#i don't usually post about myself online but I've been reflecting a lot on the time that's passed and i felt like i needed to get this out. | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ohmeadows · 9 months

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I'm curious how can you manage to write something so deranged (complementary) and it's still amazing?? Like I've been trying to write something that's out of my comfort zone but always stop halfway or chickened out because I don't know where or how to write the character. Is there a tip or notes that you can share with us? I love your stories btw and I've read all of them. Thank you so much for sharing 😘 I hope you're successful in everything that you do.

okay let me see what advice i can give!

first tip: pick a work you think does this really well and print it out. grab some highlighters. go over it like a hawk, highlighting the places you think they nailed that you struggle with. is it because they use some special verbs? are they speeding up or slowing down action? skipping over details you think you have to include or it won't make any sense? take note of what verbs they use, how they choreograph, how they set up the space and scene. this is a bit of tedious process but it teaches you so much about how others do it if you're willing to put in the time, and is just a great writing habit overall imo.

second tip: i chicken out a lot too! sometimes i have to turn that shame around. like okay, what's stopping me. i'm posting something online and no one knows who i am irl, check. sometimes i make an entirely new ao3 account just to feel safe about it. sometimes that shame can be utilized in the characters. shame when used right can be really hot, because you want to show how much a character wants something, can't stop thinking about it, even though it makes them melt from shame. and then keep upping the ante until they can't resist the desire anymore.

third tip: contrary to popular belief i think almost any kink i feasibly care about can happen with any character if you build up the setting well enough. the simplest formula is framing it as a problem character A has, and character B offers a solution. limited POV to one character means limited knowledge, so you can also play with "oh my god why are they behaving so annoying/sluttily/weird around me? ooooh oh ok they want to do [nasty kink]" and then comes a period of reflection, wrestling with it. i sometimes straight up project my own thoughts into this zone to process and be able to actually write it hahaha. it's really sexy and good tension to show the internal friction of wanting something and getting just a taste, and realizing ah shit you want it even more now.

fourth tip: if the kink is really far out of your comfort zone, write like a stepping stone guide building up to it (say, lactation might be too far out. okay. breastplay? tit bondage? sucking on nipples really intensely? nipple clamps? oiled up breasts?). and see how far you can go along it. maybe you need to stop halfway in one fic but the next time you can go a little further, and the third time you make it all the way. it is completely fine and actually really cool to explore the same kinks over and over and i promise readers won't get tired!

fifth tip: this is more something i love to read than what i usually write myself, but: character A comes across a kink in media. they begin to research it, think about it, and maybe tell character B or B finds out through accident. turns out, B is intrigued and into it. this formula works really well in building up, pouring research into it, allowing yourself to linger in doubts and details and hesitations... this whole thing, is it a trope? it should be. i love it. and it works so well with so many kinks!

okay i hope even a smidge in here was of use to you, and if you need any help with more specifics or generics my askbox is always open!

#meadows writes #suggestive /#ask meadows anything

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craftycoola · 4 months

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Happy NYE/NY everyone!

Because 'tis the season for reflection, I went through my camera roll and picked out the 9 projects from this year that I'm proudest of.

(We all know what posts from this year got the most online attention, but I think it's important to be introspective and think about what projects and posts were actually most valuable to me. Anyways. /soapbox)

Swan Song Scarf (Jasmine Lin, Crafty Coola). This is my design, and although I released it a good while ago, I'm still incredibly proud of it. I spent a lot of time sketching, charting, knitting, ripping back... it was a labor of love, but I'm proud that I stuck with it and got a result I'm happy with. Yarn: Miss Babs Yummy 2-Ply (World in a Book and Light Clematis)

Woodland Cardigan (Anna Johanna, Where We Once Knitted). This was my first time steeking, and yeah, I'm pretty gosh-darned proud of that. Yarn: Knit Picks Palette (Wonderland Heather and Calypso Heather)

Anza Dress (Kennis Wong, Itch to Stitch). This was my first time installing buttons, making (sewn) buttonholes, using interfacing (...don't judge me), and sewing scoop pockets. So many new techniques for me, but it created such a polished product and was an excellent learning opportunity. I'm so glad I took the leap with this pattern. Fabric: Singer Brand Cotton Poplin (2 yards)

Color Triangle (p: do you love the color of the sky?). This was my first time using powdered acid dye (read: Big Girl Dye instead of tie-dye/Rit/food coloring)! Obviously the whole color-formulating process for the Color of the Sky shenanigans remains in progress, but I'm proud of this triangle as it is anyways. Fiber: Knit Picks Stroll Bare, Dye: G&S Acid Dyes

Custom Intarsia Blanket. This depicts DNA replication using restriction enzymes and DNA ligase. I did this one for a custom commission, and I'm proud of myself for a) designing it, b) being so free with it, and c) getting to make something science-y! I sketched a rough plan before beginning, but I had to make an absurd amount of adjustments along the way -- in the end, I even had to duplicate stitch over the restriction enzyme bit with a half-strand (i.e. half the plies) of yarn since the stash yarn was too fine. I'm so used to planning everything and then being stubborn; this was a great exercise in adaptability and letting go.

Elderberry Dress (Shavonne Cruz, Mood Sewciety). I'm not one to do muslins or even much fitting on my sewing projects. I tend to just take patterns straight out of the envelope and then sew them, consequences be damned. This dress, though? After each wear, I've been making little adjustments to improve it; shaping the neckline and adjusting the fit, amongst other things. That's something I want to carry forward for my future projects.

Eliane Scrubs (Jalie). These aren't anything particularly special from a technical perspective, but they are possibly my most-worn me-made EVER. They've held up to weekly wear and washing and I'm proud of them for that, as well as of myself for letting my babies "do their job" instead of hiding them way out of fear. Fabric: cotton poplin

Fractal Yarn (p: swirling solar winds). I spun most of this for Tour de Fleece (which feels like a lifetime ago!) and it's a huge accomplishment for me. I'm often afraid to break down gradient braids, so doing a fractal spin was a first for me! I also got it nice and fine; a practical weight for what I usually work with. Fiber: Emily C Gillies (now House of Wool) Luck of the Draw December 2022 on Merino/Silk

Handspun Sweater (p: we pull apart the stars). Ok, so this isn't finished, but handspun sweater. I think that speaks for itself as far as why I'm proud!

#top nine #nye #reflections #craftblr #knitting #sewing #spindle spinning #p: swirling solar winds #p: we pull apart the dark

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paperbackribs · 30 days

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20 Questions for fic writers

tagged by the lovely @finntheehumaneater 💜

How many works do you have on AO3? 18

What’s your total AO3 word count? 193,735

What fandoms do you write for?

Stranger Things and The Rookie

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

A pretty flower for a pretty boy

Swift Wings and a Brave Heart

The Gift

A lavendar pin in his pocket

Clear Lungs, Full Heart

Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Absolutely! Definitely! How could I not? Lovely people have made the effort to tell me that I'm not posting into the void and I want to do the same for them. Plus, I just really like talking to commentors: they have interesting insights, or funny takes, or simply observed something that struck them and it's always fun to talk to them. Especially with the regulars who often comment; I feel like I've struck up a friendship with them.

What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

A microfic called The Bar. It's for The Rookie fandom and in it Tim gets increasingly drunk after his addict wife stole from his home and guilty reflects how relieved he is that he never told her his secret about being a selkie.

