friends who is a cop (the opposite of wholesome)

of course, the song and choreo which has since been playing on loop in my brain (🎵t-e-r-r-i-b-l-e🎵)

bonus: singing along to "good luck, babe!" before the show started

and of course freaking out about the insanity of it all with the lovely people i met in the queue ❤️

[stillcomethenight]

Straight up turning this into a post because I started writing Greek language centered Ladja HCs in my notes app. Please enjoy my descent into madness. (I don't know any Greek but I am a simple Linguistics student who grows weak at the thought of love being stored in language).

Nadja uses Greek names of endearment for Laszlo. This isn't really a headcanon since it did happen in the show but I believe it happened one singular time, so I'm just expanding on it? She actually starts using Greek terms of endearment after she spends some time in Little Antipaxos because she hears her fellow Antipaxons use them and she gets so nostalgic for the language. When she was growing up, she tended to be mistreated by those around her and so she tends to remember the Greek language as one that is used out of convenience and not out of love. But in Little Antipaxos she is reminded that it is her language and it is a language of love. That's why she never used to use Greek terms of endearment but now she does. When she starts doing it, Laszlo is quick to catch on and match her energy — he starts using Greek terms of endearment too. He doesn't speak a word of Greek but he immediately understands how much it would mean for her to be loved in her own language;

Also, Nadja sings Antipaxon songs to Laszlo. She is not a good singer. He doesn't care. In fact, he goes out of his way to learn how to play them on the piano. Even if no recorded music sheets exist at all. He might even try to sing one or two. His pronunciation is so, so wrong, but, unlike Nadja, he can sing. Imagine Nadja being so very upset about something. And Laszlo can't seem to cheer her up. So he starts very quietly and reluctantly carrying a tune in some very bad Greek. It's the last thing she expected to hear and the one thing that manages to cheer her up. The amount of love that goes into such a gesture doesn't escape her. The softest "Laszlo, you big idiot." leaving her lips as she's shaking her head with such affection;

In fact, I'm willing to bet Laszlo tries his hand at learning some Greek. Of course, he does pretty badly and he's awfully cocky when he does it. He adds the most atrocious British accent to it. But it doesn't matter, it couldn't have made Nadja happier. Like, he walks into Little Antipaxos with his newly learnt, like, 10 Greek phrases and confidently strikes conversation with the people there. They're overjoyed to hear him speak their language and so they start talking to him in native Greek at full speed. He has no idea what they're saying because his 10 basic phrases of Greek 101 did NOT cover any of this. He's just nodding his head and smiling and they don't seem to notice that he doesn't understand a word. Nadja walks in and they start enthusiastically telling her, in Greek of course, "You didn't tell us your husband speaks our language!!". Then the two of them leave and she's like "Why are they telling me you speak Greek?" "Oh, because I do!" "But you don't." "No, my darling, I do!! [Insert the absolute worst pronunciation of any basic Greek phrase here]. See? I am wonderful at it!"

[wewerebornsextuplets]

ANYWAYSSSSS im going to talk about the kiru/kara friendship because ive been thinking about them the past few days 😙 not a big lore post so much as just a bunch of disjointed ideas but you know meee I love to talk! so it will be a lot

first and foremost i think kara is probably the brother who is most intrigued by kiru being a native english speaker. he finds out one day when he's bragging about studying it in his free time to seem ~cool~ to her, and when she replies like "yeah i can tell you're working really hard!! people at your level usually struggle way more with rhotics but you seem to be doing really well with them :-)" kara gets about three seconds into his thank you before he's like Wait how do you know this. which is when he finds out she's not only fluent, but there was a time when she struggled with japanese even more than english!

after this revelation, I think they kinda become linguistics buddies, since kiru has been looking for someone to practice her english with other than family for a long time so she can stay sharp between visits and phone calls with her family in chichijima, and kara just needs someone to practice with in general. she likes to give him little pop quizzes on english phrases and grammar when they're waiting for a train/bus/someone to get ready so they can go somewhere, and kara takes it as an excuse to watch english movies with her so he can see how much of it he understands and sharpen up in some spots. kiru, known cinephile, is OVERJOYED to have someone she can show her favorites to

linguistics aside, though, i think kara feels a bit more at liberty to actually banter with kiru with playful insults about one anothers tastes since they're somewhat similar in that regard anyways. like kiru tries on his jacket and starts posing like johnny bravo, and he's like "damn you're making fun of me? with that mullet? crazy"<- he wouldn't say it like that but you know. the spirit of it. they both know they're cut from the same cloth in terms of tastes, so they feel more comfortable making fun of each other for it (even though kara has since glitter-glued every inch of the cloth he was cut from)

[allthingslinguistic]

What we can accomplish in 30 years of lingcomm: Opening keynote of #LingComm23

I was honoured to be invited to give the opening plenary talk of LingComm23, the second International Conference on Linguistics Communication. This is an edited version of my remarks. 

Thank you Laura for that introduction. 

When I first had the idea for what if there was a whole conference about communicating linguistics to broader audiences, a conference that took advantage of the pivot to online that happened during the covid-19 pandemic, to bring together that one panel that sometimes happens about linguistic topics at conferences serving broader audiences and that one panel that sometimes happens about engaging the public at linguistics conferences. To bring together all these people who are interested in lingcomm into a bigger conversation, into many panels and chances for people to meet. To take these conversations that happen at the margins and make them the focus of a whole event. To create a space where, for once, we didn't have to justify why lingcomm needs to exist in the first place, WHY it's important and interesting and exciting for people to have access to accurate information about the linguistic world around them, and we could instead get on with more of the doing, figuring out HOW to make this vital lingcomm work flourish in the world. 

When I first had this idea, in 2020, I was excited enough that the organizing committee of Lauren Gawne, Jessi Grieser, Laura Bailey, and Liz McCullough (no relation) were willing to get on board. I was excited enough that people were willing to give yet another online event a chance in 2021 after a year of lockdowns and too much Zoom. I was excited enough that over a hundred people came and talked with each other and held panels and posters and meetups, that I met people from around the world and had deeper conversations with the people I already knew. I was excited enough that on the last day of LingComm21, people resoundingly told me that we wanted this energy and this community to continue to exist. 

But now, now that the LingComm conference is back, now that I'm not even on the organizing committee, now that I don't even know what all's on the program because I didn't make it! Now that this project has been taking on a life of its own beyond any one individual person, beyond me — now I'm not just excited enough. I'm overjoyed. 

So when the organizing committee asked me to give this opening keynote, I started reflecting on what sort of effects can happen from a big talk in front of a whole bunch of people? What sort of things happen when someone gets in front of a big room and says, hey, this is important, these are the sorts of things that we could be collectively caring about? 

And I started thinking about a plenary talk that I went to almost exactly ten years ago, in early 2013, at the Linguistic Society of America annual meeting in Boston, in the US. And this talk was by a linguist named David Pesetsky, and David Pesetsky spent his forty-five minutes in front of a big room of academic linguists saying in various ways, hey, what if people knew more things about linguistics, wouldn't that be great, wouldn't that be a world we all want to live in? 

I remember this talk so vividly not just because of what David said, but because of the effect that it had on me. Now, I'm a grad student at this point, this is my very first LSA, I'd spent a lot of time during this conference wandering the hallways amid giant scary crowds of unfamiliar people. But this talk made me feel like I belonged, that the field of linguistics wanted me and needed me. 

You see, I was a grad student who had a blog. I had a blog which was under a pseudonym, which my advisers didn't know about, and which had eight hundred followers. Eight hundred whole people, most of whom I didn't know, who'd signed up to learn about linguistics from me! This was SO MANY people. I was awestruck by the responsibility. 

So when David said that the public needed to know more linguistics, I sat bolt upright in the audience. That's me! I have a public! I'm reaching people! Me with my eight hundred followers on tumblr, I'm doing this! I'm trembling, I'm on fire, I'm shaking with nerves and excitement and adrenaline. 

And so I go up, fired up with my adrenaline and my eight hundred followers, I go up to David at the front of the room after the talk. And I remember that's how I first met Arika Okrent, who'd also gone up to talk with him afterward, and she'd just published her first lingcomm book, In The Land of Invented Languages, and so she was therefore VERY fancy to me.

After that talk, David said to us, to me and Arika, that he could trace trends in people coming into his intro linguistics classes having already heard of linguistics based on the years that pop linguistic books had come out. And this made sense to me because it was also a pop ling book that first got me into linguistics, that made me want to take a linguistics class, but this was my first time seeing it as part of a bigger picture, seeing how all the individual items of lingcomm feed into a bigger ecosystem, where a book makes a high school student decide to take a class, or a class they took many years ago makes an editor decide to green-light an article, or an article makes a grant reviewer decide to fund a grant. 

And I thought THAT, that's what I want, that's the sort of impact I want to have on the world. That's the sort of thing I want to look back in 30 years and say I contributed to. 

A keynote? A keynote can make someone think about their dreams, about their 30 year plans on the horizon. 

So this keynote is your moment to dream big about lingcomm. Elsewhere in the conference there are going to be all sorts of fantastic talks and panels and posters and art and meetups about the specific things people are doing and how you might do something similar. And I'm incredibly excited for them. But this is your moment to think, if time and money were no object, if you didn't have to do it all alone, what do you hope people know about language in 30 years? Who do you hope knows these things? 

I'm serious about this, I'm serious about putting eccentric interactive components in my talks, especially online. So I want you to take a moment right now and write something down, you can follow the link that's being displayed on your screens to a google doc and write them down together or you can just grab a pen and a scrap of paper, pull up the notes app on your phone, and write it down privately for yourself. 

1. What do you hope people know about linguistics in 30 years? 2. Who do you wish knew these things? 

Everybody got the doc? Oh I see lots of anonymous animals typing, that's great. (pause) I love all your energy. And if you see someone has put something and you want to second them, you can add a plus sign + beside it. (longer pause) Okay, we're going to do one more minute, make sure you also get to the second question if you haven't yet, it's slipped on the the next page. 

[About 5 minutes total until typing pace slows down, most people seem to have used the google doc] 

I love how much energy people had in the document, this bodes so well for the rest of the conference that you all jumped in and started writing immediately.. 

Okay,  hi, hello, let's come back in. Everyone feeling a bit fired up? Some of the people that you want to reach include high school students, policymakers, teachers, parents, speech pathologists, people whose language is marginalized, journalists, writers, editors, your families. These are all super great groups of people to wish knew more about linguistics. 

