I wrote this for class but tumblr loves mermaids and classic lit

Their eyes frightened me in the beginning. Wide, unblinking, and glassy. Their eyes look nothing like ours. As you should know, our eyes have three colours: white, black, and a third we like to compare to a feature of the earth such as its sky or soil. Our eyes sit in sockets, theirs look to be just under the skin. When I was very young, I used to play with sewing needles and perform surgery on the most awful looking dolls, having convinced myself their ugliness was a symptom of some rare, unidentified condition. I tended to pierce my fingers, not deep enough to have drawn blood though I very clearly separated my skin from itself. I could look through my skin and see the tip of the needle more vividly than if I lay my hand above it and squinted. Now that you can envision how far the eyes sat beneath the skin, perhaps you can try and paint in your mind the blend of colours in them too. Some were so flooded with hues they came across grey – or the ocean floor’s lighting was not designed for me – where others looked to have changed colours every other moment. What I saw of their eyes was about the size of a whole human eye removed from the skull and just as round, as they had no eyelids. The rest of their faces were as normal as I would expect – and I had no expectations – with flat or no noses [it varied by the person and, I later learned, the region] and lipless mouths that I never wished to see open upon catching a glimpse of their teeth not too long after seeing their faces for the first time. The teeth were long and thin, not unlike the aforementioned needles. Wide spaces of nothing separated each tooth. To accommodate their teeth, their jaws sat closer to their narrow shoulders than to where their ears should be – if they were human that is. Before I elaborate on their appearance, I must stress that I did indeed stare at them, despite how unsettling I found them [I never quite adjusted to their looks], because they were and are the most visually bizarre people I have met during my travels even if they were about average human size. Any similarities we share with those people who I have taken to thinking of as Nereids [not taking into account their abstract “beauty”] were limited to the presence of eyes, mouths, and a furless torso. Of course, where we lack fur, they had shimmering scales everywhere about their bodies. Do not call them mermaids, I request of the reader, as they were not all maids and “mer” is all too simple to call them by. I was certain they were being eaten alive when I first cast my sight upon them. They were not. From beneath their navels onward, creatures of the deep more natural than themselves had seemingly been stopped halfway through consuming what I thought were supposed to be “normal” human bodies. The creatures staring at me wore fish remains as skirts or were horrific parasites that were so bold to grow from the inside out through its host mouth so it may then don the marine beasts as bottoms to hide their shame [or parade its pride in stealing life for itself].

               It’s been brought to my attention that I’ve spent about a page’s worth of words to tell you how these beings looked, but, again, I only describe them so much that you might also believe that I did not live through a hallucination caused by nearly dying. I return, then, to my adventure in the deep. Though it was not much of an adventure as I was confined to the bubble should I have any chance of not drowning or asphyxiating. I never learned who placed me in the bubble, but I did learn how the bubbles were made. Down so far away from the surface, sound, I gathered, does not travel as it does on land and through air. These people communicated by creating shapes and swirls made of tiny bubbles with their hands and fingers, which were connected by thin skin at where I thought the halfway knuckle belonged. The bubbles often did not dissipate for minutes after a conversation was finished, allowing, I assumed, time for a review of the exchange should apologies be needed. Perhaps that was why disputes were so rare between citizens. I nearly summed up conflict with a nearby province to be that of miscommunications. Actually, I do still believe that was all due to a language barrier. These other Nereids had limp horns sprouting from their foreheads that dangled bulbs of light at the end. The Bubble Nereids did not have those, as I would have surely made a mention of it. The Light Nereids, though capable of speaking Bubble, refused for reasons I never quite grasped, opting to blink their lights and wave their horns at each other, producing bubbles in arrangements that some Bubble Nereids looked to take offense to. I failed to understand why they would do business with each other if all they ever did was fight. I eventually took it upon myself to conclude that they were closer to each other than others and that, just maybe, not all conflict is bad conflict. It appeared to drive their society to best the Lights in any trade. Not that they traded anything important by English standards – and I found myself in a constant state of befuddlement at how pearls were not a commodity in any sense, but, rather, they were all in a great demand of bloody seaweed.

It's Octoberrrr 🔪🔪🔪

y’all stop hating on the poor octopus. mans just wanted to vibe

what english class will do to gay people

me, thinking: *I mean, i’m literally learning literature at oxford university, my professors must be super serious academics*

my professor: idk dudes, all i’m saying is that satan is a really fuckable figure. that’s just the truth.

need to find a pretty girl to kiss in the tortured poets department in the library and cry and annotate sapphic lit <3

Guess who decided it would be a good idea to read The House of leaves for AP literature.