What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Like, all of them lol? I like to end my stories with people in love and a bright future ahead of them. Laughter and soft kisses are often how I fade out of a fic.

Do you get hate on fics?

No, but I think you have to be a certain size before you start attracting the haters.

Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Yes, but honestly it's one of my weaknesses - it just doesn't come naturally. But in Tarnished Copper Boy it's been about trust and handing over control. In The Gift it was a reflection of pent-up, forbidden attraction.

Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

No. But I think if I did it'd be because I'd want to borrow the other universe's magic/fantasy structure.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

lol I hope not.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nah, but I did accidentally click on my bookmarks for Tarnished Copper Boy once (I forbid myself from reading bookmarks usually) and saw that there was a comment in cyryllic (?) or something. (This was a while back so I can't remember fully but) I think the comment translated to 'sweet pain.' 💜

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

negatory

What’s your all time favorite ship?

steddie

What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

secretly omega Steve forced to take meds to appear as an alpha. he agrees to getting off with alpha Eddie but frequently makes sure that the lights are off and that touching only happens in certain ways that he controls. Eddie at first thinks its a reflection on him but increasingly suspects something is up until finally unravelling the mystery. there's definitely some Steve Harrington Has Bad Parents in there, but also some nuance about them genuinely wanting what's best for him.

What are your writing strengths?

I'm told dialogue and characterisation. and, honestly, that's where I have the most fun so it'd make sense that readers pick that up

What are your writing weaknesses?

description. I literally can't imagine anything in my head. have you seen that thing where ppl are asked to imagine an apple and there's a scale of ppl can see it in their head to not at all? I'm not at all. so I do a lot of online imagery research to help flesh my writing out.

Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I generally avoid it because because I want it to sound natural and I don't think I'll hit the mark.

First fandom you wrote for?

X-files. During reading time in primary school I'd ask the teacher if I could write instead, and tried shipping them before I even knew the word.

Favorite fic you’ve written?

A Tarnished Copper Boy. It probably has the least love compared to my other fics, but that could be because it's a very large fic and chapters reflect that too, so it may be hard to invest in weekly (or, at least, that's what I tell myself haha). But I truly put my heart and soul into it, and I simply love it.

No pressure tags: @solarmorrigan 💜

#tag games #paperbackribs writing

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thebadascetic · 2 months

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Mid-Lent Reflections

So I'm hoping that today's post will be a little bit different. I've been thinking a lot about this blog and I realised that I've been treating it like an obligation rather than a voluntary personal project.

Since I began converting to Catholicism, things have become rather complication for me. I'm changing as a person and feel very disconnected from my friends, who are all secular, as a result. Additionally, I haven't had a great deal of success in making Catholic friends just yet so I honestly feel quite lonely. During these times, I'm so grateful to God for my lovely fiance who has been the pinnacle of support during this struggle. So this blog gives me an opportunity to talk about those things that I'd like to talk about with friends and potentially connect with people online.

I'd like to try and be a bit more personal and engaging with these posts but I believe that is something I'll find with time. For now, I'll share what I can with you.

Well, right now I'm sick. Nothing serious, I just have a stuffy nose and am very fatigued. I've had to cancel some appointments and interviews and haven't been very productive these past couple of days as a result, which is completely understandable. What's less understandable, though, is that I've honestly been really letting myself down with my Lenten fasts. I haven't been consistent with them at all and the only one I can say that I haven't broken is my fast from meat. I've been on social media almost non-stop and it's been awful. I usually have a block on my phone that keeps me out of most apps from 8pm-9am but I haven't been using it lately. I've been so unproductive for weeks now and have done little to no cleaning around the apartment. It's getting pretty bad here and I'm disappointed in myself. I was hoping to get back onto things this week but of course, now I'm sick. My prayer life has been almost nonexistent. I'm not going to continue, it's not helpful for me to engage in excessive negative self-talk and I should be directing my focus towards improvement, not despondency.

On a more positive note, my early childcare traineeship interviews went incredibly well! So well, in fact, that I was offered the traineeship on the spot during my first interview! I have the contract with me, that I will be signing and returning tomorrow (assuming I'm not still sick) and I'll be starting the job two weeks from today! I've already handed in my letter of resignation to my current job and am looking forward to this new chapter of my life.

I also went to Great Vespers on Saturday night with my lovely fiance. We've just passed the Veneration of the Holy Cross so I have included photos of the Cross from St. Andrew's after Great Vespers on Saturday and St. Volodymyr's after Divine Liturgy on Sunday. This was only my second time attending Great Vespers. I sat near the choir and did my best to participate. Hopefully if I work hard enough, I might be able to join the choir one day.

Lastly, yesterday I spent the day resting and watching movies and anime with my fiance. We watched the first episode of part six of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. So far, I'm not loving it. This is the first part with a female main character and it shows. I don't appreciate how overly sexualised Jolyne is immediately. I'll keep watching it at some point but right now, I'm not super interested. I just watched Chicago for the first time and watching another piece of media about women in prison (even if they aren't there for long) is not capturing my interest. My fiance showed me an episode of an old anime he used to like so I showed him an episode of Ouran High School Host Club, which I watched back in year 7, and he liked it so much we watched a second episode! We also watched Mad Max: Fury Road together. Later on, we watched Josie and the Pussycats, which he highly enjoyed and I would highly recommend.

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whyyoualwayssoradical · 1 year

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Idk how much experience you may have with this but lately I've been thinking about how most men I know somehow can't clock transwomen as fast as I can and I'm wondering if male's like don't have as strong of a recognition of sex as women do? And maybe that's part of why a lot of transwomen think they pass when it's very obvious to us 🤔

personally i've been able to clock just about every trans person i've come across, either IRL or online just from something as small as a reddit post. most of them are pretty obvious. there's like probably 30-50 trans people at my work and i can clock all of them at first glance (there's two people I am unsure of) and only one of them knows i'm trans because i told one transman that i trust, when i told him he asked if i was transmale or transfemale.

from what i've experienced, males are atrocious at pattern recognition when it comes to people because they literally just have "man, boy (potential man), woman/girl" is how they categorize people it seems. i've heard radfems talk about how part of the reason males are worse at it might be because they don't need it to survive as much, but girls and women need to be able to accurately ID a male, in any circumstance, to survive in modern society.

for me, again personally, the only people that have really clocked me have been lesbians and gay men. most straight people seem to be completely clueless, more so men than women. i do claim i pass but when i say that i mean like in most everyday situations like going to the grocery store or to get food or something almost everyone will assume i'm a "woman" even though i'm not one. i definitely think there are plenty of women who have clocked me and just not said anything/played nice. i think any woman that spent any amount of time talking with me or hanging out with me would figure it out sooner or later, but i generally tell any close friends if we're actively talking/hanging out that much because i don't want to and don't mean to deceive them.

some anecdotes from personal experience:

i have been targeted by powerful men before because they, for some reason, legitimately thought i was female. a woman who "worked" for them also thought i was. that situation made me legit fear for my life.

the most common question i got asked at whole foods anytime i mentioned i didn't feel well, multiple women would ask if i was on my period, to which i would say just no it's just stomach cramps or w/e was making me feel crappy.

most women that do suspect me to be not what i appear usually think i'm non-binary or a transman if they ever want to ask anything.

i was disallowed from doing something at a different whole foods because they said it couldn't be a woman doing it if the other person was a man (overnights require min 2 people present). this rule miraculously disappeared after the pandemic hit and we didn't have the staff to do otherwise. i had volunteered to be the second person since i already came in early so it was no big deal to come in earlier, but they were like no it cant be a man and a woman if there's only 2 people.

this isn't me trying to say "oh i pass sooo much better" or anything like that, because i doubt i pass that particularly well but also at the same time i often struggle to make sense of what i do experience. i can't imagine this many people doing all of this just to validate me and i don't go around telling people i'm a woman, however my documentation all reflects "F". these experiences are generally why i will say i "pass" and also why i use the term "assimilated transsexual".

i think being bullied so much by boys and men plus getting into radical feminism drastically improved my human sex pattern recognition. i definitely used to not be as good at it as i am now. i can look at myself and pick out my male features fairly easily. i have had more androgynous features most of my life than anything else.

it does blow my mind when i see quite clearly men wearing makeup saying they pass and are hotter/sexier than women, because i feel like any look into the mirror would reveal otherwise... which the same could totally be said about me, maybe i look like a clown too and everyone is just nice to me who knows, but i almost never wear makeup, i've only worn it on special occasions and it's usually just eye makeup, nothing else.