I want to tell a second half of this story. So, in January 2013, after I went to the LSA annual meeting and I hear this keynote and I'm in the audience and I'm getting all fired up with my 30 year vision. My, I want to be very clear about this, my pretty incoherent vision, but nonetheless my sense of urgency, that I with my 800 followers was reaching people who were interested in linguistics. That I could keep reaching them, and maybe even reach some more people, and help feed their interest in language. 

So I'm heading back from Boston home to Montreal, and as it happens I'm carpooling with a couple friends of mine, also linguistics grad students. And they were also at this keynote, and they're also a bit fired up, and we start talking in the car about what else we could do, to feed people's interest in linguistics and help get them accurate materials that they could understand. 

And we come up with a plan. We're going to make a website, and this website is going to have all sorts of excellent information on it, and it's going to be well organized, and it's going to be accessibly written, and it's going to be beautifully laid out, and it's going to be in the perfect font —  

— and then we spent three months bogged down in a discussion about which font to choose and the website never got off the ground. 

I'm not kidding. We're all pretty embarrassed about it now actually. This is why I'm not naming my friends' names, but like, I was just as much at fault here. 

But in the meantime, as we were lovingly hand-coding every pixel of this website (no no, we couldn't possibly just use a decent template from somewhere) and very politely fighting about fonts, we were doing something else, something which was actually sorta helpful...at least to a handful of people. 

Cause like, we'd also decided, as this perfect, amazing website was being designed, that we'd also pilot some very preliminary, rough versions of some of the material that we wanted to put onto it as blog posts, on my blog, All Things Linguistic, which already existed. You know, 800 followers. 

And this series, which we called the protolinguist series, was longer and more involved than anything I had posted previously, it was sort of these long linkposts with links to all sorts of things that we could find already online about various subfields of linguistics. 

You can look them up if you're curious, they're still there. And there's some stuff that I'd change about them if I was doing something like that now, for one thing I don't really think that a post with like a hundred links is a particularly effective resource, because people actually find it overwhelming to have that many links at once, and they don't click on most of them. 

But at the very least there were some people on tumblr who liked them, and who would reblog them and link other people to them, and I picked up a few more followers this way and I began to have a sense of myself more as creating resources for people and helping people in a more directed sense. 

And in the long run, we never launched the beautiful, perfect website, and these particular friends got busy with grad school. But by the end of that same year, I had written my first two lingcomm pieces for money, for Grammar Girl and for The Toast, while I was finishing my masters. And I'd decided that for at least the first few months of the next year, while I was recovering from academia, I could give this freelance writing thing a try. 

But I'd still learned a lot from trying to make a project. From trying to make two projects, this magical, fairytale website and my unglamorous blog that actually existed. And especially what I learned is that it's really useful to build up your projects in small steps. 

All Things Linguistic worked as an early project because I picked a platform I already had some understanding of (you need to understand, tumblr was cool in 2012), and it worked as a place where I could test out various styles of writing and engagement, from linkposts to articles to memes, and see how people reacted to various things. There was a community of people who were checking the linguistics tag on tumblr at the time, and I was following some of the people posting in it (like Lauren Gawne's blog superlinguo), so I was able to pick up followers because I was participating in a community. I used a free theme, just picked a colour and made an icon that was literally a screencap from a word doc, I set the whole thing up AND made my first couple short posts all in a single evening. Heck I didn't even spend the twelve dollars on the domain name, allthingslinguistic dot com until like a year later, remember I was a broke grad student, I didn't have any money.  

This magical, amazing, stupendous website didn't get off the ground because it was too magical. We wanted it to be too perfect. Even if we hadn't spent three months discussing fonts, even if we'd managed to release it on the world...what then? We didn't really have a plan for how the world was going to find out about this gorgeous, perfect website we'd made for them - I guess we figured I'd blog about it? But like, there was no reason to expect that it would be more popular than my other blog posts, and like, the thing that made people like the blog was having lots of shorter blog posts mixed in with the other gifs and memes and fun weird stuff on their tumblr feeds. So now, I'm pretty sure that after that one announcement blog post, our magical website would have just sort of... fizzled. We didn't have a plan for how people would find it or engage with it. And we spent so much time on trying to get it perfect before we launched it that we didn't end up launching anything at all. 

I don't think the idea was entirely bad! After all, my blog posts on the same topic did quite well for me at the time - as blog posts. 

But we were putting our ideas and our fire into a project that was bigger than our capacity for organizing things was at the time. Rather than shaping out a small piece, sharing it with the world, seeing what the world thinks of it, shaping out the next piece, sharing it again, and so on. Letting ourselves build capacity and learn about our potential audience before trying a big huge project. Letting people who might be interested in US find us, as we were finding them. 

So here's the second exercise. You've got three more questions in the google doc. I want you to go back to the doc or get out your pen and paper again, and think about these three questions: 

Thinking back about the people you wish knew more about linguistics: 

3. How do these people currently find out about things? Where are they hanging out, where do they get their information?  4. What do they want? What motivates them? How will learning something about linguistics make their lives better?  5. What's one small thing you could do in an hour or an evening that would get you one concrete step closer between where you are now and your 30 year vision? 

Again, you can put the plus sign beside things if you want to second them, that worked well earlier. (pause) Okay, and if you're still on the first question, try to move yourself down and think about the next one. (pause) And if you haven't had a chance to consider the final question yet, do try and get yourself down there, this document isn't going to disappear after this talk so you can keep thinking about all of the questions later as well. Also if you've finished writing things for all the questions, feel free to scroll back up and see what other people are saying. (pause) Okay, we're going to do another 30 seconds and then come back in. This is a good comment in the chat, we can have meetups on the final day, the meetup day, for any topics that people want to talk with each other about, feel free to propose those on the meetup schedule.  

[Slightly longer break overall, watching as people's cursor's move from one question to the next until activity slows down] 

Okay, coming back in again. How are we feeling? Seeing some really great and thoughtful answers from people which I'm not going to do justice summarizing, so do please browse the document and I'll just put a pin in the thought that we'll need to figure out something to do with this document after the conference, we're not going to delete it, it's not going away. 

I want to tell a third part to the story. 

A couple years later, in 2016, when Lauren Gawne and I were finally meeting in physical space for the same time at a conference, after years of getting to know each other through our blogs. And we were staying up late chatting about all things lingcomm and the various projects we'd tried and which ones had gone well and which ones had never quite gotten fully baked, because we both had some of both kinds. And when we were finally starting to talk about starting a podcast together, one of the things that made me think, "hmm, I think this could be the beginning of a beautiful partnership" was on the first night, Lauren said to me "oh, you can just pick whatever font you like, as long as you let me be the one who has all the detailed opinions about audio quality." 

And I was like, oh, audio quality, sure, absolutely! You can take that! Just like, I'm not having a whole font discussion again. 

Because as Lauren reminded me when I was practising this talk with her, we both came into the project that became Lingthusiasm with our own histories of lingcomm projects and collaborations. With our own 30 year goals and with the various different ways that we'd tried at various times to reach those goals. 

So the organizers of LingComm23 didn't ask me to talk to you today because of a mythical, magical, perfect website that never existed. But the projects that I am known for, things like Lingthusiasm and Because Internet, those are in real ways made possible by the lessons that I learned from the projects that didn't go as well. One of the big reasons my collaborations work better now is because I've learned to seek out people who have different areas of expertise and divide up the tasks involved in running a project, rather than everyone trying to have opinions about everything.

By the way, a really great thing happens when you're a decade into a career when suddenly all the sort of half-baked ideas and early awkward moments that you were trying to hide from people because you were embarrassed and you're trying to look professional and fancy, suddenly you get to pull them out and reexamine them and show them off as evidence that you understand the struggle.

So the reason I've asking you all to pause and consider these questions is that I find myself asking them a lot. Whether a project is still at the initial planning stages or it's been running for years, it's not a matter of thinking about how people are going to find your project that one time when you're first starting out, but that this is a question that's worth coming back to over and over again.

The question that I get most often from people who are working on lingcomm projects is, hey, I'm making this cool thing, I wanna make this cool thing, I'm working with some people and we're making this cool thing, but how do we get more people engaged with it? And every time, I ask them the same three questions: 

Who are you trying to reach?  Where are they?  What do they want? 

Not just what you think it's important for people to know, but what makes it enjoyable or even possible for people to engage with lingcomm. Sometimes that's about the content, like learning things that make them feel validated about their language background or learning from someone who can mix linguistics into cultural references that work for a particular community. Sometimes that's about format, maybe that's an event in a location that's convenient for them to get to, or it's having it in audio form so they can listen while doing the dishes, or it's NOT having it rely on audio because actually they can't do audio — there's not just one right answer here, there are lots of different things that people want. 

We're all at a conference about linguistics communication because we like linguistics. Because we believe in a better world where people know things like all language varieties are equally valid, and that there are thousands of spoken languages and hundreds of signed languages out there, and that oh my god, that etymology is probably NOT an acronym. No really, it's not. 

But our excitement, our passion, our drive, they're important, but they're not enough all by themselves. I can be excitedly delivering amazing, perfect, magical explanations of cool linguistics topics inside my living room and if no one is there to see or hear me, I have not yet done lingcomm. We always need to be figuring out that balancing act, between WHAT we're excited to talk about and HOW we can effectively reach people. How we can fit in the important messages that people need to know into the formats that mean that they can learn them effectively from us. 

And in my case, this meant that after I finished my masters, when my grad school friends were figuring out how to navigate the academic system and develop a research article pipeline and put things on an academic CV, I was also seeking out other areas of expertise, giving myself a crash course in journalism and book publishing and scicomm and running a small media business online. It turns out these things are both very interesting and very useful! And while I spend most of my career explaining linguistics to broader audiences, I also have another strand where I come back and explain methods of reaching the general public to linguists. 

Shortly before the pandemic hit, in February 2020, I went to the conference of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the AAAS, in Seattle. Yeah, I'm Canadian and I go to a lot of American conferences, that's how it is. And I was struck by how this conference explicitly made space for both academic scientists with an interest in reaching the public as well as science journalists and other types of public communication roles like communications officers, and how people moved fluidly between the various roles over the course of their careers. I talked with science PhD students who were planning out their first few media clips and journalists who were beefing up their expertise in particular areas of science. And I talked with a lot of people who had bridging careers sorta like mine, but for rocks, or microbes, or stars. And I thought this is cool. How do I get more of this for linguistics?  