We got to choose a book, I could have chosen hitchhikers guide to the galaxy, but I was like “noooooo, you will read one of the hardest books to read that you know of.”

hello! it’s lesbian storytime with me, zilly gooze!

so i physically can’t listen to we fell in love in october by girl in red because it reminds me of my last relationship which was… not optimal, to say the least. she was my best friend, which is already just not great. she wanted a girlfriend, not me as her girlfriend, and so i felt undervalued and like she didn’t actually like me romantically (turns out i was right lol).

but anyways, i realized i had a crush on her in october of one year, we officially began dating in october of the next year. we fell in love in october became the song i thought was ours, ya kno?

ever since she dumped me during one of the worst points of my life (which yeah, thanks for bein a good friend there bucko), i have hated that song with a passion and will not, under any circumstances, listen to it.

well, sapphics are to girl in red as moths are to a flame, and so i recently started listening to her again because she’s good ya kno?

i was not prepared for the absolute gut punch that October Passed Me By was.

see, in wfilio, the speaker keeps repeating “you will be my girl… you will be my world.” she is super super into this girl and wants to be her girlfriend so bad. it’s romantic, its slow, it’s sweet, it’s filled with longing, it’s everything you want a girl to say to you.

but OPMB is the sequel to wfilio. it tells the story of the fallout of the relationship that wfilio set up. it’s faster , it’s melancholic, it’s utterly mournful. she’s trying to move on, but, as she says in the last verse, her ex is “always in the back of [her] mind.”

most devastatingly, though, is that she repeats lyrics from wfilio- she mentions being busy looking at the stars, alluding to the line “looking at the stars / admiring them from afar,” with ‘stars’ meaning this girl she wanted to date. she repeats “i made you my whole world,” referencing the line “you will be my world” in wfilio. finally, she says, “screaming at the top of my lungs, i love you, my girl” and ends the song with “you will be my girl,” with both lines being references to wfilio’s line “you will be my girl.”

this mirroring, this pining that resulted in sadness and breakup, is literally a replica of my relationship. i fell in love in october, and i thought that my girl was fantastic and lovely. but then she started distancing herself from me, and as OPMB says, “i got bitter when you got cold / and could you really blame me though?”

“it wasn’t all good, yeah, it wasn’t all pretty.” omfg. i cannot count the number of times i told myself that my relationship was fine, it was good, it was all going great. and it wasn’t. i was lying. my ex was lying. i was just hoping that i could will a good relationship into existence (turns out you can’t, which kinda sucks imo :p).

the parallels are absolutely insane from these songs to my life. and when i heard October Passed Me By yesterday for the first time, it literally shattered me. i love it so much.

lastly, i will leave you with the cover art for each single.

we fell in love in october (2018)

October Passed Me By (2022)

oh. my. fucking. god.

THIS IS ART

The Portrait of a Lady took me forever to finish 5/5

hey! just wanted to share a little snippet of my writing. I wrote this for my ap lang class and loved it so much that i thought others might enjoy it too.

“I wish I could suffocate my thoughts and bury them six feet under the cold, hard earth in the same grave I dug three years ago for the unidentifiable skeleton of my emotions. But I can’t seem to do so. Instead, my mind betrays me; it takes the shovel I clutch in my hands and covers me in the ashes of my dignity.”

Rhetorical Analysis of Bluey???

Yes please??

Surviving High School English- A Guide

We've all been there: It's the night before your essay is due and you haven't even cracked open the book. You are staring down at a blank word document.

English can be a very hard subject, particularly if you are taking it at advanced levels such as IB or AP. English happens to be my favourite subject, so I thought I share a secret:

99% of English is bullshit.

So, I suppose this post is simply a guide to bullshitting effectively. I am going to focus on English, but it can be applied to other humanities subjects like history as well.

Sparknotes and LitCharts are your best friends.

I get it. Reading is hard. I personally love to read, and always try my best to reads the books for class, but I get that that is sometimes not possible. So just jump onto Sparknotes or LitCharts. Both have full summaries of most classic books, and a lot of popular contemporary books that are used in schools. The page for each book also has chapter-by-chapter summaries, character breakdowns, analyses of major themes and motifs, and even essay ideas.