#this got way longer than i expected #sorry

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crown-jay · 10 months

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Hello!

I am someone who thinks they also might be a Median System. Your posts about you figuring this out are super helpful and relatable! I also felt the same click when I found the term median system where I was like “That’s it.. that’s me..” I also had the same experience of discovering what DID was in 2018 and being like “Am I??? NAhhhh… right???” up until this year when I started really swinging the opposite way of “Oh no this is a thing I am somewhere in this group” I'm trying to relate my experiences to others to see if I'm on the right path to figuring this all out.

Tell me if these are relatable or not:

I also feel comfier with plural first pronouns, I've always felt like it's me and my brain (where the now discovered "others" live) and together we are a "we".

Another way I kinda described it to myself was feeling like a system that never fully fractured.

Or that it was the way people describe masking but at an extreme where I’m not TRYING to change my behavior, it just sorta happens and I’m “someone else”.

Or what I called masking felt more like skipping songs in a playlist to get to the right one instead of putting on a mask.

For me sometimes I expect to see a different face in the mirror and I get weirded out while still recognizing that, that is me and my face.

If these are not relatable at all please let me know and be honest.

Some questions:

Do you have amnesia?

You said that you can’t tell someone has been fronting till after. What tells you that someone was fronting?

No pressure to respond or answer any of these btw. Bottom line: Thank you for sharing your process through all this it has been very helpful comparing experiences.

Hi, thanks for reaching out! Sorry for the delayed response, we had a small crisis and went back in denial but we're good now.

We're much more comfortable with plural first person pronouns, though we're still getting used to using them online, sort of testing the waters at the moment. We agree with the "me and my brain" sentiment. It's like there was always something there but we just couldn't figure out what it was. Turns out, there was something, and that something was other people lol

Our system is definately less fractured then others. Our switches are smoother and we're less distinct from each other.

We mask a lot. Although we have a hard time figuring out what is masking and what is the host fronting, as a lot of the time we mask to copy the host. So maybe we're not actually that similar, we just mask a lot. We assume time will tell.

More often than not, our reflection doesn't reflect (hehe) our inner appearance. It can be quite jarring at times, especially for Orym, since he is a cis man in an AFAB body.

In answer to your questions:

No? But also, kind of? We don't experience amnesia in the sense that we blackout and can't remember what other alters have done while we're not fronting. We remember that but it's like we remember it from a different perspective. Like we witnessed fronting instead of experiencing it (unless, of course, we were the one fronting at that time) that's the best explanation we've come to. We tend to have emotional amnesia when looking back on times we weren't fronting, unless we were close to the front. For example if I (Sawyer) was fronting and experienced an angering experience, Orym would remember the experience, but wouldn't remember how exactly I was feeling. He might feel anger about it, but he won't remember or feel my anger. Not sure if that makes sense.

We've gotten better at knowing who's fronting. Usually we use process of elimination. While our alters are quite similar, they still have their differences, even if they're little things. Not masking a lot? Probably Bastian, since it doesn't mask as much as the rest of us. They also don't talk much. More soft spoken? Probably Orym. Generally less dysphoric? That's Ajax. Et cetera. I think that's a good tip, especially for median systems. If you find that alters are sometimes too similar to differentiate them effectively, find their small differences, ones that generally only correspond to one of them. You can then look for those when determining who is fronting, co-fronting, co-con, etc.

If you have anymore questions, feel free to ask! In fact, answering these made us realise things about ourselves which helped us understand our system better! So that's pretty cool.

#median system #actually plural #plural #plurality #plural system #the king answered a thing

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myswatchlist · 11 months

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fleabag

i just finished watching fleabag. when i started the show and while i was watching most of it i was just simply enjoying it, not thinking too deeply about what any of it meant or how seriously it is able to relate to real life. i am not a writer, and this blog is mostly for myself. but in case youre reading, heres what i thought about fleabag.

it was the ending and the fact that its over that really did it for me. i hate (i love) when shows have an actual impact on me. i will be thinking about "it'll pass" forever. or until i forget about it. and then i'll see some post online talking about the ending of fleabag, or i'll talk to someone about the show, and then i'll be thinking about it again.

this show is about loneliness to me. and i'm so glad i watched it now. i am 20 years old, i've been on summer break from school for about a week, and i haven't seen any of my friends. i've spent the past year or so running away from being alone. i got out of a year long relationship (my first serious relationship. i was 17 when it started) and immediately attached myself to someone else. when we broke up i clung to my friends. i haven't known what it was like to be alone since i was a child and probably at my lowest and i am learning how to be by myself and how to be my own friend as an adult.

all media, like tv shows, just shows the most intense version of an emotion or life event. i don't want to be the kind of person who puts everything i have into a tv show and thinks so so deeply about it, but it's interesting (and honestly useful) to use media like tv that is meant for entertainment and use it as a way to reflect. this is honestly why i wanted to start this blog. half of it is the fact that i just like to talk about movies and tv shows after i watch them and have so many thoughts, but the other half is that i know in all parts of my life i need to get to know myself and what my emotions mean.

since the beginning of theater it was meant to force audiences to feel certain emotions. and that is still consistent through movies and tv shows today. i've sort of strayed from fleabag here. throughout the show fleabag is searching for something. and the audience is used as her escape and comfort throughout as she breaks the fourth wall. the commentary on religion and human connection here is mind blowing. only the priest ever notices that something is happening when she breaks the fourth wall. fleabag uses her comments to us, the audience, in the same comforting way that people can use religion.

side note, again, i'm not a writer, so i'm just sort of rambling here, it may not make sense. but that's okay.

anyway, i have a deep appreciation for the way each of the characters find love at the end of the show. or at least everyone gets what it is they really need, whether or not it feels good and whether or not its what they think they want.

i think i have to be done writing this now. theres no closure in this post but i've written a lot. probably more than i should have, but if i keep going i don't think i'll stop. i have so many thoughts and i will keep thinking about this show. i enjoyed it. i'm usually not a fan of endings but i liked this one and i appreciate how it was unfulfilling in a very fulfilling way.

i'll get better at this. bye!

#fleabag #long post #writing

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liz-and-the-blue-bird · 1 year

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Good evening to me

Since I've gotten some new followers: "Good ___ to me" indicate long personal posts. You don't have to read them ofc, they're mostly for me down the line.