So this is one of the purposes I hope for from this conference, that LingComm isn't just a conference of academic linguists saying in circles to each other "how do we reach beyond the ivory tower more?" "I dunno, I'm also up here in the ivory tower" "oh no" but it's also just as much a conference of people who've figured out some things in terms of attracting an audience of people who are interested in language and are now realizing that, oh god, I feel like an impostor because I don't actually know that much linguistics, but I wish I knew more linguistics, cause it's super interesting and like, people are asking me questions now, and I don't want to let them down, and I don't want the linguists to hate me, but like, halp? I just think these two groups of people could have some very fruitful conversations! [makes "now kiss" gesture, but like, in a metaphorical sense, obviously] 

There are some people like me who do lingcomm more or less full time, who figure out the delicate balancing act of making a living from a career in lingcomm, who develop expertise in that whole combination:  linguistics as a topic and the methods of getting messages out to groups of people and the business side of making a living while doing so. And one of my 30 year goals is for there to be more people in this position! 

But there are always going to be many more people where lingcomm is a part of what they do, whether that's a journalist who sometimes writes linguistics articles and sometimes writes articles on other topics, an academic who fits in interviews or a channel of their own around teaching and research and all the other responsibilities, or someone who maybe has a degree in linguistics or who's read a heck of a lot of books about it and has a dayjob somewhere else but finds talking about linguistics with people to be an incredibly fulfilling pasttime. And in many ways, it's the fact that so many of us are excited to talk about linguistics that makes me so optimistic about the next 30 years. 

I also ask these questions about 30 year visions because I want to underline that progress is possible. 

In 2021, at the first lingcomm, we were lucky to have as one of our speakers David Crystal, who's been doing lingcomm since 1969, which is longer than I've been alive, whose books are probably the reason some of you are here. And David also said that things have gotten better over the decades, that many of the myths linguists were trying to address in the 1970s and 1980s and 1990s have now been pretty thoroughly busted,  that now when he does media interviews people are aware that they need to be talking with a linguist, which wasn't the case when he started doing them. We have made progress as a field in the public consciousness over the past 30 years, even when it doesn't always feel like we have, and we can aspire to more things in the next 30. 

We've even made progress in the past ten years, since I heard that talk that fired me up about lingcomm. 

So, a week before my book came out, in 2019, I went back and re-read some of the rejection letters that editors sent for Because Internet in 2015 (my suggestion is to never do this, this was a terrible idea for morale). But in retrospect, it's kind of interesting, because a couple of them said things like "I just don't think the market is there for a book about language that's not prescriptive." Four years later, I…look, I think we can safely say there was in fact a market for it. 

But what was more important for me, in terms of the 30 year plan, was hearing from other linguists who'd been able to cite the success of Because Internet in selling their own lingcomm books to publishers, in people feeling like my name on a blurb could help convince readers that this was the kind of book they might want to pick up, in being able to signal that there's a genre of books that also embrace a curious and analytical approach to language.

People who are readers read more than one book a year — and they read way more than one article. People who like podcasts listen to more than one podcast. People who like video subscribe to more than one account. People who like museums go to more than one museum. When I look at topics like pop history and pop science, god, they have SO MANY books and podcasts and scicomm accounts and museums and documentaries. This is my 30 year goal, that linguistics has a thriving ecosystem of so many ways that people can engage with it. 

Our competition isn't each other, it's all the other things people could be doing with their time and not even necessarily enjoying them. It's doomscrolling, it's aimlessly opening Netflix, it's playing silly little games on your phone. 

The goal of doing lingcomm isn't about ego, in trying to make one person into a celebrity. Frankly, I just think there are far more efficient ways of trying to become rich and famous. You know, have you considered making some weird food videos? Maybe having a weird looking pet and posting photos of it? I think those do pretty well. And like, I know we could all be getting more attention right now if we were willing to spout hot takes about how Insert Group Here are ruining language. We're here because we've chosen not to do that. We're here because we've chosen service to the harder path, the ethical path, the more rewarding path, of feeding people with language information that liberates them, that challenges them, rather than the easy path of stoking their insecurities and validating their prejudices. 

I hope that one of the things that the lingcomm conference becomes known for over the next 30 years is as a place to find collaborators to join you in this ethos of serving the public with lingcomm, whether that's students excitedly hatching ideas with each other like I did in my friend's car, or journalists and linguists connecting with each other to publish really great news stories, or more established projects finally meeting other people in their niche and thinking about how they could collaborate. 

 I'm already so delighted to NOT be on the organizing committee this year, that our incredible committee of chair Laura Wagner and members Keeta Jones, Lauren Gawne, Raquel Meister Ko. Freitag, Daniel Midgley, Sadie Ryan, and Martha Johnson have been doing such a fantastic job putting this conference together. Most of this committee met for the first time at LingComm21 and decided that this was a vision and a community worth investing their time and organizational energy in. And if this is a project that you also want to help keep happening, please join us on the final day, the meetup day, for a meeting about a potential LingComm25 in another two years. That conference is by no means guaranteed, and it will only happen if this community decides that it happens. 

This community is a rare space in which the value of lingcomm is taken for granted, a relief from most of our lives where we're constantly trying to justify what we're doing, whether we're communicators trying to justify why linguistic stories need to happen or linguists trying to justify why the public needs to know. And we can instead collaborate with each other on things like sharing what's worked and what hasn't worked with respect to audiences and gatekeepers like editors and producers and deans. 

Our 30 year visions for lingcomm are not things that any one of us is going to be able to accomplish alone. My vision for you, for us, for the next four days is that we meet people, we talk with people, we learn from people — and we emerge, all of us, back to our regular lives, knowing that we're not alone in being fired up about lingcomm. 

I look forward to meeting you and hanging out with you and hearing from you what gets you fired up about lingcomm over the rest of this conference and for the next 30 years. Thank you. 

[mysteriawrites]

Hello! If you do Baldur's Gate 3 matchups, could I please get one? I'm an autistic she/they enby, I'm fine with any gender, and while I currently work at a library I'm hoping to become a professor of celtic languages and a linguist someday, so I'm learning Scottish Gaelic, Irish and Welsh. I'm super short, only 4' 10" (147 cm), with long wavy auburn hair, glasses, pale freckled skin and a boyish fashion sense. I also have some chronic illnesses like scoliosis, joint pain and asthma. I'm really polite and very friendly with everyone I meet, but I'm also very protective over my loved ones and can be sassy when I feel it's deserved. While I'm generally an anxious person, I'm not afraid to make the first move because I basically tell myself that the moment could slip away, but I will be having heart palpitations while doing that lol. My special interests include linguistics, science, magic (I practice witchcraft irl), cooking, video games, plant identification and a bunch of other stuff, though honestly I'm down to learn about whatever is available (within reason). I've been described as "homely" and "wise beyond my years" since I give good advice and am very self aware. I really enjoy taking care of people but can get flustered if the sentiment is returned.

Thank you so so much, take care of yourself and Happy Holidays sweetie!

We Interupt your regularly scheduled program for.......A MATCHUP TRADE WITH: @tolkien-fantasy

An: i haven’t finished bg3 so bear with me please

Gale of Waterdeep!!!

I’m just gonna say it. You two are fuckin nerds, but that’s part of what makes your relationship work so well. Gale is overjoyed to have someone who is not only as passionate about things as he is, but also shares the same passions. You guys also have similar views and personalities in general.

I’m not gonna go into how yall met since the game p much does that for me so I’m just gonna ramble about your relationship until i run out of ideas lol.

So Gale takes every opportunity he can to visit the library you work at. It’s killing two birds with one stone really: he gets the books he’s looking for and he gets to see his darling girlfriend.

On the topic of books you guys absolutely have reading dates. Whether it’s in his tower, your house, or at the library during your break you two will just sit together and read. Sharing notes on whatever the subject the book is about.

You guys also do joint magic research together. Lots of books and papers scattered everywhere, potions bubbling and brewing in cauldrons, blackboards covered in chalk. It’s basically your mad scientist lair.

Although you know how to not take things too far and we all know Gale needs someone to restrain him sometimes.

Gale enjoys you teaching him about your type of magic. He finds it fascinating and gives you his full attention when you’re explaining it. He also asks a loooooooooot of questions.

Given your knowledge on practically every language in faerun, you make his research so much easier by decoding ancient text for him. What would take him months to do would take you at most a week, although he does force you to take breaks if you ever get too into it and forget to eat or sleep.

You guys absolutely have a garden together. Not only to grow magical plants for your spells and potions, but also just some for cooking and because it’s a calming hobby/past time.

On that more domestic note, you do most of the cooking. It’s not that he doesn’t know how to cook, but he’s the type who would live off instant food and microwave meals so more time could be devoted to his research.

He does try to help though and he finds it very enjoyable to cook with you. It makes him look up from his books and attaining knowledge for a moment and appreciate what’s right there in front of him: you.

I feel like you guys would have a cat. Although you adopt Scratch the dog and the Owlbear on your adventure, I feel like he would really like a cat.

Also imagining that cat causing havoc in your lab by knocking stuff over, sleeping on your notes, and trying to steal your attention away from your work is hilarious to me but shhhh

Part of why he does so much reading and researching, is to try and heal some of your aches and pains. Even if he can’t take your problems away completely (though he’ll never stop looking and trying) he does want to at least make your life a bit easier and the pain more bearable if not non existent.

I’d like to think of Gale as an ambivert. He doesn’t get tired out by socializing, but also appreciates his alone time. So if you guys are ever at a social event he’ll be able to take the initiative for once and make up an excuse for you guys to leave when your social battery is low or you’re getting overstimulated.

He thinks your height is the cutest thing ever. How you have to get stool or latter to reach the higher shelves in the tower. He doesn’t mind having to reach them for you, in fact he enjoys it. He also likes wrapping his big frame around you when you guys cuddle.

Speaking of cuddling, while he doesn’t mind being the little spoon (despite your small frame he feels very comforted in your arms) he’s usually the big spoon. He’s nice and warm and likes having his arms around you.

He wants you to feel the same love, care, and protection that you give to others.

