#ways to remain healthy

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

License to Kitty.

[possamble]

What are your headcanons about Marcille's mom if you have any? It's interesting that what drew Donato to her was cause she lived the history he studied, or that was said somewhere at least. She must've had an interesting life.

so this was going to be just a normal answer but then I realized I have a Lot of Things To Say. so here goes, a compilation of what we know for a fact from the canon, what I've extrapolated from the visual cues and details, and my theories based on all of that.

Things we know for a fact about Marcille's mother because they were explicitly stated in the manga and supplemental materials:

She was a court mage for a Tall-man kingdom at the southern part of the Northern Continent

Donato, a court historian, fell in love with her because she had lived through the history he was studying, and he courted her for 17 years (age 15 to 32) before getting married

She was a cheerful person who rarely showed extreme emotion and took things as they came

She always cooked a huge meal for Marcille on her birthdays

She remarried a gnome after Donato's death and a short distance away from Marcille's childhood home

Pipi, Marcille's pet bird, was actually older than Marcille and originally belonged to her mother (bird died at 62)

She was extremely heartbroken when Donato died and ultimately ended up instilling a deep fear of mortality in Marcille with her words

the only time she showed extreme emotion in front of her family was when Donato could no longer eat his favourite dish near the end of his life.

She scolded Marcille for being cruel to ants (implying she can have a stern side when needed)

Things that are explicitly shown but mostly through visual cues

She has a very distinctive style of dress always involving a ribbon choker (mirroring Marcille's habit of always wearing a matching choker with any of her outfits that don't cover her neck)

She was almost stereotypically good at housekeeping and traditionally "wifely" things (very frequently depicted wearing an apron or doing some domestic chore when not at work, seems to have been an avid cook).

She knits? (also, note the affectionate smile as she's looking at Donato and Marcille reading a book together in the full panel)

She was as excited for Marcille's milestones as Donato was.

She didn't tell Marcille much about elven food

(there are a couple things that this panel in particular implies:

She lived a good deal of her life (if not being born and raised) in a mainly elven country in the West, implied by her knowing enough of an elven region's cuisine to prefer Tall-man food over it

seems to have a pretty carefree and casual demeanour overall, if this is how she replied to Marcille asking her about it (sounds like she never gave her culinary preferences that much thought to begin with)

slightly related to number 2, it seems like she and Marcille had a fairly casual parent-child dynamic (especially in comparison to the Toudens' memory of their father)

(local elf tastes Italian food once and never goes back))

However, she seems a lot more... serious in most of the other times we see her? Almost like the very stereotypical archetype of a graceful elf.

Subsequent conclusions about her personality:

Usually pretty carefree and cheerful at home, has been a loving and attentive parent throughout Marcille's childhood (while not being so doting that she didn't discipline Marcille).

Slightly more conjectural theories on her personality:

Had a much more graceful and professional personality at work, which would explain the more serious portraits we see of her.

Given that both she and Donato had positions at the royal court, it seems a little odd that she'd go out of her way to do all the housework herself, so maybe she just enjoyed doing it?

Now taping all the evidence together and toeing the line between analysis and fanfiction:

It's clear that she loved Donato very much and was utterly devastated by losing him. But there's one thing that really stuck out to me in what little we see of her:

Doesn't she seem... angry? The way she's gritting her teeth, clutching the tablecloth, and how this is the first and only time we see her eyes opened that wide. In the following panel, you see her being quiet and dejected after her initial outburst. She's still crying very intensely, but her brows are furrowed, and she's not really responding to Donato's affection in her body language.

We're not told the details of how she felt about losing Donato other than that it upset her. But this, to me, implies that she was angry and resented that he was aging, that the end of his life was approaching. An "it's not fair" type of preemptive grief. And if this was the first and last time she cried like this in front of her family, she was either very good at coping in private... or very bad at letting herself feel unpleasant emotions until they become unavoidable and end up overwhelming her.

