probably time for this story i guess but when i was a kid there was a summer that my brother was really into making smoothies and milkshakes. part of this was that we didn't have AC and couldn't afford to run fans all day so it was kind of important to get good at making Cool Down Concoctions.
we also had a patch of mint, and he had two impressionable little sisters who had the attitude of "fuck it, might as well."
at one point, for fun, this 16 year old boy with a dream in his eye and scientific fervor in heart just wanted to see how far one could push the idea of "vanilla mint smoothie". how much vanilla extract and how much mint can go into a blender before it truly is inedible.
the answer is 3 cups of vanilla extract, 1/2 cup milk alternative, and about 50 sprigs (not leaves, whole spring) of mint. add ice and the courage of a child. idk, it was summer and we were bored.
the word i would use to describe the feeling of drinking it would maybe be "violent" or perhaps, like. "triangular." my nose felt pristine. inhaling following the first sip was like trying to sculpt a new face. i was ensconced in a mesh of horror. it was something beyond taste. for years after, i assumed those commercials that said "this is how it feels to chew five gum" were referencing the exact experience of this singular viscous smoothie.
what's worse is that we knew our mother would hate that we wasted so much vanilla extract. so we had to make it worth it. we had to actually finish the drink. it wasn't "wasting" it if we actually drank it, right? we huddled around outside in the blistering sun, gagging and passing around a single green potion, shivering with disgust. each sip was transcendent, but in a sort of non-euclidean way. i think this is where i lost my binary gender. it eroded certain parts of me in an acidic gut ecology collapse.
here's the thing about love and trust: the next day my brother made a different shake, and i drank it without complaint. it's been like 15 years. he's now a genuinely skilled cook. sometimes one of the three of us will fuck up in the kitchen or find something horrible or make a terrible smoothie mistake and then we pass it to each other, single potion bottle, and we say try it it's delicious. it always smells disgusting. and then, cerimonious, we drink it together. because that's what family does.
52K notes
·
View notes
The Riddler: Riddle me thi- Is that a fucking kid.
Dick Grayson, a non-native English speaker: What does fucking mean?
The Riddler: Fuck- I mean shit- I mean it's a grown up word, ask your dad about it
[A Few Years Later]
The Riddler: Riddle me th- Is that another fucking kid
Jason Todd, raised in Crime Alley his entire life: Who the hell you calling a fucking kid? I'll beat your ass motherfucker, you and me right now.
The Riddler: Wow you are. Something.
[A Few Years After That]
The Riddler: Riddle me- Where the fuck are you getting these children?
Tim Drake, raised in high society but also not raised at all: That's a naughty word sir.
The Riddler: At least you're polite
[A Few More Years Later]
The Riddler: Riddle m- WHY THE FUCK DOES THIS ONE HAVE A SWORD!?
Damian Wayne, above silly things like Vulgar Language: I Was Expecting A Battle Of Wits, But You Appear To Be Unarmed.
The Riddler: WHY DOES HE TALK LIKE THAT???
7K notes
·
View notes
I JUST SAW THESE POSTS OF DANNY BEING RAS AL GHUL CHILD LIKE THE FIRST THAT IS LIKE 25-30 YEARS OLDER THAN TALIA AND MAKE MY BRAIN WORKS FUCKING WIGGLE!?!?!??
anyway
Danny established the status quo and the disappeared for 20-60 years and the is summoned by Ra where he’s like “Dad you could’ve have called my personal phone you know that right?” And Ra’s like “YOU WENT OFF THE GRID FOR YEARS AND NEVER TOOD ME-!!??!? Now do you look different? Are you eating? What’s with comingoutthesummoningcirclefortheghostking? HMMM???”
“Ah- I knew I forgot something! Let me tell you all about it! I see you brought the whole fam and in laws let’s have dinner and discuss it- AWWWW THATS BABIES!!!”
*Damian, Jason, Tim, and Dick being referred to as “babies”*
“Excuse me.”
Danny then fucking tackles them in hugs and loves while dodging and/or holding their punches and kicks
"My maternal uncle is coming for a visit and likely evaluate my living arrangements.. We must be at our absolute best when he is here. " Damian announces one evening right as the family is finishing preparing for a night of crime fighting.