[geosquare]

i made this post the day before i turned 14, into linguistics for fun but thinking i could never major in something that impractical. now i'm majoring in linguistics at my dream school and i know 14 year old me would be overjoyed and in disbelief that this could have happened. inspirational

yeah sex is cool but have you seen how historical linguists reconstruct proto-indo-european words

[voxiiferous]

**| So this will make sense to absolutely no one here, but I need to say something. So years ago, like three or so now, I ran into a weird circumstance linguistically. I had been reading something that referred to Soviet apartments as “novostroika”, but could find no corroborating evidence of that literally anywhere else on the entire internet, and I searched. Oh did I searched, I searched high, I searched low, I had an entire class last summer on Russian geography where Soviet apartments came up. I could find “Khrushchyovkas”, but not “novostroika”. I could find lots of content for Khrushchyovkas, it seemed that was just what I was looking for. Eventually I just gave up and accepted that it must have been a weird fluke or case of slang or something. Clearly somethings are just not meant to be understood.

And then, tonight, as I was looking for an entirely unrelated (well tangentially related, but I didn’t know that at first) word for a run down, shared apartment, I found that apparently that was a fairly localized thing, called the kommunalka, an earlier Soviet apartment. And just out of curiosity, I check the Wikipedia, and there it is, the answer to the question that I could not answer, that taunted me for so long: “Today in Russia, Soviet style apartment blocks are still built and are termed "Novostroika", they are often painted colorfully and have all modern amenities”. THE ANSWER RIGHT THERE.

I am, on one hand, overjoyed to finally know, on the other, I am so deeply annoyed of how I came across this knowledge. Of all the characters I honestly never thought would bring about the answer, by 1950s American TV host was on the list!

[stocky2016]

“A Wee Dram of Inspiration”

A poet needs

mood, concentration

the peace, maybe even that

“away from it all” distillation…

Like the inspiration for a rare malt-whisky

ideas require time, enduring fermentation...

A remote island, off the Scottish

ancient landscapes with its

gushing peaty streams...

a windswept, angry horizon…

It takes casks of patience and a little day-dreaming,

a subtle, maturation process

to develop appropriate linguistic reality…

an earthiness filtered from sheep’s droppings

and granite-cold imagery…

My sole candle was just enough light to write

and unload…a jaded “towny poets”

cluttered mind.

My ideas began to flow

with whisky-flavoured metaphors,

grouse-screaming similes,

eagles that plunder a habitat of nesting similes…

Remote places forgive such indulgent

drunken verses that don’t scan or rhyme.

Darkened, low-ceiling, semi derelict crofts

are where struggling poets escape time.

A wee dram or two of the fiery Scotch, props

up the flickering ambition of wasted candles…

the diminishing embers of aborted scribbles,

and smoky ashes of random ideas.

Tonight however,

was oh so very different…

a late-night session

in the candle-lit silence of cottage gloom…

My tired eyes suddenly opened

to see, where blindness had only existed before,

Words came impulsively, almost out of context

committed to paper hurriedly, before memory fails.

Pages were no longer screwed up las

rejected waste paper on the floor

ideas suddenly cascaded like waterfalls…

I was writing at last, I needed nothing more.

Overjoyed that my creative imagination was alive,

solitude helped me process the ideas 💡

A tumbler full of the “peaty stuff”

that wee dram of the Highlands,

and poetry soon followed, line after line

just a couple of swallows and poetry was mine.

© G.P.S. 19th December 2021 (re-Edited 16th August 2022

and a further re-edit 9th April 2023)

(Pictures courtesy of Google Images)

[dragonji]

rly should try to get Something thrown together for the last two essays i need for the semester (both already past due) but i think i will start fdcm instead

[ts-porter]

The Shanty and the Hive

.

The first time the humans told us they sang their way through subspace, we thought it a translation error.

.

We-the-hive were overjoyed to meet them. Finally, finally, it was proven that we were not alone! And though we already knew that we must not be, given the vastness of time and the multiverse, we also knew that those same vastnesses were against us. Civilizations we could meet are greatly outnumbered by those who came before us and we are too late to meet, those who will come after us and we are too early for, and those so far away that we cannot find them.

A starfaring civilization, like our own, increased the chances of meeting greatly. One of our most distant scientific surveyors sensed a faint and far away disturbance, similar to the waves our own ships make when diving into and out of subspace. An exploratory team was sent to investigate, and there at the furthest reach ever taken from the hive's center, to our everlasting joy, we found human explorers on the far edges of their own range.

Their ships were strange to us, and their selves even stranger. Translation, and the mutual communication of peaceful intentions, was difficult. Mathematics was the first understanding we were able to share, as the basic principles do not change—though their and our systems of harnessing it are different. Science followed after, as the elements and natural laws are unchanging. So it was discovered that we-the-hive and the humans share the common ground of being carbon-based heterotrophs who consume water to maintain life processes.

These commonalities were far outnumbered by our differences. Yet, the most important thing we had in common was the desire to understand each other. With earnest effort, with forgiveness for unintended insult and misunderstanding, we worked to learn each other's languages.

Science being an early part of our understanding of each other, we asked them about the construction of their ships. They told us of their material compositions and their subspace engines, different in design but similar in purpose to our own technology—but when we asked them about the shielding and stabilization they used to make the journey survivable, they told us only that they sang their way through.

Translations were imprecise, and their language often contradictory. Of course we believed that it was yet another translation error. We believed there was a nuance we were missing.

The humans were a very musical civilization. They were always singing, all of them. They sang for joy, and they sang for mourning, and they sang for any reason at all between the two extremes.

(Later, we would discover that this was not universally true. That those who crewed their ships were chosen from the most musical among them. We only met their singers, their travelers, their ship's crews. How could we know differently?)

We believed, with music such a central part of their civilization, that they had given the words for song more meaning. Their subspace stabilization and shielding technology, without which any ship that dove into the confusion of subspace would be utterly destroyed and lost, had taken its name from music. We-the-hive noted the mistranslation, and worked to increase our understanding.

As our trust and understanding increased, as the human linguists became haltingly conversant in our language and we in theirs, the humans introduced to us a group of their hatchlings. It was a mighty show of trust, as they valued their younger generations as deeply as we did our own. Though still flexible, an adult human's mind was too set in its ways to easily become fluent in another language. That of their hatchlings was far more suited to the acquisition of language. With equal time spent between their own language and ours, it was hoped that the young would grow to be adults who could serve as translators and teachers to increase the closeness and understanding of our peoples.

We allowed our hatchlings and theirs to mingle, to play together, to bond. We spoke to the human hatchlings, and the speed at which they learned our language matched the speed they learned the language of their own people. It was to be a long project, but a joyful and an exciting one.

We learned more about the humans, and they learned more about us. Along with scientific sharing, we established a small trade, exchange of goods and curiosities from one civilization to another.

Our understanding grew, but we still did not understand completely. The humans told us that they sang their way through subspace. When we could no longer believe that the translation was so deeply in error, we instead believed that the crews who piloted the human ships did not understand the technology they used. They were such a granular species, not unified. We believed that those who built the ships had not shared knowledge with those who piloted them, and so they had developed superstitions around technology they did not comprehend.

We-the-hive asked to send a pod of researchers through a subspace dive on one of the human ships. We asked for it. The humans agreed, willingly, in exchange for an equal number of their own scientists to take the same trip aboard one of our ships. Our pod and their scientists were chosen. The ships and the destination were chosen.

The pod boarded the human ship with nothing but curiosity and excitement. As the humans were wont to limit the number of dives they took and make the most of every trip, a ship carrying cargo on one of their usual supply runs was chosen. The ship was called the Merry Dancer, of the type the humans called a 'small freighter'.

It was greatly open through the inside. The 'bird's nest' hung from the ceiling at the center, and there the Captain and Pilots had their stations. Room had been found to rig up two safety harnesses, to secure two individuals from the research pod where we could watch the Captain and Pilots work. The rest of us joined the singers, who stood in a line from stem to stern along the bottom of the ship.

The mood was solemn and focused as the humans prepared for the journey. The subspace engines were prepped, their rumble vibrating through the ship. The Pilots and Captain stretched their hands and rolled their necks, loosening themselves up. The singers took deep breaths and hummed, warming their voices.

"All Ready?" the Captain asked. She was a small human, her wrinkled skin a pleasingly luminous deep brown and her thickly curly silver hair tied up in many braids and twisted into a knot at the back of her head. She was called Janette, and when she spoke, in her firm and quiet voice, the crew of the Merry Dancer listened closely and with respect.

"Singers in Position," the chief among the singers—the Lead Chanter—reported. "At your command, Captain." He was a large human, hairless and very round, with pink skin heavily freckled with brown spots. He was called George, and his voice was big and booming as so many of the ship's singers were. Even when he was not working he was always surrounded by the singers of the Merry Dancer, in a loud and happy group that was always singing, for they trusted him and liked to be close.

After a look and a nod with the two pilots, the Captain spoke again. "You may begin when ready," she said. And then, informally and with a small smile, "Sing to me."

Lead Chanter George stamped out a beat that the rest of the singers took up immediately. He inhaled a massive breath, filling his belly and broad chest to its limit. (And we had heard of the training most ship's singers chose to undertake from childhood, exercises to increase their lung capacity and improve the volume and resonance of their voices, that they might sing loud and long without doing themselves damage. George epitomized the results, as so many lead chanters did.)

He belted out the line to song we had heard the humans singing before. A 'shanty', they called it; an old one. It was dated from long before their species even dreamed that they could leave their birth planet and sail across the stars rather than the oceans of their homeworld.

"Oh, we'll blow the man up and we'll blow the man down!" George led.

And every singer through the ship, in time and at great volume, sang out in answer: "Way, hey, blow the man down!"

George spared a brief moment of attention to wink at the nearest member of the research pod as he led again: "We'll make the trip over, won't let our friends down."

"Give us some time to blow the man down!" the singers responded.

The sound of their voices and the solid beat of their stamping boots vibrated the entire ship. It was clear that the acoustics were designed such that the vibrations bounced off the walls of the ship, centering unerringly on the crow's nest. The Captain and the Pilots nodded in time as the Lead Chanter improvised the next verse and sang it up to them, as the singers responded in tuneful chorus.

The Captain's hand clenched on a lever, the subspace engine throttle, tight enough her knuckles paled. A deep breath, and she slammed the throttle wide open in time with the singers. The engine roared briefly, outclassed only by the song. Immediately it was clear why the humans, in their language, had named their version of the subspace dive after a violent strike—the punch. It was a hard transition, swift and jarring.