It's not too remarkable a detail on the surface. It's even reminiscent of what the audience has seen of Marcille. But... when it comes to the big picture, you'd think an elf who voluntarily chose to marry a tall-man and have a half-elf child would have been better prepared for this.

It kind of recontextualizes her cheerfulness to me.

"I'm sure everything's gonna be okay!" (or some variation thereof, depending on what translation you have).

And this is stated to contrast her extreme grief when finally confronting Donato's failing body and eventual death. But I'm wondering if... maybe this optimism was why she was so upset. What if she went into all of it thinking "everything's gonna be okay"? What if she was a little young by elven standards, and just followed her heart thinking that her own resilience would get her through anything?

Of course, only to get completely overwhelmed when she actually loses Donato. She turns into a completely different person. And that's heartbreaking on its own-- but what the audience sees is the effect it had on Marcille. Can you imagine being her, watching your invincible and upbeat mother suddenly lose all the light in her eyes in one go?

I've already made a huge post about how I think Marcille models her "work persona" off her mother, but another thing that stuck with me as I was looking for more details in the manga was this:

copy pasting from the other post i made about it lmao it's like... the second she resigns herself to lifelong pain and terror, there's another portrait of her mother facing her like this. with their heads bowed, in mirrored body language of resignation and despair and sorrow. Except it's posed like Marcille is still looking at her mother but her mother is looking away.

It took me a second to realize, but I think that it's a visual metaphor for the fact that Marcille's mother was the only long-lived role model she had-- and she failed to model healthy grief for her daughter. I don't say this as an accusation or to disparage her as a character, but just as a matter of fact. In her, Marcille was seeing herself older and losing a short-lived spouse or loved one of her own, and all she saw was hopelessness.

But her mother didn't mean to instill hopelessness and terror in her. She wasn't really thinking of how it would truly affect Marcille at all (at least, that's how I'm interpreting her looking down and away from Marcille in the metaphor), she was just sad. And she, in her own way, was trying to protect her daughter and help her prepare for future losses.

What she meant was "loss is inevitable, and you have to learn how to be in pain but live on anyway." What Marcille heard was "loss is inevitable, and you will be scared and hurt for the rest of your life."

Again. Marcille's mother doesn't feature explicitly in the story the way her father does -- but in so many ways, her shadow, her silhouette, her reflection is always hanging over Marcille.

All that to say... headcanon-wise (everything from here on is 100% without evidence lmao), I'd like to think that she matured and realized that she failed Marcille. I imagine her being regretful about it, wanting a chance to fix it but never finding a way to insert herself back into Marcille's life when Marcille is so so so busy becoming the most accomplished mage possible. I imagine her being herself again, now, so many years after her loss and after remarrying -- but with her cheerfulness tempered with a lot more wisdom and the pain of having gone through loss like that. I think the second Marcille actually tells her what happened in the dungeon, she'd want to go running to her daughter again -- if Marcille tells her the full truth instead of just being embarrassed she let things get that far. (oh, the tragedy of her wanting to be more like her mother and an accomplished adult who doesn't need to be babied... being embarrassed to actually tell her mother how much she fucked up...)

There's also the tension of her having remarried -- I know that there's at least a little bit of resentment that Marcille harbours about that, because she's childish like that at heart even if she makes an effort not to externalize it. I think that her mother would be aware of that, potentially adding to her sense of guilt and apprehension at trying to reappear/intrude on Marcille's life. I honestly don't think Marcille has met her stepfather -- or even considers him a stepfather rather than "mama's new husband" and kind of a total stranger. I think she and her mother actively don't talk about it in their correspondence, like an elephant in the room.

but, ultimately, I think her mother is on her side no matter what. Ancient magic? Dark necromancy? Sure, she'll feel guilty and like she was partially responsible for setting Marcille down such a painful path, but she wouldn't care. that's her daughter!! she would've moved back west and been petitioning for her at the court, buying a house right next to the Canaries barracks and visiting her every day that she wasn't on a mission. And if her husband had opinions on Marcille becoming a "dark arts user," he either gets over it or it's divorce with him. Yes, she might have had her optimism completely humbled by losing Donato like that -- but she's still headstrong and self-assured and she doesn't care what people think of her. It's her way or the highway and she's always going to be in Marcille's corner.