Seriously. Use them.

2. Audiobooks

I love audiobooks. I get at least half my reading done through them. I like using Audible the best (no affiliate link. I just love it!). You can get your first audiobook free, and they have a whole catalogue of books that are included if you are a member. Seriously, normalise audiobooks. They have saved my ass so many times when I have had to read a big book in a short amount of time. The best thing about them is that you can listen to them while you do other things. Doing chores, driving, making dinner, even going for a run. And if you have dyslexia, it will be a lifesaver for you.

3. Know a few things, but know them well

Do a close reading of a few chapters. Know examples of one motif by heart. Having vague knowledge is no good to anyone, least of all yourself. Hone in on a few key points, and know them inside and out. You can afford to do this in English. Again, Sparknotes and Litcharts are great for this. Choose one theme, and read their page on it. It's as simple as that!

4. If your text was set in/ published in a different time era, do some very basic research on that period

For example, Of Mice and Men (a great book, btw) was both published and set in the 1930's. It is set in California. This is important because many of the story's main themes and motifs are based around this. The themes of the American Dream and minority rights are very prevalent throughout the book. Steinbeck was trying to make a statemnt. And if we didn't know the social context of the time, we would not be able to analyse it. So do your research, even if it is very basic

5. If you are not sure, it is probably a reference to the Bible, or Shakespeare, or Greek Mythology

Literally. Give me any classic book, and I could point out a hundred references to these three. Your English teacher will certainly give you extra points for picking up any allusions of this sort. Once again, on both Sparknotes and Litcharts, most books have a page dedicated to the literary allusions present in them. Use. This.

6. Utilize Tumblr

It sounds silly, but you are much more likely to remember what happened/major themes if you read them from shitposts. Engage people with discussions! Talk about your thoughts on the book, ask them for theirs! There is a very good chance that practically every book has been fandomised on this hellsite. I recently had an incredibly interesting and insightful discussion about the phenomenon of Sherlock Holmes and its effect on modern fan culture. Wouldn't that make a great essay?

7. If you can find any evidence whatsoever, then to your English teacher it is good enough.

If you can successfully argue a point, then you will do well on your essay! Anyone seen that post about the person who wrote an essay that Hamlet was partially blind, and they ended up getting a really high mark for it? That is what I am talking about! Argue that Jay Gatsby was gay, that Sherlock Holmes was autistic and that Dorian Gray had ADHD. Write a whole essay proving that George was in love with Lennie or that Heathcliff is a werewolf. Claim that everyone in Pride and Prejudice is an alien. I don't care (although I would love to read the alien one!). Seriously, I have talked to my English teacher about this: as long as you can find evidence and defend your claim, it is true in the eyes of your teacher.

8. Actually listen in class

I may just be lucky, but every English teacher I've ever had has supplied the class with a lot of the information above, such as the historical context of the story.

9. Start early and over-outline

If your essay is an assignment and not an exam, my advice is to start as soon as you know what the task is! Even if you write the title, and start mulling it over in your head. Write down any ideas you have immediately, take quotes from the book, the author and even others. Once you have your ideas, outline, outline, outline! This is my greatest advice for any subject you need to write an essay for! Don't make the outline rigid, but put down all your ideas. Be silly with it, using abbreviations and swear words and memes. Just get your points down. This fights procrastination too, becuase you think you are only outlining. Once you have everything out in a rough order, all you have to do is open up a blank document and put it into formal and pretentious language. I usually find that if my outline is a bit less than half my word count, then I will be good to go once I have typed it all up. The ratio might be different for you. See what works.

And there you go! You have just written yourself a world-class essay with all of your knowledge of the book! I'm so proud of you!

I hope this has been helpful. These are the ways I personally work. If I think of anything else I will add it on.

Happy reading! (Or Sparknote-ing lol)

my 2022 ap exam results

ap lit: 5

ap physics c mech: 5

ap us gov: 5

ap comp gov: 4

super happy with these results. honestly i should not have gotten a 4 on comparative bc i literally did not take a single note all semester but major props to my teacher for explaining stuff well enough in class that i didn’t fail the exam 🤪

The abilities in bsd are honestly kind of funny when you know the story they’re based off. Like the original story Rashomōn is about a servant stealing an old lady’s clothes out of necessity and because she tried to justify stealing from the dead; But Asagiri was just like: “Scary coat go brr 😋”