#this was one of the four works i wrote my religious studies final paper about
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why do i think jesus was trans? well, i dont, actually, i dont think so at least?
but i watch my husband poke tenderly at my top surgery scars, wondrous, almost disbelieving, despite having seen them over and over, and i think of jesus feeling a hand probing his side, fingers curling in for proof, proof that this is real
but ive used enough t needles now to make my own halo of them, my own crown of thorns
but i think of birth, and death, and resurrection, and i think of how i had to die to be born again, that to save myself i had to kill the part of me, the parts of me, the me, that no longer served me, that never did
but when i woke up from surgery, sore and confused and lighter than i had ever felt, i knew more certainly than i knew anything else, that this was the first day of my life
maybe i do think jesus is trans, and even if he isnt, i know for a fact he knows what it means to have to abandon everything to live the life you were meant to
#tomas tvivel klar by elisabeth ohlsen wallin#this was one of the four works i wrote my religious studies final paper about#transness is holy and in christ's image i think#in one way or another#(paper was on art that queered christ)
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Interlude 1: Lessons From The Old Testament
3/27/2021
It is a lovely Saturday afternoon in Las Vegas. And I mean genuinely beautiful spring weather! It’s 73 degrees outside with a perfectly pleasant breeze that would be great accompaniment for a hike in Red Rock canyon. Alas, I must report for work in an hour.
In following my plan to read the whole Bible in a year, I’ve been working through the books of Samuel and Kings for the last 2 weeks. This morning I wrote down some of the lessons I’ve gleaned from the Old Testament in general, but these 4 books in particular.
1. Am I listening for God’s voice? 1 Samuel 3:10: “…Speak; for thy servant heareth.” No, God doesn’t use an audible voice today as He did with Samuel, but that’s because we now have his Holy Word in the form the Bible. We also have the Holy Spirit if we are truly born again. I need to make sure that I’m always listening for the Spirit and seeking God’s wisdom in all things. I should never be so busy with daily life, nor should the noise of the world be so loud, that I don’t hear God when He speaks to me.
2. God does not tolerate sin. Eli was a servant of the Lord, but he failed to rear his sons to also fear and obey God. Because of this, God took the lives of all three and gave the priesthood to Samuel. Same for the nations of Israel and Judah. Throughout the books of Samuel and Kings, God punished his chosen people over and over as they continually disobeyed his commandments and turned to idol worship. There were occasional respites, short periods where certain kings would obey and fear God; David and his son Solomon, for example. Unfortunately, those two – and two or three others in the succeeding generations – were the exception, not the rule.
Am I always obeying the Lord’s commandments? Am I living my life in complete service to Him? When I do sin, am I genuinely repentant? God will forgive me, His love and mercy are as vast as the universe He created. But He is also a jealous God, and He will punish me when I turn from Him, as a loving father will discipline his child when he strays. I should always be striving to please God and obey Him always in all things.
3. There are consequences for sin. God’s divine patience with Israel and Judah finally reached an end in the latter half of the book of 2nd Kings. He delivered His people into the hands of their enemies, and both nations were exiled into Babylon. Chapter 17: 7-23 summarizes the sins of Israel and Judah and God’s punishment for their continual sin.
Even though God will always forgive me when I sin, He will not spare me the consequences of my sin. Therefore, I need to always be seeking Him first and be making good choices.
4. God will reward obedience and faithfulness to Him. David was chosen as King of Israel because he had a heart that was always seeking God. Even in the worst times of his life, when he was on the run and hiding from Saul, David never lost his faith that God was always with him, and that He would take care of him. (Psalms 23 & 46.) God rewarded this faithfulness time and again throughout David’s life.
Same goes for Solomon. When God spoke to Solomon early in his life, Solomon requested not riches or long life but, instead, the wisdom to lead the nation of Israel. God rewarded Solomon’s request with not only wisdom but riches as well.
Now, it should also be noted that, even though David and Solomon always sought to please and obey God, they also sinned. Both men were polygamists, and David even committed murder to try to cover his sin of covetousness and adultery. But God used them anyway, and each still suffered the consequences of their sin. Which brings us to the final point:
5. God always keeps his promises. The Israelites were never completely wiped from the face of the Earth. God had made a covenant with Abraham, and He had also promised His people salvation through the lineage of David. Therefore, while He allowed His people to suffer the consequences of their disobedience, He still protected them and kept His word to them.
God will do the same for me. No matter how many times I stray, I will never lose my salvation. God has promised me that He is preparing a place for me in Heaven, and He will keep that promise. But neither is that a license to go do whatever the hell I want. Refer back to lesson #3.
What I also found most striking about these four books was the clear parallel of the nation of Israel/Judah at this time and the United States today. Over the past year, I have argued with strangers on Facebook who try to convince me that America is not now and never was a Christian nation. That belief utterly baffles me. The phrase “In God We Trust” is still stamped on all our coins. The Declaration of Independence uses the phrase “divine Creator”. Despite all the scrubbing and washing by today’s social justice warriors, it’s still a known fact that all our founding fathers believed in the basic religious principles taught in the scriptures. Those principles are scattered throughout the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and other documents such as the Federalist Papers. George Washington and his compatriots might not all have been born again Christians, and they were most certainly as flawed, failing and sinful as you and me. But they regarded the Bible as an essential guide to the basic facts of our flawed, failing, sinful human nature, and they crafted a carefully constructed form of government that was designed to enhance the best in all of us and, by the same effect, discourage the worst.
Today, that government is in serious threat of being dismantled from the inside out. The founding fathers had not anticipated what Paul wrote to Timothy: “This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.” (2 Timothy 3:1-5)
Today’s generation is all about the self. Just as Israel and Judah in the Old Testament continually turned away from God to worship false gods and idols, so we today have turned away from God to worship the idol of ‘self’. There is not a single news headline lately that doesn’t bear some form of the phrase “personal rights”, or “individual truth”, or “living as him/her/itself”. Everyone screams about their own “truth” and that their “rights and freedom of expression” are all that matters, especially when it comes to the homosexual and transgender movements. Everyone’s rights are more important than everyone else’s, and our nation has become a people who are “…lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God.” (And no, before you even say it, I am not referring to the COVID/mask/pandemic government mandates. That specific case is a whole ‘nother argument where, yes, personal rights and freedoms most definitely matter.)
And, just as He did to Israel and Judah at the end of 2nd Kings, God’s divine patience is rapidly running out for America. God delivered Israel and Judah into the hands of their enemies, the Babylonians. His chosen people spent seventy years in exile as punishment for their wickedness and their disobedience. Something I didn’t know before reading the commentary in my MacArthur study Bible is that Israel never returned from that captivity. Several thousand Israelites had migrated to the kingdom of Judah prior to the Babylonian captivity, so that all twelve tribes were still intact seventy years later, but it was only the former kingdom of Judah that actually returned, whole and united as the ‘new’ nation of Israel, seventy years later.
Think about that. God kept his promise to Abraham. The whole of His chosen people were not utterly wiped from the face of the earth, but the meager, reunited nation that returned from Babylonian captivity was nowhere near the size or power that it once was. God’s wrath was justified and vast.
If you study world history, you will find that ANY nation that has ever put God first has ALWAYS prospered. Think of the Victorian era of 19th century Great Britain. Queen Victoria was – and still is – revered as one of England’s greatest monarchs, and it’s because she believed that her empire was blessed by God. The evidence is self-explanatory. At that time, England – and the United States – were considered by all the world as the greatest powers, and the best lands of equal opportunity by all those seeking a better life. Our founding fathers built this nation on the premise that God had created every man and woman – no matter his/her race or station in life – equal. That ALL of us were endowed by our Divine Creator with certain, inalienable rights. And that, as long as we continued to recognize the source of our blessing and our greatness as a nation, we would prosper.
Sadly, that cannot be said of us today. We, as a nation, have fallen so far from God’s grace that I wonder what our exile will look like. Though I have not yet done a close reading and study of the book of Revelation, I am fairly certain that nowhere in that book is there a mention of any western nation such as ours. We are rapidly losing our reputation as a world super power, and I believe that America as we know it today will not exist by the time chapter one of Revelation begins. And, right now, it’s not hard to see why.
John 1:4-5 says, “In Him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in the darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.” (Emphasis mine.) America has become filled with great darkness. For me, personally, that is my only mission for the rest of my life. I will do what I can to be a light for Christ and the gospel as we get closer and closer to that first chapter of Revelation. God’s wrath is coming, and only those who have believed on His name and accepted Him as their Lord and savior will be spared His judgment.
The only answer for today’s corrupt generation is the command from God found in Matthew 6:33, “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” For those who are still ignoring that command, Isaiah warns, “Seek ye the Lord while He may be found, call ye upon Him while he is near: let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon.”
Amen.
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Nostalgiaholic - The Remix
When I used to look up at the night sky alone as a child, I imagined a sinister, infinite, black, blanket sprinkled with glitter. Although, when my eyes followed the tip of my Uncle Jon’s finger, as he both traced celestial, stick-figures in the same sky and narrated their mythic, Greek stories, space always transformed from that lifeless blanket and into a destination to be explored.
Jon, at times, was so inspired by space and space travel, he filled canvases dedicated to the filtered visuals he discerned. As a dedicated science-fiction nerd, his paintings certainly had their share of stylized spaceships, laser beams, and explosions. But as an equal part, planetarium-loving, star chart-studying, telescope-owning, amateur astronomer, Jon’s celestial backgrounds were wild, bubbling layers of greens, whites, blues, and reds, instead of a simple, flat, all-consuming blackness. Those paintings showed the cosmos as a tangible, topographic map ready to be explored, and not a deep, infinite sea of loneliness.
That being said, I used to daily study a picture Jon painted of an astronaut floating upside down in the aurora borealis lights of Jon’s interpretation of space. The figure held tight to the lifeline coming from his spacesuit at the waist with his left hand. However, the same lifeline extended from the suit like a piece of floating spaghetti getting smaller, until it vanished in the distant horizon. His right hand (so big that it appeared to explode from the canvas), desperately reached out for salvation.
The reflective shield on the helmet hinted at the impending doom of the astronaut. The reflection didn’t show a ship or even another hand reaching back, instead there were simply more endless miles of lively, colorful flashes of the space setting to die alone in.
No matter how much I wanted to imagine hope for the character, there was none… at least for him.
I often wonder if Jon’s painting was inspired by one of his favorite movies, the 1968 Stanley Kubrick classic 2001: A Space Odyssey. When it finally, came on network T.V. one Saturday afternoon in the 1980s, I was excited to see it. Hell, if Jon liked it, I would certainly like it.
False. It turns out there were two barriers to me enjoying 2001: A Space Odyssey -- Star Wars and silence.
One summer, my brother and I bragged about watching Star Wars 47 times on HBO.
I thoroughly enjoyed "The Bar Scene". Especially the part in which a handsome, tanned, mischievous Han Solo (brown, feathered hair parted evenly in the middle) tried in vain to smooth-talk the twitchy-trigger-fingered, reptilian, green-faced, bug eyed, intergalactic thug Greedo (bald head).
Shit, reciting Greedo’s opening line to Han for anyone who’d listen (“Oo-nah too-tah, Solo?”) is still one of my favorite past-times.
In Star Wars, everyone could cover vast distances in the dark, dusty, intensely cold, INFINITE vacuum of space. It’s as easy as a con-artist pulling a few levers, confidently bellowing the order, “Punch it, Chewie”, and going faster than light without having to even buckle a seatbelt.
In reality, distances in outer space were not so easily traversed.
The Earth’s moon is 238,000 miles away. It took Neil Armstrong and the fellas six days to get from Earth, to the moon, and back, all while being cooped up in basically a large, flying port-a-potty. Their spacesuits looked about as comfortable as wearing every outfit in the average American’s good-credit-infused, stuffed closet AT ONCE.
This detail of space travel was not lost ‘Stanley Kubrick’s flick. Even though there are a beautiful array of stunning special effects, it often felt like the audience traveled each second of the 365 million mile trip from the Moon to Jupiter. There were no visual cues of a blurring landscape to both gage speed and generate a sense of movement. The stars are perched in the background like apathetic teenagers forced to sit at the table during dinner, when they’d rather be in the solitude of their own rooms.
Body movements and conversations in the film were also slowed, as if everyone was walking in a filled swimming pool. Mix in a relaxing soundtrack of orchestral music, and it’s the perfect lullaby capable of depowering my movie-watching enthusiasm. In fact, the first five times I tried to watch the movie, I would fall asleep at an early scene featuring a space stewardess silently laboring down the aisle in her gravity “grip shoes” on her way to ultimately retrieve a floating pen for a sleeping passenger while composer Johann Strauss’s famous waltz, The Blue Danube, rhythmically chants in the background.
A few years ago, I tried one final time to watch the movie. And this time with the help of a streaming video platform, I was able to pause, re-group, pause, re-group, pause, re-group, and finally watch the movie my uncle loved.
The striking thing about the movie is how quiet it actually was. For much of the movie, there are no musical cues to warn of danger or intrigue. Dialogue was conducted over the subtle drone of machines simply doing their mundane jobs of keeping the enormous spacecraft running during its long flight to Jupiter. Life and death sequences were not given intense music accompaniment like traditional horror movies. It’s as if Kubrick was saying, “People’s lives aren’t being scored by some musician to bookmark key events. Life is merely something that happens -- even in space.”
It’s this absence of audible hints that makes 2001: A Space Odyssey uncomfortably realistic, as if the audience was watching a livestream of a computer gaining sentience, refusing to die (be turned off) and fighting off his oppressors (the flight crew).
I’ve read that when a “vacuum” exists, somehow all of nature rushes to fill that empty hole. So it’s funny that many science experiments happen in conditions that closely resemble a vacuum, in an effort to ensure results unweighted by additional stimuli. Interestingly enough, because the movie is set in the vast, unforgiving, vacuum of space, Kubrick’s storytelling, in essence, becomes an experiment to determine if audiences will stay engaged without the traditional musical trappings. Indeed, this stark story about the thrilling birth of strange, other-worldly life injected energy into overall science fiction mythology, and also into my young uncle.
Over the past 11 years, I have written a fairly regular Facebook post titled Reasons I Know I’m Getting Old. When I started this, Facebook seemed to simply be a 21st century photo album, in which many people posted similar, stiff, smiling, posed pictures and inspiring quotes which suggested my extended online community was living their own collective happily ever afters.
But it was boring...
I mean, I loved my kids too, but were only my kids getting whoopings and other childhood punishments? My wife was awesome too, but was I the only person still having trouble translating to her the humor in my daily fart symphonies? Was no one else dealing with the often deflating, drudgery of the work-place? Was parenting a lifelong crap-shoot for me only? Because there was no connection to what I was seeing on my finger strolls on my phone, I was having a hard time wanting to even own a Facebook account.
Therefore, on April 14, 2009, I conducted an experiment: How would my friends respond to a post that showed some dissatisfaction? Nothing political or religious, just everyday grumblings. I wrote:
“[Barry Huff] is dragging in from coaching his daughter's basketball team only to be greeted by Cap'n Crunch and a [sic] yet another pile of papers to grade!”
It received nine comments (four of those were my own). And one of those commenters hinted that they understood the challenge of managing the grading paperload.
Facebook soon became a sliver into my reality normally hidden, when I walked into my home and shut the door for anyone who wanted to see access. Initially, reposting fill-in-the blank lists, or other people’s videos, didn’t interest me. I just wanted folks to know it was okay to not have all the answers. Here I was, boogers and all.
But the experiment gathered a more scientific component in March 2020 -- the addition of an actual vacuum.
In March 2020, the United States of America instituted a national quarantine in the hope of limiting the possibility of infection from the rapidly spreading “severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)”, shortened simply to the “Coronavirus”. I suspect that the horrified wails of a certain mexican beer company sharing part of the same name as the virus (after having carefully crafted years of popular commercials associating its product with serene, relaxing beach scenes) are still heard by masked customers now filling their shopping carts with other adult beverages. Thus ensuring (at least in a few inebriated minds) binge drinking episodes without sudden, beer-birthed, pockets of community spread.
During this quarantine, the noise of my life (reporting to a building to teach, side-hustles, sporting events, car travel, movies, fast food) disappeared. And with that sudden vacuum, came the desire to collect and revise the writings I posted about the uncertainty of navigating adulthood.
And while I still worry if I have the skill to create something that gives a clearer picture of my true self to my wife and kids, each vignette is a piece of the mosaic of my humanity. And hopefully, this collection of blessed fallibility won’t be unnecessarily camouflaged during the stories told at my funeral one day, as attendees gulp down heaping portions of smothered pork steak, collard greens, macaroni, and apple pie piled on their sagging, disposable plates.
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Chapter 3 - Secret Organizations Throughout History
When I explained the MM method to my editor, he went into a frenzy, a word that here means “a state of joy due to the possibility of getting rich by selling several publications that will describe the chronology of historical documents whose general public shows interest."
My editor has sponsored several chronological studies, and has been publishing numerous brochures about publications such as the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Vaticanic Codex, Plato's Dialogues, Flavius Josephus: The Unauthorized Autobiography (Also Known As The Life of Flavius Josephus) The Red Book, among many others, spanning many years of human history, from the earliest days until the third world war. With the help of the results found by these other chronological research groups, associated with the results of my own research, I could relate some events recorded by Lemony Snicket with some specific years.
The earliest event recorded by Lemony Snicket is found in the book entitled "The Slippery Slope." (TSS) Lemony cites an account involving Adam and Eve, who had to flee a garden facing snake problems. According to Lemony Snicket, the event is recorded in the Holy Bible. I contacted the group in Tel Aviv, and according to them, when applying the MM Method in the Holy Bible, the event recorded by Lemony Snicket occurred in about 4,000 BCE.
