Part of the process of recovering from my first psychotic episode has involved revisiting all of the famous gothic horror literature i read and was fascinated by as a preteen and reading Poe has been a constant experience of yeah I’ve been there before buddy and it really does feel like he was ahead of his time in terms of presenting reality as inherently absurd in a way his peers didn’t often touch upon. People often stop their analysis at “Edgar Allan Poe utilizes unreliable narrators a lot” instead of going a bit further to put themselves in the shoes of the characters and asking what it feels like to live in an unreliable reality. Reading Poe stories feels so very melancholic at a moment in my life when I don’t know how to get care for these issues, whether or not I’m actually sound of mind or just convincing myself I’m losing touch with reality-- in other words “faking it.” Ever since the incident moments of joy and curious hobbies have gone from being seen by those around me as quirky hyperfixations to something more sinister and unwell. Others who I thought really cared for my health and safety seem to treat the revelation that I am “losing my mind, no literally. . . please let me tell you what happened” with the if i’m retelling the story of what flavor of soda i picked at the vending machine. It’s so alienating as if being terrified of your own mind and it’s capability to break apart the rules of reality isn’t alienating enough. I think Poe really captures that feeling I get when things are just a bit off until they crescendo into an event that seems massive and tiny and inconsequential all the same. I really can’t describe it because the fear I feel is unlike any other fear I’ve felt and you don’t know it until you’ve felt it and it clicks. Out of curiosity I wanted to see how well H.P. Lovecraft held up or if my distaste for his work was strictly from the knowledge of who the man was in life. The answer is no, it does not. Frankly I find it insulting that H.P. Lovecraft is put at the same level as Poe, far above the tens of Gothic writers that preceded him by decades to nearly a century. . . of whom Lovecraft would openly take influence from just to water down down everything that makes those works interesting. The “indescribable” horrors that Lovecraft describes are paradoxically comprehensible. I’ve had many discussions with my partner about why more grounded surrealist art feels far more surreal and uneasy than art that is comprised of endless “weird” imagery. To keep this topic brief, think something like David Lynch. His films are utterly bizarre compared to your average hollywood blockbuster, sure, but as far as surrealist media goes? His films are very grounded in reality, but that reality feels off and strange in a way that genuinely is indescribable. When I read Lovecraft on the other hand, it feels like he read a lot of gothic literature about the sublime, indescribably transcendent nature of the universe and replaced that with essentially. . . a big scary monster. When Lovecraft writes “indescribable” or other similar words as a descriptor for what his characters see, it feels akin to when 14 year olds discover the SCP wiki and think that the more you write REDACTED or [DATA EXPUNGED] the scarier the object of horror is. It feels lazy when you’re not given any other reason to feel afraid. When I read Dagon it feels like I’m reading an early 2010s creepypasta written by someone who hasn’t been writing long enough to analyze what makes something scary. It genuinely feels like someone trying to write what they think psychosis might be like. His stories are so inhuman (and not in the way he’s trying to achieve) and detached, and I never get the is it real or not feeling I get from older gothic stories dealing with notions of sanity and humanity’s role in the universe. I know the big spooky space creatures are real in the universe of the text, so I don’t really connect the Lovecraftian hero’s lapses of sanity. You don’t see the same tragic decay of mind and body and ill-fated social dynamics that permeate so many of Poe’s stories. I genuinely don’t know what purpose there is to be gained from the oft-quoted declaration that the core of Lovecraft is about uncovering knowledge you aren’t supposed to know. I frankly don’t know how you can separate the art from the artist for HPL when so much of his work seems to pretty clearly match up with antisemitic “secret global society” conspiracy theories that go back centuries upon centuries. Think about it for two seconds: the “terrible knowledge” that gets discovered is typically the existence of some all-powerful cosmic race that seems to hide itself at all costs and could possibly end humanity’s pitiful existence should they so choose to do so. So much of his work involves this utterly unsympathetic view of otherness as an “indescribable threat” in society whereas I think a lot of Poe’s writing really captures the terror of being othered at a time when the treatment of mentally ill and disabled people was at one of its all-time peaks. I might revisit this idea again when I’m not tired as shit but I think in all, Lovecraft feels almost boring. Nothing feels really impressive despite the scale of its horror. In some ways, Poe really feels almost shockingly similar to a lot of postmodern man-vs-reality narratives, whereas Lovecraft feels like he takes a lot of the same aesthetics of gothic literature and uses it to craft a narrative that is far more simplistic than it seems at first glance. It hardly even qualifies as a man-vs-god narrative prevalent in the time of the Illiad, but given HPL’s track record when it comes to respecting human beings it’s all just a bare bones black and white us-versus-them man-vs-man narrative. Now, art doesn’t have to be thematically complex to be good, but I find it a bit insulting when the man with the copy-paste self insert characters with the personality of soggy paper wants to profess understanding of profoundly existentialist, indescribable terror. . . and the vast majority of his work is just an allegory with a metaphor writing-hand heavier than CS Lewis’s own that gives me no insights about the world other than that he literally couldn’t get over the “indescribable” fear of “grug look different from ogg, grug bad!” dog you didn’t make a cosmic discovery you are literally the fuckin meme “men will smoke weed once and think they’re enlightened for discovering empathy” or whatever. i have more transcendental experiences railing twinks and cuddling with pretty girls talk about smth really indescribable!!!!! it’s fucking caveman shit. mf really would be writing shitty fanfic of shadow puppets if you locked him in the cave fr fr. prolly wouldn’t notice he’s in an allegory fr fr life is indescribable and that’s what makes it beautiful and tragic and precious just eat a cock like the rest of us instead ur scarin the hoes with your shitty octopus fursona!