(She also needs a name lol. I went with Juno, just to be cute about "Marcille"s closest real life equivalent being Marcella, which is the female version of Marcellus, which in turn is a diminutive of Marcus, which was derived from Mars. Absolutely in love with Marcille potentially being named after Ares/Mars the fucking god of war btw)

[acaptainbyanyothername]

Midst spoilers for S3 E16: Trustfall

This is sort of just a jumble of my own interpretation of Phineas and Jonas’ dynamic (which is definitely influenced by my being aspec and having a strange understanding of romance) but I honestly don’t think the kiss complicates their relationship any more than it already is complicated. I feel like their overall dynamic would have been relatively unchanged if they hugged in that moment instead of kissed. Phineas said it best— they’re each others’ person. They both made atrocious mistakes and fucked each other up, but at the end of the day they love each other. When going into this episode, I had no idea if they were going to kiss or not (I knew both were possibilies, but didn’t know the direction it was going to take). But I knew based on their respective arcs and views of each other they were going to plan their futures in conjunction. They were always going to be the most important person to each other. They just so happen to be similar-aged and both attracted to each other, so they used a kiss to demonstrate that to each other instead of other methods of affection. I think trying to wrestle them into typical “romantic” or “platonic” boundaries will always fundamentally miss an aspect of their dynamic. They both fucked each other up, but they want to work through it and plan a path forward. They are the most important person to each other, and they demonstrated in multiple ways througout they episode, one of them being a kiss.

[basilbots]

Loving the villains as the shitheads they are so true, but also redemption arc aus my beloved gonna collect me some aus of both

[greenerteacups]

Half of the kingdom for Angelina, Fred and George dynamic! I shan't pretend I understand it but I sure as hell enjoy it!

You and Fred both!

Fred and Angie are the type of FWB couple whose reasons for not dating, inter alia, center on both of them just... not really caring that much. Romance isn't a priority for either of them; I think that when they started liking each other, it was a gradually developing case of mutual attraction under circumstances where neither one had time for a relationship. Angelina is busy trying to hold a quidditch team together, and it's hard enough without this doofus beater eating up more of her time than he already does. As for Fred, he's diligently preoccupied trying to put Minerva McGonagall in an early grave, and I think deep down he probably has a 17-year-old boy's healthy terror of commitment, too. But he does respect Angelina a hell of a lot, and he makes her laugh — something that she, as a generally serious person, could do with a bit more of. When he's not making a fool of himself, and she's not busy with the soul-eating job of being the following act for Oliver Wood, I imagine them having a comfortable, lowkey, no-strings FWB arrangement. Like, they were teammates before they were ever involved, and when you've seen someone's ass platonically, it takes the edge off seeing it in other contexts.

George is also here. The twins are such a social unit that anyone dating one of them sort of gets a two-for-one special, but the fact that Angie doesn't take it seriously helps to make things un-awkward. In fact, I think she's actually quite fond of George — he's more chill than Fred is, and a little bit sweeter, easier to get along with — and having known them both since first year, Angie probably understands that if you're involved with Fred, George is going to Be Around. It's like a love triangle where only one leg is romantic, and also everyone is eminently cool and happy to hang out with each other.

[seaweedstarshine]

This part was like half a year ago — but it's still cute that Forge and Ororo were both thinking of each other at almost exactly the same time—

—I love the fact that they agree on what the problem was in their relationship. I see fun things in the future for the reagent and the tinkerer—

—I have unreasonably high hopes they're gonna cross paths and do something interesting in the Black Panther arc in X-Force.