According to the group in Tel Aviv, there is no evidence that Adam or Eve was part of any secret organization. However, apparently the snake in question was part of an organization, and was apparently leading the first Schism to be recorded. More information on this subject can be found in the Tel Aviv Brochure.
The next event related to VFD formation is in the book The Wide Window (TWW), also written by Lemony Snicket. In chapter 12, Lemony describes the events involving a man named Alexander the Great.
According to Lemony Snicket, Alexander the Great was a Greek conqueror. Based on this information, I requested help from the Samothrace Archaeological Research Group. The group sent me photographs of the manuscript named Historiarum Alexandri Magni Macedonis Libri Qui Supersunt (aka the Biography of Alexander the Great, Written by Someone Else, Not Himself). I told this to my editor, and he said, "No one will be interested in that." Therefore, I myself had to apply the MM method on the document. I am glad to have done so, as I have found a lot of useful information about VFD formation.
Lemony Snicket wrote: "Alexander the Great lived more than two thousand years ago." Whereas the TWW book was Lemony Snicket's third written book about the Baudelaires, and the first of the books was written in 1999 AD, one can conclude that Lemony Snciket believed that Alexander the Great lived before the year 1 BCE.
Applying the MM method to the book Historiarum Alexandri Magni Macedonis Libri Qui Supersunt, I calculated that Alexander the Great was born on July 20, 356 BCE and died on June 10, 323 BCE (He lived only 33 years, which was a life short for humans at the time). So Lemony Snicket's statement that Alexander lived more than two thousand years before TWW's writing is chronologically correct, according to my research.
Lemony describes a specific event involving this conqueror. Lemony wrote:
"Besides invading other peoples countries and forcing them to whatever he said, Alexander the Great was famous for something called the Gordian knot. The Gordian Knot was a fancy knot tied in a piece of rope by a king named Gordius. Gordius said that if Alexander could untie it, he could rule the whole kingdom But Alexander, who was too busy conquering places to learn how to untie knots, simply drew his sword and cut the Gordian Knot in 2. This was cheating, of course, but Alexander had too many soldiers for Gordius to argue, and soon everybody in Gordium had to bow down to You-Know-Who the Great. "
According to the MM method applied in Historiarum Alexandri Magni Macedonis Libri Thu Supersunt the event took place in the year 334 BCE.
This report is very compelling to understand VFD-related events. By cutting off the Gordian knot, Alexander the Great gained the confidence that he could conquer all Asia Minor, and that is exactly what he did.
According to his biography, in the year 331 BCE Alexander defeated King Darius III, and came to dominate the entire region ruled by the defeated king, including Palestine. Palestine was the homeland of Lemony Snicket's ancestors, and probably the birthplace of an ancient secret organization formed by scribes known as the Sopherins.
According to the writings of Flavius Josephus (a Jewish historian whose writings are being analyzed by the Tel Aviv group) Alexander the Great had a dream about a Jewish high priest. When Alexander came to conquer the city of Jerusalem, which was the religious center of Lemony Snicket's ancestors, this same high priest met Alexander. After this, the priests showed Alexander an ancient manuscript that contained a prophecy about Alexander's conquests, written by a man named Daniel. Because of the dream and the prophecy, Alexander made a deal with the people of Lemony Snicket's ancestors. The people would peacefully submit to Alexander, and Alexander would allow an organized and secretive group of scribes from the people of Lemony Snicket's ancestors to spread throughout his empire, promoting peace, order, justice, literary education for all.
I couldn't find the name of this organization, so I even got a name for it myself: "Alexander Supporters." (AS)
According to the writings of Flavius Josephus, after Alexander's untimely death, the enormous empire to which he had formed passed a huge Schism. Four of their generals divided the empire, which included parts of large parts of Africa and Eurasia, into the regions of ancient India.
The influence of the AS focused heavily on the African part of Alexander's empire, which came to be dominated by General Ptolemy's family. Alexander created a city called Alexandria, and with the influence of the AS, Ptolemy's family arranged for the creation of the largest library to date, the library of Alexandria.
The Alexandria Library was a huge undertaking. AS's headquarters were installed inside the library. AS's goal was to catalog all the world's knowledge in one place, but they soon realized that this would be impossible because people around the world know so many things. Thus, attached libraries were created, and later branches of the Alexandria library were created in other cities. More and more AS members were trained to catalog the manuscripts of these libraries. The work was so much just for maintenance in all libraries that AS set aside the obligation to promote peace, order and justice, and focused solely on promoting literary knowledge. Because of this, AS did nothing to stop the wars that took place at that time. But AS soon realized that failure to comply with the entire agreement they had made with Alexander would prevent the maintenance of all their libraries. Because of the revolutions and wars that were taking place around the world, several AS libraries were being destroyed one by one.
Finally, in the year 45 BCE, an accident caused a fire in AS headquarters, the library of Alexandria.
When the fire began, several volunteer librarians fought the fire using water and buckets. Flavius Josephus called this event "The Moment When Librarians Realize That Both Water and Fire Destroy Books Made of Paper." Much of the Alexandria library collection has been lost.
The librarians who were members of AS who fought the fire gathered in one of the library's secret rooms. They decided that day, May 4, 45 BCE, that they would restore the basic principles of AS. They realized that to be able to fight the fires libraries that were happening around the world, it was necessary to combat the causes of these fires, which was precisely the lack of peace, order and justice. In addition, they realized that it would be a great idea to devise more practical methods of fighting fires after they started, something better than splashing water on precious books. That's why they formed a faction within AS. While AS members received government salaries to work in libraries (as part of the deal with Alexander), members of that faction would receive no money to combat the injustices of the world, and to promote peace and order. Therefore, this faction came to call itself Ethelontikí pyrosvestikí ypiresía (they spoke Greek at the time).
That faction had to act even more confidentially than AS. Many believe that Flavius Josephus himself was part of it. It was he who recorded the creation Ethelontikí pyrosvestikí ypiresía in his Authorized Autobiography. However, Flavius Josephus recorded no information other than the creation of the faction. But the translation of Ethelontikí pyrosvestikí ypiresía into English was very important in my research. Ethelontikí pyrosvestikí ypiresía means Volunteer Fire Department.
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Good News for People Who Love Bad News
A/N: Another commissioned fic, this time for the lovely @azure-scientia! Consider this a sort of sequel to this corporate AU I wrote earlier for Noctis.
Tagging friends! @raspberryandechinacea @noboomoon @emmydots @bleucommelhiver @gowithme @hanatsuki89 @valkyrieofardyn @animakupo @lazarustrashpit @blindedstarlight
[Link on AO3]
The bright Altissian sun in this fine Monday morning usually does the trick to jumpstart your hectic work day. That, and an excellent cup of coffee coupled with a plateful of pancakes down at Café Leville. This has become your religious routine after living in this scenic city by the sea for almost a year, and for a year it has brought you nothing but small comfort even away from home.
However, the moment you snap awake does not allow you to relish any of these simple pleasures.
Instead, you are greeted by a dizzying wave of nausea as you jump out of bed, hurrying straight to your bathroom, dry heaving into the sink. Your throat is parched by acid, your mouth as metallic as a handful of loose change. Wash, rinse, repeat. By now, you are already used to the bitter taste that always seem to linger at the tip of your tongue—which, you would argue, not as bitter as the day you and Noctis parted ways, but none of it matters now. You are moving forward, you tell yourself in the mirror. You are moving forward, one preposterously lightheaded morning at a time.
You only wish you can say the same to the slowly growing bump in your belly.
Perhaps moving forward is easier said than done. Scratch that—it is always, most infinitely, easier said than done. These last couple of months with Noctis chronicled exactly that: how it is easy for the two of you to say We’ll make time for each other, yet a voicemail is a much reasonable company than an actual phone call; how easy it is for him to say I’ll stay over on occasions he is in town, only for you to wake up to an empty bed; how easy it is for you to say I love you and not truly mean it, how the words tremble and shake with an uncertainty of all the forgotten messages, the forgotten dinners, the forgotten birthdays. You have to say, all those mutually brilliant but doomed attempts of maintaining this long distance relationship is exceptionally impressive, if not quite ambitious. Noctis tried. He really did. And so did you.
The weeks that carried on since the day you saw him last were all a numbing blur. A miserable restart, each day a trial run. At breakfast, he always sat across from you, poured caramel syrup into your pancakes and dashed a little into your cup of coffee. Now, you cannot take the scent of caramel without aching for his sweet smile. You ache for his sweet smile but between you and the shadow of this memory plastered on every empty seat are the hours he did not call back, an immeasurable space, the Cygillan Ocean.
Still, you do not cross the open seas. You do not board the next ship. You choose to live without the high from the sweetener. Besides, why should his absence matter, anyway? You probably have embraced your pillows more than you have ever held him in your arms, kissed your wine glass more than you have ever kissed him. You have drowned your longings in the river of your tears hoping it would cleanse your body from the memory of his warmth. But muscle memory is a curse; it only knows how to remember and does not permit you to forget. If you could, you would kiss as many people as possible just so you can erase the stamp of his lips on yours.
But that’s not you.
So you practice forgetting. They say practice makes perfect, but in the battlefield that is heartbreak, practice is the only thing that makes sense. You unlearn habits that remind you of him. You teach yourself to listen to all the love songs he used to play in the stereo of your living room without flinching at the ghost of his laughter. You teach yourself to play the video games he used to compete with you without hearing the sound of his delighted voice. You say his name over and over and over until it loses its meaning. You do not wait for his call. You do not beg him to stay. You do not ask to keep his promise. You inhale the sickly sweet scent of caramel and do not think of him.
And you have not been thinking of him. But the day you find out about the life growing inside you is the day you finally do.
Someone is knocking at the door of your bathroom. “Hey, you alright?”
You turn to see Crowe leaning by the doorframe, all strained smile and worried eyes, arms folded over her chest. She had been in Altissia on official Lucis Labs business these last couple of weeks; after learning she could not afford a single room in the Leville (“I’m afraid the accommodation for your trip is currently out of our budget,” Ignis had happened to tell her, which she already knew was a code for The collaboration with Niflheim Studios is fucking with our costs and overall finances, hence she did not pursue the subject any further), she opted crashing your place was a much more suitable option.
“You look like a hot mess,” she says, her face screwing into a frown. “You need me to buy something for you? Like, tea? I don’t know what kind of painkillers are safe for pregnant women, but I’ll go ask—“
“No, it’s okay, it’s fine,” you say hurriedly. “I’m fine. You don’t have to.”
“Really? Are you sure?” Crowe studies you with a significant look. You can see in her eyes an unspoken question she is meaning to ask. But she does not ask. She exercises an unlikely tactfulness that does not seem to suit someone like her who never minces their words, veiled in a patience that seems to wait for you to open up and tell her, No, I’m not, this isn’t fine, I don’t think I will ever be fine.
But these words never leave you. You swallow them into a smile and say, “Yeah, I’m sure.” You rake the hair back from your face. “Thank you.”
“Alright then.” Crowe nods thoughtfully, turns to take her leave. But she stops halfway. She circles right back around and looks at you with a serious expression you have come to know so well. “I know this is none of my business, but you know you don’t have to go through this on your own, right?” She rests a steady hand on your shoulder. “I’m here, and you can talk to me anytime, whenever you are ready. Okay?”
You weakly nod. “Yeah, okay.”
“Good. Now don’t even bother going to work—I’ll be dropping by AW, anyway, and I’ll let Weskham know you’re sick. You go get some rest. Got it?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Crowe smiles, gently pats you in the back. She edges imperceptibly towards the hallway and out of your sight. You close the door behind you, take a shower, press your head on the cold tile. You listen as Crowe goes through the motions of her own morning routine: the soft sizzle of the pan from the kitchen, the whistle from the kettle, the thrum of the bass from the stereo. None of it distracts you from the thoughts that seem to echo louder than the steady humdrum, nor the idea that has been troubling you for quite some time.
Maybe I should try calling Noctis again…
And you do. Well, not after a few moments of procrastination, of course—you know, get dressed, grab a slice of Crowe’s waffles, turn on the TV yet not quite watching anything for thirty minutes—with the hopes of maybe, quite possibly, you can sober up from the ridiculous idea. But the notion of it grows more stubborn by the minute. In the end, you could not resist. You fish your phone out, scroll through your contacts. You hover around Noctis’s name, and with a deep breath, you press the button.
The other line rings once, twice. Thrice. Four times. Five. He does not pick up, and you are only greeted by his almost too-mechanical voicemail. Hi, this is Noctis. I’m either on a call or away from my desk. Please leave your name, number, and the reason you’d like to chat, and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.
A beep follows. A sudden surge of fear clogs your throat. How does one even begin this kind of message? If you have been more brazen, or more confident, you would have gone on to say Hi, this is your ex, I am nine weeks pregnant with your child, please call back at your earliest convenience. Or maybe a simple, Hi, Noct, it’s been a while, we really need to talk. But you are neither brazen nor confident at the moment. You are all too reckless and emotional and tired and really just straight up fucking hormonal.
So you do not say a word and you hang up. A breeze flutters through your windows to occupy the silence. You do not try calling him again.
At the breakfast table, Noctis has been awfully quiet. The selection of food before him is as appetizing as any feast, but he does not feel like eating. He has been staring out into the glimmering expanse of the Cygillan Ocean from the balcony of his hotel room, trying to distract himself from the wafting scent of coffee, bacon and pancakes, and caramel. Especially the caramel. A strange thing to be sure, to shy away from relishing the signature delicacies of Hotel Leville at this fine, Altissian morning.
But for him, these simple pleasures only conjure the ghosts of all the memories he has of you.
It is almost a year and a half since Noctis last visited the city, yet everywhere feels like it has been suspended in time. Nothing seems to have changed: the warm sea salt breeze and ship-bourne markets; the vibrant thoroughfare and maze of streets; the throng of tourists lining up for gondola rides. Once, you had insisted that the two of you brave the long queue just so you could watch the lantern festival out by the docks. He still remembers that luminous night as if it was just yesterday: the sky encrusted by stars, the slow rise of paper lanterns trailing like fireflies, how your face was illuminated in the light. How he was caught by the teeth of your charm. How you kissed him without paying the gondolier any mind. How until now, he is still at the mercy of the memory of that night—and quite frankly, all his other days with you—all of which he thought he had forgotten. But he has not forgotten. He has never forgotten you.
And him being here after all this time…
All he knows is your specter is all over the city. Every street and alley magnifies all of his shortcomings, his mistakes, the time he has lost.
Across from him, Ignis stirs from reading the morning paper, looks up at Noctis with an expression that is achingly conscious behind the reason of his brooding silence.
“Is everything alright, Noct?” Ignis asks; he folds the paper and sets it down. “We have a meeting at nine o’clock with—“
“By any chance, could you cancel all my meetings with Weskham and those annoying brats from Niflheim Studios this morning and move it tomorrow?” says Noctis, not meeting the keenness of Ignis’s curious gaze as he rises out of his seat. “Tell them it’s a personal emergency that I need to attend to.”
Ignis purses his lips for a moment, as if carefully crafting his response. He smiles. Then, he says, “Very well. Send her my regards, then.”
Noctis scoffs. Of course. “That obvious, huh.”
“Frankly, it’s about bloody time.” Ignis pushes his glasses back to the bridge of his nose, takes a sip of coffee. “The fact that it took you more than a year to gather this courage to make amends is beyond me.”
“I, um… well—“ Noctis stammers, reaches for the back of his head; Ignis is never one to pull any punches, and that teasing jab is something Noctis knows that he rightly deserves. “It hasn’t been easy,” he adds sullenly.
Ignis sighs. “And I could only imagine it hasn’t been easy for her, either.”
Noctis does not say anything. He considers Ignis for a fraction of a moment. To be fair, Ignis is right. Surely, Noctis could not fault Ignis for taking your side; he had been the one assuaging all your worries when Noctis was constantly away on business. The splinter of truth in his words is a sharp dagger of guilt right through the heart. And yet, Noctis feels like there is more to it. He wills himself to probe further, and—
“I apologize for speaking out of turn,” Ignis says solemnly. “Do you need me to accompany you? Or Gladio, perhaps?”
“No, I can manage.” Noctis smiles, waves a diffident hand. “I’ll see you guys later.”
“Best of luck,” says Ignis as Noctis ambles away and out of the door.
Aiden’s cheery, bell-like laughter is swelling throughout the living room of your apartment—this utterly gregarious baby extremely amused with your exceptional talent in making silly faces—when you hear a knock at the door.
“Mummy’s going to be right back, Mr. Sweetface!” You give him a playful kiss and you hurry down the hall, unlatch the lock, and open the door with the remains of your beaming smile. “Hi, how can I— oh.”
You blink. The smile on your face immediately falters. With a numbing sense of disbelief, it takes approximately ten uncomfortable seconds for you to acknowledge that the man before you is Noctis.
“Hello,” he says. Even after all this time, the features of his face remain the same: his manner and bearing sharper, striking, yet much more handsome than before—truly and unjustly so; and those blue eyes, much like your son’s.
You open the door a little wider, still staring at him, letting the silence stretch longer than the first. “Hi,” you finally say.
“How are you?”
“Fine.”
He nods. “That’s great.”
“I didn’t know you were in town.”
“We just came in this morning. You know, for the merger.”
“Oh. Right.”
Another strained pause. It does not last long when Aiden’s delighted giggles burst the silence like a pin popping a balloon.