Everyone freezes from their respective stations, twisting around to stare at the young Robin in confusion. He doesn't notice; he is too busy making sure his katana is sharpened to perfection and balancing it on his fingertips.
"Baby Bat?" Dick calls, "What do you mean by that?"
Damian pauses in his prep work, approaching the eldest with a pretty impressive scowl. " Mother sent a messenger a few days ago about Uncle's plan audit. Should we fail it, I shall be removed into a different household."
"An audit? Removed?" Steph repeats, confused, but Damian has no idea why. He thought it was pretty apparent that Uncle Daniel would be scoring them, which would determine if Damian would be allowed to continue living within them. He has done so to all of Ra Al Ghul's offspring, and nothing his Grandfather has done has been able to stop him.
How could they think they would have more power than his grandfather?
"When shall Dusan be here?" Father asks, quickly switching on the home security. "What kind of attack should we expect?"
Damian scoffs, "Not the White Ghost. Uncle Dusan is on the other side of the world on a mission for Grandfather. No, Uncle Daniel will be the one conducting the suit. He is the eldest, after all."
Father's eyes narrow behind the white lenses of his masks. "I was unaware your mother had more siblings."
Damian considers the words, wondering how he could politely- at least he shames Alfred- remind his father that his grandfather has been around for hundreds of years. Staying at his peak through the usage of the Lazarus Pit, he has never been short of lovers.
And sometimes those lovers have given him children, many who aged and died naturally, as none has deemed worthy of the Lazarus. All except for one, the First Son, who has never needed the Pits but remained youthful and powerful on his own.
The perfect heir.
It's too bad he had abdicated long before Damian was even a thought.
"Grandfather has had many children, but Uncle Daniel is different. Special. He is the First Son."
"Capital letters," Todd cuts in, shaking his head. "It's never good when the League of Assiasans assigns capital letters. How strong is he?"
"He could easily best Grandfather and all under Grandfather's command," Damian replies, watching as the rest of the vigilantes grew uneasy by the information. It's good that they are wear of Uncle Daniel's power but they have nothing to fear of his wrath. "Uncle Daniel is a pacifist. He carries a protective core."
"A Al Ghul that a pacifist? I'll believe it when I see it." Drake droned as he was clipping on his utility belt. At once, Damian felt his body grew hot with rage. No matter what, it seemed Drake would always curse his family.
The way he says the family name drips with disrespect as if the other teen was saying a swear.
"My Uncle Daniel is a great man!" He shouts, gripping his sword so har his knuckles ache. Drake's face twists as if though he smelled something foul and the rage burning in Damian's chest spreads to his whole body.
He is just about to reach for his throwing knives when a familiar cold hand settles into his hair. "Aw thank you Little One. I love you too."
"Uncle Daniel!" Damian shouts excitably, forgetting the fool he was about to run his blades through. His uncle stands before him, the same darl night hair, warm blue eyes, and a crooked smile that had secretly comforted him in his youth.
"Where in the world did he come from!?" Damian hears one of Father's adopted brutes gasp but does not care to see who as his uncle quickly reels him in for a hug.
Hugging Uncle Daniel was like being wrapped in warm blankets in winter. He always ran rather cold, but it was lovely to be wrapped in his arms and surrounded by his protection.
It felt like nothing in the world could harm him from here.
"You seem well, Little One. Are you happy?" His uncle says. The delict of their native tongue is another comfort Damian can sink into.
"I am." He allows, snuggling his face against his stomach, as childish as it is. If only he could grow taller like his father.
"Wonderful. I'm so glad." His uncle then switches to English, ignoring all the weapons drawn and pointing at him from the Bats. Damian steps back to admire the man he wishes to grow into. "I'm terribly sorry for arriving so late, nephew. You must be tired. When is your bed time?"
"I do not have a bedtime." Damian scoffs. Uncle Daniel frowns, reaching into his chest to pull out a clipboard and a pen- he'll never get used to his uncle storing things within himself no matter how often he sees it. Damian is pretty sure he heard someone gag.
A soft click is heard as his uncle opens the pen and quickly scribbles something down. He is not tall enough to see what is written, but he can see clearly as day that his uncle selected the red ink of the muli-color pen he is using.
