My mom has this awful friend, Cynthia. My loathing goes deep enough that I’m not even going to change her name. If she ever finds this she knows what she did.
On multiple occasions my mom asked this horrible irresponsible chicken brained woman to watch after our animals while we were away. I don’t know why once wasn’t enough, because the first failure was so spectacular that anyone in their right mind would know she couldn’t be trusted with any level of responsibility or direction following.
You might be thinking to yourself, FFS, this level of antipathy is surely unwarranted! But you’d be wrong.
To set the scene, we were living in downstairs of our house when I was about fifteen. My mom has always wanted more animals than can reasonably be kept indoors which is how we ended up with three cats. When she wanted to kick them all outside I protested, and so all three cats lived in my bedroom with no access to the rest of the house.
That really wasn’t great, so in an attempt to give them options we made a window cutout with a cat door in it to give them access to the outdoors. Looking back on this as an environmentally conscious adult it’s wretched, cats should be indoor only, but at the time I was desperate to give them some freedom because one bedroom is too small for three cats.
So my parents and I went on a week long trip to visit family out of state. We told Cynthia to come feed and water the cats, and to scoop the litter box. Most importantly, don’t lock the handle of the door, because we only have the key to the deadbolt.
I’m sure you can see where this is going.
Cynthia locked us out. We arrived home after 12 hours on the road, desperate for the comfort of our own beds. We were met with an unyielding door. With a sigh I volunteered, “I can punch in the cat door and climb in the window.”
I slipped behind the bamboo outside my window and pushed in the cutout. A horrible insidious reek wafted out at me. I paused, prickling with foreboding. But I had a job to do, and by god I’d see it through. I hefted myself up into the window and my hand immediately landed in something wet.
Skin crawling, I pulled myself up and surveyed the darkened room as a miserable odor of decay and suffering poured out of the room around me. I could see dark shapes littering the carpet and it didn’t take a genius to guess that the cats had taken up hunting in a big way during my absence.
I pulled my hand out of the pile of vomit it had landed in and dropped into my onetime bedroom turned now into a hellpit of decomposing wretchedness. I turned on the light. I wished I had not turned on the light.
My eyes scanned across the floor, tallying as they went. Two dead birds, a dead baby rabbit, five dead mice, and one dead snake. I paused on my alarm clock, perplexed to see a stain of white on it. I stepped closer and saw a furtive movement.
The tally suddenly contained also: one live bird that had shit in several places, probably in pure terror to find itself trapped in a room littered with decomposing woodland creatures, which honestly, fair. I coaxed it out the window and finished the survey with five discrete piles of vomit.
I unlocked the door and let my parents in. They exclaimed in disgust at the horrible smell. We stood together in my doorway floored by the magnitude of neglect. The unscooped litter box was a subtle footnote in the tangible reek my living space. I disposed of the parade of ecological disaster, cleaned vomit, and scooped the box after a brutally long day on the road. The cats were fine, and happy to see me. They had a huge dish or food and water so Cynthia’s neglect at least hadn’t harmed them.
Then I slept on the couch while my bedroom aired out, the windows flung wide to dispel the uneasy ghosts of the hunted. I spent the whole night cursing Cynthia’s name for this evil she’d visited upon me. When my mom asked her, "Cynthia, didn't you see the dead animals?"
Cynthia responded, "Yes, they smelled so bad, I just ran in and out as fast as I could." I fully don't believe she did any caretaking, and I'm personally of the opinion that she locked herself out on the first day and never came back.
The next day my room had returned to a habitable level of smellscape and I gratefully crawled into my bed that night. I stretched out and froze as my foot brushed something cold and wet?
The final indignity: one last dead snake, inside my very sheets.
Fucking Cynthia.
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Odysseus always trusted Penelope. He was ordered to lie to her and it hurt him to do so. Penelope was distrustful of this stranger until she had absolute solid proof.