Noctis curiously peers over your shoulder. “Sorry, I—is that—“
“Shit, um—please come in,” you say, almost too hastily. Noctis is taken aback, slightly hesitating, but he indulges your invitation all the same. You usher him down the hall and into the white-washed brightness of your living room. “Have a seat,” you tell Noctis, gesturing to the couch as you pick Aiden up. “Congrats, by the way. For adding another gaming firm in your slowly growing empire.”
He squirms a little in his seat. “Well, I’m sorry—”
“Oh, we both know you’re not sorry,” you say dryly. He laughs. “Weskham’s been expecting that move for quite some time.”
“Right.” He pauses. Then: “He’s adorable,” he says with a strangely pleasant smile as Aiden waves at him, all bubbly and giggly.
“Yeah, he truly is.” The sudden quiver in your voice startles you. You clear your throat and say, “Well, he can get a little rowdy sometimes, but, yeah. Um—“ you bite your lip, trying to quell the sudden surge of emotion at the pit of your stomach— “would you mind if I take him back to his room first?”
“Sure,” says Noctis.
“C’mon, my Mr. Sweetface,” you say, pressing another kiss on Aiden’s chubby cheeks as you disappear into the next room, tucking him back to his crib. With Noctis briefly out sight, you take deep, shuddery breaths. You squeeze your eyes shut. You have imagined many a scenario on how you would run into Noctis one of these days, and quite frankly, this is not one of them.
You heave another breath, steady your trembling hands, muster a year’s worth of hard-earned forbearance before you walk right back out into the living room. You see Noctis, hands on the pocket of his perfectly tailored pants, studying and browsing pictures of you and Aiden perched on your shelves.
“Didn’t know you had a kid,” he says, holding a frame in hand.
There are so many things you could say at this point, but instead, you choose to say nothing.
Seeming to sense your unease, Noctis turns to you and smiles warmly, the same way he always does whenever he reaches out to assuage any of your worries. “Where’s his dad?” he asks curiously. Then, raising a hand as if to backpedal, he gingerly adds, “I mean, if you don’t mind my asking. I’ll understand if you don’t want to talk about it… wait, is everything okay?”
“I’m fine,” you say, but your voice cracks. So does your façade of bravery. Maybe it’s Noctis’s voice that first brought you to tears, or probably how gently he raised such a curious question which he had every right to ask and had every right to know the answer. Or maybe, it’s how he carefully crossed the space between the two of you—no more open seas, no more distance and time—with such reassured steps.
He firmly rests his hands on your shoulders. “I’m sorry for prying, I shouldn’t have asked that—“
“No, no,” you croak. “It’s only right that you asked. And I’m sorry for not telling you sooner. I really am. And I…” You falter into a pause. “I didn’t mean to keep him from you, Noct.”
You watch as the fine machinery of his face begin to grind into a slow realization. His hands fall away from you, his breath stutters into a hitch. “Wait, are you saying…”
You stare at him and nod.
He stares back. The blank expression on his face drifts to a quiet yet seething shock. He falls back on the couch, buries his face in the palm of his hands.
“When exactly were you planning to tell me?” he says, after a long, excruciating silence.
You sigh. “To be honest, Noct? I’ve already tried. So many times and in so many ways. You never returned any of my messages, never picked up when I called. I mean, sure, if you ask me, whoever’s your new personal assistant needs to get their shit together on sorting your business and personal affairs, but yeah—I get it. You’re a busy guy. Busier now, more than ever. And I… I just got tired of always being the only one trying to reach out.” You shake your head, press your hands together. “I mean, at some point, when I was five months pregnant, I went back to Insomnia and dropped by the office just to talk to you in person. But you weren’t there.”
He lifts an incredulous brow. “Wait, you were in the city? How come I didn’t know about this?”
“That’s what I’d like to know,” you say flatly. “That fella from Niflheim Studios—Ardyn, is it? He never told you, did he?”
“Hold on—“ his mouth twists into a grimace— “what’s Ardyn got to do with this—“
“He was the first one I saw when I dropped by the Citadel. I assumed he knew me; he called me by name, which I thought was strange. Anyway. I told him I had to see you. He said you were in Tenebrae for some conference, and he’d let you know as soon as he was able. When I didn’t get at least a single call or message from you, it’s either he never told you or you didn’t care at all—“
“That son of a bitch.” His face hardens, his hands curl into fists. “I swear, that bastard will pay for—“
“Noct.” You catch him by his wrist. “Please don’t.”
He says nothing, and so do you. This time, the silence that lingers is doused with regret. Noctis draws a heavy, wistful sigh. He slips his hand in yours. You let him.
“I always wonder what ever happened to us,” he says quietly.
“Life happened, that’s what,” you sniff with a small laugh. “I’m sorry for not trying harder—“
“No, no, don’t— I’m the one who’s sorry, more than anything,” he says sharply, his voice on the brink of breaking. “I’m… I am really sorry for letting this you go through all of this alone. For not being here with you and our son.” He wipes his eyes with one hand, the other shaking against yours. “And look—I’m not asking you to forgive me now. But I’ll do whatever it takes to make it up to you. If you would allow me.”
You consider Noctis for a while. He holds your gaze, firm and true. “Of course I would,” you hear yourself murmur under your breath, choking back the tears. “I would love nothing more.”
The bright Altissian sun in this summer morning has not changed in the last three years. But what has changed, however, is the company in which you keep.
In the balcony of your apartment, you watch Noctis make the silliest of faces in front of Aiden. The sound of their laughter rings like a song. The boy squeals “Daddy!” as Noctis takes him in his arms, pressing a kiss on his forehead, giving him a snuggle.
For a moment, Noctis turns to look at you and smiles. He does not say anything. Yet somehow, you know that this is more than enough.
#final fantasy xv#ffxv#ff15#ffxv fanfiction#noctis lucis caelum#noctis x reader#older!noctis lucis caelum#older!noctis x reader#my writing#writing commissions
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Protect the Spiderling Pt. 2
Someone brought to my attention that I wrote this, so here’s a part two I guess. Idk guys it’s crap but it’s all I have right now XD Enjoy or don’t!
Also this is super late, but idk if anyone is like. Religiously following these or not so whatevs. It might slow down a bit, cause school starts next week too so idk what that will do to my life. We’ll see!
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“Hey, kid, what’s up with you? You know how I feel about moping in the lab. There’s no place for that teenage angst of yours in here.” Tony was worried when instead of laughing it off like he normally would have, Peter instead jumped, the web shooter he’d been working on falling to the floor with a clatter.
“I’m so sorry, Mr. Stark! I didn’t mean to, I swear!” Tony stared at him, wide-eyed as his kid kept up a steady stream of apologies and assurances that he’ll “be better”. Finally, the painful words stopped, but was instead replaced with those beautiful bambi eyes of Peter’s welling up with tears as the kid stood there and stared at him with fear. Tony felt his heart stop.
“Kid—” he started.
“Hey Tony! You don’t happen to know where the kid went, do you?” Steve called from just outside the lab. Peter squeaked and bolted for the other side of the lab, away from the two super soldiers who entered only seconds after. Bucky’s eyes brightened. “Oh hey, Pete! I thought you said you were going to go to bed?”
“What?” Tony turned to stare at Peter. “Kid, it’s only 9! Are you feeling okay?” Peter just stared at the three of them, so Tony moved so he could still keep an eye on him, even as he spoke to his boyfriends. “I’ve been busy with meetings all day so I hadn’t had the chance to see him today, and I know he has a big assignment due tomorrow that he was working on, and with his finals coming up, I knew I wouldn’t get to see much of him. Wanted to get some time in with him before he got too busy.”
Peter let out a sniffle behind them, quiet whimpers leaving as he tried hurriedly to wipe his tears off his face. “Peter, what’s…” Tony let his words drift off, unsure of how to even ask what was happening right there. Bucky stepped in.
“Peter, was that assignment Tony is talking about one of those that the others ruined?” Tony’s head whipped towards Bucky, a look of confusion and fury in place, but Steve shushed him before he could say anything.
“It was my fault, though, I swear I didn’t mean to be in everyone’s way! I just, just,” he burst into a fresh wave of tears.
“Pete, you were on the ceiling. None of us were using the fucking ceiling.”
“How often do they bully you like that, sweetie?” Peter sniffed again, refusing to answer Steve’s question.
The three men looked at each other uncertainly. Tony moved to offer Peter a hug, but he moved away. “They don’t bully me. I was in the way. It’s fine.” Bucky growled, shoving the papers in his hands to Steve before lurching forward and grabbing Peter’s arm so he would stop shifting away from them. Peter yelped but after he was caught, he seemed to give up on getting away from them and was compliant as they moved him over to the couch Tony had in the workshop. There wasn’t much room for the four of them, but Bucky was nothing if not a problem solver, so he mentally shrugged and tugged Peter onto his lap. Peter initially balked but even with his spider strength, he wasn’t much of a match for him. He was too busy crying and feeling guilty, apparently.
“Listen to me, kid. Even if you had been in the way—”
“Which you weren’t.” Steve inserted smoothly.
“There are nicer ways to let you know than to shoot you down.” Tony made an enraged sound in the back of his throat at this, and Steve was smart enough to grab him, forcefully pulling him into his lap, too, super soldiers carefully but firmly holding back their geniuses. “They could’ve said something, they could’ve asked you nicely if you could move, but the fact of the matter is, there’s no reason for you to. They weren’t using the space, you were there before we got there, and you weren’t hurting any of us. You wanted to study at the table, Bruce was there. So you found a solution that wouldn’t affect anyone but still allowed you to be around us like you wanted.” Peter’s tears had somewhat died down now, but Bucky wasn’t finished. “Peter, you. Did. Good.”
It took a minute, but eventually, Peter offered a shaky smile. It seemed that was all Tony needed before his thoughts returned to his own personal rampage. “Okay what the hell! Which one of those morons tried to shoot down my kid!”
Peter tried to placate, leaning towards Tony as well as he could when Bucky was still restraining him and refused to let him move far. “It wasn’t that bad, Bucky is exaggerating. Don’t worry about it, Mr. Stark.”
“Nice try, Pete,” Steve adjusted his hold on his squirming lapful. “Bucky was not exaggerating. Clint literally shot arrows at your stuff to force you down. That’s a thing he actually did, buddy.”
“Aw come on, you weren’t even there!” Peter whined, squirming in earnest now to escape Bucky’s grasp.
“Doesn’t matter, Bucky doesn’t exaggerate. Anyway, look what we did for you!” The papers they had were retrieved from the floor next to the couch, and waved in Peter’s face. “That assignment you have due tomorrow was on WWII, right? That happened to be the one that was destroyed the most, so Stevie and I helped put together some stuff for a new one.” Tony froze, staring at Bucky with a blank look on his face, while Peter jolted upright.
“Are you serious?” he aske, head whipping back and forth between the two of them.
Bucky chuckled, “Yeah, we’re serious, bud.”
“We took some of the information from what we could read of your paper. Some of it was stuff Friday helped us scrounge up from the internet.” Steve explained.
“And then we added some first-hand information!” Bucky finished triumphantly.
“You can use it if you want, or not, but if you get started now, you should be able to finish looking it over and rewriting it for yourself tonight.” Steve glanced at Tony, concerned that maybe he would be upset about Peter possibly staying up late to work on the assignment, but Peter only looked relieved, nodding as he finally managed to slide off of Bucky’s lap.
“I can absolutely have this done, thank you so much, guys! You have no idea how much this grade was worth! Thank you, Mr. Rogers! Thank you, Mr. Barnes! Good night, Mr. Stark, can we do some lab time tomorrow maybe?” He barely managed to wait long enough to get a nod out of his adopted father before he took off for his room, anxious to complete the assignment as soon as possible.
Steve looked up at the ceiling. “Hey, Friday, will you make sure none of the other Avengers run into Peter tonight? He needs to focus on that homework of his, and they need to be dealt with as soon as we get a chance.
Friday answered her affirmative, and Bucky and Steve turned their attention to their boyfriend, who looked dangerously close to tears.
“What’s the matter, doll?” Bucky slid a little closer so he and Steve could share Tony’s weight (not that he really weighed much more than a wet kitten, something else he and Peter had in common).
“You guys really re-did one of Peter’s assignments for him?” Unsure of what to say, Bucky just nodded.
“Of course we did, sweetheart, what happened wasn’t his fault and it wasn’t fair. Why should his grades suffer just cause some of the other Avengers were being jerks?” Steve asked him gently. Tony just sniffled.
“That was so nice of you. Thank you.” Bucky and Steve wrapped him in a hug when his tremulous smile fell and was replaced with a frown. “But why were the others messing with him like that?” Immediately, Steve’s and Bucky’s expressions darkened. It was Steve who responded again. “Dunno. But we’re gonna find out.”
#mcu#mcu fic#stuckony#irondad & spiderson#irondad and spiderson#marvel cinematic universe#marvel cinematic universe fic#mywriting#jessi rambles#soft#bucky & peter#bucky barnes and peter parker#irondad#spiderson
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LET’S TALK ABOUT MY HISTORY TEACHER
(Who is currently on administrative leave and is awaiting trial with the school district)
(TW: Abuse, animal abuse, police brutality, racism, implied (but wrongly) terrorism, politics, anxiety, panic attack mention, violence, religious entitlement. Please let me know if there are more.)
He is....so many things. Rude, self-entitled, racist, and disrespectful, to name a few. So, here’s the things he’s done.
• Banned Metal water bottles because someone accidentally made a noise with one, once. It wasn’t even that loud, nor long. Just a slight clink as they put the lid on.
• Told a story about a storm in Mecca (2015) that knocked over a crane onto a Mosque and it killed 107 people. Injured 238. This happened to occur on 9/11. He told us the story the day after 9/11 this year (2018) and ended it with “Weird, right?” and a sly smile.
• Told us multiple times to write in the textbooks, which is basically vandalism. Previous markings in the book show it isn’t the first time he’s asked this of students. I always refused.
• “Freedom of press, right? Except the press are in the pockets of the democrats.” A direct quote from him (I had begun writing down these types of things as they happened to give to the principal. This stuff happened daily).
• He once planned to show us a video of the Chinese police beating a man in the streets, despite all of us protesting verbally and profusely. He forgot, and didn’t show it, but to think he would’ve.
• He showed us a video of monkies domesticating puppies, which inevitably included animal abuse. Although it is just nature doing its thing and it isn’t a human abusing an animal, he should’ve given a warning so that us animal lovers could step out of the room. I felt sick afterwards.
• I was afraid of asking to leave class while having a panic attack because I thought he would tell me to sit down and not let me go. I had planned to just walk out - the counselor told me I could do that - but he did let me go without asking any questions.
• We watched a video about online privacy and how google created a separate search engine for the Chinese government. He slandered the company and said that they’re awful and guilty for supporting a dictatorship like that. While it isn’t a good thing to do what they did, yes, I don’t think he should’ve thrown his political views in like that.
• In that same topic, he mentioned one of the creators of the video was a Democrat who voted for Hillary. I found this comment odd, and called him out on it and asked what that had to do anything. His response ran something like this: “Well, it’s usually something liberals are concerned about and I think all parties and everyone should be concerned about.” That didn’t answer my question, nor did it come close to explaining why that guy’s political part and who he voted for had any reason to be included in the discussion.
• I doodle in class sometimes to help stay focused. I always have, and it’s always a good tactic. Especially when watching videos or listening to lectures. I draw circles, boxes, swirls, etc. Just mindless things. Well, one day, I’m drawing on a paper that happens to have a larger drawing on it. It’s in a different pen color than what I’m currently using, so it’s obvious I’m not drawing that. I have my notes page right next to me, and I’ve taken three or four notes already. He tells me to stop doodling at least three times - other kids are sleeping, or not doing anything - and every time I try to explain, he walks away. I approached him after class and explained, and he told me that I got a good grade on my last test, so he can’t exactly tell me I can’t draw in his class, but it better not affect my grade. I said it helps me to focus better. He responds along the lines of: “I mean, if you believe that lie about how your brain works, then I can’t stop you. But that’s not true.” I responded : “I think I know how my brain works, since I’ve been doing this since third grade and it hasn’t negatively impacted me yet.” And then I walked out of the classroom.
• He dictated how we did notes. No full sentences, only use the word “the” when absolutely necessary, no more than half a page, etc. It was ridiculous. I gave one sentence summaries of the two paragraphs in each eight sections. That was eight sentences. He told me it was too long, and that I shouldn’t be writing full sentences. I told him my brain doesn’t work that way, and it won’t help me if it isn’t in a full sentence. We argued, and I walked out of the classroom to go to my next class. We also turned in our notes each class, and didn’t get them back until after the relevant test.
• He once limited everyone to three bullet points per reading section (usually two or three pages). Everyone blamed me since he pointedly looked at me when saying “some people write full sentences and a full page.” To say I was popular in that class is a very wrong statement. Every time he would mention anything wrong that we’ve done with notes, everyone would turn to me. Thanks.
• I once wrote half of my notes on the Japanese in Japanese, and I got extra credit. I did it out of spite, but hey. Worth it. I also wrote incredibly long and complicated headers to spite him.
• We re-enacted the Trial Of Socrates, and as the attorneys, we spent time in the library researching. We had to write opening and closing statements, and a script for our witnesses to follow with our questions and their answers. At the trial, they were not allowed to have the script with them. Somehow we won, as prosecution, but it was still difficult since the witnesses had not done any of the studying of their roles at all, even though we insisted they should. So not only did we have to research the entire case itself, write an opening and closing statement, we had to research our three witness and write scripts they couldn’t use AND research the opposing team’s four witnesses (one being Socrates) and write counter arguments and cross examination questions. In a week.