Not an ask but I do need a pick me up. I’m 18, my parents kept me away from boys and now that I’m dating I feel like everyone is not serious and thinks I’m a just a hook up I’m on tinder I think that’s where people go to find boyfriends but idk. I think it’s stupid because I don’t present myself that way i dress modest I don’t cuss so i don’t understand why they just think im a hook up. If you have some pointers on what I should do differently that’d be amazing they don’t have to be older although I do think the guys at my college only want a hook up too…idc for money or should I? Should I be hypergamous I don’t think that possible for a dark skin woman like me coming from a upper middle class family I think it’s harder for me also to date older bc I think someone who’s 25 or older would want nothing to do with me who 18 rightfully so I’m not saying I’m not attracted to them but what value would I bring…. Ig I do need help ig the whole run down on dating. I think people only talk about what to do in relationships instead of giving advice on how to find such relationships how would we use the advice people give us if we don’t know where to find such men. Most men my age just want hook ups I mean I can’t blame them it’s college.

Thank you in advance sorry for being naive or depressing

Any guy will TRY to hook up regardless if you’re a classy lady or not. They will literally try to bang a hole in the wall if they could lol. Their testosterone is through the roof and driving them insane. They will have the audacity to say and do things that they will later regret because they’re young, and it still happens when they’re older but not as often since they learn self control. After reading your message I don’t get the feeling that you think your an “it girl.” I think you should focus on boosting your confidence up or these men will run you over. You have to be so confident that you don’t question yourself as much and run them over instead when they don’t meet your standards. If you want to care about money that’s completely up to you. Typically things will go a lot better when a man is financially stable but your age group is so young so that won’t be happening for a while. If you date this young you have to accept that a man won’t be able to treat you to really nice dates and gifts. They might even be asking you to split the bill if they ask you out. I think you need to prioritize the relationship that you have with yourself first and then secondly entertain the idea of going on dates and meeting guys. There are very few guys who are worth dating in college and you can’t really expect them to propose at that age either. The ones who are more likely to be loyal will be the nerds, the athletes will 9/10 not be loyal even if they’re in a relationship. Also, your skin color does not matter when trying to date up. Once you have your confidence up you attract the type of men you would want to date a lot more than actually finding them. It’s not always about looking it’s more about making yourself available and blocking out the ones you should ignore.