This is kind of a weird one, it's mostly reflective stuff today. I don't usually make these without a lot of negative or at least melancholic emotions to work through. Regardless, I want to stop writing about the recent ex, but a lot of this is going to be tangential to her, so she'll pop up a few times. However, I want to focus on some personal thoughts that I've been thinking about.

Here's a song.

Right at the end of February, I took an OCEAN test or a "Big Five Personality" test. This is actually unusual among personality tests, it is actually supported by Psych research. Results tend to not change over a long period of time, etc. etc. You can take it yourself here, and be sure to share with me your results! I'd love to see them. In the meantime, here are my results:

The Extraversion and Openness to experience being so high is unusual, I think. It means a lot of what makes me comfortable involves art and people, or perhaps as an extension of that, expressing myself and communicating. With this context in mind, I've started to look back at my personal history. Moments where I'm sad or melancholic, I tend to write. When I was very young, it started with poetry, but now it has evolved into these journal entries. And I guess the reason I prefer to make them public is because of that extraversion, that longing to communicate with people my ideas or emotion.

Speaking of, I found a bunch of old notebooks the first week of March. So I've been reading through them all. And by a lot, I mean a lot:

And then, even older notebooks.

You can tell these are older because I doodled things on them. I never doodle anymore.

The first batch, the moleskins and stuff like that are primarily journals. Or at the very least, notes on what happened. The one that is open actually started 4 days after the ex 8 years ago. After a week of being sad and noting every single thing that has been happening, it abruptly jumps 8 months to me complaining about something else because I was not a very consistent note taker.

Meanwhile the one with the bird on it is actually a poetry notebook, before I started preferring to write exclusively online aka in the tumblr editor. The last poem written in there is Sucks. Then I stopped writing poetry for a very long time, and a lot of my writing energy became these journal entries, as well as other stuff on this blog, usually regarding anime.

The older notebooks, the spirals, are pretty much all poetry notebooks back from middle school and early high school. Though there's a few where I just doodled a bunch. They date all the way back to end of middle school.

But the poems SUCK. Like they're REALLY BAD. Most of them are actually on DeviantArt however, so they actually had an audience. Had.

I enjoyed looking through them. Interestingly, a lot of the love poems in them are reference to my first first girlfriend in middle school/high school. There was even a photo of us from back then, which was a big surprise. I don't remember much from her other than, well, making out a lot. I liked making out. I still do, but it started there.

We were a problem. We made out on all the band trips home. We would be late to band practice because I had brought her to a quiet corner of the school to just make out with her straddling me or me grabbing her butt. We made out so much in the practice rooms that the band directors ended up putting up signs in the band room saying to limit PDA ("no purpling" I think is what they said).

But I digress. I don't know her anymore. And she has such a common name that I wouldn't be able to stalk her if I wanted to.

Here's an indie song I just learned about and have recently been obsessed with.

I already kind of feel normal. I have spikes down but I've started waking up at 7/10 instead of 3/10 and winding up. 7/10 is about my default state. 10/10 is like... On a date with a girlfriend who I know is excited to be with me. 1/10 is trying to decide if life is worth living. 7/10 is "would dance to One Direction if it started playing right now".

I had a moment about a month after the break up where I just had a really bad breakdown. It was a combination of some more bottled up thoughts about the relationship that I had trouble finding a reason to write down or tell anyone and how poorly I had been taking care of myself and my surroundings because of my mental state. And I told it all out to a very old friend of mine. She comforted me but she said something that has made me feel better the most since the break up happened.

"But the fact that you're here, telling me this in this moment, just shows how much you cared and how much you can care for people."

It made me feel better. A lot better.

My capacity to care.

I care about a lot of things, very deeply, and often for very little reason. Stuff like the most efficient route to work, or my specific boba order that tries to get the "most drink per drink." How I tend to pause and stare at the sky for no real reason other than it's there and I won't see another like it. How I overthink things and memorize useless things. But this is the first time that that I've been told and thus realized, that it is no weakness or weirdness.

It's a strength. It's just me. A tremendous capacity to care.

I've been holding on to that ever since. I hope I don't forget it. Because from my old poetry and journal entrees, I tend to let girls and myself gaslight me into thinking that me caring about them so much, "too much" is a fault of my own. It isn't.

It isn't. It isn't. It isn't.

It is simply me.

But anyway.

I've started talking to a new girl. I've made it clear I just got out of a relationship, just to be fair to her, and tbh I'm not super certain on her, but it feels like I just want to see where this goes. I just really really want to meet people right now.

I think I have always had this fetish for nostalgia. Where I couldn't fall in love with anyone who I hadn't known for a long time. I think I learned about this very recently, and was why I was so aromatic until I re-met the ex. When I realized it, I started thinking I needed to grow out of it in some way. Especially if I'm actively trying to meet someone new. It's not that I wouldn't open up to people, I've always been a chronic oversharer (see, um, this entire tumblr post series), but rather I wouldn't feel supremely comfortable with people until I knew them for years.

But then a friend told me that my music taste is nostalgia. After I linked her that song I just linked. Because a lot of songs I send to her have this nostalgic feeling, even between different bands, genres, languages. Sometimes it's sad nostalgia, sometimes it's happy nostalgia, but it's definitely a longing for something deep and sentimental.

And I had just learned about that song.

This changed my feelings towards my "nostalgia fetish." I don't think I am looking for people who I have known for years. It just so happens that lot of my closest friends are that because I'm old and that's just how friends are when you're old. But I think it's moreso I'm looking for someone who has this same sentimentality. This same depth of emotion when looking at something old or close to them. My fetish for nostalgia isn't nostalgia for the person, but nostalgia in the person.

At least, I hope so.

Whatever, I'm looking forward to meeting new people.

Last song.

Many years ago, I remember the first time I felt normal after that break up. It was like 10 or 11pm and I was bringing someone home. They lived in Round Rock but I lived in downtown Austin, since I was a UT student at the time. After dropping them off, I still had like a 20 minute drive and I had just learned that The Summer Set's album, Legendary, had a deluxe edition, which that song I just linked is a part of. I look them up on youtube and hit play.

And on that drive home I found peace, somehow. I remember stopping before getting to the highway, next to a unkempt grassy field, and standing there, looking at the sky. I missed the sky and stars. I missed that hour drive home from her house when it was getting dark and you could see the constellations because I was between 2 medium sized cities. I missed that bumpy road that seemed perpetually under construction and twisted and winded and didn't make sense. I was a lonely boy who didn't have a place that felt like home and didn't know where he was going to end up. But I knew and, at least in that moment, was fine with it.

I still am that boy. But that constantly under construction road got finished in the past 8 years. That starry sky was gone, I noticed, from our drives to Austin together—too many small towns and buildings had popped up, too much light pollution. I thought I found a place person like home but it was a dusty extended stay motel that I ended up staying at for 5 months, with too high of a rent and a crummy landlord.

Last time I felt over her, I remember saying that my daydreams no longer had a girl on my shoulder. I felt really aromatic. Really antisocial. I became an island. And I don't know if I'm trying to replace her or what, but I don't think that will happen this time. I might be fine without a partner, but I know I am better with one. I know I'm ready.

For anything, really.

#the kyoukai no kanata gifs are important to me too #for some reason i associate it deeply with college and the ex #i have weird associations i think #i mean i describe songs with taste flavors #when i was in uni i made playlists named after drinks #anyway i digress #to me #this might be the last one for a while #thank you everyone who spends the time reading these #as well as anyone who just spends time interacting with me #i consider you all friends

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not-poignant · 2 years

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Hi Pia!