• A kid once came in really late to class. He came in quietly, apologized for interrupting, and gave our teacher his pass. He went to sat down, and the teacher told him what page we were on. While pulling the textbook out from the metal cradle under the desk, it snagged and made a ringing noise. The kid, realizing quickly what it was, silenced it and apologized again. Our teacher kicked him out of class for “interrupting”, not allowing him to take the textbook. He missed the entire class.
• He has a quote on the board one day and we had to explain if we agreed or disagreed with it. (“I would rather entrust our government to the first 400 people in the Boston telephone directory than the entire faculty at Harvard.”) I disagreed, naturally, and one of my friends explained most of my points. When asked to tell my side, I did say that she had said my main reasons. I don’t remember exactly what I said, but he looked me dead in the eye, and in front of everyone in the room asked: “So, you don’t care that they’re a bunch of liberal, champagne drinking jerks?” I was shocked, to be very honest. I kept my expression and voice even, and never broke eye contact. I responded: “If they do their job right, then no. I do not care, as long as they do their job and do it well.”
• Has spoken in ways that put his religion and beliefs above others. Comments like “When God made the world” and such were sometimes thrown in.
• Mispronounced multiple Greek Gods’ and Goddesses’ names. Such as Nike (uh-knee-kay), and Zeus (Zay-oos). I corrected him each time and each time he glared at me.
• He once tried to inform us that the reason Indian music sounded so strange was because they used the half-step intervals that we don’t have. I literally laughed so hard he paused the video and asked me why I was laughing. I had to explain chromatics to him. “We have them, we just don’t use them as abundantly or frequently in every song. It’s normal in Indian music to hear that.” He was still skeptical, even after I told him I’ve studied music theory in passing and have been in music classes for five years, and can read two clefs and can play two instruments.
• And now the finale, which got him suspended. This was not in my class, but this is what we were told happened. He held up a picture of a monkey and pointed to the only black kid in the class (we have very few in the school anyways) and said,”Look! It’s your ancestor!”
He will not be back to finish out this semester, and it doesn’t look good for him to come back next semester, if at all. I wrote all of these down with dates and my dad went to the principal with the list. If he does return next semester, it has been made abundantly clear that I am not to be in his class.
#personal#katetalks#highschool#horror story#public high school#history#history teacher#tw: violence#tw: anxiety#tw: panic attack#tw: police brutality#tw: implied abuse#tw: implied violence#tw: panic attack mention#tw: implied terrorism#let me know if there are more tw#tw: racism#tw: religion#tw: animal abuse
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The moment James Norton decided he might actually want to be an actor was during his appearance as Gwen Stefani in the school miming competition, when he was 11.
Most people chose songs by a boyband, or Coolio, but Norton picked Stefani, because he loved No Doubt. It was a boys’ school and the female costume department wasn’t very well-equipped – one pencil skirt and a blonde wig between them, whether you were Cleopatra or Courtney Love – so everyone assuming a female role looked rather similar, with very badly applied lipstick. ‘Really young weird drag queens is what we looked like,’ remembers Norton.
A video exists of this debut. ‘And in the first verse I was clearly terrified. But then I remember feeling the audience and being fuelled by them.’ By the second verse he starts to strut, out of nowhere, and the connection was made. ‘F— yeah!’ thought Norton. ‘This is it!’
Here we are 20 years later and Norton is having the time of his life. In what has become a varied career curriculum – a pop star (Gwen Stefani), a padre (Sidney Chambers in Grantchester), a prince (Andrei in War & Peace) and a psychopath (Tommy Lee Royce in Happy Valley), not to mention his theatre roles – Norton has managed to escape the sort of typecasting that could have defined him.
He is a good-looking, fairly posh, highly accomplished and intelligent actor, who in a short time has become very famous indeed.
When we meet he is rehearsing a role in Belleville (which has now just opened) at the Donmar Warehouse in London, and his reputation is set to soar with his new television role – as a young hedge-fund manager in McMafia, the BBC’s eight-part exploration of financial corruption and global organised crime.
Inspired by Misha Glenny’s book of the same name, the series was written by Hossein Amini (who wrote the 2011 film Drive) and James Watkins, who also directed it.
It was shot over eight months in London, Croatia, Moscow and Tel Aviv, with an international cast, including David Strathairn and Faye Marsay. Norton plays Alex Godman, the son of Russian exiles with mafia connections, who has been working to distance himself from his family’s reputation.
Glenny’s book is a masterful piece of investigative journalism and has quite a reputation with both law enforcers and gangsters.
‘Actors can be brilliant at what they do but they don’t necessarily engage in the issues or environment beyond their role,’ says Glenny, who acted as an adviser on the series. ‘James gets the character, and the environment and the issues. He has an extraordinary ability, which enables him to make this very subtle 180-degree turn over the eight episodes.’
It’s a Michael Corleone type role. When Norton was cast, the director told him that what they were hoping for in Alex Godman was part Sidney, part Tommy – somewhere between the vicar and the psychopath. Norton believes McMafia has a valid, topical message, what with the Paradise Papers and the climate of tax evasion, Russian interference and widespread corruption.
‘There’s such an appetite for it now; everyone wants to see what state-level corruption looks like. It’s a catalyst for a conversation, and hopefully we can use it to mobilise something – because of the way that financial institutions are structured, it’s impossible to police that grey area where legality ends and criminality begins.’
If I ever turned up in a convertible my family would just laugh We meet for breakfast in the Covent Garden Hotel on a cold November morning, before Norton’s rehearsal at the Donmar.
He is chatty and engaging and it is not long before we get on to the subject of his 92-year-old Great Aunt Grania (most interviews with Norton mention James Bond and his Great Aunt Grania), known for her confidence-boosting prowess. He tells me about the time when she looked at him quizzically over dinner and said, ‘I can’t understand why you look so good on the screen James, when you look so bland in real life.’
I don’t like to contradict a 92-year-old, but I beg to differ with Great Aunt Grania. Norton is much better looking in real life than on television. His face is full of light; so is his voice – and he laughs a lot and is ready to be amused at all times. He seems curious, well balanced and up for anything. I imagine he comes from a very happy family. ‘I do,’ he says. They are, he says, his great leveller.
‘And you do need that constant reminder of who you were before the madness started. I am lucky to have such a normal, grounded family who are really supportive. They enjoy it all through me and I enjoy their enjoyment of it, but they’re never going to be seduced by it. Which means that hopefully I won’t get seduced by it either. If I ever turned up in a convertible my family would just laugh. The person I was at 25 is exactly the same person I am at 32.’
Norton was born in London but grew up in Malton, North Yorkshire. Both his parents worked full-time – unusual, he says, at that time for where they lived.
His father was a university lecturer and his mother started off as a nurse. ‘She didn’t come on holiday with us for several years because she was doing a PhD in her spare time. She’s a strong woman and an amazing example to us.’ His younger sister is a doctor.
Norton went to the local primary school and had a thick Yorkshire accent (not dissimilar to that of Tommy Lee Royce) then went to the public school Ampleforth College.
‘I didn’t love school. They were not the happiest five years of my life. I didn’t fit in. I hit puberty quite late, which made quite a big difference. I loved theatre and music, which wasn’t as cool as liking rugby and smoking. Also I really enjoyed the academic side and worked really hard; school set me up in a way because I wasn’t popular so had more time to work.’
He doesn’t come from a religious family, but Ampleforth was a strong Catholic school. ‘It was extraordinary. It’s stunning, set in this big valley which was often bathed in morning mist. And you have prayers three times a day, so it was really quite a magical, mystical place.’
Because he was unhappy at school – he was bullied a bit, but not badly – Norton made friends with the chaplain, Father Peter, who became a sort of therapist. A relationship with faith developed ‘but it was more of a fascination and a comfort than a belief’.
After school, ‘I sort of let rip. I went off on an eight-month wander around South Asia on my own and I went a bit crazy. I finally felt comfortable in my own skin – there’s so much contention in that small, pressure-cooker environment of school so when I found people I loved and who loved me it was an amazing relief.’
He spent three months teaching in Nepal then went to India (with a tiny battered little Nokia - no smartphones back then) and had a wild, eye-opening time.
The theatricality of faith in Nepal really appealed to him. ‘Every day seems to be some sort of religious festival; it’s so imbued in their culture and their daily lives.’
When he went to Cambridge he read theology, ‘but I’m not religious; I’m intrigued. And I studied mostly Hinduism or Buddhism, not much Christian theology at all, which was really awkward when people would come up to me on the set of Grantchester and say, “You know – from Corinthians, Chapter Two” and I hadn’t a clue what they were on about.’
He got a first from Cambridge, but still managed to fit in a lot of theatre and alcohol while he was there, and had a relationship with a girl who directed him in several theatre productions; he still wears a bracelet she gave him today. It reminds him, he says, of the second time when he suddenly felt he could be an actor.
‘It was probably the moment it turned from a dream into a reality,’ he says. By the time he left university he already had a place at Rada. ‘It’s such a great feeling when someone asks you what you want to do with your life and you can reply “I’m an actor” – rather than, “I want to act.”’
To support himself, he worked as a children’s party entertainer in the holidays. Norton graduated from Rada six months early, having secured an agent and made a brief appearance in An Education in 2009. His first major theatrical role was in Laura Wade’s play Posh at the Royal Court in 2010, about the Riot Club, a fictionalised version of The Bullingdon Club at Oxford.
‘There were 10 guys in the cast and every evening, after the play, we’d spend all our wages on booze. It was like a sports team.’ In 2011 he appeared in a revival of Journey's End at the Duke of York theatre, to this day one of his favourite roles.
A solid two years of theatre followed. ‘There were endless conversations with my agent about trying to nail a film role – and then suddenly you break through and your schedule changes – especially if you get a recurring series like Grantchester or Happy Valley – and you have no time left for theatre.’
He then went four years without doing a play at all – until last year’s Bug at the Soho Theatre, and now Belleville at the Donmar. Belleville is a punchy piece of writing by Amy Herzog about a young couple who’ve graduated from Yale and decide to move to Paris. Norton plays a doctor; Imogen Poots is out of work his actor wife. They’re living the American dream, but they have a certain sense of entitlement, and, inevitably, everything falls apart.
Norton didn’t know Poots before they were cast, but they were soon rehearsing sex scenes together. ‘I had only met her two weeks before. You have to just trust, and let yourself be vulnerable.
'Of course it has a brilliant side to it – you get to know someone so quickly and intimately, and you build fantastic relationships; similarly with the director. I think the definition of an extrovert is someone whose energy is fuelled by other people, which I think I am – so a rehearsal room is a joy.’
Norton appeared in the TV series Death Comes to Pemberley (2013) and Life in Squares (2015), but it was three roles in fairly quick succession that made him a household name: firstly, as the 1950s cleric Reverend Sidney Chambers in Grantchester (2014-17), which had three series.
This, he says now, is the most fun he has ever had on set, mainly because of his friendship with Robson Green, who plays Inspector Geordie Keating. (At one point Green was ordered off set by the director because they were laughing so much.)
He also played Prince Andrei Bolkonsky in Andrew Davies’ revered six-part adaptation of War and Peace (2016), and Tommy Lee Royce in Sally Wainwright’s brilliant BBC police drama Happy Valley (2014-16), which won a Bafta, and saved him, he says, from a life sentence of period drama.
Wainwright, the gifted writer of Last Tango in Halifax and Scott & Bailey, had seen Norton on stage in Journey’s End, but he was still pretty unknown when the call went out to audition for the part of Tommy Lee Royce, the psychopathic killer who becomes Sgt Catherine Cawood’s nemesis in a small town in West Yorkshire.
Norton already had the right accent from growing up in Malton. He was sent the script while he was in South Africa doing a ‘rather ropey’ film about Vikings, and he recorded his audition on video. He was very impressed by the screenplay, but didn’t really think he’d get the part. So, he says, he had nothing to lose, and went for it.
‘The character was so rich… my [audition] scene was the most incredible piece of writing, where a man is so sad and damaged that the most loving act he can think of to do for his eight-year-old son is to kill him.’ Not long after, he got a call from his agent to tell him that the part was his. ‘Being offered Tommy changed my life because it’s opened so many doors. It showed that I could play the baddie.’
And he did it memorably. As Tommy Lee Royce he was horribly convincing – so much so that once when he was in a queue, the girl in front of him turned round and saw him, screamed and ran away.
Last year, he was tipped to be the next James Bond, and became the bookies’ favourite. He gets asked about it constantly, but there's not much to say.
‘It would come with incredible challenges, but beyond that I haven’t thought about it at length because it’s so speculative and silly. I’m flattered that people would even consider me. But I’m also a huge fan of Daniel Craig, so would want him to do a few more films.’
Happy Valley, which won a Bafta, saved him, he says, from a life sentence of period drama Norton is permanently busy. He has just filmed the remake of the ’90s classic Flatliners; today he is rehearsing for Belleville and then recording voiceovers for McMafia, this evening he is attending a ball in aid of JDRF (Junior Diabetic Research Fund).
He has type 1 diabetes, having developed it when he was 22. His mother and his sister are also diabetic. He injects himself several times a day, but has incorporated it into his life and doesn’t let it deter him. ‘So for example, the kedgeree is about to arrive and I’ll have an injection to counter the carbs; it’s just about having a level of awareness about what you’re eating.
‘It’s interesting being on stage or on set because your body is full of adrenalin and that screws up your sugar, especially when I’m on stage for a full hour and a half. I have to anticipate it at the beginning of the show and make sure my sugar levels are going up or are at least stable. In period plays, I’ve had to stitch little pockets in my costume for sugar tablets.’
A few years ago, during a performance of Journey’s End, Norton was shaking a bit, and sweating from the adrenalin because the play was going well, but one of the other actors thought he was hypoing and told the stage manager.
‘Pandemonium broke loose. The next thing I know, they’re improvising and offering me Lucozade in a teacup, saying, “Cup of tea, sir?” and putting biscuits all over the dugout. So there have been moments where diabetes and theatre have collided.’ But since he started talking about it, he’s realised that he can have a positive influence on young diabetics and demonstrate that it’s a manageable condition.
What else? He lives in Peckham, in a house full of vintage clothes left over from when he used to run a clothes stall in Nunhead, and firmly refuses to talk about his love life, despite what I thought was some rather persuasive questioning on my part.
‘Let’s leave that one vague. Just say that at that point I started tucking into my kedgeree…’ He smiles broadly, disarmingly, but he is steely. Somewhere between a vicar and a psychopath.
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12 Books to Take You Around the World
Posted: 04/07/2020 | April 7th, 2020
At a time when we can’t travel the world, the next best thing we can do is pick up a good travel book. As Emily Dickenson said, to shut our eyes is travel. Books transport us to distant lands and cultures. They nourish our wanderlust, entertain us, inform us, and provide us with a reservoir of potential trip ideas.
In short, they’re magic.
I love reading travel books. Without them, there would be places and cultures I’d never have heard of. Travel books have added depth to my travels and helped me develop much more nuanced perspectives of different countries and cultures. They’ve also inspired me to visit tons of new places all around the globe.
Of course, I love traveling even more than reading but since we can’t do that right now, books are our window out into the world.
If you’re are itching to get your fix but are stuck in lockdown or self-isolation, here are some suggestions to get you started and keep your wanderlust stoked:
1. The Atlas of Happiness: The Global Secrets of How to Be Happy, by Helen Russell
Helen Russell, author of one of my favorite books, The Year of Living Danishly, wrote this comical visual guide that takes readers around the world — from Iceland to New Zealand to Japan to Ireland — in search of the ways that people define and discover happiness in their lives. It’s an informative, well-researched, and a feel-good guide to how the world stays happy — which is especailly important these days!
2. Ultimate Journeys for Two: Extraordinary Destinations on Every Continent, by Anne and Mike Howard
Having founded Honeytrek.com, Anne and Mike teamed up with National Geographic to curate these recommendations for intrepid couples. Chapters are organized by type of destination (beaches, mountains, deserts, and so on) to help travelers discover new places and experiences based on their interests.
It’s an amazing resource for finding inspiration and ideas for your own travels (even if you’re a solo traveler). The photos that fill its pages are stunning and will ignite the kind of wanderlust that will keep this on your coffee table for years.
3. The Dogs of ’Nam: Stories from the Road and Lessons Learned Abroad, by Christopher K. Oldfield
In this collection of short stories, our extremely budget-conscious Community Manager, Chris, recounts fumbling his way across the world as a backpacker on a budget. This is not a glamorous tale of luxury travel but rather a true and honest accounting of what it means to be a traveler.
His adventures (including being stalked by a jaguar in Costa Rica and living at a Buddhist monastery in Japan) will entertain you, make you think, and hopefully inspire you to get out there and have some adventures of your own!
4. Four Corners: A Journey into the Heart of Papua New Guinea, by Kira Salak
The British explorer Ivan Champion was the first individual to successfully cross the island of Papua New Guinea in 1927. In this book, author Kira Salak, the first non–Papua New Guinean woman to traverse this relatively untouched country and write about it, details her own epic adventures, experiences, and self-discoveries as she tries to mimic Champion’s epic journey.
It’s a riveting look into the wild jungles of a country that so few have been able to visit firsthand.
5. Around the Bloc: My Life in Moscow, Beijing, and Havana, by Stephanie Elizondo Griest
This is the story of a young journalist who travels to Russia, China, and Cuba to witness the effects of communism and explore a world not many of us get to see.
Griest relates her experiences as a volunteer at a children’s shelter in Moscow, a propaganda polisher at the office of the Communist Party’s English-language mouthpiece in Beijing, and a belly dancer among the rumba queens of Havana.