Then. Oh, then. We understood, suddenly and most terribly, why the humans could not describe their subspace shielding and stabilization technology to us, for they had none.

They had none!

Their minds, bodies, and their entire ships were fully exposed to the nongeometrical confusion of subspace. The research pod, we who had asked to be there and been eagerly chosen, were caught up in it as well. Spacetime was ruffled, twisted, wrinkled, defying understanding in ways that three-dimensional space and regularly linear time never did. Unshielded subspace was a mind-destroying horror, the likes of which we-the-hive had never experienced.

And through the midst of the direful disorientation, the humans were singing.

We-the-hive discovered the principles of subspace engines, the basics for the traversing of subspace to make the lightyears of interstellar travel pass in hours, long before we used them. The dive to the space below the three dimensional and outside of linear spacetime requires mere force. Three generations were born and died while we developed the much more difficult shielding and stabilization technology, which requires finesse. Only when we had perfected it, when we could hold an entire ship in a stable pocket of three dimensions through a subspace trip, did we become starfarers.

The humans had taken a very different approach.

Lead Chanter George stood like a stone against the wind, inventing lyrics for his ancient shanty, and the ship's singers stomped the deck in time and answered, never faltering. Above them, Captain Janette and her pilots listened hard to the song and the echoes. Their hands were on their controls, manually firing the ship's small stabilization engines. They judged by the sound alone whether any part of the ship was warping, if it was redshifting or blueshifting out of tune or out of time.

Ship's singers had told us, proudly, that they lived and died by their voices. We had thought it hyperbole.

The twist and shake of the ship, what the humans called the shimmy and roll and the bucking gravitational waves, never abated. The singing never ceased. In between lines of the call and response of the shanty, singers took sips of water from the bottles on their belts to keep their throats from growing dry. George communicated with his Second with brief hand signs, and sie took over leading with a different shanty—another ancient song, The Wellerman. The pilots breathed hard with the effort of concentration. Sweat beaded at the Captain's hairline. A thin trickle ran down her cheek and neck in a jaggedly uneven line, pushed and pulled by the roiling of subspace.

The humans, with their fortitude and adaptability, and specifically the crew of the Merry Dancer with their long experience, were able to keep functioning. They could continue to work despite the tearing disorientation, else the ship and all in it would have been lost. The members of the research pod were not so prepared, and were not so adaptable. With communication disrupted between us so each was utterly alone, with the confusion and isolation overwhelming, we had all curled up tight inside our carapaces for safety, like frightened hatchlings. Only one in three were able to even peek a single eyestalk out to observe with shattered perception, to increase our knowledge and understanding as had been the intention of the trade.

(On the hive's ship, mid journey, one of the human researchers aboard hesitantly asked when the trip was going to begin. This caused great confusion all around.)

Another unknowable and incomprehensible time later, the Second signaled to Lead Chanter George, and he led again with a third song—Roll The Old Chariot Along. The music, sure and unending, was a comfort in the confusion. The singers' strong voices, unified, were a touchstone in the chaos.

The third song was ongoing when the subspace engine began cycling again, powering up for the punch back out. Despite the strain, despite the confused length of time of their singing, George's voice grew in volume, and the rest of the singers followed. They overwhelmed the sound of the engine, providing Captain Janette and the Pilots with the guidance they needed through the last moments.

The second punch was every bit as harsh as the first. Space time warped, twisted, and then snapped back into three dimensional linearity. Through the transition, the singers never faltered. The reverberation of their voices rang through the ship, a joyful shout. George had his hands raised high as he led one final chorus at half time.

"Lead Chanter, singers, you may stand down," the Captain announced, formally, and then smiling but still dignified despite her obvious weariness. "Nicely done, crew."

Some of the singers cheered and hugged each other, or slapped each other's backs in celebration. Others, though, ran and fell to their knees by the nearest of the research pod to them.

"What happened?", "Are they ok?" "Are they hurt?", "I don't understand they just collapsed as soon as we punched!"

Lead Chanter George, trusted and respected by the singers he led, sang out calming words even as he sat on the deck beside one the nearest researcher from the pod—one who had an eye stalk out monitoring. He smiled at us, human expression of happiness. He placed one large warm hand on the back of the researcher's carapace. He could not speak our language, but with his tired voice he sang the tone of safety—with the caress and the crooning he communicated an absence of danger as we might to our own hatchlings.

We would learn that a young relative of his was among the human hatchlings who mingled with ours, that by observing us with our own hatchlings he'd learned the way to offer comfort. One and another of the singers took up the tone, until the ship throbbed with it. The research pod were given care and reassurance, and with the sharp reduction in stress we were able to uncurl, to communicate and reintegrate and return to a harmonious whole as we worked to piece together our shattered understanding of what had occurred.

The touch and the tone were not quite the same as our own, similar enough, but different. Still, the difference was not unpleasant. In that moment, in the relief and the... the kindness, the sonorous resonance of a human singer's voice and the softness of a human hand were fixed as beautiful. These humans were not us, not ours, but become beloved. When the research pod was reintegrated in the whole of we-the-hive, the beauty and affection remained.

We would learn that the journey we observed had been 'easy', routine, as safe as any trip could be. The humans had pride in the safety of their ships and in the training of their capable crews—that they lost, astoundingly, merely one in two thousand ships in unstabilized dives.

They had done so much with so little, singing their way through subspace while still researching the technologies that would make it safe.

When we-the-hive truly understood the risks the humans took with every single journey, when the research pod's knowledge was fully integrated, we knew we could not leave them without the advantages we had.

.

The decision to share all details of our subspace shielding and stabilization technology with the humans—with our friends—was swift and without dissent.

.

.

Edit - 04/20/21 So! This story is actually an eventual-future-worldbuilding of a short story about space shanties that I wrote in 2018, and which I have finally found a home for! The story in question sadly does not include aliens, but it does have ace lesbians singing their way through danger. It’s sweet and hope-punky and I think that if you enjoyed this one, you’d enjoy that one too!

“(don’t you) love a singer” is available in the It Gets Even Better: Stories of Queer Possibility anthology by Speculatively Queer. You can grab a copy [here]!

[newsmutproject]

Cunning Linguists Author Interview: Ollie Fox

Property of Damien ♥, she writes on my arm, in blue, to see how long the markers last. The felt doesn’t tickle like I’d expected. It’s just a smooth, gentle pressure, with a hint of sharpness when she presses down. It feels like it’s scratching an itch I didn’t know was there.

-from “Written” in Cunning Linguists

Ollie Fox is an American writer and creator of The Queer Earthling, where they write sex toy reviews, erotica, advice, and real-life stories. Ollie, who is nonbinary and on the asexual spectrum, is passionate about showing the world that sexuality and relationships don’t have to look like anyone else’s to be joyful and fulfilling, and that sex positivity and inclusiveness go hand in hand.

What inspired you to write this story?

“Written” was a nonfiction piece I wrote about my experiences with body writing, initially published on my blog in 2019. It’s one of those stories that just tumbled out of my fingers, wanting to be written, inspired by kink, mental health, and my love for the written word; I also really enjoyed the anachronistic order and exploring my relationship to all those things at different ages. (I would note that it uses she/her pronouns for my spouse, which is what they used at the time; they do not any longer, but they encouraged me to leave their old pronouns even for this collection, as it reflects our reality at the time it was written.)

When did you start writing about sex? What are some of the challenges and benefits you’ve discovered?

I formally started writing about sex—and, specifically, my relationship—in 2019, initially as a standalone article on a website before launching my blog, Queer Earthling. My spouse and I are both a-spectrum and trans nonbinary (although at the time I didn’t know I was either of those things) and live a nonsexual kink lifestyle. I didn’t see many sex blogs or sex content that included relationships like ours or even acknowledged that folks like us were out there. I initially just wanted to write about how people could connect in intimate, but not traditionally sexual ways; it ballooned into writing personal anecdotes, sex toy reviews, contemplation of identity, kink guides, and—of course—erotica.

I still love writing about sex and relationships, but it can be hard to maintain a blog, keep a regular posting schedule, and balance what I want to share with the world and what I want to keep private, to say nothing of the discouragement I feel sometimes in the current political climate. However, even though I’m less prolific than I was when I began my blog, I am really proud of the work I’ve produced. I’m overjoyed whenever I hear people reach out to tell me if they find it relatable or even helpful, and participating in the wider sex-positive and queer community has been so rewarding.

What’s your favorite sexy word? Is there a word you really like that has an unfair bad reputation?

I’m a huge fan of the word “cunt” lately, when used to actually describe a vagina (rather than as a derogatory term for a human). It’s less clinical without being euphemistic, its single-syllable Anglo-Saxon simplicity makes it nice and punchy in either erotic writing or dirty talk, and its bad reputation can make it feel extra sexy when used without malice.

Cunning Linguists comes out May 18th, 2022! This anthology of language, literature, and lechery is available at

Gumroad (use coupon code NEWSMUTPROJECTFAN for $1 off)

Amazon.com  Amazon.co.uk  Amazon.ca  Amazon.de  Amazon.fr  Amazon.es  Amazon.com.mx   Amazon.co.jp   Amazon.it   Amazon.nl   Amazon.com.br  Amazon.com.au   Amazon.in

Smashwords

Support indie bookstores when you buy a paperback copy through Bookshop.org

Barnes and Noble

Indiebound (where you can arrange to get a copy through your local bookstore)

Book Depository

Alibris

Other retailers – Books2Read

And add it to your shelf on Goodreads and LibraryThing  

[mxchellesworld]

Gloria

Spencer Reid x Latina!Reader

request; Spencer and a reader who is bilingual

synopsis; Spencer turns 30 and spends the day with his favorite people

warnings; just fluff

*I added translations for a few things at the end

a/n; fuck accent marks, all my homies hate accent marks>:( lol but really, i did this in spanish since i speak it and thought it would be cute - i am very happy i got this request! as always enjoy

***

Spencer was proud of his multi linguistic skills, he had worked hard to be able to communicate with others in different languages. However when he wasn’t using his skills in a case or for research, his language skills were put to great use in watching his Russian films and trying to impress you.

While yes you had been together and married for nearing 6 years, it was always his main goal. Even when you first started to get to know one another and he met your parents he whipped out formal spanish greeting, with Elle’s help of course, which immediately had your mother swooning. Papa took some getting used to but now Spencer was his son at heart.

When you found out you were pregnant with your little girl he made sure to get books in spanish as well. According to him the novelas you watched weren’t gonna do much to help but give her more of your sass.