[cassidyawesome]

if law was truly such a good surgeon, why didn’t he just operate himself back to a man in the fight with blackbeard. Law frauded through doctor school theory.

[icedmetaltea]

I encourage ya'll to let yourselves be sad about stupid shit, not everything has to be due to a bunch of super serious and overwhelming reasons. Sometimes it's just cause you really suck at board games and wish you were better but ur brain doesn't let u no matter how much you've tried YES I'M STILL MAD ABOUT IT

[raspberryjellybrains]

Morpheus is a truly fascinating character to look at from a moral perspective because he's such a dick but about 50% of the time it's on accident and the other 50% it's on purpose, but not because of any genuine hate or malice just... poorly directed sadness. Neither of these reasons make it okay, but they make it damn hard to see where the lines are regarding guilt, blame, and forgiveness. As if this isn't enough, hearing Morpheus' take on things (or appalling lack thereof) along with some others makes it even harder to grapple with.

When I'm analyzing this first 50%, I often come back around to asking whether someone should punished for something they didn't know was wrong, which is a normal hard and fast 'no', but this someone has had millinea to find out it is wrong and correct it and hasn't, which then pulls me into questioning where the ignorance becomes willful. Especially when the individual is so blindsided by the idea that there might even be something wrong. Morpheus is cold and aloof, which I put down to a general temperament thing; the problem is that he can't afford to be. This is, quite literally, a major reason why the series ends the way it does. He wasn't particularly mean to Lyta, just not very kind or understanding. He was busy and distracted and hurting and didn't explain what was going on or offer much sympathy (none in the comics). Is it okay that he did that? No. Do I understand why and feel sad that a trait that is innocuous to most was deadly to him? Yes, of course always, yes.

The other 50% where Morpheus is trying to hurt people, it's born out of his own hurt, as most cruelty is. He is not a malicious being; cruel, but not malicious. The way he treats Destruction is from his own wish to escape the weight of their existence and a frustration that someone did it, someone did it and he couldn't stop or join them. He doesn't actually hate Destruction, Dream clearly blames himself at least in part for his leaving and seems to miss him as much he wants to respect or exile him for the deciding to do so. He's on the fence about how to act and overcompensates by being desperately terrible, which is what he always fucking does. That's the worst part! I chose Destruction specifically as an example because the situation lays bare the core of his cruelty very, very well. Nada and Orpheus are good examples as well. Dream doesn't like not knowing what to do, doesn't like being scared and can't stand the idea of being thought of as anything less than perfectly confident and controlled at all times (wow, so healthy!). He doesn't want people to look at him and see someone who needs comfort so he doesn't let them look at all, and ensures they don't by pushing them away at the slightest offense. If they brush against an insecurity or hurt, he's trained himself to lash out rather than lick the wounds. He condemns Nada to Hell when she sees who he is and rejects him for it; He leaves Orpheus on an island for a thousand years because he reminded Dream that he can't fix everything, or even keep those he loves safe; He's so unforgiving and rude towards Destruction because he did what Dream desperately needed to do but couldn't.

Thing is, these are both fixable flaws with obvious sources, but he has spent so long living by them that he doesn't know any other way to do so. Maybe it makes me an apologist—I'm willing to acknowledge that I can tend to hold a warped perspective on things—but I see his core personal moral failings as holding himself to an ordinary standard of behavior when an extraordinary one is needed and feeling that somehow his power and suffering makes him better than just about everyone else (now think about that and Lucifer and lose your mind briefly.) He isn't, on the whole, awful and irredeemable. He's flawed and he's trying, but when one is endless there is very little room for such a thing.

Then I end up asking the question: did he deserve it? does anybody? And that's... hard. Morpheus caused real hurt and damage, intentional or not, across space and time. Does he deserve to die for it? I would like to say no, but I would also see reason in saying yes. The questions get big, applicabilty of death penalty and impact of intention on action big, and that's usually when I stop the train. The point of Morpheus' weird and complex morality is to drive the train straight into the sunset, which I fully encourage those who can do it safely to do but if I did, we would be here until tumblr was ash.