I just saw your post about you uploading things to Wattpad and was wondering if that was smth you usually do(and is it only for not-poigniant or spectacles too??)? And was it just to be available and accessible in more online spheres or for another reason?

Hi anon!

I've never done it before, and frankly a lot of my writing isn't suitable there due to its taboo or extreme nature (like Game Theory) so only certain stories are worth the risk in the first place.

I'll be probably cross-posting a mix of stories over time, from both the @not_poignant and @thespectaclesofthor accounts under the Pia Foxhall name.

It is 100% a business decision. I can't advertise or mention Patreon or Ko-Fi anywhere on AO3, which I actually think is 100% appropriate and the right thing but is not super helpful for making sure I have a secure income from serial writing. However, I can mention Patreon and other sites on Wattpad, and in fact they offer places where you can put the links.

Not only that, but because Mallory & Mount will be an early access release story (i.e. people on Patreon will see chapters first - then everyone else via free access sees them second), setting up dual cross-posting across AO3 and Wattpad means I'll hopefully be putting myself in a good position. I'd like to have a couple of stories already being posted chapter-by-chapter before I launch Mallory & Mount.

I don't know how it will go. Folks on Wattpad might hate my writing (though my works have been stolen from AO3 and posted there, so maybe not! Lmao). It might completely crash and burn, but at least I will be able to say I tried it. :) My understanding is that a lot of Wattpad readers don't often use other platforms like AO3 (the fact that the chapters need to be so small in length seems to reflect this), so I might also meet some new readers who like what I do! Maybe they won't! It's all a mystery.

I've been putting it off largely because of the time it takes to convert my chapter sizes, and because Wattpad needs covers for stories which I don't have to worry about on AO3. :D

#asks and answers #pia on wattpad #being transparent about this #i have no intention of leaving Ao3 #and AO3 will always be my home-base and the place where i plan on interacting with folks and engaging with them etc.#it's got the best community #and i love it there #but...y'know #sometimes i have to think about my bills #and i'd rather not exclusively do that through Ao3 #so i'm actually hoping this takes some stress off my shoulders if it works #but it may not!#they might hate my writing there!

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amphibeans · 7 months

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October 8 - laid-back

October's leaves are starting to fall, the days become shorter, darker, and more spooky this time round. And this will reflect into the writing. Welcome to another blog of mine, this one is one of the more personal ones I have written. No pictures this time, I want to be real for a moment. So, I suggest preparing yourself before reading this, because I go into a lot of heavy topics in this post. Got it? Perfect, have fun reading.

On my own again

The biggest news I got this week and probably this year was that my only classmate I have in science has decided to not follow the lessons anymore due to personal reasons. I won't go into much detail what these reasons are. This news hit kinda hard with me, because that classmate of mine didn't seem like they had issues with the thing that led them to drop out.

So from now on I'm on my own most of the time in class, luckily not all the time but atleast two thirds of it I am. It felt weird at first, since I knew that all the responsibilty of talking to the teacher and answering their questions to exercises was now in my hands. But at the same time it felt normal, since the times that my classmate wasn't here, I did the same thing. But now with this new knowledge, it changed a whole perspective in me.

This moment led me to think like I usually do about something that I learned from, this time it was about feeling lonely and being on your own. I myself have had these feelings of loneliness before, long times of talking to people and losing contact with them, and they never felt so strong after I broke up with my boyfriend. Being now more accustomed to it, the realization of getting to do a school year mostly on your own didn't hit as hard as it usually does for me. Constant exposure to a certain feeling has led me to not feeling anything about it anymore, just a cold broken heart if you will.

As someone who is introverted, I've told people about how I feel lonely even though I don't like contact with people. Most of my newer friendships have happened online, and with some counter movement against it (mostly from my parents who haven't grown up in such an environment). I myself struggle with keeping real life friendships afloat, but this buoy seems lifted if it all happens through a screen. It might seem dystopian thinking this way, but it has had tons of positive effect on me in the last years.

If you ever feel lonely, you're never alone. There will always be someone who cares about you, and loves you, and appreciates you. If you have the courage to talk to them, I highly recommend doing so. They might have the same feelings as you can have, and therefore it's a win-win for you both.

Dreaming about bigger things

That was a lot to pack in, so now I'm gonna talk about something more upbeat. And that has all to do about dreams.

If I could explain my dreams concretely, I would not be able to give a proper answer or give it justice. They are very abstract with a lot of things always happening in them. Sometimes they feature people, other times they don't feature people at all and it's just shapes, sometimes they go beyond the supernatural. It's a mess, and I have been thinking of saving them after hearing a friend does this as well. Perhaps I'll do it one day.

Dreams can be very fun, but of course nightmares exist too. One moment where they can get really spooky and sometimes go on the border of hallucinations is when I have a migraine. I wanted to be more upbeat about this section so I'm not gonna go into detail what they contain.

Anyhow, this section is dedicated to those dreams that begin to shape a career or story in an individual, and sometimes even makes them legends in the process. A great example of this is the dreams Kendrick Lamar had of another rapper 2Pac; and which let him to create his now classic album To Pimp a Butterfly centered around that story.

A recent dream I had had is meeting Adrianne Lenker from the band Big Thief, whose album songs I recently listened to. In the music she made she seemed a kind soul, and I filled the gap this way by thinking she was the same in real life. We held a great conversation, and she gave me a ton of music advice. I still think about that dream, and it inspired me to perhaps send some demos to the label she is signed to. So just like Kendrick, this might become something big for myself. Perhaps a dream you're having might influence your life later on.

My point with all of this is is that the concept of thinking about your future career points through the act of dreaming can be very important to shape. The reason I started doing this blog was through the act of dreaming it and having a vision for it. Of course, nothing is 100% how I wanted it to be, but the core values are still there. Your visions shouldn't be perfect, but if their main point gets across that's more than enough to strife for.

What are some dreams you might be having recently? Try tapping into them, perhaps they might give you meaningful information about yourself.

How you're seen

One thing that has always been fascinating in people is the way we present ourselves in front of others, and how we adapt to certain people.

At school, I'm a different type of me than I am in my music, or at a party, or at my volunteer work, or online. They're all different personas: they all act different, they sometimes even speak another language that differs from them. But in total, they are still all a part of me, my identity as a whole.

When I always meet people and get to know them more, I try to tap into their own personal feelings to try and understand them more. This makes me so linked to people and why I always feel sad when we don't talk anymore. All my friends are a part of me, and losing a piece of them is for me losing a bond. Through the years I got to learn from it, but it's still a character trait that runs deep through me.

Which comes back to my classmate, because their persona was shown to be different depending on school and not-school. They present themselves as kind, well-spirited, happy, and loving life, but to see them be slightly different from that is what made me think about the way we present ourselves.

Perhaps you struggle with trying to please people like I do, and presenting yourself differently than you really want to. We tell ourselves that being yourself is part of a happy and prospering life, but as with many life lessons we encounter problems in them. We are complex creatures, and our philosophical language keeps evolving with time. So finding a way to be ourselves is tricky, and there might as well never be a proper and well-rounded solution to the question of "Am I being myself?"

One thing you should not be afraid of is thinking you are not you. One time a friend of mine told me they worried about presenting themselves to other people, but that was a non-issue to them now. The solution they came up with is that it's their life and we can do whatever we want to do. And when I knew about this, doors started opening up for me.