But when she came into the world he was more than overjoyed hearing your cooing over her. The way her big brown eyes lit up hearing your voice in the mornings.

“Donde esta mi princessa hermosa,” you said switching off the sound machine in the nursery. Instantly you were met with the sound of tiny giggles immersing from the swaddle of yellow fluffy blankets in her crib.

Another thing Spencer told you was that talking to babies was key in helping develop their speaking and understanding skills. Of course there was a percentage to accompany the fact but you got the just of it.

“Vamos a despertar a papa,” you said lifting her up and running your fingers through the steady growing curls on the top of her head.

She instantly perked up at the mention of her dad. Gummy smile spread across her chubby cheeks.

“Es su cumpleaños hoy. Creo que tu eres el mejor regalo que le pudia ver dado,” you finished by rubbing your nose onto hers. She shrieked in laughter, her tiny hands grabbing onto your hair.

After giving her diaper a quick change and dressing her up in her favorite onesie which read ‘daddy’s genius’, of course gifted by the best god mother Penelope Garcia, you walked over to your bedroom.

She clung onto your earrings as you patted down the hall trying to make minimal noise and wake up Spencer. You opened the door to see him still sound asleep having come back from a case late at night.

He was laying on his back, head tilted to the side with one hand under the pillow and the other on his stomach. You watched the rise and fall of his steady breathe in the Halloween t-shirt he slept in.

You smiled at the hitch in Gloria’s breath seeing her daddy first thing in the morning. The way she wiggled her body in your arms just dying to see her favorite person.

You straddled his waist trying to keep your weight on your knees to not wake him up. You then placed Gloria on his chest and let her go to town. Her sloppy kisses on his cheeks woke him from his slumber.

He slowly opened his eyes and let the smile spread across his face, “Oh wow what a way to wake up,” he let out a giggle.

Spencer sat up and held her close to his face, peppering kisses all over her rosy cheeks.

“We wanted to give the best father in the world an early birthday gift. Huh G,” you said calling for the little girl.

She babbled away in agreement making both you and Spencer share a laugh. You got off from his lap and snuggled into his arms.

��Well gracias Gloria,” he said bopping her nose, “I appreciate the wake up.”

You pressed a kiss to his cheek and watched as the two interacted before getting up to make breakfast.

You left them in bed and went to the kitchen whipping up some pancakes and a bottle for Gloria. When things were finishing up you heard Spencer’s steps coming down the hall.

He sat her in the high chair next to the table and wrapped his arms around your waist as you plated the food.

“Thank you for the best birthday gift I could ever ask for. I love you so much Y/n, you guys make me the happiest man on earth.”

You turned and met him with a sweet kiss, “Love you so much more mi amore. You deserve every bit of happiness Spence.”

Your moment was brought to an end by tiny hands banging on the plastic tray of her high chair. You both shared a look of understanding before you sat in the chair next to Gloria’s.

Spencer sat across from you while the three of you shared breakfast together. Gloria’s attitude was quickly changed by the cut up pieces of pancake you let her munch on.

By the time you had finished breakfast she was ready to be bathed and have some playtime before her midday nap if she was to endure the fabulous party hosted by none other than Papa Rossi.

“I’ll clean up here, you give her a bath and get her ready,” you said taking Spencer’s plate.

“You cooked I can clean this up no problem,” he tried to argue.

“No no you guys have your daddy daughter time. Then you can read her a story before her nap,” you said nodding.

He smiled at you then picked her out of the high chair and leaned down to press a kiss to your cheek. You could hear him cooing and talking to her as they made their way down the hall.

_

By 2pm you were getting ready to head to Dave’s house or Uncle Dave as he’s been more recently known. He agreed to host Spencer a little birthday party which consisted of the team and their kids.

After getting gloria dressed she was still fast asleep in her car seat and the ride to Dave’s was smooth with small talk and quiet music on the radio.

Spencer drove with his hand interlocked with yours in the middle, randomly pressing kisses to it during red lights.

“Mama y Papa called to wish you a happy birthday. It was when you were bathing G but they told me to relay the message,” you said playing with the scarf around his neck.

You could see the small blush creep on his face. Any mention of your parents thinking and caring for him hit really hard within him. They knew of his past and did their best to have him know he was truly a part of your family.

“I’ll make sure to call them tomorrow and say thank you. Maybe we can visit them soon, I know they miss Gloria and I really miss your mom’s cooking,” he said with a smile.

Arriving at David’s you were met with the door being ripped open by all the kids of the BAU. The boys were more than happy to wish their Uncle Spence a happy birthday and greet their little girl.

Since she was the only girl of the bunch they had sworn to protect her the best they could. Even if it wasn’t much now, when she got older they would definitely be her playground body guards.

Penelope and Derek then let you guys in and attacked you both in the biggest hugs imaginable.

“Oh hot mama I’ve missed you so much,” Garcia said swaying you back and forth.

“I’ve missed you more Garcia. We should round the girls up and get brunch sometime,” you said with a quirk in your lip.

She instantly lit up and grabbed your hand to take you to the rest of the BAU ladies. You looked back to see Spencer and Morgan laughing as they cooed over Gloria who was now waking up for her godfather.

The rest of the night went down smoothly with Gloria being passed around like a hot potato. Though she never minded, loving the attention from all her aunts and uncles.She was quite the stunner. Even getting Hotch to break character and indulge her in a wholesome game of pickaboo. 

A few games were played and stories were told but it was time to cut the cake before it reached anyone’s bedtime. 

You sat around Rossi’s yard, the candles reading 30 glowed under the October sky. You all sang and held smiles on your face as Spencer blew out his candles. Gloria bouncing on his lap happily around all the commotion. 

While he’d never admit it, you knew he actually didn’t wish for anything. Everything he could ask for was surrounding him at that very moment and he was more than content with the love of his favorite people.

translations

“Donde esta mi princessa hermosa,” - “Where is my pretty princess”

“Vamos a despertar a papa,” - “Lets go wake up dad”

“Es su cumpleaños hoy. Creo que tu eres el mejor regalo que le pudia ver dado,” - “It’s his birthday today. I think you are the best gift I could have ever given him”

[leiawritesstories]

Speak To My Heart

Rowaelin Month, Day 15: A bad day

Word count: 3422

Warnings: language, bit of depression, fighting. In short, there is angst in this fic. Hope the ending makes up for the rest.

Linguistics and foreign languages are two of my personal passions, so please bear with the bits of language talk that I couldn’t resist including. Brief word of clarification: a lot of expressions we use in English either translate into something extremely rude or don’t make sense in other languages. Translation companies have been trying for quite some time to make sure they don’t accidentally send a client a translated instruction manual that reads “fuck your mother” instead of “for questions, contact your local energy department.” All right I’ll get off my soapbox. :)

The phrases in foreign languages, marked with *, are translated into English at the end. Enjoy!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Rowan’s day had been shit. The second he walked through the door, he’d been bombarded with an endless slew of crash reports, malfunctioning equipment, faulty passwords, and best of all, having to rewrite half the security firewalls because one of the rash young idiots in his department couldn’t be bothered to check his work for errors before sending it to management. And management thought it was the department boss’s job to fix all of his employees’ fuckups.

He hated IT.

Even more so since being promoted to department chair. 

All he wanted to do was the fun stuff--program design and development, fixing the flaws in his own designs, and of course making those who tried to break into his company’s systems regret their pitiful existence. But Cadre Tech’s bitch of a CEO refused to let the best software engineer on her staff actually do his job. 

Most days, he could cope with the pile of useless shit she directed to his desk. Most days. Today was not one of those days. Probably because on top of all the meaningless tasks he’d had to field, he was also forced to sit through one of Maeve’s bullshit “department head strategy sessions,” where every department chair had to pretend they gave a single shit about any word coming from their CEO’s garishly red, pinched mouth. 

As if she knew anything her staff actually did. 

Thanks to the compulsory meeting, Rowan was stuck in his office at nearly ten o’clock, painstakingly combing through the final draft of the update to CT’s translation program. This program had shot the company to fame and fortune, or at least insane stock value. “A Google Translate that actually translates,” their marketing department called it, and by the gods, that stupid slogan worked. And made sense. Rowan knew the program was just as good as it claimed to be.

He’d put in the hours, alongside a team of linguists, software engineers, designers, and people fluent in at least one other language. Frequent were the sessions where the project whiteboard turned into a jumble of words in twenty or more languages, Spanish alongside Arabic next to a column of simplified Japanese characters spilling over into a row of Cyrillic lettering. Rowan himself spoke German and some Spanish, but even he was lost amid the cacophony of eighteen different people switching from language to language, trying to figure out how idiomatic expressions translated from one language to another and what words should never, ever be placed together. 

It took the team well over a year of bickering, or as they called it, friendly linguistic disagreements, to make it from loosely mapped concept to functioning program. By the time it hit the market three years ago, the software had been so well promoted that companies all over the world snapped up their chance to finally communicate properly with the client they’d offended years ago with a bad translation. 

At launch, of course, Maeve stood in front of a sea of shouting reporters brandishing microphones, smiling her serpentine smile, and proceeded to thank the creative team for all their “contributions” before taking all the credit herself. 

Said creative team went to the bar that had become their usual gathering spot that night to get drunk and shit-talk their horrible boss, not necessarily in that order. 

His favorite memory of that night was hearing the chief linguist, an outside contract with multiple advanced degrees who spoke eight separate languages besides English fluently, refer to Maeve as “quella puttana rugosa che non riusciva a convincere un cazzo a venire a dieci metri da lei se si vestiva da figa.*” The Italian speakers on the team were crying with laughter, and so was everyone else, once she translated it.

And then she downed another shot of vodka and hissed something that sounded like “sukya bliyad, no puedo mich betrinken con esta ordures.**” When everyone blinked in confusion, she sighed and relayed the sentiment in English. 

Nobody had laughed as hard as Rowan. Aelin Galathynius just had that effect on him.

She brightened his darkest days.

But she couldn’t ease the strain of today.

And it was all his fault.

~

Aelin glanced up at the clock on her wall and cursed in three different languages when she saw that it was nearly eleven. Without meaning to, she’d spent all afternoon and evening writing lesson notes on idiomatic expressions. She really couldn’t help herself once she got into the topic; it was her pet project.

And the subject of one of her dissertations. Yes, she had multiple. 