There are way too many people talking about how "Odysseus lies to Penelope. What a prick!" and it makes me sad/mad as that's not the case at all
The whole "Odysseus usually always has a reason to lie" maybe upcoming essay aside, He was literally commanded by Athena to not tell anyone. And it was with Penelope that he had the hardest time keeping up the act with. Not only because she's smart af and figured him out almost immediately (that essay coming soon too) but because he was trying to keep himself from crying with her.
I think people forget that he is disguised to look like someone else completely. If a random man claimed to be your missing husband, wouldn't you be scared/freaked out?
Anyways, the 3 most important people in his life are Penelope, Telemachus, and Laertes. He lies to all three.
Telemachus: Lied by letting Eumaeus answer him and still under the orders from Athena, did not cry or reveal himself until Athena allowed him to. (I read it as him being in shock. Last time he saw him, Telemachus' hand could only wrap around one finger and now he's as big as him. a bit shocking to say the least)
Laertes: He teared up seeing him but still decided to question and test his father, not by the order from Athena.
Penelope: He was trying so hard to keep from crying, tried to noodle his way out of lying to her, Under Athena's orders. still couldn't help but basically flirt with her.
Also to get this outta the way: No, it wasn't a matter of trust. He is shown to trust her right away. As this happens even before he gets the chance to speak with Penelope.
Staunch Odysseus glowed with joy to hear all this—
his wife's trickery luring gifts from her suitors now,
enchanting their hearts with suave seductive words
but all the while with something else in mind.
(Book 18, Fagles)
If Odysseus does not trust her, why is he so happy to see her "flirt" with the suitors? It's because he KNOWS what she's doing and knows she doesn't actually want them. If he didn't trust her, he would be upset by this.
Now for the "it hurt to lie to her" bit.
Athena's command:
"Tell not a single person in the palace, man or woman, that you are back from your wanderings; but endure all vexations in silence and submit yourself to the indignities that will be put upon you.'
(Book 13, Rieu)
If you are my son—truly of our blood—
let no one hear Odysseus is back home.
Don’t let Laertes know or the swineherd,
or the slaves, or Penelope herself.
(Book 16, Johnston)
And the people he did reveal himself to, he only did so after being given permission by Athena.
Athene spoke to him. 'The time has come,' she said, 'royal son of Laertes, Odysseus of the nimble wits, to let Telemachus into your secret, so that the pair of you may plot the downfall and death of the Suitors and then make your way to the famous city. [...]
(Book 15, Rieu)
He talks to Telemachus before talking to Penelope.
I’ll stay here,
so I can stir the servants even more—
and your mother. As she laments, she’ll ask
for each and every detail.”
(Book 19, Johnston)
Odysseus is already sweating about having to lie to her
The next part would honestly be me just inserting almost ALL the text for this so I'll go into a summary. It's all in Book 19.
Penelope asks him where he's from. And instead of answering, it's a tsunami of compliments. Calling her flawless. Comparing her to a king. etc, etc,
Probably because he couldn't help himself and had to babble about how wonderful she is Who wouldn't? before finally ending with "Please don't ask me where I'm from. It makes me sad."
Penelope, probably overwhelmed by his praise, immediately goes into how "her beauty left with her husband. It did not. And where did you say you were from again?"
"Fine! I'm from Crete..."
And we all know that as soon as she starts crying, after a lovely description of how her tears "melted", he talks about how hard it was for Odysseus to hold in his OWN tears. Lying to her and being unable to comfort her was painful for him!!!
But though Odysseus' heart was wrung by his wife's distress, his eyes, hard as horn or iron, never wavered between their lids, so craftily did he repress his tears.
(Book 19, Rieu)
Even with him revealing himself to Euryclea, when she cried out to Penelope, Athena made sure she didn't hear! It's most likely that he wouldn't be able to tell her even if he wanted.
She spoke, and her eyes glanced over at Penelope,
anxious to tell her that her husband had come home.
But Penelope could not see her face or notice,
for Athena had diverted her attention.
(Book 19, Johnston)
He desperately wanted to be with her again. Literally daydreaming about it!
At those words
Dawn rose on her golden throne in a sudden gleam of light.