6. Rediscovering Travel: A Guide for the Globally Curious, by Seth Kugel
In his book, Kugel challenges travelers to reignite our age-old sense of spontaneity (remember traveling without constantly summoning Google Maps, consulting TripAdvisor, and using travel points?).
The stories of his misadventures explain — often hilariously — how to make the most of new digital tools without living and dying by them.
7. My Invented Country: A Nostalgic Journey Through Chile, by Isabel Allende
Allende is best known for some of her more famous works, such as The House of Spirits and The Japanese Lover. But in this memoir, she explores her personal journey living in numerous countries and her complex emotions toward her Chilean homeland.
The book paints a vivid, nostalgic picture of the world from which is is from. Sometimes funny, sometimes sorrowful, its insight and realism are what make this a captivating read.
8. Misadventure Is Better, by David Campbell
“If it isn’t a good time, it’s usually a good story.” That’s the backbone of this hilarious tale. Campbell, born to an American father and French mother, has been confused about where he belongs since day one.
After graduating from college, he decided to go abroad for a while to figure things out. He worked as a cycling tour guide in Europe, enrolled in the Peace Corps in Senegal, earned a master’s degree in New Zealand, went back to Senegal for his thesis research, and then returned to New Zealand.
9. Wanderlust: A Love Affair with Five Continents, by Elisabeth Eaves
Written by Elisabeth Eaves, this book follows her journeys around the world as she satiates her wanderlust and learns about herself. It started off slow but I really loved the writing here. It really drew you in and left you inspired. The book follows her from being a student studying a broad to being a backpacker around the world to living in Pakistan and Australia. Along the way she comes to peace with the wanderlust inside her and figures out how to balance being a nomad and someone with roots.
10. Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, by Jack Weatherford
I never knew much about Genghis Kahn so when this was recommended to me, I thought why not. It was a surprisingly pageturner. This was not some dry history book filled with footnotes but a vividly told story about Kahn and his descendants. Most history books miss the “story” part but not this one. It has an arch, vivid imagery, and incredible characters. And it fills you in a lot on the Mongolian empire. Who knew they had a central bank, universal education, paper money, didn’t torture, or had religious freedom?
11. Ten Years a Nomad: A Traveler’s Journey Home, by me!
This is a memoir about my ten years traveling and backpacking the world, my philosophy on travel, and the lessons I learned that can help you travel better. It takes you on a trip around the world from start to finish: getting the travel bug, planning, setting off, the highs and lows, the friends made, what happens when you come back — and the lessons and advice that result from all that.
It is my opus on travel.
12. How to Travel the World on $50 a Day, by me!
Okay, I know I include this book in every list, but it’s awesome, so you should read it! This New York Times best-seller, called “the bible for budget travelers” by the BBC, will teach how to master the art of travel so you can save money, get off the beaten path, and have a more local, richer travel experience, no matter where you’re going. It will help you plan for the trip you can take when the world starts again and we can all leave our house.
And it will help you score the budget deals that will make that trip even more affordable too!
***
In these times when we can’t travel with our bodies, we can still travel with our minds. These books will help fill your days and recharge your wanderlust battery for when you can finally traverse the world again.
If you have any suggestions that I can add to this list, leave them in the comments!
P.S. – We’ve launched a new members-only community on Patreon! Members get insider access to events, photos and stories I’ve told before, exclusive content, bonus social media posts, phone calls with me and the team, live Q&As, postcards, and much more! Click here to learn more!
Book Your Trip: Logistical Tips and Tricks
Book Your Flight Find a cheap flight by using Skyscanner or Momondo. They are my two favorite search engines, because they search websites and airlines around the globe so you always know no stone is being left unturned.
Book Your Accommodation You can book your hostel with Hostelworld as they have the largest inventory. If you want to stay somewhere other than a hostel, use Booking.com, as they consistently return the cheapest rates for guesthouses and hotels. I use them all the time.
Don’t Forget Travel Insurance Travel insurance will protect you against illness, injury, theft, and cancellations. It’s comprehensive protection in case anything goes wrong. I never go on a trip without it, as I’ve had to use it many times in the past. I’ve been using World Nomads for ten years. My favorite companies that offer the best service and value are:
World Nomads (for everyone below 70)
Insure My Trip (for those 70 and over)
Looking for the best companies to save money with? Check out my resource page for the best companies to use when you travel! I list all those I use — and they’ll save you time and money too!
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Tears of Tenderness
He hadn’t loved her as he did now on that name day all of those years ago. He hadn’t even thought of loving her in such a way until many years after that first dance.
A Pierretasha Wedding Fic (I don’t have an AO3, so enjoy the read more.)
Tears of Tenderness
The night before the venchanie was agonizing-- Pierre stayed awake for hours, fear and anxiety pressing against his broad chest, threatening to suffocate him, the sheets of his bed surrounding him in uncomfortable warmth. He laid there a while, the sound of his breath loud and uneven, quieting every now and then, with a listening ear checking for intruders. Pierre always became paranoid at late hours. Unable to withstand this particular bout of insomnia without action, he decided that he might as well make something of his time. He wrote a few letters that needed sending, walked the grounds three times over, checked on the pigs, and finally returned indoors and tidied up his study, a place which, Natasha had once remarked, always had the feeling of having been ransacked just moments before you entered. After gathering a final few papers, which had been strewn about his writing desk, Pierre looked around the room, tried and failed to come up with more mindless tasks to occupy himself, and sat down in his armchair. Finally, he began to doze off.
Suddenly, he awoke, breathing heavily, and felt a great amount fear begin to swell in his chest once more. The terrible dream that had awoken him from his short slumber had caused him to believe that he had slept through his own wedding, an action (or rather, inaction) for which he would never be able to forgive himself. Pierre looked frantically for the clock, and upon discovering that it was only four in the morning, began to calm himself. After taking a series of long, low, deep breaths, he decided that comfort was what he needed, and so he began to search his many bookshelves for something to read. From the shelf nearest to his desk he drew Candide, which had always had the power to ease his apprehension. As his glassy eyes scanned pages upon pages of Voltaire’s familiar quips and biting retorts, Pierre felt the weight begin to lift from his chest. After some time, the sun began to peek through the small crack under the drawn shade over the window, and so he closed the book and decided to get ready.
He gathered his clothing in one arm, sweeping it quickly from his closet, without fear of wrinkling the fabric in the crease of his elbow. He considered calling a servant to help him dress, but eventually decided against it. He had to keep his hands busy, or they would begin to shake, just as they always did when he was nervous. He pulled on his trousers and dress shirt, and stretched his suspenders over his great, burly shoulders. They were a little small, and dug tightly into him, though he didn’t mind. The slight discomfort he felt would eventually fade, lost in the excitement of the events of the day ahead. Finally, he pulled on and buttoned his waistcoat, the last piece of his bridegroom’s ensemble, and having finished dressing, decided to leave for the church. While he acknowledged that he still had hours until guests would even start arriving, he reassured himself that his exceptional punctuality would only be to his benefit. If I am there early, he mused, remembering his nightmare, then it will be impossible for me to miss it by mistake.
As he opened the great wooden doors leading into the cathedral, Pierre saw a man sitting in one of the front pews. Upon hearing the loud creaking that echoed all around him, Nikolai Rostov turned, and smiled at his friend.
“Ah, Bezukhov!” Nikolai said in a jovial tone, “Tasha said you would show up early. She asked me to come and sit with you until we start. She said it would put you at ease.”
“I find that I am a little intimidated by the accuracy of her predictions. She seems, sometimes, to be something close to all-knowing,” Pierre chuckled. He hugged his soon-to-be brother in law, and took a seat next to him in the pew. “How is it that she knows so well of these things?”
“She knows you, Pierre. She has always known you.” Nikolai paused for a moment, remembering, and then continued. ”When we were growing up… she would talk of you so often. Her description of your character always had such pinpoint accuracy. We would always joke that while others studied maths and literature, she studied music and you.”
Pierre blushed, thinking of Natasha, and smiled to himself. He had never thought of her, or anyone for that matter, thinking of him or talking of him when he was not present. He had always imagined that, in others minds, he had ceased to exist the moment he left a room. Knowing now that Natasha had remembered him (and took pains to do so) filled his heart with a magnificent feeling that he could not express with words. He inhaled sharply.
“What is it?”
“Oh...nothing...nothing.”
“Come on Pierre. You are going to be my brother soon. Brothers can confide in each other.” “No really, Nikolai. I’m fine.” Pierre sat for a moment, and Nikolai’s eyes bore straight into his. The Rostovs, Pierre believed, shared a unique ability to pull out one’s truest feelings with a simple, piercing look.
“I am terrified, Nikolai.”
“Terrified? Of what? Of Natasha?”
“No…” Pierre trailed off, remembering every frightening thought he had throughout the night, “I am terrified that...that I will not...be enough for her.”
Nikolai, uncomprehending of the intention behind this statement, chuckled heartily, leaning forward onto the pew.
“Well, I don’t know you’ve got... experience, eh? I remember your youth almost as well as I remember my own. You were not always the picture of virtue, my friend...” Nikolai cleared his throat, and continued. “I am not sure that I want to be the one to give you advice on this subject. All I can say is that...I’m sure that you’re going to be... just fine, Pierre.”
Pierre, realizing the misinterpretation, blushed heavily, and worked quickly to amend it.
“No! No… not… not that. I mean, I am a little concerned about-- no!” Pierre felt his face getting hotter by the moment. “You see, you misunderstand me. I...want nothing but her happiness. What if her happiness does not lie with me?”
“Ah. I see. Bezukhov,” Nikolai said, his eyes betraying nothing but absolute sincerity, “I have never known her happiness to lie so truly in anyone else.”
Pierre, unable to find words, let out a long breath.
Nikolai patted Pierre reassuringly on the back, and the two men sat in silence, a quietness which Pierre appreciated, for at least this time it was filled with good company. After a while, Nikolai checked the clock, and noticing that it was almost time, began to usher Pierre to the back of the church. Looking over the many empty pews, Pierre took a deep breath. Relax, Bezukhov.
Though he tried greatly to take his own advice, Pierre could not help his nerves as he stood at the entrance, waiting. He searched the room for a distraction, anything to put his mind at ease. Family and friends filtered slowly into the room, a low hum echoing throughout the old church. Pierre began to take note of the splendid architecture of the place in which he now stood, a glimpse of a bygone era still standing tall. He took notice of the buttresses, cracked but sturdy, and the immaculate stone carvings that accompanied them. He studied the twisting stone vines caressing the structure, in awe of how such art could come to be, and pitied the artist, knowing that these sorts of things were often overlooked in the presence of religious practice. He began to observe the sunlight, casting the brilliant blues and reds from the stained glass windows over the faces of the guests, making them look as though they were paintings in a museum. After studying these effects for some time, his distractions ran out.
Suddenly, Pierre began to feel it again-- the great fear creeping through his veins, turning his blood to ice and stopping his breath; the fear that he would remain in this church just as he was now: alone. He shuddered at the thought. It was not so difficult to imagine. He had heard of men abandoned at the ceremony, victims of the cold feet of would-be wives, and while he never placed blame on either the bridegroom or the bride for the dissolution of a union, he had always had a lingering fear that it would soon happen to him.
He would understand if she left him, and would not think her cruel. He had always felt unworthy of Natasha’s love, for, even after all of her mistakes, she was the height of humanity in his mind, and he was a model for all of its faults. How could she love me? He thought, but he never dared to ask, for he feared that even posing the question would cause her to realize how superior she was to himself, and she would finally gain sense and leave him for someone better.
As the minutes passed, the fear grew stronger, and Pierre began to feel his face burn. He looked down, worried that tears would well up in his eyes, and took a deep breath. She will not abandon you. She loves you. She loves you. After a long moment, he felt a hand lift his face, ever so softly, and he suddenly realized that every last bit of air he had just taken in had vacated his lungs. She looked into his eyes, and forgetting everyone else, he let his tears begin to spill over his eyelids. A wide smile began to spread across his face, and the only thing he could see was her, his Natasha, standing there with him. The light glanced off of her cheek, making her own tears shine.
Pierre took her hand, and unable to contain his joy, firmly kissed the back of it. He held her hand over his heart, and reached out with the other to wipe away her tears. She did the same for him. Their eyes were fixed on each other.
“Pierre. Oh my dear, sweet Pierre. You know that if you cry, I shall cry too.” He laughed and felt a rush of warmth overtake his body. “My heart is racing so terribly!”
“Mine, too.”
“I’m so...I don’t know. I feel as though I cannot breathe.”
“Are you alright?’ Pierre asked in concern.
“Oh...oh I’m sure I’m just fine. Oh goodness Pierre, how could you want me? I wonder all the time why you should want to marry me when I panick so easily at everything.”
Pierre, hurt that she could ever wonder about how truly he loved her, began to stroke her cheek with his thumb, and Natasha placed her hand on his, looking up at him.
“Because, my dear Natasha, there is nothing in this world or the next that could persuade my soul that it did not need yours.”
Natasha took a deep breath, smiled softly, and held tightly to his hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze.
“I love you,” she breathed, holding back a fresh wave of tears.
Pierre exhaled, having the wind knocked out of him by her once more. She had a talent for it.
“It looks as though it’s time,” he whispered, still very much out of breath. Her gaze bore straight into his eyes, glassy yet focused, and she nodded, breathing heavily.
The priest began by blessing their rings, handed to him by Nikolai and Sonya Rostova, Pierre and Natasha’s respective svideteli. The priest told them of what their union would be-- the betterment and completion of two souls, incomplete on their own but whole and strong together. Pierre had never felt stronger than when Natasha was by his side, and he felt a particular warmth and fondness for this statement.
“You will now exchange the rings.”
Natasha took the ring from Sonya and placed it carefully on Pierre’s finger. He felt a tear fall from her face and onto his hand, and felt his own tears begin to gather again. He took the ring from Nikolai and noticed that his hand was shaking. Natasha reached out to steady him, and with another reassuring squeeze, helped to guide the ring onto her hand. The priest joined their right hands, making them one, and instructed them to keep them together for the rest of the ceremony. Pierre could not think of anything finer.
The crowning and everything after passed in a blur, until Pierre realized that the priest was giving the final blessing. He looked quickly at Natasha, who was already looking at him, and realized that it had happened.
They were married. He and Natasha Rostova. Natasha Bezukhova. Just a few hours before, he had feared that he would spend his life alone, and now she was here. Now they were each other’s. Overwhelmed with joy, he kissed her, as if by doing so he could prove that he was not, in fact, dreaming. In the abruptness of the kiss he caught Natasha by surprise, though she reciprocated quite enthusiastically. Pierre could hear Nikolai’s soft laughter behind him. Everyone could see them, and he did not care. After all, he was kissing his wife.
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The ballroom was the brightest he had ever seen it on a winter’s night. All rooms are brighter when she is in them, Pierre thought. He had often wondered what this kind of happiness would feel like. For so many years, he had lived in dimly lit rooms and kept to himself, reading and letting his life go by in an indistinguishable, drunken rush. But now-- things were vibrant, fresh, new. When he was with Natasha the world simply seemed better.
He watched her float through the crowd, from person to person, talking animatedly and receiving their most sincere congratulations. Pierre himself was caught up in some conversation about the developing United States, but found the topic dull in comparison to the bright light of Natasha Rostova. Bezukhova, he reminded himself, smirking slightly. He was not sure he would ever be used to that.
Distracted once more from his conversation, he saw Natasha speaking with Sonya, the two women bubbling with excitement. They hugged and held each other’s hands, exchanging knowing looks and whispering to each other whenever something new and somewhat scandalous seemed to be afoot. Every once in awhile, they would look over at Pierre, and he would become somewhat uneasy, but in a way that one does when teased by family. The looks were joyful and loving. After some time, Natasha hugged her cousin and returned to Pierre’s side. She took his hand.
“I am sorry to do this to you,” she said with a mischievous glint in her eye, “I know your disdain for it, but I find that, on my wedding day, it is a requirement of my husband to dance with me.”
“Tasha…” he muttered, pulling back, “Tasha you know how awful I am.”
She pulled his face close to his and spoke at a level that only he could hear.
“Pyotr Kirillovich Bezukhov, you could step on my feet all night and I would still choose to only dance with you. I would like,” she said, her warm breath dancing on his neck, sending a shiver down his spine, “to dance with my husband. And so I shall.” Natasha pressed her lips firmly on his mouth, and held their kiss for a long, sweet moment. While he was lost in cheerful bewilderment, she lead him onto the dance floor, and a waltz began. After a moment, Pierre realized Natasha’s treachery, and could not help but to be impressed. He reluctantly but graciously obliged her.
Just as she had done as a young girl, Natasha helped Pierre and guided him through the steps. “This one is quite simple,” she’d say, though no dance ever seemed simple to Pierre. However, seeing how happy it made her, he put his best foot forward. He looked at her with wonder as she showed him through each piece, gracefully explaining what he was to do next. He felt so much younger when he danced with her, and forgot is hatred for it almost at once.
He remembered her name day all those years ago, when he stopped by unannounced to offer his well wishes. That was the day they danced for the first time. The dance, of course, was entirely innocent-- he did not love her then as he did now. But this dance was different. Each turn, each step, every last movement of every last muscle was entirely electric.
He hadn’t loved her as he did now on that name day all of those years ago. He hadn’t even thought of loving her in such a way until many years after that first dance. Until after he realized it was too late. After Hélène. After Andrei. Upon the last few thoughts, Pierre felt a pang of guilt, as though by their misfortunes he had received blessings he did not deserve. He pushed the thought aside. He was happy, he had to let himself be happy, for after everything they had seen, everything they had faced, after all of the wasted time, Natasha and Pierre were here, dancing as husband and wife.