So I can't offer an answer with a neat little bow, or even a particularly persuasive argument as to the final moral determination of Morpheus as a character, but that wasn't necessarily my goal. I can tell you one thing for sure: he would majorly benefit from one (1) positive and healthy friendship.

[enobariasdistrict2]

no but like it's still kinda insanely funny to me that eddie literally called billy 'brother' and told him he loved him and billy was like 'go fuck yourself' like i'm never getting over eddies face it was too funny ohmygod mabdjdkdfndjdnms

like yeah billy was obviously an asshole he constantly disrespected eddie and stepped all over him eddie had every right to demand better treatment and an equal power dynamic but.... fucking billy's wife wasn't the way to do that and then having the nerve to call billy brother a day after he admitted to that like bro what did you expect i can't menfrkdkfjdk

[bat-the-misfit]

today i typed someone as ESFJ and...

... i can't stop thinking about how much i love ESFJs

[pacificgasandelectric]

While I’m on my high horse: if you’re going to disagree with someone or judge them for something they said, at least have the decency to do it with what they actually said instead of your interpretation of it.

Stating that something happens is not endorsement of it. Posting analysis of something is not inherently a claim that one’s analysis is the only possible correct reading. Calling something “common” is not the same as arguing that it’s a majority. Enjoying a particular narrative in fiction is not and cannot be real-world apologism because that fiction is not real. And so on.

[lover-of-mine]

I've been thinking about this for a WHILE now, because I keep trying to find what could be the turning point for buddie, and I'm in the Eddie had his oh moment already train and he just didn't want to bring it up for whatever reason, he didn't want to deal with it and he had stuff to work through and he was scared of messing things up and Buck died and Buck has stuff to work through, so he's just in this limbo space where he knows what he wants but doesn't know he can get it, or maybe he just got comfortable with the way things are and hasn't felt the need to change them yet, but the more I watch this show, the more i feel like Buck's oh moment is not happening without a nudge, because it's becoming painfully clear that Buck has no idea what being in love with someone in a healthy way means. Things with Abby were all sorts of complicated and Abby was never all the way in, Ali was never around enough so they never left the honeymoon phase until it became clear she was against the very thing that makes him who he is and Taylor was a dumpster fire all around with the way they just don't understand each other. And the whole "she sees me for who I am" things comes back to the way Buck hasn't felt seen in a relationship and it's clinging to this idea of what it should look like. I don't think Buck can get to the "oh, this thing I'm feeling is love" conclusion alone. Because he has this idea of what love should be like but he doesn't seem to be able to apply that idea to himself.

[dollsome-does-tumblr]

me trying to force myself to eat various meats for protein even though they always make me feel gross: this is fiiiiiiiiiiiiine

[pawjamas]

like it’s crazy to me how people build up all this resentment and frustration and anger with someone just because they’re not able to communicate what is bothering them that this person did or is doing. i get it that confrontation can be difficult, it is! especially due to trauma regarding it! but that is something that NEEDS to be worked on for the sake of yourself and your relationships and the people who you are friends with/etc. or you are going to lose friends that way, that is just the reality of you not working on bettering yourself - and it is for the benefit of everyone including yourself.

[fictional-worlds-are-exquisite]

sharing a room with my sister atm and I’ve been very very careful to be quiet going to bed so I don’t wake her (I’m always last to bed) because if there’s one thing worse than a sleeping person breathing audibly, it’s an awake person breathing audibly

and tonight i crept into the room softly, put my book down painstakingly slowly on the bedside unit without sound, lowered myself into bed and pulled the blankets up as silently as I could manage

and then promptly slapped a spider crawling up my arm with all the strength i could muster creating a truly loud cracking noise

it had to be done