She’d worked her ass off for years to get through college, then through graduate and doctoral work while teaching at universities to offset costs, then earned a full-time teaching position at one of the top-ranked universities in the world. She got to teach linguistics, her lifetime love, and give guest lectures at other universities and at conferences, teaching people all over the world about the complexities and interrelatedness of language. Hell, she spoke ten; she’d be qualified to speak on linguistic relationships by virtue of that alone.

Gods, she was the chief linguist behind the most successful translation software ever produced. Even if the bitch who owned the rights to said software had literally threatened to sue over ownership rights if any of the people who’d poured their figurative blood and sweat and literal tears into building the program tried to claim a small piece of the credit each of them so richly deserved. 

That software and her role in its creation--even though Maeve Ond had claimed the public credit, the creative team spoke at interviews and made news features for their work in Cadre Tech’s massive success--had solidified her credentials as a professor of linguistics, had boosted her into her lecturer spot.

Last year, her university granted her tenure. 

She should have been overjoyed, and she was, but not as much as earning tenure deserved. 

Because there was nobody to share her joy.

Three years ago, in the wake of CT’s overnight jump to worldwide fame, Aelin fled a love she did not and never would deserve. 

She told herself she would never look back. But she did. Almost every day, she looked back at the life she’d shared with Rowan and tried to convince herself that she did the right thing.

Try as she might, she could never silence the whisper that echoed always in her mind. 

“You broke both of your hearts” 

Someday, she told herself, someday she would be back in Doranelle. Someday, she would have a chance to apologize. Someday, maybe she could fix the Rowan-shaped chasm that gaped wide in her heart. 

Yet here she was, sitting in a very nicely appointed hotel room in the university district of Doranelle, typing furiously away as if burying herself in notes and prep for tomorrow’s lecture could make the urge to contact Rowan disappear.

~

Three years earlier. Doranelle.

“Knock, knock.”

Rowan’s head jerked up from where it had most definitely not been slumped on his desk. “Wha--Oh. Hi, Aelin.”

“You’re falling asleep, buzzard, let’s go home.” He heard laughter in her soft voice. 

“As if you won’t just get home and start cross-checking every single one of the phrases on your ‘potential problem’ list.”

She chuckled, walking over to him. “Fine. We’re both perfectionist work whores. Doesn’t mean we don’t need sleep.”

“I know you too well to believe you’re actually going to sleep.”

“All right, you win. Come home now, I’ll make some food, and you can put me to bed.” She winked saucily at him, leaving very little doubt what putting her to bed would entail, and he was up out of his chair in seconds. 

“Hand over your computer, Fireheart,” he grinned as they walked into the small house they shared on the outskirts of the city. 

“What?”

“Your computer, love. I’m leaving both of our work bags on the shelf by the front door so we can actually catch some rest tonight.” He pressed a finger to her mouth to silence her protests. “Uh-uh, Ae, we have interviews tomorrow and I won’t let the genius behind this program’s flawless word-to-word be anything but well-rested.”

She sighed, but he saw the love in her eyes. “Here, then, my dear brilliant software engineer. Leave your notebook, too, because I know if it’s anywhere near you, you’ll be up at three in the morning scribbling blocks of gibberish and picking apart your faultless code until you go insane.”

Both of their work satisfactorily put aside, Aelin made good on her promise to cook Rowan dinner. 

And then he made very good on his promise to put her to bed. 

The next morning, they were both awake with the sunrise, content to lay curled in each other’s arms as the morning light spread across their room.

Rowan drifted back into sleep, waking for good when he caught a whiff of coffee from the kitchen’s direction. 

“Morning, you sleepy buzzard,” Aelin grinned, sipping from her mug.

Rowan dropped a kiss on her head as he reached for his mug. He took a long drink, sighing as the milky, sweetened caffeine hit his mouth. 

“I will never understand how you drink your coffee black, Fireheart.”

“Not all of us need to sweeten the hell out of coffee to drink it, Ro. Maybe if you can’t handle the real thing, you should go back to your pretty little cups of crappy cafe tea.”

“Mention my pretty little teacups again, Ae…”

She giggled. “You be quiet and drink your coffee-flavored milk, my love.  We both know you’re impossibly grumpy until you have caffeine in your veins.”

He grumbled something unintelligible as he drank his coffee.

They were nearly late to work that morning, even having planned an extra half hour to arrive, thanks to Aelin wearing what Rowan dubbed her “sexy professor suit.” She fixed the pins in her French twist in the car, making herself once again a portrait of professionalism, and slipped Rowan’s hand from her leg.

“Two hands on the wheel, Whitethorn.”

He pouted. “But I’m a safe driver and I want to hold your hand.”

“My hands are over here, love, not down by my skirt.”

When he pulled into his spot, Aelin closed her eyes and took a deep, slow breath. 

“You good, Fireheart?”

Gods, she loved hearing him call her that. “Yeah. I just…needed a moment to settle myself. To tell myself the cameras aren’t here to tear apart what I say.”

Rowan wrapped his hands around hers. “Dr. Aelin Ashryver Galathynius, the bland reporters are here to stand in awe of your expertise. Not a single word you say will come across as anything but brilliant and beautifully said.”

She squeezed his hands, her usual confidence returning. “I love you, buzzard.”

“I love you too, Fireheart. Let’s go talk about our amazing achievement.”

The day sped by in a blur of reporters, interviewers, teleprompters, practiced speeches, lights, cameras, and crew. When the last bleached-blonde anchor of the last interview of the day cut her crew’s cameras, Aelin flopped against her second-in-linguistic-command, Dr. Nehemia Ytger, the expert on ethnic African languages. 

“If I never see a news crew again, it’ll be too soon,” she sighed. “I’m beat.”

Nehemia snickered. “But we’re done talking about how proud we are that Maeve and her marvelous company have done such a grand service to the world.”

Aelin snorted softly. “Right. And now we servicepeople want to go home and take off our heels.”

“Amen to that.”

As the team filed out of the studio, Rowan made his way over to Aelin. “Holding up?”

“Not anymore,” she said, leaning casually into his side. “My heels are killing me, there’s a hairpin stabbing into my scalp, and I really, really need to pee.”

Rowan laughed, deep and husky. “Let’s get you home, then.”

“I’m stopping in the bathroom first.”

Just before she left the ladies’ room, Aelin heard voices in the break area. Familiar voices--Rowan’s, Maeve’s, and the snippy, borderline whiny tones of Remelle Frelau, who worked in the marketing department and had a hell of a boner for Rowan. 

“--looking at revenue over--” Maeve’s voice cut out, but from the gasps of the other two, the revenue was through the roof. 

“And it’s all thanks to this genius here,” drawled Remelle, who if Aelin had her guess was probably clinging onto Rowan like a platinum-blonde leech. 

“Ms. Frelau, this was the product of a team. No single person could possibly have made it happen alone.”

“Oh, call me Remelle, or even better Remy. And you’re the team leader, so you practically did create it by yourself.”

Aelin snickered to herself. Vapid bitch had no idea what she was saying. 

“That’s not how teams work, Ms. Frelau. We wouldn’t be here without Dr. Galathynius and Dr. Ytger’s language expertise, not to mention the creative genius of the engineers, graphic designers, linguists, and programmers.”

“Ms. Frelau, though her judgment is clearly biased, has a point, Mr. Whitethorn,” Mave said. “You demonstrated remarkable collaborative leadership qualities throughout this project, and I fully expect that you will continue to do so.” Maeve’s heels clicked away. Rowan’s voice followed her.

“Thank you, Ms. Ond, but I have to credit Dr. Galathynius--”

“Will you stop kissing that woman’s ass?” snorted Remelle. “Gods, she’s not worth your time or your praise; all she does is translate words into different languages and you idiots drool over that like it means anything.”

Aelin jerked like she’d been slapped. She knew Remelle was a self-centered, shallow, spiteful bitch, but she hadn’t known she would do this.

“--did more for this project than you and your useless whiteboard of catchphrases,” growled Rowan. 

“I don’t care what she ‘did for the project,’ Rowan, she’s never going to be good enough for you.”

“Thank you for caring about my welfare, Frelau, now please kindly fuck off.”

Aelin chose that moment to saunter out of the bathroom and head straight for Rowan, her face showing no hint of having heard that conversation. She did note with satisfaction Remelle’s vain attempt to march out of the room with some semblance of dignity. Too bad her heel caught on the seam of the hallway carpet and the break room’s tile flooring and she had to grab the doorframe to keep from collapsing. 

“You’re awfully quiet, Aelin.”

“Just thinking. Processing, really. It’s been a hell of a day.”

Rowan nodded. “I bet.”

“And hearing fucking Remelle rip into me for being useless…didn’t make it better.”

“Shit, you heard that?”

“Yeah. I heard that.” Her voice was hollow. 

Rowan pulled into their driveway and shut off the engine. Reaching across the console, he cupped Aelin’s face in his hands. “Aelin. You are brilliant. You are terrifyingly smart. You are a force of nature. Nothing, nothing you will ever do is useless. Don’t let that jealous bitch make you think you are less than the perfect woman.”

She smiled tentatively at him. “She…she told me before that last interview that I could never be enough for you. Because you--because of Lyria.”

Rowan raked a hand through his hair. “Ae, can we talk about this inside?”

That night, he told her about his former fiancé, Lyria. He told her about their whirlwind romance, their youthful dreams. He told her about the horrific crash that stole away Lyria’s life. A drunk trucker, a narrow pass in the mountains. He showed her the box in which he kept all the memories of that life. He cried. Aelin cried. He curled against her, let her comfort him.

“Sometimes, I wish she was still here. She’d understand everything. She always did.”

Aelin had no response. She let Rowan fall asleep, his weight shifting off her and into his bed, and looked through the box. Everything she saw served as another reminder that this was the first woman he loved, the woman who understood everything. 

She was worthy of him. 

But was Aelin?

The more she looked at Rowan and Lyria’s happiness, the more the answer solidified. 

No.

When Rowan woke up the next morning, Lyria’s box sat on Aelin’s side of the bed, a side that had not held Aelin.

He glanced out the window.

Her car was gone.

He got up and frantically paced through the house.

Everything she’d brought into his home was gone.

As was she.

~

Present day. 

Rowan opened his front door mechanically, pulled off his shoes, dropped his work backpack on its shelf, and was halfway to his bedroom before he realized he’d just opened his front door. His front door that was always locked. 