He only uses red when he is doing bad things. Damian breaks into a sweat. "What was that? Uncle what did you just write?"
"No bedtime. Tsk tsk." Uncle Daniel mutters, looking around the cave with disapproval. "No proper heating living space."
"Oh no! I do not live down here. This is merely the training grounds. We live upstairs" Damian quickly says, waving his hands frantically in the air as his uncle's unimpressed look. Curses, the auduit just began and already he got bad markings.
"Would you care for a tour? I shall not be going on patrol-"
"He forces you to fight crime? At your age?" Uncle barks, throwing a look of utter disgust at Father. It's the same one he gives Grandfather whenever the older man tries to raise child soldiers.
Even Damian had not been sent on any missions. His childhood had been intense training but nothing that was life-threatening.
"I volunteered to go!" He tries to defend Father, but his uncle only clicks his pen and scrambles more red ink on his paper.
Drat and Damian were actually enjoying living at the manor. He will likely have to say goodbye to it all and be moved to some house Uncle deemed more child-friendly.
"What is your diet here? Have you been taken to the doctor? Any form of therapy?" His uncle fires each question quickly, walking through Todd and Cain when they try to apprehend him without a glance.
His uncle is, and not to sound like the fools of his school, so cool.
2K notes
·
View notes
they want to talk about mental illness and acceptance and how everyone is a little ocd it's cute and quirky and their "intrusive thoughts" are about cutting their hair off and you say yours are about taking a razorblade to your eye and they say ew can you not and everyone is a little adhd sometimes! except if you're late it's a personality flaw and it's because you are careless and cruel (and someone else with adhd mentions they can be on time, so why can't you?) and it's not an eating disorder if it's girl dinner! it's not mania if it's girl math! what do you mean you blew all of your savings on nonrefundable plane tickets for a plane you didn't even end up taking. what do you mean that you are afraid of eating. get over it. they roll their little lips up into a sneer. can you not, like, trauma dump?
they love it on them they like to wear pieces of your suffering like jewels so that it hangs off their tongue in rapiers. they are allowed to arm-chair diagnose and cherrypick their poisons but you can't ever miss too many showers because that's, like, "fuckken gross?" so anyone mean is a narcissist. so anyone with visual tics is clearly faking it and is so cringe. but they get to scream and hit customer service employees because well, i got overwhelmed.
you keep seeing these posts about how people pleasers are "inherently manipulative" and how it's totally unfair behavior. but you are a people pleaser, you have an ingrained fawn response. in the comments, you have typed and deleted the words just because it is technically true does not make it an empathetic or kind reading of the reaction about one million times. it is technically accurate, after all. you think of catholic guilt, how sometimes you feel bad when doing a good deed because the sense of pride you get from acting kind - that pride is a sin. the word "manipulation" is not without bias or stigma attached to it. many people with the fawn response are direct victims of someone who was malignantly manipulative. calling the victims manipulative too is an unfair and unkind reading of the situation. it would be better and more empathetic to say it is safety-seeking or connection-seeking behavior. yes, it can be toxic. no, in general it is not intended to be toxic. there is no reason to make mentally ill people feel worse for what we undergo.
you type why is everyone so quick to turn on someone showing clear signs of trauma but you already know the fucking answer, so what's the point of bothering. you kind of hate those this is what anxiety looks like! infographics because at this point you're so good at white-knuckling through a severe panic attack that people just think you're stoic. even people who know the situation sometimes comment you just don't seem depressed. and you're not a 9 year old white kid so there's no way you're on the spectrum, you're not obsessed with trains and you were never a good mathematician. okay then.
mental illness is trending. in 2012 tumblr said don't romanticize our symptoms but to be fair tiktok didn't exist yet. there's these series of videos where someone pretends to be "the most boring person on earth" and is just being a normal fucking person, which makes your skin crawl, because that probably means you are boring. your friend reads aloud a profile from tinder - no depressed bitches i fucking hate that mental illness crap. your father says that medication never actually works.
you still haven't told your grandmother that you're in therapy. despite everything (and the fact it's helping): you just don't want her to see you differently.
6K notes
·
View notes