The last two paragraphs might seem contradictory to each other. At the one hand there isn't a proper way to be yourself because of our complexity, but at the other hand it's what we decide is good for us that makes us unique. In the end it's for you to decide these rulings, and if it seems like you struggle to find who you really am, the mid-point might well be to be less harsh on your definition of being yourself.

Routines update

Two weeks ago I told you about a way to get your best routine by trying out different routines and seeing which ones feel best to you. I told then that I would do the same thing I gave as advice, and I tried my best to keep up with that promise.

I have tried many ways to get on with the day. One of the most prominent ones I did even before starting with giving this advice is studying at school instead of at home, and this routine has worked marvelously; I feel more productive in working on something than I did at home. However, there are of course the caveats where change has been slow and not well thought out.

One of these things I still struggle with is the way I wake up and go to sleep. I usually wake up at 6 AM every day except on weekends and go to sleep at around 11 PM, which for my age is too little sleep, and my body can feel that sometimes. Days to me are working phases: I need to do work without many breaks in a continuous fashion, be that working on music, school, or another of my top secret projects that take years to finish. And while that has worked for a very long time without issue, today that has led to a lot of stress on my part. And I need to work on that a lot.

I tried to work on getting that self-care that I need but unfortunately I haven't had any luck yet. However, what you should not do in a situation where all hope seems lost is to give up. Giving up leads to more problems than it solves them. Keep on trying and sooner or later I will get there. If you feel like you're also stuck somewhere, don't give up. Before you know it, it might be resolved, and sometimes that resolution is at the palm of your hand (quite metaphorically and literally). You got this !!

I hope this situation might paint a good picture into trying to solve a routine issue. I know my writing isn't perfect and mistakes can slip through the cracks, but my main point with this blog is to inspire, not to be a guardian trying to criticize your mistakes. Everyone makes mistakes, learning from them and adapting them is part of what makes us human.

Song of the week: ingdyar by Adrianne Lenker and Will Anybody Ever Love Me? by Sufjan Stevens

This week's blog post was more on the rambly side of things, and if some things aren't as clear-cut as they usually are, feel free to message me about it on my Instagram. Critiques help make me fix some mistakes I might have in writing. Thank you for reading. - Acacian

#blog #thoughts #thinking #self care #student life

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vargan · 1 year

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Improving Study Habits for a Better Outcome

March 26, 2023

Every student has their own study habit. Some prefer to study with short breaks in between, some are inclined with straight, long study sessions but ends with a long rest. Others retain what they read by diligently revising their notes, while some create a concept map of what they learned and miss. Assessing your study habit is vital, especially when you're in college like me. Knowing what you should tweak in your habit may benefit you in the long-term because you're appropriating your study sessions with how you want to study. The main thing in this post is how do I study for my subjects?

MY STUDY HABITS

I am a student that prefers reading course materials one or two days before the actual lecture. I prefer to schedule my timeframe of study and play, so I can be organized as possible. That way, balancing personal and academic work can be a win-win situation for me. However, it's best to note that my study habits is erratic, not consistent. Why? It all starts with my mood and motivation to study. If I don't feel reading the material, I would rather do other things or just slack off. Most of the time, it's the energy that I have throughout the day. As a student that commutes to and from school, my energy level is significantly low as I arrive at home, leaving little to no time for studying. So, whenever I force myself to study with small power, little to no memory retention is acquired.

Aside from motivation and mood, I believe that the most influential in my study habit is the technique. Usually, when I read pre-lecture materials, I shift from reading to paraphrasing what I read into notes. It may seem a good habit to write notes while reading, but the problem arises because I rarely go back to the notes I read nor quiz myself of what I learned. Frankly enough, I find it hard to create my own reviewer on a specific subject, so I always look for a study partner to ask me questions about the lesson, but to no avail. Maybe another factor why my study habit isn't effective is because of my mindset. Reflecting on my study sessions, I actually tend to rush the readings and notes since it's quite a headache to read through myriads of texts in an eye-straining laptop. Thus, my quality of learning is reduced because of rushing. I have been searching for study techniques online such as the Pomodoro, Feynman, and SQ3R, in hopes of achieving the perfect retention and gaining focus and concentration. The thing is, I easily quit one of the techniques, and it's either I did it wrong or it doesn't fit for me at all.

CONNECTING MY HABITS TO OTHER METHODS

As you can see, I have a lot of things to work on with my study habit and the factors behind it. For one, my discipline in studying is problematic. Another would be creating a consistency in my mood and motivation, along with a better mindset when approaching studies. Recently, I stumbled into a radio podcast by DZUP featuring Kay Anonuevo about study habits. Upon listening to the podcast, I gained many insights about her self-regulated learning podcast. She mentioned about metacognition, in which you do it by assessing how you think and learn - so it's more on reflecting about yourself in terms of studies. Looking back to myself, I don't reflect much on what I've read nor learned after one study session, and that is a concerning problem for me. Not only do I just force myself into studying, I see myself not enjoying it at all.

Kay mentioned how important time management is if you don't want to cram at the last minute. The thought of cramming isn't my best option because when I cram, I tend to panic, create less quality outputs, and even regret - regrets that I could have accomplished it on an early date. She gave techniques on how to deal with cramming - first is to create a time schedule of what subjects to study. I have been creating multiple schedules of when should I study, but I was only able to follow half of those schedules. Part of the problem is the energy and motivation I have left throughout the day, as well as the hectic schedule I create with little to no breaks. So, I think I have to reassess myself before creating my schedule.

Self-regulated learning should come with a mindset, as Kay mentioned. It's equally important to have an end-goal while studying, since this serves as my motivation. Maybe my unmotivated self doesn't have a concrete mindset, since the only thing in mind is to finish this subject, which is a short-term goal. The need to change my mindset is a must.

Kay pointed out that having a supportive environment for your studies by removing distracting objects can help improve concentration. Putting on phones in silent can be a helpful strategy. However, even if I make my study place neat, my brain's tendency to wander around is high, so I think that creating breaks should be done or just listen to my needs, that's all. I don't have to rush things.

When Kay mentioned about exerting more effort in learning, she meant by creating supplementary notes and such. Sometimes, I do find myself creating and revising notes, especially when I enjoy the lesson. The problem is, I only exert it when I like a subject, so it's not consistent. What if I have to try other methods like teaching someone the lessons I've learned? Or maybe create a journal to track the concepts I gained?

HOW HEALTH IS CONNECTED TO MY HABITS

Apart from having the discipline to study, recall information, and learn new things, I see that my health habits are connected with my study habits. For example, my lack of sleep can be associated with my decline in concentration and even wandering mind. Lack of sleep can reduce your attention and concentration, which is actually concerning to me (Harvard Medical School, 2014). Even studies found that the relation of academic performance and sleep are directly proportional. Sleeping with better quality actually creates a better memory consolidation and exam performance (Ahrberg et al., 2012). Sleep isn't the only factor that affects how we learn. Even stress, exercise, and lack of a healthy diet has a role in how we absorb information. In stress, I find myself not able to manage my stress well, and my tendency is to quit when the situation becomes dire for me. Because of which, my study habits can be seen as doing requirements and readings in a slow-paced manner. Most of my diet is mainly eating meat and little veggies, so I believe that the lack of different variety of nutrition for my brain to sustain has a factor, and a sign to eat a more balanced meal. In terms of physical activities, I am quite embarrassed to share that I am a sedentary person, so I don't enjoy physical activities. However, if I really want to excel in my studies and make my study habits effective, maybe moving my limbs and strengthening my muscles can strengthen my brain activity as well.