Someone was in his house.

Someone who either had a duplicate key or insanely good lockpicking skills.

Exactly one person owned a duplicate key to his house.

Aelin.

That’s impossible, she lives in Orynth, she can’t be here, he told the traitorous part of his brain that leapt with joy at seeing Aelin’s face again.

He turned around and made his way through the kitchen--nobody there--to the living room. He flicked on a lamp, casting a soft light around the room.

And nearly had a heart attack.

Aelin Galathynius sat on his couch. 

For a moment, he just gawked at her. She looked so…different. Older. Gone was the infectious smile that had captured his heart. Dark shadows smeared under her eyes, testament both to the long hours she devoted to her work and to recent sleepless nights. She was twisting a ring on her right hand, a familiar sign of her nerves. From his angle, Rowan could see a hint of dark script on her wrist. A tattoo. The Aelin he knew didn’t have tattoos.

“I’m not a ghost.” Her voice, weary and hollow, broke the tense silence.

Rowan crossed the room, propped an arm on the fireplace. “Why?”

“Why am I here? Why did I leave? Why did I cut you out of my life?”

“Everything.” He couldn’t keep the waver from his voice, but his eyes burned into hers.

She took a steadying breath. “I’m here to apologize, first of all. I’m here to face what I ruined and to try and start mending it. I’m here to come to terms with everything I broke when I left three years ago.”

Whatever he’d expected her to say, it certainly wasn’t that.

“I’m sorry, Rowan. I’m sorry I left like that. I was…I was scared.”

“You can’t just run away from your fears, Aelin!” He couldn’t keep the frustration from his tone. “You can’t just abandon someone when you have a bad day!”

“I’m sorry! I know I shouldn’t have left! I know I can’t run from my fears; I’ve spent the last three years trying and fucking failing to do that! But I don’t know what else to do.”

“Saying something about it would have been a good first step.” 

“I’m bad at emotions, Rowan. I tried. It wasn’t enough.”

“That’s not a good enough excuse.”

Aelin flicked a tear from her face. “I know.” Her shoulders slumped. “I’m so sorry, Rowan. I should never have left. I let some stupid comment root into my head and make me doubt myself. I made myself believe I would never be good enough for you. I left you. I loved you, and I still left you. I still love you, even though I’ve tried to suppress it. I can never make up for that. I…I just wanted to tell you how much I’ve regretted that horrible decision all these years. I want you to be happy, Rowan, I--”

“How am I supposed to be happy without a source?” He’d dropped onto the couch, close enough to touch her but still keeping his distance.

“What?”

“You didn’t just take yourself away, Aelin. You were my happiness. I’ve spent three fucking years trying to make myself believe I’m better without you in my life, and I can’t.”

She was unabashedly crying by that point. “What do you want me to do? How can I make up for abandoning you?”

“Stay.”

Her gaze locked onto his, both of their eyes pooling with tears.

“Stay with me, Fireheart.”

“But--”

“I never stopped loving you either.”

A choked sob ripped out of Aelin. Rowan couldn’t hold himself in check any longer; he reached out and tugged her gently into his arms. To his shock, she didn’t resist, burying her face into his chest as sobs shook her shoulders. When she calmed, he tilted her chin up.

“Will you stay, Aelin?”

“Yes. Even though I will never deserve your forgiveness, yes.”

~

Translations:

* = “that pinched old whore who couldn’t convince a dick to come within ten metres of her if she dressed up provocatively” (Italian)

** = loosely translated as “Fucking hell, I can’t get drunk off this garbage.” (in order, Russian (badly phonetically spelled out because Rowan POV), Spanish, German, Spanish again, French) (the Russian doesn’t directly translate, so it could mean several different variations of expletive)

~

Might there be a second part? Perhaps......

[lostbbygorl]

IN ANOTHER LIFE, FOR SURE: EREMIKA

Genre: FLUFF, MODERN AU, SLIGHT CANONVERSE AU, REINCARNATION AU

~~~~~~

Once again, Mikasa lay curled up in a ball like a kitten on top of Eren’s grave. Armin and Jean watched the sight of the young girl refusing to leave the side of her lover, even in death, a month after his passing, with melancholy in their eyes.

Mikasa told herself and everyone else that she was fine. She was strong, and nothing could change the past (Well, Eren could…). She knew she was lying, and so did everyone else, but what’s a girl to do if the man she’s loved since childhood were to never awaken again, and that too for the safety of humanity? She sobbed and she sobbed, and then she covered up all traces that she sobbed. It was a regular cycle. It was tiring. Nobody knew when it would end, but everyone mustered up all the sensitivity they had in them, and didn’t pressure her to make it end.

But enough is enough, and we all hit our breaking point. Mikasa Ackerman hit hers on a peaceful morning in a bed of bright purple flowers as a majestic bird flew over her. Connie had realized that Mikasa was sleeping longer than usual, and when he stooped down to shake her gently so that she’d rise, the horrified boy noticed that she was completely still, and devoid of any pulse, breath, or heartbeat.

And so, the last Ackerman woman was buried beside her lover, and teary eyes surrounded their eternal slumbers as friends and family said goodbye to them one last time.

The second time Mikasa opened her eyes, she was in a room with pastel walls and toys littered on the floor. Hey grey orbs were met by two overjoyed faces. One of a blond man, and the other of a raven haired woman. They fed her milk, played with her, and gave her unconditional love. And so, Mikasa grew into a beautiful, sensible young woman for the second time. Her life was a dream! Two amazing parents, a group of loyal friends, and unmatched beauty to top it all of, along with good grades of course.

But there was something she absolutely couldn’t explain! Mikasa would sometimes wake up in a cold sweat after a horrible nightmare, and sometimes a queer dream. These dreams didn’t occur every night, but they weren’t terribly infrequent either. Mikasa saw gigantic, hideous man eating beasts, and young ones around her age whooshing threw the air with blades to decapitate the beasts. She often saw herself behead the creatures, and she saw her best friend, Armin beside her too, along with her other friends. The less scary ones were just as confusing. She saw visions of herself on horseback riding through a dense forest, she saw visions of herself sparring with teens in military style uniforms. But the most confusing dreams, and the most common ones, consisted of a tall boy with dark hair and turquoise eyes.

She saw herself run beside him and fight beside him. She caught his name twice. What was it again? Oh, yeah, Eren Yeager. Mikasa had no idea why she saw this boy so often, and why a part of her mourned for him and yearned for him too. Oftentimes when she had nothing else to do, she’d wonder who he was, and if he did exist, was he doing well? A familiar sense of fondness washed over her everytime she thought of him.

It was finally time for her to go to college. The first day of college fell on the first snowfall, and it was cold outside. Mikasa shot Armin and Sasha a quick text to see if they were waiting outside the college campus for her as planned the week before, and then proceeded to leave her apartment, the keychains of her black Jansport backpack dangling as she walked.

The college halls bustled with chatter as new students and welcoming teachers conversed with each other and scurried around to find their classes. Armin was going off about his linguistics major and his excitement for his first class. Mikasa listened with a small smile on her face, till a particular new student nearly made her heart stop…

Standing in front of her was the boy she had been seeing in her sleep for the past 19 years. He was a tall, well built boy with his shoulder length hair tied in a halfway man bun, gleaming turquoise eyes, and a boyish smile that the girls definitely went wild over! He was currently talking to a shorter, lean female professor who Armin mentioned was Ms. Hange Zoe, the biomedicals head. “I feel like that subject will be the most interesting, what about you Mika? Mika? Hello! Earth to Mikasa!”, Armin said, taking her attention back to him. “Huh? Sorry. I zoned out”, she murmured.

“You were staring at that dude”

“Wasn’t”

“Was”

“Wasn’t”

“Hey, guys. Are yall new here too?”, the third voice joined in. It was Eren Yeager! Or at least, his doppleganger.

“Uh yeah. Hey, I’m Armin, and this is my best friend Mikasa”, Armin introduced.

“Nice to meet you both. I’m Eren”, the boy returned. The blood in Mikasa’s ears rushed and her hands quivered at Eren’s words.

“So, what are your subjects?”, Eren asked.

“I’m doing linguistics”, Armin chirped.

“Um, I’m doing psychology, Eren”, Mikasa stammered as she looked into his all too familiar eyes.

“Oh wow. Me and you are both doing psychology then. I shall see you in class”, he grinned.

“I wanna hang with you too though, Armin”, he added in a friendly manner. Armin and Eren made more small talk as Mikasa’s brain whirred 1000 miles per second. How? What the? One thing was for sure though, she’d get to the bottom of this boy no matter what!

“Um, can I have your numbers?”, Eren asked.

“Yeah sure. Armin, give him my number. I gotta rush to the toilet real quick”

“Sure, Mika”.

Mikasa ran to the nearest ladies washroom and locked herself in a free cubicle. There, she hyperventilated and attempted to calm down.

Her dreams would for sure be getting more intense tonight.

The fluttering of her heart and the tiny rays of sadness that she linked with this familiarly unfamiliar boy sure had gotten more intense….

[mcrmadness]

Today I have been searching for videos about Berlin dialect, cos I'm a language and linguistics nerd who's also very much into dialects, but all these videos are just. Not that educational. They are mostly targeted to the beginners learning the language (and I'm no longer one!), so there are not many examples. They just keep saying what's common, and most of the time it's the same aspects I already know about the dialect. And usually it's someone who doesn't even speak the dialect themselves. OR they just read out sentences in different dialects but it's all so fast I can't follow nor compare properly, so it's as good as nothing.

I think I managed to find one (1) video that was at least more informative, even tho that also focused on the same details but at least they had there someone from Berlin and explained everything in peace, but not in this. Super easy and slow pace most language teaching channels for beginners do.

And the rest of the video result are something I have already watched before... maybe I should try again but this time in German. If I just manage to understand the German spoken in those, there MIGHT be a bit more content in German. Maybe.

(And in fact I'm interested in German dialects in general, but most of the videos are just these fake-overjoyed takes on something very shallow and almost look like "look what I can do!" type of fun fact videos that don't actually offer you much. Then there are also videos about the topic from non-natives, and sorry but I don't really trust an American talking about German dialects as much as I trust a native German. No matter how fluent they would be, if it's only your second language, you can't understand the deepest of quirks of that language. I mean, for example: English is not my first language but I speak it fluently, yet it's impossible for me to know or even understand stuff to the level of natives, especially what comes to culture etc.)