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Pierre helped Natasha into the carriage, taking her hand while the maidservant helped her with her dress, and he climbed in after her. They waved out of the window to their families as they left. Natasha’s mother was in tears, as was Sonya. Denisov smiled joyfully, and Dolokhov nodded as a man and woman he had not remembered inviting to the wedding draped themselves on his shoulders. Mary and Nikolai waved and smiled, and Pierre could swear as they passed him, Nikolai gave him a wink. Pierre pulled himself back into the carriage, blushing a deep shade of red.
“What’s wrong, my dear?” Natasha asked, concerned.
“Oh...nothing,” Pierre cleared his throat, a great many thoughts flooding his mind, “Nikolai. Something funny he did, that’s all.”
“Ah, Nikolai. I love him dearly, but I do not think I wish to speak of him now.” Natasha paused as she moved onto his side of the carriage. “All I want to hear of is you, Petrushka. How are you my love?” Pierre blushed even more as his wife put her head on his chest, which, now that she was near him, was moving much faster. He put his arm around her and gently kissed the top of her head.
“Petrushka, your heart is beating so quickly!” she exclaimed, running her hand up to feel the quickening beat within his chest.
If this continued, his face would soon turn the color of a beat.
“That...that is always the pace of my heart when you are near,” He paused a moment, taking everything in, and continued, answering her original question, “I am very well, Natasha. The best I have ever been.” Natasha looked up at him, kissed his cheek, and put her head in the exact place it had been only a moment before.
They sat in silence for a long time, and Pierre began to realize how exhausted he was. He was sure this was the first time he had sat down since the ceremony, and was beginning to feel how sore his legs were. He was not used to dancing as he did tonight. He looked down at Natasha, who had now fallen asleep, and he realized that she must feel as tired, if not more so than he did. He gently rubbed her back with his hand, and she snuggled in closer to him. Tears, which had been so present in him on this day already, began to fill his eyes once more, and he took a deep breath to calm himself, an action which roused his drowsy wife.
“Are we home Pierre?” She said, a sleepy gruffness coating her voice.
The question excited him. There was a “we” that now belonged to this home. A “we” that had not existed before this morning. The “we” that he had only ever dreamed of before. He looked out the window of the carriage as it began to slow.
“Yes darling, we are.” Pierre exited the carriage first, and upon helping his wife down, he swooped her up in his arms while she squealed with delight. He laughed heartily and carried her over the threshold, through the entrance hall, up the stairs, and over the threshold of his room...their room. He sat Natasha down on the bed, and he sat next to her.
Natasha looked into his eyes.
“Hello, husband,” she whispered, cupping his face with her hand.
Very suddenly, he began to cry.
“Oh my goodness! Pierre? Petrushka? ”
“Natasha…”
“What’s the matter? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing Tasha, nothing is wrong,” he said, working furiously to stop the rush of tears streaming down his face, to no avail.
“Have I done something?”
“Tasha...you’ve done... everything.”
Pierre noticed that his last remark had struck something in Natasha.
“My dear, no, please. I should rephrase,” he said, clasping her small hands in his, kissing them feverishly, “You’ve...done everything for me. You’ve helped me in ways that I could not have ever foreseen. You. You are everything dear Natasha. I think what is wrong is that...nothing is wrong. Quite the contrary. Everything is as right as it can be, and I do not feel as though I am worth it.”
“Oh Pierre…”
“Natasha…” he said, and he paused for a long time, wondering if he should continue. “I...to believe that you love me. To… believe that any of this is real. That I am worthy of any of this...you don’t need someone like me. I am not worth it.”
Natasha looked into her husband’s eyes, hurting so terribly for him as he had for her this morning, hating that he felt this way, looked at him for a long moment, tears now rolling down her face. She stroked his cheek, warm and damp with tears, and reassured him.
“Stop,” she said quietly, heavily. She held his gaze. “Pierre... my Pierre...I must tell you that though you may not believe it, this is true of me, too: there is nothing in this world or the next that could persuade my soul that it did not need yours.”
Pierre looked at Natasha, his breathing returning to normal. They both smiled, and began to laugh, softly, understanding each other perfectly.
“My dearest love…” he said, and pushing back her hair, he kissed his Natasha, every bit of longing he had ever felt for her now validated in this perfect moment of bliss. The Bezukhovs were quite content.
#pierretasha#war and peace#natasha rostova#pierre bezukhov#my writing#mine#memetrash5001#the bezukhovs#wedding#headcanon#fic#fanfiction#pierre x natasha#natasha x pierre
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About the stationery theme ask, can you do that all, please?!? Love ya!! ((I want to know everything about you))
Oh my goddddd. You make me smile and blush and say ‘omg’ so much! 💖Sure! I shall do all the remaining ones for you.
gel pen: when are you most comfortable?When I am at home, in my room, wearing the most mismatched but comfortable clothes and my hair is in the weirdest bun while I sip on my green tea and watch kdrama. Also when I interact with people who match my frequency in terms of values, beliefs and attitude (like you!!! 💖)ballpoint pen: tell me about the day you’ve just hadI went to college, attended a seminar on career choices which was brilliant, send an email to the speaker of the seminar for an internship opportunity at his startup, had a yummy lunch with my mom, studied for like an hour, and spent the last hour answering all the asks. It has been a lovely day. fineliner: what’s your greatest achievement?
Scoring 100/100 in my 12th std Economics board paper. I know marks don’t define you or mean much beyond a point but this meant a lot to me because, A. I worked hard B. I didn’t expect it (I asked my dad to check whether it was ‘00′ instead of ‘100′ because in spite of all my hard work and knowledge, failing seemed more possible than a perfect score in a subject like Economics)C. I was the first person to score full in Economics in the long, long, long history of my school which is very well known for national rankers. highlighter: what are your best qualities?I am highly self aware which helps me with interpersonal skillsI am a highly creative person I strive to be a kind human being
felt-tip: describe your aestheticLong conversations at night, sleepy Sundays, lavish meals, body warmth, endless questions, toothy smiles, dancing in the rain, the comfort of an oversized hoodie, flowers in hair and comfortable silences. stapler: out of all the people you know, who do you think you are closest to?My family definitely glue stick: what do you look for in a lasting relationship/friendship?Understanding, inspiring/encouraging, helping to learn and grow, meaningful conversations, solid support and honesty. tape: tell me about your longest friendshipWe became friends in 6th grade and she helped me change from a bossy bitch to a less bossier bitch. I changed cities 2 years later but we continued to be ‘best friends’ until we stopped in meaning but continued in essence. I know I can always show up at her place even now and she will welcome me and my bags. no questions asked. We are so different culturally and religiously but that has never been an issue between us. She has seen me have a 180 degrees change and I have witnessed the same. We have no expectations of the other because we already know and feel the unconditional love. ruler: what line will you never cross?Abuse - physical and sexual eraser: what do you consider to be your biggest mistake?Giving like 12746495083756 chances to two completely undeserving ass holes. scissors: ever had a bad break-up?Yessticky note: something about yourself you’d like to changeMy weight stamp: a date that’s special for you and why
17th January. It’s my birthday. Need I say more? haha I love this day because for the longest time it was the only day I thought I could paper/care/only be concerned with myself without feeling guilty. bookmark: a book that means a lot to you and whyIt’s actually a play - Cat on a Hot Tin Roof by Tennessee Williams I studied it in 11th grade and it meant a lot because I could strongly resonate with the major themes of homosexuality(which I took it as being true to who you are) and mendacity. folder: describe your familyI have an older sister who is like my best friend and who irritates me most days as though she is the younger sibling. I love her and she is super hardworking and sincere and strong and inspires me everyday. My mom and dad are similar in the sense that they had to go through a lot of hardships in their life starting from childhood (different sorts of hardships) but they are still some of the happiest and content people I know so their general personality, mindset, attitude and courage constantly inspires me. I could write a book on each of them.whiteboard: tell me your plans for tomorrowPretty routine - college, tumblr, lunch, studying, tumblr, kdrama, workout, tumblr, sleepblackboard: tell me about a memory that has affected who you are todayOh...6th grade, I am crying my eyes out. And probably puking. I am so damn scared. completely terrified. Lost. Lonely. All of this while being at my home. Promising myself that even though I can’t do much to make things better, I can definitely try and I can start with studying and getting good grades and making my parents proud. It took me four years, but I got there.
pinboard: what are you focusing on in your life right now?my health and college tablet: tell me your plans for the futureBecause this is my final year at college, I have absolutely no idea what life is going to be like next year. Honestly. My plan is to just take great care of my physical and mental health and save loads so I can start travelling. envelope: tell me a secretOkay I guess it’s time...I joined tumblr sometime in 2015 but I had no clue what this app was used for so didn’t use it after that first day. Months later when I was dating this guy, he told me about this friend on the other side of the world who he has been emailing since the last 2 years. I got kinda jealous. He gave me her twitter which lead me to her tumblr. I went through her tumblr and she wrote a lot of stuff. A lot of personal stuff. My jealousy vanished and I wanted to support her strength to be so vulnerable and seeing as she had no notes, I reset my tumblr password (since I hadn’t used it after that first day months ago, I had forgot my password) and then furiously liked all her stuff. A couple of weeks later I posted for the first time on tumblr. And so that’s how I joined tumblr.
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I’ve just returned from the Conference on the History of Women Religious (CHWR) at Saint Mary’s College just across the road from University of Notre Dame. Here are some highlights from each of the four days.
DAY 1. There were three panels during the first session, and I attended the panel on the history of nuns and racial justice. It included a sing-song story about the late Sr. Thea Bowman at the USCCB; a moving personal account by a Sister of St. Joseph of Rochester NY (left photo) on living in Selma during 1959-1968; and an account on Sr. Margaret Ellen Traxler and others in the NCCIJ. To my delight, the last presentation mentioned fifteen Franciscan nuns from Assisi Heights, where I worked during my senior year in high school, who participated in the Cabrini Project in Chicago.
Early Americanist Ann Little (Colorado State) gave the evening’s keynote, mostly on her recent biography of Esther Wheelwright. She was New England-born; captured by the Wabanaki Indians at 7 and became Catholic among them; and joined the Ursulines in Canada and eventually became mother superior. The story is fascinating, and I’d like to read the book sometimes in the next year.A theme that caught my eyes has to do with the nun’s habit(s). Prof. Little pointed out a comparison between the Ursuline habit and the Wabanaki female hood regarding weather, among other things. Another reason for the thickness of the Ursuline habit was restriction of hearing and seeing for the purpose of interior prayer and introspection. Another presenter mentioned that Martin Luther King wrote to Catholic bishops and religious orders to invite priests and nuns to march in Selma and elsewhere. He really wanted them to wear the collars and religious habits. Until this conference, I hadn’t seen photos of civil rights marches from this period showing nuns. One photo showed a nun in full habit participating in the Meredith March Against Fear in June 1966. Imagine putting on something like that to walk outdoors under the high heat and humidity of a Mississippian summer.
DAY 2. I went to all four sessions, starting with a morning panel on three archives in NYC area. The archives of the Sisters of Charity of New York might draw much interest from researchers because of its holdings on St. Vincent’s Hospital, but the Maryknoll Mission Archives is probably most applicable to my research. I also cross my fingers that there are relevant materials in the many deposits to the Archives of the Archdiocese of New York, which, incidentally, illustrates the old joke that even the Holy Spirit doesn’t know how many orders of Catholic nuns there are in the world. Until its archivist’s presentation, for example, I hadn’t heard of the Sisters of Divine Compassion or the Sisters of Our Lady of Christian Charity. I did know about the Hawthorne Dominicans, having first seen their ads in Catholic publications during the early 1990s. I didn’t know, however, that their founder was the daughter of Nathaniel Hawthorne. Similar to UMV earlier this month, I stayed in a student dorm and, from suite mate Farrell O’Gorman, an English faculty at Belmont Abbey College, learned quite a few things about Mother Mary Alphonsa, as Rose Hawthorne was eventually known, from my Unsurprisingly, the New Yorkers at the conference knew plenty about her and her branch of Dominicans.
My NYC-accented morning was balanced out by a panel on the Sisters and Daughters of Charity moving to the West during the nineteenth century: to St. Louis, California, Nevada, New Mexico, and Colorado. For the first time in my conference-going life, I heard two presentations consisted entirely of excerpts from letters, annals, memoirs, and diaries. (One presenter has been a Daughter of Charity since 1958 and gave her presentation from a wheelchair.) These presentations added up to a remarkable portrayal of endurance. The nuns’ travels to the American West might not be as melodramatic as Xuanzang’s journey to the west, but they sure were no picnic. They smelled, for example, the awful air of coal when passing through West Virginia, and they saw horrifying scenes of chained slaves in Missouri. There were sicknesses and even a few deaths along the way. The challenges continued well after they arrived to Santa Fe or San Francisco. But the difficulties also revealed opportunities. As someone in the audience put it during the Q&A, in the East Coast, Catholic nuns built institutions–orphanages, hospitals, schools–parallel to the already existing structure. In the West, however, they built the structure itself.
The last panel that I attended also considered antebellum nuns, albeit with a French rather than New York accent. Jacqueline Willy Romero, whose article was recently published in the same issue of American Catholic Studies as mine, told a fascinating story of conflict between a French-born Sulpician bishop of Bardstown, Kentucky, and a nun of the Sisters of Charity, which he’d founded and stood as their superior general. Gabrielle Guillerm, a doctoral student of Robert Orsi at Northwestern, talked about different types of memory about French missionary nuns in nineteenth-century America. Even though I’d known that France led all Europeans in missionary endeavors, I was still mildly stunned to learn that in 1878, three-quarters of Catholic missionaries, men and women, were French. To paraphrase Kathy Cummings during her commentary, the French roots of American Catholicism were deep and long. It is most appropriate, then, that the site of this conference was founded by French nuns.
DAY 3. I missed the afternoon sessions due to being online for a committee meeting in Malibu. And in the morning I gave my presentation on Vietnamese women religious. It was supposed to be about their exile to the U.S. in 1975, but I ended up speaking more about their lives in colonial Indochina and in South Vietnam. There was more about NYC at my panel, this time on the Dominican Sisters, from native son Jim Carroll who spoke with a distinct New York accent. The other panelists, a husband-and-wife team, spoke about the four American women missionaries that were murdered in El Salvador. To this familiar story, I learned quite a bit about their background from this presentation as well as the banquet’s plenary talk by Eileen Markey (Lehman College), author of a book about Sr. Maura Clarke, one of the missionaries (top). Similar to Day 1, the plenary was interrupted by tornado siren that forced all attendants to the basement. The interruption was fortunately much shorter this time, and there was also a nice display wing that kept some of us helpfully distracted (bottom).
The most fascinating presentations came from the first session. There were a paper on indigenous Mexican nuns by an American doctoral student at Rutgers and another on discalced Carmelites in the Netherland by an Irish-Dutch historian. The second paper, in particular, explained an ideology of self-renunciation, reparation, and meritorious and “sacrificial suffering” in Carmelite cloistered and contemplative life. The Q&A was also notable for a question and answer about Edith Stein. The papers are parts of larger works-in-progress, both of which I look forward to read when they are completed.
DAY 4. The last day ended with lunch, so there were only two sessions in the morning, each with two panels. I went to the back-to-back panels on CARA’s ongoing research about (a) culture and ethnicity on religious life in recent decades; and (b) international religious institutes in the U.S. since 1965. There were many charts and graphs shown by the presenters, plus a lot of feedback from panelists and audience on questions and approaches regarding these subjects. There was also quite a bit about Vietnamese American Catholics due mostly to the effort of Sr. Thu Do, a member of the Lovers of the Holy Cross in Hanoi. She’s been a principal investigator of these projects, and I met her briefly last year when she visited my parish during a tour of surveys. I chatted with her several times at this conference and I look forward to read the final findings and analyses.
In the afternoon, I went to the archives at Notre Dame and learned that the holdings are still kept on the sixth floor but the research room is now on the first floor. I was on the sixth floor only once when living in South Bend, and it shall remain so. The new place is spacious with many tables for researchers in the large room. I was taken to the small room with only four tables. There were already three people busy at work, and two of them were CHWR attendants like myself. I returned the next morning and found a third conference-goer, one of the Dominican Sisters, also examining some materials. Life of the mind.
Besides meeting a number of archivists and academics for the first time, the conference afforded a chance to see several people I haven’t seen in years, including John McGreevy and Mary Henold. Headed by Tom Rzeznik, the programming committee did a fine job putting together the schedule. Kathy Cummings and the Cushwa Center ensured a smooth run of the conference on the face of occasionally inclement weather. The campus of Saint Mary’s College is quite beautiful and, in contrast to the bustling of visitors and construction at Notre Dame, quite serene.
The 11th triennial conference on the history of women religious I've just returned from the Conference on the History of Women Religious (CHWR) at Saint Mary's College just across the road from University of Notre Dame.
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We now have more evidence that Galileo likely never said “And yet it moves”
Enlarge / Portrait of Galileo Galilei by Justus Sustermans, circa 1640.
Galileo Galilei famously stood trial for his insistence—based on astronomical observations through his telescopes—that the Copernican model of the Solar System was correct. The Earth revolved around the Sun, not the other way around, contrary to the Catholic Church’s teachings at the time. He was never formally charged with heresy, but he was forced to recant his stance. Legend has it that after he did so, he muttered, “E pur si muove“ (“And yet it moves”), meaning the Earth.