FUTURE PLANS AND IMPROVEMENT IN MY HABITS

The first thing that I want to change in myself when improving my study habits is to have a mindset - a mindset that isn't for the sake of passing, but a mindset that I'll enjoy and learn things, along with the mindset of accepting mistakes and that it's okay to not understand things. Furthermore, I think that creating a fixed mindset is necessary, as it gives me a sense of purpose on why am I studying, in the first place.

One of the important plans I have is learning how to control myself from using my phone and minimizing other distractions while studying. To be honest, technology made me more distracted than I was before, but technology is inevitable, so I have to adjust. I read an article that distraction is caused by internal triggers and external triggers, which are satisfying our negative feelings and cues from our environment, respectively. What I found interesting in this article's technique (Eyal, 2020) is to identify how do I react when having the urge to satisfy my needs, as it can help me manage these urges. Apart from that, I should make it a habit to create my environment study-friendly, and when I mean study-friendly, I have to shutdown social media, silent my phone, and just open two or three tabs, to which I have to focus on.

What I think I should improve more on is rewarding more and being gentle to myself better. I have to be honest here, I am the type of person who is harsh on the mistakes he made, and would lead to feelings of laziness and unmotivation. Listening to my body a little bit wouldn't hurt at all, like if I should take a break, I must take a break. When I was able to study for 1 hour, I should take a short nap as a reward.

As a person who doesn't like exerting much effort, changing that personality would mean a lot for me. Starting today, I have to create more effort when I want to learn things. Creating visual notes, sharing with my friends what I learned, journalling what I can recall, and testing myself are all good choices that I have in mind. Of course, I should start small first to appreciate the beauty behind it. So, for example, this day, I will create a journal about my learnings, an outline and quiz on the next day, and so on. The point is to reinforce that learning I have by applying it to the things I enjoy, reflecting on myself and point out what parts am I lacking.

Observing my health is equally important to stay motivated and retain information. What I think that I should start doing today is creating a workout plan. Exercising does come with benefits in studying. One, it improves cognitive functioning by improving long-term memory and the neurons to be more receptive in learning. It improves mental health, as it improves mood and reduce anxiety, which are common problems that I faced in my old study habits (Brainscape, n.d.). Being able to sleep 8 hours a day would also drastically improve how I approach the materials and readings bestowed upon me, and be able to manage my time better.

Studying isn't always about how you study. There are a lot of factors to think about when you want to have an effective retention of information. It shouldn't be shunned to think about your daily routine as a factor in your mood. And for me, I hope that I will continue to assess myself and learn more about it, as I seek to improve myself day by day into a better version of myself through studies, physical and mental health, and determination.

REFERENCES

Ahrberg, K., Dresler, M., Niedermaier, S., Steiger, A., & Genzel, L. (2012). The interaction between sleep quality and academic performance. Journal of Psychiatric Research. 46(12). pp. 1618-1622. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022395612002786#sec3

Eyal, N. (2020, May 10). Learn HOw to Avoid Distraction in a World That's Full of It. Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/automatic-you/202005/learn-how-avoid-distraction-in-world-thats-full-it

How regular exercise improves your studying (n.d.). Brainscape. https://www.brainscape.com/academy/exercise-and-studying/

Sharpening thinking skills with a better night's sleep(2014, March 1). Harvard Medical School. https://www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/sharpen-thinking-skills-with-a-better-nights-sleep#:~:text=When%20people%20don%27t%20get,or%20react%20to%20dangerous%20situations.https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022395612002786#sec3

WORD COUNT: 1822

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ahagia-sophia · 2 years

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Long post ahead

This is a rough draft of a document I'm putting together. I figured I'd put it on tumblr in case this, like many of my writing projects, becomes nothing more than a dusty file in a forgotten folder. At least this way it might reach someone who needs it.

These are my thoughts on being a butch transwoman. I got the idea for putting this together after I saw so many young (whether in body or in mind) girls going on to forums (see; Reddit and Tumblr) and asking the general queer community how to be queer. I was moved to write it after I saw other butch transgirls approach butch women and ask that same question. Often the answer was unsatisfying.

"Be who you are. That's all it takes to be butch. If you are, you are. If you aren't, you aren't."

This is correct. And really, it is the be all and end all answer to being queer. But this isn't really useful to girls who have gone through the painful journey of self-discovery only to find that they can't even be transfemme right.

They're too masculine. Dresses don't feel right. Make-up doesn't feel right. Pastels don't feel right. Looking at all the transgirls around you and realizing that you're a minority inside of a minority is alienating. So, that's the girl I'm talking to. The girl who has sat down and read book after book, article after article, and asked question after question in an attempt to find herself in someone else. To find the answers that she needs so that she can take that first step forward to realizing that all she needs to be is herself.

First, my credentials. I've only been out for a year, and I've only known I was butch for about 6 months. I'm not a queer elder, I'm not on the scene talking to queer women, I'm not in bars, and I'm not at events (covid is Fun). I will be, of that I'm certain. But I haven't yet. So all these ideas and thoughts and definitions that I'm going to lay out in this document are based purely on my own academic reading, introspection, and talking to other girls on tumblr.

Reading books like Stone Butch Blues and Dagger: On Butch Women (both free online) is a good place to start if you don't want to get all of you information from some chick on tumblr. But as you're reading them you may find yourself asking the question, "but where am I? Where are the butch transgirls in these books about butch women?"

The answer, so far, is that we're not there. When transwomen are discussed from the butch angle they're usually feminine. Or, like a shooting star, you see a single sentence about a muscular transwoman racing and playing and boasting with the other butches, but rarely is there more than that. And you may notice that when (for lack of a better term) cis-butches talk about their experiences being butch it's all rather ciswoman-centric, which makes sense.

From what I gather being Butch was something that was suppressed by second-wave(?) feminism and only in the 80s/90s were butches no longer demonized or thought of as backward. So they had a lot going on, and the groundwork still needed to be relaid. They're writing books for themselves about themselves. And that means that most butches that you'll read about are approaching masculinity from a very specific direction.

You and I. We've come all the way around. From a little boy playing with snakes and mud and rocks to a confused girl who knows she was never that little boy, but can't understand why she isn't feminine like the other girls. We're not rebelling in the same way they are, we didn't live the lives they led. And while I can always see who I am reflected in any given butch, it sure is nice to have another transbutch around to tell you that you're not alone.

Being a masculine woman who's saddled with a dick and a deep voice is a rough place to start. I like my voice, I like my boots, and I like being solid as a rock. And to anyone who didn't know, I probably look like just another man. And when I look at myself in the mirror, sometimes its hard for me not to see a man.

That's the real crux of it. Transwomen already tend to feel a lot of impostor syndrome, especially if you're a lesbian. And especially if you're a masculine lesbian. Because you and I are just about the easiest targets for TERFs and pricks this side of the Rockies. And that gets to your head.

It took me a long time to separate being masculine and being a man in my own head. I never had a problem seeing how butches are masculine and not men, but for me in my own head it was different. To me, being masculine is the gateway to feeling feminine.

I have never felt more feminine than when I'm being masculine.

I've never felt more like a woman than when I'm clomping down the street listening to my carabiner jingle.

I've never felt more feminine than when sweat blinds me after a good workout.

