#they were both clean

[extraclwnporeal]

Every time Castiel heals Dean, he's actually doing two miracles: healing Dean and cleaning both of them. The angel figured the human didn't like to see his own blood on both of them during the fights, so Castiel just get rid of it at once when he heals Dean.

But then, Castiel was weak, for whatever reason. He didn't have much energy and wasn't showing it to anyone, but still needed to heal Dean. Castiel laid his hands on his forehead and neck — firmly, mostly to ground himself — and healed him, but he only had the strength to do that part. He couldn't clean them, he didn't have the grace to do so. Castiel stumbled, and Dean gripped him tight. His angel's hands were dirty, bloodstained — and that blood was his.

Dean carried Castiel to the room in the motel they were staying, for he was too weak to walk. He laid the angel down, and only his vivid blue eyes followed his movements. Dean got a rag and a bottle of water and a spray of alcohol and began cleaning him. His hands, his face, his neck. Dean changed Castiel's clothes, even though he was somewhat recovered now. Dean kissed Castiel's hands, still red-y stained with blood and now smelling of alcohol. Still, they were Castiel's hands, the same that healed him and the same that wielded his blood.

Dean kissed Castiel, and then they were clean.

[bloominglegumes]

i love normal guys doomed by the narrative

[ropes3amthoughts]

This is such a mess but do you guys get my vision

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

snf sob... his favorite regular... wailing in the club rn

[ofdarklands]

mitr'a's childhood drawings

(with some help from mutti)

[tinyufoboss]

hmmmmm 2+ years of tomgreg: a retrospective

[alonsoings]

lando needs to get over himself and max needs to own up when he’s in the wrong amen please be adults xoxo

[undertheredhood]

at some point, jason and stephanie have tricked the entire batfamily into believing that they’ve swapped bodies, like in the freaky friday movie.

[batsplat]

February 2014 (text from Mat Oxley's The Valentino Rossi Files: Everything I've ever written about VR: From 2008 to now):

During the winter the nine-time champ spent more time than usual thrashing round his dirt track ranch, keeping himself mentally and physically sharp and getting used to a motorcycle moving around beneath him. He knows that Marc Marquez’s ability to ride on the ragged edge with a more muscular, more sideways style is changing MotoGP, so he needs to change with it. Rossi may never look as spectacular as Marquez on a dirt bike or a MotoGP bike, but both his former and current crew chiefs believe he can do better than he did last year, when Marquez made him look rather second rate.

Rossi on inviting Marquez to the ranch:

"Yeah, for sure, a lot of time. But I think that Emilio [Alzamora, Marquez's manager] is not very happy that Marc come because he said that after we make a race and maybe it's dangerous." (x)

A Sideways Glance at Misano 2014, including pre-event karting on Wednesday night where Marquez reportedly struggled:

Misano 2014 (text from Mat Oxley's Valentino Rossi: All His Races):

^ Márquez won the first ten races of 2014 and this was the first time all year he was beaten in a straight duel. He couldn't handle Rossi's pace at Misano, so he ended up losing the front and falling.

Valentino was fast throughout practice and secured his first front-row start of 2014. [Rossi was asked after qualifying about the threat posed by Marquez and Lorenzo, identifying Lorenzo as the favourite before adding, "But you never know with Marc. He's a bastard."] In the race he rode better than in years, hanging his upper body inside the motorcycle more than ever before to increase turning. He snatched the lead from Lorenzo and then fended off Márquez, who struggled to find enough grip to match Vale. At one-third distance the world champion pushed it too far and slid off, so Vale cruised home 1.6 second ahead of Lorenzo. His crew had done a great job of creating maximum grip via adjustment to chassis balance and electronics set-up. His 107th GP victory showed he was once again as fast as anyone, because when he won at Assen 2013 he didn't have to beat Márquez, Lorenzo or Pedrosa, who were all injured. "It's fantastic to come back to victory again," he beamed after his first win with [new crew chief Silvano] Galbusera. "I knew we could fight and I pushed from the start. I always work hard and never give up and trust that days like this can happen."

^ The breakthrough win at Misano. For the first time since his return to Yamaha he had gone head-to-head with Jorge Lorenzo and Marc Márquez and beaten them both. From this moment another world title was a possibility.

(x for more details)

Aragon 2014 press conference:

Rossi: Revenge at the ranch! No, first of all, we enjoy a lot, because have a lot of riders and also from superbike and a lot of bike on the track and was a good day, yeah. Marc was very fast, already fast like me at the first time, as always, and I think he did the best lap time but I won the race so is 1-1, so is... come si dice, pareggio pareggio [tied]. Marquez: Yeah, yeah, was really nice, you know, I was really [impressed] to see his circuit, his home, because in the future I would like to have, because was impressive and riding there was all the riders was really nice and... like Valentino says, we were there fighting together like in Misano race more or less, but yeah... the important thing is that we enjoy it and was really nice to ride there with him and also with the other riders.