And great Odysseus caught the sound of his wife’s cry
and began to daydream—deep in his heart it seemed
she stood beside him, knew him, now, at last …
(book 20, Fagles)
Clearly doesn't trust her. /sarcasm
It's PENELOPE that has trouble trusting him. And rightfully so! While she was very certain that was her husband, there was so much going on and of course, she's cautious! He looked like an elderly stranger at first, why is he hiding from her? He somehow took out all those men with only a little help, Athena isn't telling her anything, Helen was kidnapped and she did not want that to possibly happen to her too, etc.
He even understands her cautiousness to be reasonable.
As she spoke, lord Odysseus, who had borne so much,
smiled and immediately spoke to Telemachus— his words had wings:
“Telemachus, let your mother
test me in these halls. She will soon possess
more certain knowledge. Right now I’m filthy,
with disgusting clothing on my body.
That’s why she rejects me and will not say
I am Odysseus. [...]
(Book 23, Johnston)
He even trusted her completely to take care of everything while he was gone before. And he does again when he wakes up and goes to see his father. Telling her about how she too wise to need instruction
Odysseus (and Penelope as well) is well-known for his cunning tricks and how his loyalties are often blurred but one thing that is for sure about him is that he trusts and is loyal to Penelope full-heartedly. He spent every day missing her and their son and wanting to go home to her. The only moment we see his trust in her waver is during the Treebed scene, (which is what she wanted to test).
They are "like-minded". 😭
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tbh i think a lot of the people saying "well both sides are wrong"/"bt stans are just as toxic" are just not exposed to other perspectives in this fandom. as a buddie fan who's been watching this show since s1, i can safely say that buddie fans have always been toxic. like as fact. to me, to say that bucktommy fans are just as harmful or just as annoying or just as bad as buddies consistently are is just. delusional. indicative of at worst a biased opinion and at best an uninformed one. buddie has been here since s2 and fans have ruthless ever since. bucktommy has been here for 3/4 of a season and for the most part, stay in their lane. i'm sure there are bucktommy fans who suck, like that's just being on the internet, but you have to be blind to ignore how insane buddie fans are and genuinely how much worse they are in comparison.
i don't want to generalize and i think constantly adding that disclaimer is annoying as hell bc obviously i'm not talking about everyone but because buddie has been here for so long and taken up so much mental space of very die-hard, passionate fans, you're going to see much more intensity on that side. after season 5, i had to step away from the fandom and the show because of how frustrating it got. it was annoying to see people swear up and down buddie will be canon by the end of s3-no wait s4-no wait s5-no wait- and ultimately it sucked my enjoyment out of a show i otherwise enjoyed because i got swept up in the Buddie Of It All and forget about why i watch the show to begin with. we've been left to stew in our theories and now we can't tell what canon and what's fanon anymore, and when the show reminds us, the disappointment and frustration kills our hopes.
i was also active in the dan and phil fandom and supernatural fandom, like ik why people think we're annoying and it's because we are. we make everything about the one thing we like, we comment on every post begging for it to become canon, we're violently disappointed when the show doesn't play into our fan theories because we've convinced ourselves buddie is going to happen by the end of the next episode or actually the end of this season or actually maybe the end of the next season. we've torn a part every female love interest, either making them boring or making them unlikeable in our fanon. all that to say is that when people call us annoying, they're telling the truth and when bucktommy fans say buddie fans are toxic, they're coming from a sincere place. i mean we can't even enjoy our own ship because we're so quick to get our hopes up and be let down about something as stupid it becoming canon. who cares if it becomes canon, just like it to like it.
and it makes sense why there's perceived "toxicity" on the bucktommy side. our energy is being matched; the obsession, the passion, the surge in fandom. if you don't like it or even just find it annoying, i suggest you guys look back on your own posts and comments and behaviors towards other people in the fandom and other characters and unbiasedly compare it to the Toxic Bucktommy Shippers you're claiming you hate. if bucktommy fans are obsessive, it's because we've set the stage for that. if bucktommy fans are getting aggro and defensive, it's because buddie fans have been on the opposition and don't know how to turn it off. we've gone from underdog to bully somewhere in the last 6 seasons.
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