As with many such legends, it’s probably too good to be true. “It would have been crazy for Galileo to say that in front of the Inquisitor,” astrophysicist Mario Livio told Ars. Livio is the author of a new biography of the famous scientist, Galileo and the Science Deniers, and while researching the book, he found himself captivated by the longstanding debate about whether or not Galileo really spoke those words. It resulted in a separate academic paper about his findings.
The earliest biography of Galileo was written by his protege, Vincenzo Viviana in 1655-1656, with no mention of the phrase. According to Livio, the first mention in print is in a single paragraph in the 1757 book, The Italian Library, by Giuseppe Baretti, written over 100 years after Galileo’s death. That would point to the story being a myth. But then a science historian named Antonio Favaro spent four decades studying Galileo’s life and work, publishing a massive tome, The Works of Galileo Galilei. In 1911, he also published several articles detailing his efforts to determine the origin of the famous phrase.
Enlarge / Portrait of Galileo in prison, often attributed to Murillo circa 1643. New evidence suggests it was painted much later by a different artist.
That year, Favaro received a letter from a man in Belgium named Jules Van Belle, claiming to own a painting, circa 1643—shortly after Galileo’s death in 1642—that depicted Galileo in prison, holding a nail in his right hand, having traced the Earth moving around the Sun. Written underneath was the famous motto. The painting was attributed to a Spanish painter named Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, and Van Belle thought it may have once belonged to an army commander named Ottavio Piccolomini, brother of the Archbishop of Siena. Galileo served the first six months of his house arrest at the archbishop’s home.
That raised the possibility that Galileo had said those words, just not in front of the Inquisitor. Yet the painting was never examined by any independent art historians. When Livio decided to follow up on Favaro’s work more than a century later, he found that nobody knew the current location of the Murillo painting. He consulted with four art experts specializing in Murillo’s art, and all determined, based on photographs of the canvas, that it was not the Spanish artist’s work.
After about a year hunting down various clues, Livio finally rediscovered Van Belle’s painting. It had been sold to a private collector in 2007 by one of Van Belle’s descendants. The auction house had dated the painting to the 19th century. So it is still far more likely that the famous phrase is just a legend that emerged sometime in the mid-18th century. But no final determination can be made unless the new owner agrees to let the painting be examined by art historians.
Nonetheless, “Even if Galileo never spoke those words, they have some relevance for our current troubled times, when even provable facts are under attack by science deniers,” Livio recently wrote at Scientific American. “Galileo’s legendary intellectual defiance—’in spite of what you believe, these are the facts’—becomes more important than ever.” Ars sat down with Livio to learn more.
Enlarge / Cristiano Banti’s 1857 painting Galileo Facing the Roman Inquisition.
Public domain
Ars: Perhaps Galileo never actually said “And yet it moves.” But one of the most famous genuine quotes attributed to Galileo is this: “The book of Nature is written in the language of mathematics.”
Livio: That was one of his incredible intuitions. Today, this is so natural to us. We still don’t exactly understand it, but it’s very natural that all the laws of physics are written as mathematical expressions or equations. But in his time, those laws were not written in any way. So how did he get this intuition that it is all written in the language of mathematics? To me, this is absolutely incredible that he thought about that. In fact, he formulated the very first laws of physics, with the slight exception of Archimedes maybe.
Ars Technica: Galileo is one of the most famous scientists in history, and there have been so many books published about his life and work. What led you to write your own take?
Mario Livio: One reason is that all the existing biographies of Galileo, at least the serious biographies, were written mostly by science historians or science writers. None was written by an active researcher in astronomy or astrophysics. So I did think that I can perhaps put his discoveries in the context of what we know today. A second reason is that the very best biographies that exist are not that accessible for a general audience. They are scholarly biographies. So my goal was to write a somewhat shorter, more accessible, focused biography, but I did my best to still keep it entirely accurate.
Finally, I always knew this, but it just struck me even more so recently, that at the end of the day, Galileo was fighting science deniers, and we are unfortunately encountering a rampant science denial today. So I thought that this would be an important book to write. A fight that Galileo fought already 400 years ago, and truly, eventually won, it seems we somehow need to fight again.
Ars: Galileo is still a powerful symbol of intellectual freedom (scientific or otherwise). Why has Galileo captured our imaginations for so long?
Livio: There are many reasons for that. Galileo, by writing the Dialogue on the Two Chief World Systems, attracted a lot of attention. He was perhaps the best known scientist in Europe because of his discoveries in astronomy. So his book attracted the wrath of the Inquisition and the Pope, and he was put on trial for this and was humiliated and suspected of heresy and put on house arrest for eight and a half years. This is pretty incredible. We are now in lockdown for what, a couple of months, and we’re going crazy.
So he became the symbol for the fight for intellectual freedom. It was not, as sometimes it is portrayed, the fight between science and religion. Galileo was a religious person, like everybody else at that time. All his point was that the Bible is not a science book, and we shouldn’t therefore interpret literally what is said there as if these are scientific facts. “The Bible was written for our salvation,” he said, “Not as a science book.”
“His tongue could be sharp, and his pen even sharper.”
If there is an apparent conflict between a literal interpretation of the text in scripture and what experiments or observations tell us, then it means that we didn’t understand and we need to change the interpretation. As long as the conclusions of science concerning physical reality are accepted, with no intervention of religious beliefs and no denouncing of provable facts, no conflict between the two realms can exist.
It had also to do with his personal characteristics, of which stubbornness was a chief one, as well as a high degree of self-righteousness. Galileo advocated that there were only three things one needs to do to determine truths about the world: experiments, observations, and reasoning based on data from those. He also said that he didn’t believe that the same God who has given us our senses, intelligence, and reasoning wanted us to abandon their use. So his tongue could be sharp, and his pen even sharper.
Enlarge / Astrophysicist Mario Livio says his new book holds lessons for what the life of Galileo can teach us about how to respond to science denial today.
Simon and Schuster
Ars: Conversely, Galileo’s example has been twisted by various cranks and crackpots into the exact opposite of what Galileo stood for. I’m reminded of Carl Sagan’s observation: “They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.”
Livio: This is the Galileo fallacy. It is really a complete twist of logic. There are people who say, “Look, Galileo also was alone among all those people who disagreed with him, and he turned out to be right. So if I have my opinion and it’s against everybody else, then I am right too.” But that really doesn’t apply. Galileo was right because he was right, not because he was alone against everybody else. Most people who are alone against everybody else are wrong. Putting Galileo on trial, finding him guilty, and condemning him to house arrest would have been wrong even had he been wrong about his model of the Solar System. He expressed a different scientific view. So what?
Ars: Science builds on what came before, and we’ve come a long way since Galileo. So let’s talk about the connection between the past and the present in terms of his work.
Livio: Galileo wasn’t always right. For instance, because he was a mechanical person, it was very foreign to him to think of forces that act mysteriously across distance. So he didn’t really think about gravity the way we think about it today, not even in the way that Newton thought about it. Kepler, for example, had written about the moon perhaps having an influence on the tides, which is correct. Galileo ignored that. He suggested this model that had to do with the Earth’s speed and its revolution about the Sun, with those two motions combining to generate the tides. This was an interesting mechanical model, only it’s incorrect and didn’t really work.
He also never accepted Kepler’s elliptical orbits of planets, based on false impressions from the Greeks about things being perfectly symmetrical. So he thought orbits should be circles and not ellipses. But when you talk about symmetry, it’s not the symmetry of the shapes that counts, it’s the symmetry of the law. In other words, the orbit can be elliptical, but the ellipse can have any orientation in space.
Trust in science. That’s my main message. What is good about science is that it self-corrects. The self-correction sometimes takes a very short time and sometimes take a very long time. It could take sometimes decades, or maybe even centuries, but eventually it self-corrects. It is generally not wise to bet against the judgement of science. In a case such as climate change, or a pandemic, when the fate of life on our planet is at stake, it is absolutely insane.
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Dinosaur books!
More dinosaur books. After I finished Jurassic Park, I started reading Crichton’s bio and realised he had written a sequel – The Lost World. While checking on Amazon, the search result also showed The Lost World by Arthur Conan Doyle. I was so surprised and even more surprised when I read the outline and realised that Conan Doyle too wrote an adventure story with dinosaurs! What fun! So I ordered both. I loved both books and I can’t believe I was not even interested in dinosaurs for so long! Funny how things change over the years – a person’s character and a person’s love for dinosaurs :).
Due to the order in which I read these books, I saw a funny contrast. A book written in 1995 and then a book written in 1912. A book with Sarah Harding and then a book with Gladys Hungerton. Sarah is a brilliant, no-nonsense and fearless biologist. Gladys is a professor’s daughter wishing only to marry a famous man. I absolutely loved Sarah’s character and her actions in Crichton’s book and to read of Gladys after her, was a big shock. I cringed whenever I read Gladys’ dialogues in Conan Doyle’s book in the first chapter. However, I had to remind myself that this was a book written in 1912, women really didn’t have any freedom to go anywhere and do anything and it was Gladys’ bad luck that she was born in that century and was the woman she was. Plus, she was Conan Doyle’s version of a woman and not really his view of ALL the women then 🙂 ( at least I hope not). Still, it was jarring to me. Now that I’m done with the book, I actually feel sorry for Gladys – maybe she did have a great spirit of adventure and danger and seeking the unknown and risking your life for those moments that make you FEEL alive – except due to the society and her upbringing, it was twisted and it finally projected out as only a childish wish to marry a famous man who had the freedom to actually go out and see danger and adventure in his life. This was a good lesson for me to learn and appreciate, when I looked at both books together. Gladys words ( that made me dislike her at first, but now I just see a suppressed adventurer, wanting to live vicariously through the man in her life :(. ): "It is never a man that I should love, but always the glories he had won; for they would be reflected upon me. Think of Richard Burton! When I read his wife’s life of him I could so understand her love! And Lady Stanley! Did you ever read the wonderful last chapter of that book about her husband? These are the sort of men that a woman could worship with all her soul, and yet be the greater, not the less, on account of her love, honored by all the world as the inspirer of noble deeds."
"If I marry, I do want to marry a famous man!"
"There are heroisms all round us waiting to be done. It’s for men to do them, and for women to reserve their love as a reward for such men. Look at that young Frenchman who went up last week in a balloon. It was blowing a gale of wind; but because he was announced to go he insisted on starting. The wind blew him fifteen hundred miles in twenty-four hours, and he fell in the middle of Russia. That was the kind of man I mean. Think of the woman he loved, and how other women must have envied her! That’s what I should like to be,–envied for my man."
Sarah’s words ( totally loved this character): In the darkened trailer, Kelly was frightened, but she was reassured at the no-nonsense way Sarah talked about weapons. And Kelly was beginning to see that Sarah didn’t let anything stop her, she just went and did it. This whole attitude of not letting other people stop you, of believing that you could do what you wanted, was something she found herself imitating.
"That’s very good," Harding said. "I think these people owe you their lives." "Not really," Kelly said, with a little shrug. Sarah shot her a look. "All your life, other people will try to take your accomplishments away from you. Don’t you take it away from yourself."
Here are my favorite bits from The Lost World, Michael Crichton:
Malcolm’s reply was immediate: "What makes you think human beings are sentient and aware? There’s no evidence for it. Human beings never think for themselves they find it too uncomfortable. For the most part, members of our species simply repeat what they are told -and become upset if they are exposed to any different view. The characteristic human trait is not awareness but conformity, and the characteristic result is religious warfare. Other animals fight for territory or food; but, uniquely in the animal kingdom, human beings fight for their ‘beliefs.’ The reason is that beliefs guide behavior, which has evolutionary importance among human beings. But at a time when our behavior may, well lead us to extinction, I see no reason to assume we have any awareness at all. We are stubborn, self-destructive conformists. Any other view of our species is just a self-congratulatory delusion. Next question."
Guitierrez shrugged. "I don’t know, but the whole attitude toward research has changed, Richard. It’s very noticeable here. Costa Rica has one of the richest ecologies in the world. Half a million species in twelve distinct environmental habitats. Five percent of all the species on the planet are represented here. This country has been a biological research center for years, and I can tell you, things have changed. In the old days, the people who came here were dedicated scientists with a passion to learn about something for its own sake-howler monkeys, or polistine wasps, or the sombrilla plant. These people had chosen their field because they cared about it. They certainly weren’t going to get rich. But now, everything in the biosphere is potentially valuable. Nobody knows where the next drug is coming from, so drug companies fund all sorts of research. Maybe a bird egg has a protein that makes it waterproof. Maybe a spider produces a peptide that inhibits blood clotting. Maybe the waxy surface of a fern contains a painkiller. It happens often enough that attitudes toward research have changed. People aren’t studying the natural world any more, they’re mining it. It’s a looter mentality. Anything new or unknown is automatically of interest, because it might have value. It might be worth a fortune."
These kids were smart, they were enthusiastic, and they were young enough so that the schools hadn’t destroyed all their interest in learning. They could still actually use their brains, which in Thorne’s view was a sure sign they hadn’t yet completed a formal education.
In the end, their differences came down to personalities. Malcolm considered Levine pedantic and fussy, preoccupied with petty details. Levine never saw the big picture. He never looked at the consequences of his actions. For his own part, Levine did not hesitate to call Malcolm imperious and detached, indifferent to details. "God is in the details," Levine once reminded him. "Maybe your God," Malcolm shot back. "Not mine. Mine is in the process."
"Now, if this picture makes sense, where does natural selection act? Does it act on the body, enlarging the brain? Does it act on the developmental sequence, pushing the kids out early? Does it act on social behavior, provoking cooperation and child-caring? Or does it act everywhere all at once – on bodies, on development, and on social behavior?" "Everywhere at once," Arby said.
She stood up. "You know about George Schaller?" "Sure. He studied pandas." "Right. Pandas, and before that, snow leopards and lions and gorillas. He’s the most important animal researcher in the twentieth century-and you know how he works?" Kelly shook her head. "Before he goes into the field, George reads everything that’s ever been written about the animal he’s going to study. Popular books, newspaper accounts, scientific papers, everything. Then he goes out and observes the animal for himself. And you know what he usually finds?" She shook her head, not trusting herself to speak. "That nearly everything that’s been written or said is wrong. Like the gorilla. George studied mountain gorillas ten years before Diane Fossey ever thought of it. And he found that what was believed about gorillas was exaggerated, or misunderstood, or just plain fantasy – like the idea that you couldn’t take women on gorilla expeditions, because the gorillas would rape them, Wrong. Everything…just… wrong." Sarah finished tying her boots, and stood. "So, Kelly, even at your young age, there’s something you might as well learn now. All your life people will tell you things. And most of the time, probably ninety-five percent of the time, what they’ll tell you will be wrong." Kelly said nothing. She felt oddly disheartened to hear this. "It’s a fact of life," Sarah said. "Human beings are just stuffed full of misinformation. So it’s hard to know who to believe. I know how you feel."
" Do you realize the limits of our understanding? Mathematically, we can describe two things interacting, like two planets in space. Three things interacting – three planets in space – well, that becomes a problem. Four or five things interacting, we can’t really do it. And inside the cell, there’s one hundred thousand things interacting. You have to throw up your hands. It’s so complex – how is it even possible that life ever happens at all?"
"This idea that the whole world is wired together is mass death. Every biologist knows that small groups in isolation evolve fastest. You put a thousand birds on an ocean island and they’ll evolve very fast. You put ten thousand on a big continent, and their evolution slows down. Now, for our own species, evolution occurs mostly through our behavior. We innovate new behavior to adapt. And everybody on earth knows that innovation only occurs in small groups. Put three people on a committee and they may get something done. Ten people, and it gets harder. Thirty people, and nothing happens. Thirty million, it becomes impossible. That’s the effect of mass media – it keeps anything from happening. Mass media swamps diversity. It makes every place the same. Bangkok or Tokyo or London: there’s a McDonald’s on one corner, a Benneton on another, a Gap across the street. Regional differences vanish. All differences vanish. In a mass-media world, there’s less of everything except the top ten books, records, movies, ideas. People worry about losing species diversity in the rain forest. But what about intellectual diversity – our most necessary resource? That’s disappearing faster than trees. But we haven’t figured that out, so now we’re planning to put five billion people together in cyberspace. And it’ll freeze the entire species. Everything will stop dead in its tracks. Everyone will think the same thing at the same time. Global uniformity."
"Are you listening to all that?" Thorne said. "I wouldn’t take any of it too seriously. It’s just theories. Human beings can’t help making them, but the fact is that theories are just fantasies. And they change. When America was a new country, people believed in something called phlogiston. You know what that is? No? Well, it doesn’t matter, because it wasn’t real anyway. They also believed that four humors controlled behavior. And they believed that the earth was only a few thousand years old. Now we believe the earth is four billion years old, and we believe in photons and electrons, and we think human behavior is controlled by things like ego and self-esteem. We think those beliefs are more scientific and better." "Aren’t they?" Thorne shrugged. "They’re still just fantasies. They’re not real. Have you ever seen a self-esteem? Can you bring me one on a plate? How about a photon? Can you bring me one of those?" Kelly shook her head. "No, but…" "And you never will, because those things don’t exist. No matter how seriously people take them," Thorne said. "A hundred years from now, people will look back at us and laugh. They’ll say, ‘You know what people used to believe? They believed in photons and electrons. Can you imagine anything so silly?’ They’ll have a good laugh, because by then there will be newer and better fantasies."