Valentino Rossi, Marc Marquez and the Ranch

[yuriyuruandyuraart]

motorcycle sketch featuring cross!! >:)

[airrec]

Let's talk about the relationship between "personal level redemption (i.e. one character starts making changes for the better)" and "the corrupt institution/context in which the characters are developed to hurt each other".

Now, one or two characters reaching the point where they say "that's it, no more, I don't want this, this is not right, I am choosing not to continue on this path" is great, don't get me wrong. Redemption (AKA the path towards trying to do better, to make reparations, to not repeat the mistakes of before - forgiveness is not an obligation here, only that the character has recognised their hurtful actions and has ceased them and is now trying to do better) on a personal level is so important, and should not be diminished in value.

However, it is also simply and factually true that when it comes to the context in which certain characters have made those terrible choices or been forced to become something they otherwise might never have become, that in order for there to be actual long term solutions, those corrupt systems, those violent institutions - those must be dismantled. These things must stop in order for the system to not just keep on chugging, to not just break the next set of characters as it broke the last ones.

Sometimes, a character cannot realistically meaningfully travel very far down their path to redemption before something changes or shifts within that system in order to allow them that. For example, a character who is constantly on the defensive because people are hunting them down to try to kill them doesn't have the option of not defending themselves (usually with violence) unless they choose to die at their hunters' hands. Even if they do not start fights, they can't disengage if others start them first; in order to stop, others must also stop.

It is unfair, in contexts where there is a great and systematic corruption, to place the onus of a "happy ending" on singular people if there is no intention of dismantling the system that gave birth to such horrors. How cruel, how unjust, to take one person and say to them, "this is all, totally and completely, your fault, and it is your responsibility to change because you are the thing that needs fixing here."

Think of it like climate change: yeah, sure, putting your rubbish into the correct bins and reducing your personal carbon footprint etc is helpful. But what change you can make, if you make it alone, if you make it isolated, will never meaningfully chip away at the global level of pollution caused by the whole system. What needs to happen is a lot of people banding together to force the system to change, and for those who benefit from it to be held accountable. Because that's the other element of tragedy: there is nearly always someone benefitting from the tragedy, and it is not often those who are the most blamed or slandered.

Yourself may be a good place to start, but it is not where it ends. It is a long hard road, to the recognition that there are many factors that contribute towards tragedy - to the personal choices of characters, and to the reasons they made those choices in the first place; the action = reaction, the consequences, the pressures, the emotional and mental factors, the physical factors, the numerous interweaving stories of everyone trying to protect them and theirs, and sometimes in doing so hurting others.

Redemption and understanding how tragedy came to be is rarely as simple as we want it to be, and this complexity is a feature, not a bug. If you want to be able to point at someone and say "there; that is the bad thing" then 99/100 times I would first take a good look around to see what made the bad thing bad. Then I would take one good look at yourself in the mirror, and ask yourself if you could have been the bad thing, too, if things had shaken out just that little bit differently - the answer might not be one that comforts you.

[cherubchoirs]

Ok... now we NEED that family photo of the 4 of them together. Raphael just keeping everything positive despite the fact Gabriel is a fallen angel and Michael is basically rotted. How would that sort of reunion go anyway?

they're doing great!!!

there is. a lot of strain, but raphael is determined not to allow it to create so much tension that it eventually causes collapse. plus he does begin to see that all of the issues they have now, at least on an emotional level, are things that have been there for EONS, so maybe it was about time they had to face those problems. obviously michael and gabriel's relationship is the biggest issue, and it goes both ways - mike of course has massive problems dealing with gabriel's fall and his choice in v1, while gabe does feel that michael kind of abandoned them and then he comes back to everything all fucked up to pass moral judgment??? raphael is similarly frustrated if not to the same extent, with his family being more important to him than anything else when he can no longer be so sure that their existence is infinite and assured. uriel is dealing with severe anxiety over it all since his life had been incredibly quiet with little drama involved - he wrote god's knowledge constantly, a meditative practice he can no longer channel. and not knowing EVERYTHING is actually really stressing him out, plus he's really, really terrible at approaching interpersonal issues and he's by far the most introverted of the four so he can easily get lost in the shuffle. and they're all just intensely worried about michael besides, mentally and physically since it's actually hard to tell where he's doing worse. but at the end of it all, there is still love in them, and something in each of them refuses to let this die...it's just going to be quite the process finding peace again

[marxism-transgenderism]

..

[grinchwrapsupreme]

for a show that's fundamentally about family it's weird that we've never heard even a passing mention of Pete White or Dr. Mrs. The Monarch's families. Like we saw Sheila's wedding and her family wasn't there, and you can't tell me Rose hasn't asked Pete about his mother at least once. We know more about Brock Samson's family than theirs. Hell we know more about Underbite's family than theirs

[asteroidaffection]

what would you do if we never made a sound?

[once-upon-the-earth]

ok i just remembered the weird amount of romantic stuff people at the scouts threw at my unknowingly aro ten year old ass (like the time they forced me to kiss a guy in front of the whole camp it was weird as fuck) and I think I can say in retrospect that this shit fucked me up a little