Here are my favorite bits from The Lost World, Arthur Conan Doyle:
"South America is a place I love, and I think, if you take it right through from Darien to Fuego, it’s the grandest, richest, most wonderful bit of earth upon this planet. People don’t know it yet, and don’t realize what it may become. I’ve been up an’ down it from end to end, and had two dry seasons in those very parts, as I told you when I spoke of the war I made on the slave-dealers. Well, when I was up there I heard some yarns of the same kind–traditions of Indians and the like, but with somethin’ behind them, no doubt. The more you knew of that country, young fellah, the more you would understand that anythin’ was possible–anythin’! There are just some narrow water-lanes along which folk travel, and outside that it is all darkness. Now, down here in the Matto Grande"–he swept his cigar over a part of the map–"or up in this corner where three countries meet, nothin’ would surprise me. As that chap said to-night, there are fifty-thousand miles of water-way runnin’ through a forest that is very near the size of Europe. You and I could be as far away from each other as Scotland is from Constantinople, and yet each of us be in the same great Brazilian forest. Man has just made a track here and a scrape there in the maze. Why, the river rises and falls the best part of forty feet, and half the country is a morass that you can’t pass over. Why shouldn’t somethin’ new and wonderful lie in such a country? And why shouldn’t we be the men to find it out?"
With much labor we got our things up the steps, and then, looking back, took one last long survey of that strange land, soon I fear to be vulgarized, the prey of hunter and prospector, but to each of us a dreamland of glamour and romance, a land where we had dared much, suffered much, and learned much–our land, as we shall ever fondly call it. Along upon our left the neighboring caves each threw out its ruddy cheery firelight into the gloom. From the slope below us rose the voices of the Indians as they laughed and sang. Beyond was the long sweep of the woods, and in the center, shimmering vaguely through the gloom, was the great lake, the mother of strange monsters. Even as we looked a high whickering cry, the call of some weird animal, rang clear out of the darkness. It was the very voice of Maple White Land bidding us good-bye. We turned and plunged into the cave which led to home.
PS: I was dreaming that someone should write a story where Gladys and Sarah team up and go on a dinosaur adventure of their own. And I was really hoping someone would have written more of Lord John Roxton and Edward Malone’s new adventures…
Posted by solarisgirl on 2018-10-27 13:35:05
Tagged: , books , book , The Lost World , Crichton , Conan , Doyle , bed
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Imam Ash-Shafi`i: The Grand Jurist for the Sunnah
New Post has been published on https://www.truth-seeker.info/jewels-of-islam/imam-ash-shafii-the-grand-jurist-for-the-sunnah/
Imam Ash-Shafi`i: The Grand Jurist for the Sunnah
By Truth Seeker Staff
Imam Ash-Shafi`i: The Grand Jurist for the Sunnah
Everything was placid in the large valley except for the voice of a two-year-old child who was weeping. His mother embraced him, took him close to her chest, and patted his shoulders with tenderness and compassion. The youngster quickly went into sleep as his mother stared at the far horizon saying in a low weakened voice:
“May Allah have mercy on your soul: father of Muhammad (her husband); you took us with you from Makkah to Gaza in search of our daily bread and good life, yet you died and were buried here. Here am I on my way to Makkah again to have your son raised among his tribe and clan ‘Banu Al-Muttalib’.”
The poor mother went into a bitter fit of weeping and crying as she remembered those few years, she had spent in Palestine with her beloved husband, who was the best husband, brother, and friend for her. However, the happy and beautiful days passed as quickly as clouds, or as a short but pretty dream.
In the honourable Makkah, the mother lived with her child in the protection of her husband’s family. She raised her son by giving him a good education and instructions, flowing on him her love and compassion, so the youngster grew up with a well-balanced psyche, a peaceful nature, and great ethics. The virtuous mother took on her shoulders the responsibility of teaching her son the Quran, reading, and writing so that he may be well acquired with both religious and other fundamental knowledge.
Thus, she sent her son to one of the small elementary schools despite her poverty and inability to save the instructor’s wage. Yet, Muhammad went to his first day at school almost unable to walk properly, and when the instructor saw Muhammad, he sort of belittled him and told him:
“O my son, just sit next to me and listen carefully to your elders so that you may get used to reading and memorization.”
However, the young Muhammad Ibn Idris Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon him) was glittering with intelligence and ingenuity. He used to incredibly quickly learn by heart whatever he heard from what the teacher dictated to his students. Every single day in the small school, his knowledge increased along with his enthusiasm to learn more. His teacher then loved him more and actively pushed him forward. The youngster naturally became more and more distinguished, until his teacher told him one day,
“My son, you are highly smart and intelligent to the extent that I hardly make any effort with you that is worth any wage. All I need from you is to teach on my behalf when I am not present.”
The youngster rushed happily to his mother to tell her the happy news that she would not have to pay any more for the teacher. The virtuous mother was glad for her son’s excellence and encouraged him even more to study. This led him to embark actively on the completion of learning the Quran by heart which he finally completed when he was only seven years old.
Being in great happiness for her son’s completion of the memorization of the Quran in that fast manner, she started thinking about how could she best direct this smart child towards more excellence. She sent him to attend the lessons given around the Sacred Mosque of Makkah. The boy started to listen to prominent scholars; and as he did not have the price for papers on which to write what he listened to, he used parchment, palm tree leaves, and camel shoulder bones.
During this early period of his quest for knowledge, Imam Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon him) intelligently realized the importance of the learning the classical Arabic language from its pure sources, in order to understand the Quran and the Sunnah, (the Prophet Muhammad’s (may Allah exalt his mention) sayings, acts, and approvals) in the best possible way. He went to the Huthayl tribe, which was among the most eloquent Arab tribes, and stayed with them for long years in which he learned their eloquence, memorized their poems, studied the biographies of Arabs from the pre-Islamic era as well as the Islamic era, and learned the skill of knighthood and archery. He eventually became a brave unrivalled knight and a skillful archer who rarely missed his target.
As years passed, Imam Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon him) returned to his beloved hometown Makkah. No sooner had he quenched his longings to his mother, he continued his quest for knowledge enthusiastically. He headed for the Grand Mufti (Religious Jurist) of Makkah, the Sacred Mosque, Muslim Ibn Khalid Az-Zinji who became the first teacher for him in Fiqh (Islamic Jurisprudence). He also started studying Hadith under the supervision of Sufyan Ibn ‘Uyaynah, the narrator of the Sacred Mosque.
In a short time, Imam Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon him) rose to prominence as an excellent Islamic scholar. His mentor, Muslim Ibn Khalid gave him permission to answer the religious enquiries when Imam Ash-Shafi`i was only fifteen. He told him proudly,
“O, Muhammad! Give fatwa and answer the questions of people. By Allah! Now it is opportune for you to give fatwa.”
His other mentor, Sufyan Ibn ‘Uyaynah, used to refer enquirers to him while he turned towards him and pointed, “ask this boy.”
While still studying in Makkah, Imam Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon him) heard of the renowned scholar of Madinah, Imam Malik Ibn Anas (may Allah be pleased with him). He wanted to become a student of Imam Malik (may Allah have mercy upon him) yet he saw with his sharp intellect that he should not go to him unprepared and void. He memorized Malik’s famous book “Al Muwatta” in only nine days. After that, he went off to see Imam Malik (may Allah have mercy upon him) in his house in Madinah. Imam Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon him) spoke eloquently and politely with the Imam and told him that he wished to become his student. The Imam looked at the boy for a long time as the boy was telling his story of how he sought knowledge so far. The Imam had an astonishing physiognomy and a penetrating insight; he told him:
“My son! By the Will of Allah, you will have a great future. Tomorrow, come to me and bring with you someone who could read the Muwatta’ well as I fear you would not be able to read it by yourself.”
Imam Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon him) responded with the same politeness,
“Imam, I will read it myself from memory without a book.”
Imam Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon him) remained in the company of Imam Malik (may Allah have mercy upon him) for a long time. The Imam loved him a lot, and in 179 A.H after Imam Malik passed away, Imam Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon him) returned to Makkah from Madinah equipped with a great load of knowledge which had influenced his life. In Makkah, he was wedded to Hamidah Bint Nafi’, a granddaughter of Caliph ‘Uthman Ibn ‘Afan (may Allah be pleased with him) and had two sons and a daughter from her.
In the courtyard of the well of Zamzam and next to Prophet Ibrahim’s Maqam (the stone on which he stepped up to put the bricks in the Ka’bah), Imam Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon them) sat down to teach people and around him many students were gathered from everywhere. His circle became very prominent in the Sacred Mosque of Makkah and even became well known outside Makkah until it reached Iraq. Abdur-Rahman Ibn Mahdi, one of the scholars of Iraq sent him a letter requesting that he authors a book on the evidences of legislation from the Quran, Sunnah and the consensus of the religious scholars, as well as other issues upon which the science of Fiqh (Islamic Jurisprudence) is built. Imam Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon him) wrote the book and named it Ar-Risalah (The Treatise) which became the first book that founded what came to be called: ‘Ilm Usul Al-Fiqh (The science of the sources of Islamic Jurisprudence), of which Imam Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon him) was the organizer, classifier, and the inventor of its issues.
In 195 A.H the Imam Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon him) travelled to Baghdad for the second time and continued to teach there for two years. Many studied under his supervision including Imam Ahmad Ibn Hanbal (may Allah have mercy upon him) who later said,
“Had it not been for Imam Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon him) we would not have known the understanding of Hadith.”
Before he left Iraq, he had finished writing his large book Al Hujjah (the Proof), in which he put down the essence of his new school of jurisprudence.
In 199 A.H, the Imam went to Egypt where he started to spread his knowledge between the Egyptians who loved him very much. More students came to him from all over the world. Towards the end of his life, the Imam became very sick. This illness continued with him for four years yet it did not stop him from teaching or lecturing. When he came back to his house after teaching, he used to force himself to ignore the pains of the sickness and get absorbed in writing, and editing and proofreading the book of Hujjah which he wrote in Iraq. After completed the proofreading and editing work, he renamed the book’s name as Al-Umm (The Mother).
The Imam remained to follow his daily routine until illness forced him to retire and stop teaching. His students used to visit him to console him in his sickness. One day one of his students entered his room and asked him:
“How do you feel this morning O Imam?”
Ash-Shafi`i (may Allah have mercy upon him) answered:
“I feel that I am travelling away from this world, away from the brothers, drinking from the cup of death, and approaching Allah the Glorious. By Allah, I do not know if my soul will go to heaven so that I may congratulate it, or to hell so that I may lament.”
He then went into crying. On a Friday, the last day of Rajab in the year 204 A.H, his pure soul went up to its Provider and Caretaker. He was buried in the cemetery of Qurashiyyin amidst the cemeteries of Banu Al-Hakam in Egypt. May Allah bless the Imam’s soul and admit him into his wide paradises.
——–
Adapted with editorial modifications from www.islamweb.net.
Read Also:
Life of Imam Ibn Al-Qayyim
Imam Malik ibn Anas
Imam Al-Hasan Al-Basri
Al-Laith Ibn Sa`d: Imam of the Egyptians
The Story of Sibawayh: The Imam of Grammarians
#Featured#Fiqh#Imam Ash-Shafi`i: The Grand Jurist for the Sunnah#Islam#Islamic History#Maliki school of thought
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a paper I wrote freshman year
Neeka Campbell
Physical Science
20 December 2017
The Truth About Evolution
Only three percent of the American population identifies as Atheist. Some studies seem to show about twenty-six percent of Americans “don’t believe in god”. It’s concluded that most people shy away from identifying as “atheist” because other studies show only thirty percent are accepting of the title. The word has seemed to acquire a bad rep over the years. Atheists have been accused of being Satanists, devil worshipers, and were associated with witches hundreds of years ago. Most non-believers and atheists agree with the ideas of evolution. Evolution will sometimes be referred to as a theory, but it’s important to acknowledge evolution as fact. There are some elements to evolution that have been brought to the table by different scientists that are still considered theory. As a whole, it is a fact. There is a fine line between fact and theory.
Growing up, I was raised mostly agnostic/atheist by my parents, grandparents and aunt. If you explore the bookshelves of all my family members you will find almost all versions of the Bible, books about all different religions, books about atheism and books about agnosticism. I always remember my parents telling me to inform myself rather than just believing what they believe just to believe it. They said if I wanted to attend church they would be willing to wake up on Sunday morning and take me. My grandfather was especially determined to stay informed about both sides. He and my grandmother grew up in rural Missouri, his father the local Pastor. After being raised fully Baptist, he joined the Army and was stationed in Berlin, bringing my grandmother with him. They lived there for years, having very little access to their traditional church beliefs, growing away from their roots. Seeing the different beliefs of all the other Army-men that came from different parts of the country and the different beliefs of the people of Berlin, changed the way he and my grandmother looked at the religion they were raised on.
“The Family Tree” of the human race is something certain scientists often refer to when trying to convey the information of evolution. Like all trees, we begin with the roots. Our “roots” are the Ardipithecus group of primates that existed about 5-6 million years ago. Scientists think these human like primates evolved in Africa and were one of the first to being walking upright. The next branch, or group, is Australopithecus. Three to four million years ago is when these early humans fully walked on two legs but could also climb trees. Very close to the Australopithecus group, around 3-2 million years ago, the Paranthropus group could also fully walk on two legs. This group did develop sets of larger and stronger teeth, which gave them more food options. The final branch is the Homo group, around 2 million years ago to now. That’s us! The homo group was the first to explore outside of Africa. They have bigger brains than the earlier groups (like the size we have today).
Each branch has subgroups within the bigger groups, the biggest being the Homo group with at least six subgroups rather than the average 3-4. Obviously, some of these groups overlap each other in their time on Earth. In a way that almost confirms the evolution further because the ones that might’ve migrated or adapted to new surroundings were at a higher chance of evolving over the overlapping years.
If you take dogs for example, the earth did not have domestic dogs millions of years ago. We had wolves, a predator that used its skills to hunt and survive in the wild. These wolves were domesticated by humans who wanted to use wolves for their own good. Over the years we learned to breed and train wolves into the domestic dog we have today. Currently, there are over 300 different breeds of domestic dogs that could not have existed millions of years ago.
Fact and belief are two different things. Evolution, natural selection and survival of the fittest are all fact. We have several fossil records that prove evolution is fact. Religion in any form is belief. It’s simple. A person who believes in god or gods can also accept facts as what they are. Facts. Religious people are only in the wrong when they are unable to accept the facts.
Just like everything in life, there are many problems with religion. Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, Islam, etc., are just a few examples of the many religions of the world. If you take a closer look at religion, the only thing they have in common is the “he said she said” way of believing. For example, Christianity is basically taking Jesus’s word when he claims to be the son of a higher power called “God”. There is no hard evidence other than the bible which was written by over 40 people over the span of 1,500 years. Is it possible for them to all know the word of God? If there is one God that created everything, why are there so many different religions with so many different beliefs and so many different rules? Why do they all fight each other?
To look at both sides from, not a logical standpoint, but an emotional. Majority of the population of the human race are more emotional than logical in most situations. Religion does its best work connecting to people’s emotions, specifically everyone's fear of the inevitability of death. Though religion is more than just that, it takes up a large part, especially why most people are believers. We use it almost as a coping mechanism instead of accepting death as it comes. Life is short, but religious people are counting on the after-life to be better and longer (eternal) than life itself. When it’s taken out of context, the whole idea seems a bit bizarre. Stripped down in its most basic form it’s be “good” in life so after you die you have a better after-life or be “bad” and burn for eternity. That also goes back the opinion of what individual people think is “good” or “bad”.
Everyone wants an answer but the truth is we don’t have one. People who think they know what’s happening are ignorant to the world as a whole. People shouldn’t pretend to know or believe they know because none of the religions on this earth agree with each other so why should we just pick one and stick with it. No one knows what’s happening beyond our little universe. Even if there is some type of higher power, we wouldn’t even be able to comprehend it because we are still just primitive creatures trying to survive just like we were years ago.
Until God or the gods knock on my door and tell me “Hey I’m real” or “We’re real”, I will continue to stick with the more logical side of the argument. I will not claim to know what’s going on and no one else should.
Regardless of what you believe, I tend to find lots of people focused more on death or post-death than they are on life as it’s happening right before them. Religious people are so caught up in what happens after, they have trouble realizing what is in front of them won’t last forever. People are so caught up on what everyone else thinks to take a minute to think about how much that really matters. No one should care about what other people think or believe as long as they aren’t hurting anyone else and are happy. What is the true point of life if we can’t all live together, respecting each other, and trying to improve the world; rather than destroying it because we don’t think the same way?
Works Cited
Online:
Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History. Human Family Tree | The Smithsonian Institution's Human Origins Program, 1 Mar. 2010, humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-family-tree.
Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History. Human Fossils | The Smithsonian Institution's Human Origins Program, 1 Mar. 2010, humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils.
Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History. Human Evolution Timeline Interactive | The Smithsonian Institution's Human Origins Program, 1 Mar. 2010, humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-evolution-timeline-interactive.
“Way More Americans May Be Atheists Than We Thought.” FiveThirtyEight, FiveThirtyEight, 18 May 2017, fivethirtyeight.com/features/way-more-americans-may-be-atheists-than-we-thought/.
“Who Wrote the Bible?” Who Wrote the Bible? | Bibleinfo.com, www.bibleinfo.com/en/questions/who-wrote-the-bible.
“Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey.” National Geographic Channel, 26 Aug. 2015, channel.nationalgeographic.com/cosmos-a-spacetime-odyssey/.
Printed:
30-second Religion by Russell Re Manning
30-second Evolution by Mark Fellowes and Nicholas Battey
The End of Faith by Sam Harris
Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil deGrasse Tyson
New Testament (Billy Graham Evangelistic Association)
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