I've never felt more feminine than when I have to work on my car, or fix a drain, or tear up carpet, or just be a shoulder for my girlfriend to cry on.

I've never felt more feminine than when I have to be calm and level headed in a turbulent situation.

When I seek masculinity. And when I perform masculinity. It's different. This is hard to explain in my own mind, let alone put into words. So I'm going to talk some more about other things and try to approach it from a different angle.

One idea that I've seen thrown around a lot is that being butch is an inherent challenge to male masculinity. Being butch is another way, a different path, a different theory of masculinity that is predicated on being queer and being a woman. I am certainly both of those things. And if I wasn't the kind of person to overthink something to death that's where I would leave it. Done and Done.

And really, you won't get any push-back from anyone who's opinion you should care about. No decent butch is going to push you out of the community just because of an accident at your birth. And no girl worth knowing is going to exclude you because your shoulders are a little too broad.

But anyway, you're probably waiting on the answer to the question posed at the beginning of all of this.

"How can I be butch?"

Well, honestly, I couldn't say. I'll tell you what makes me feel butch though. For me the easiest way to feel butch is in my music. I like acoustic guitar and harmonica. I like off-key vocals and lyrics that I can barely understand. I like songs about love. I like sad songs with a quick bassline.

When I go out I like the weight of my carabiner on my waist.

I like denim. Lots and lots of denim.

I like to wear leather too. I like to write poetry. I like to be there for people. I like to be someone that everyone can rely on for help if they need it. I like pretty femmes that make me tongue-tied when we go out together. I prefer to top. I don't like to be penetrated. I like long midnight drives and smoking under the stars. I like to camp. I like to raise my voice and get in good natured arguments over meaningless things. That's what makes me feel butch.

If you're read this far, I'd really dig it if you added you're own thoughts about being butch (trans or otherwise). I'm probably going to expand on this, there are a lot of topics that I've only grazed here that I really want to go into.

#Butch #transgender #lesbian #long post

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itsclydebitches · 3 years

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Here's a quandary I've suddenly found myself in: where do you stand on writers deleting their own works, fanfiction or otherwise? I've had this happen to me on more than one occasion - I go to look for an old favorite and find it's since been deleted from whatever site I read it on.

On the one hand, I'm inclined to think that, "Sure. The author wrote it, it's their call. I don't own the work - I certainly didn't pay for it. It's their decision, even if it's disappointing."

But at the same time I can't help but consider the alternative - if I believe in death of the author (and I do), that an author's work fundamentally isn't solely theirs once it's been published, posted, etc., then it also seems wrong to have a work deleted. Stories aren't the sole property of their creator, after all.

But then I circle back. D'you think there are different obligations between authors and readers and the works being made in fandom space? I know if I had bought a book and the author decided they wanted it back, I would feel pretty comfortable telling them no, given I'd paid for it and whatnot. But that's a different world from fanfic and fandom space generally.

So. You're insightful Clyde, I'm curious as to what you'll have to say here (and to all y'all thinking about it, don't flame me. I haven't decided where I stand here yet - haven't heard a good nail-in-the-coffin argument for or against yet).

Val are you a mind reader now? I’ve been thinking about this exact conundrum the last few days!

(And yeah, as a general disclaimer: no flaming. Not allowed. Any asks of the sort will be deleted on sight and with great satisfaction.)

Honestly, I’m not sure there is a “nail-in-the-coffin argument” for this, just because—as you lay out—there are really good points for keeping works around and really good points for allowing authors to have control over their work, especially when fanworks have no payment/legal obligations attached. In mainstream entertainment, your stories reflect a collaborative effort (publisher, editor, cover artists, etc.) so even if it were possible to delete the physical books out of everyone’s home and library (and we're ignoring the censorship angle for the moment), that’s no longer solely the author’s call, even if they have done the lion’s share of the creative work. Though fanworks can also, obviously, be collaborative, they’re usually not collaborative in the same way (more “This fic idea came about from discord conversations, a couple tumblr posts, and that one headcanon on reddit”) and they certainly don’t have the same monetary, legal, and professional strings attached. I wrote this fic as a hobby in my free time. Don’t I have the right to delete it like I also have the right to tear apart the blankets I knit?

Well yes… but also no? I personally view fanworks as akin to gifts—the academic term for our communities is literally “gift economy”—so if we view it like that, suddenly that discomfort with getting rid of works is more pronounced. If I not only knit a blanket, but then gift it to a friend, it would indeed feel outside of my rights to randomly knock on their door one day and go, “I actually decided I hate that? Please give it back so I can tear it to shreds, thanks :)” That’s so rude! And any real friend would try to talk me out of it, explaining both why they love the blanket and, even if it’s not technically the best in terms of craftsmanship, it holds significant emotional value to them. Save it for that reason alone, at least. Fanworks carry that same meaning—“I don’t care if it’s full of typos, super cliché, and using some outdated, uncomfortable tropes. This story meant so much to me as a teenager and I’ll always love it”—but the difference in medium and relationships means it’s easier to ignore all that. I’m not going up to someone’s house and asking face-to-face to destroy something I gave them (which is awkward as hell. That alone deters us), I’m just pressing a button on my computer. I’m not asking this of a personal friend that is involved in my IRL experiences, I’m (mostly) doing this to online peers I know little, if anything, about. It’s easy to distance ourselves from both the impact of our creative work and the act of getting rid of it while online. On the flip-side though, it’s also easier to demean that work and forget that the author is a real person who put a lot of effort into this creation. If someone didn’t like my knitted blanket I gave them as a gift, they’re unlikely to tell me that. They recognize that it’s impolite and that the act of creating something for them is more important than the construction’s craftsmanship. For fanworks though, with everyone spread around the world and using made up identities, people have fewer filters, happily tearing authors to shreds in the comments, sending anon hate, and the like. The fact that we’re both prefacing this conversation with, “Please don’t flame” emphasizes that. So if I wrote a fic with some iffy tropes, “cringy” dialogue, numerous typos, whatever and enough people decided to drag me for it… I don’t know whether I’d resist the urge to just delete the fic, hopefully ending those interactions. There’s a reason why we’re constantly reminding others to express when they enjoy someone else’s work: the ratio of praise to criticism in fandom (or simply praise to seeming indifference because there was no public reaction at all), is horribly skewed.

So I personally can’t blame anyone for deleting. I’d like to hope that more people realize the importance of keeping fanworks around, that everything you put out there is loved by someone… but I’m well aware that the reality is far more complicated. It’s hard to keep that in mind. It’s hard to keep something around that you personally no longer like. Harder still to keep up a work you might be harassed over, that someone IRL discovered, that you’re disgusted with because you didn’t know better back then… there are lots of reasons why people delete and I ultimately can’t fault them for that. I think the reasons why people delete stem more from problems in fandom culture at large—trolling, legal issues, lack of positive feedback, cancel culture, etc.—than anything the author has or has not personally done, and since such work is meant to be a part of an enjoyable hobby… I can’t rightly tell anyone to shoulder those problems, problems they can’t solve themselves, just for the sake of mine or others’ enjoyment. The reason I’ve been thinking about this lately is because I was discussing Attack on Titan and how much I dislike the source material now, resulting in a very uncomfortable relationship with the fics I wrote a few years back. I’ve personally decided to keep them up and that’s largely because some have received fantastic feedback and I’m aware of how it will hurt those still in the fandom if I take them down. So if a positive experience is the cornerstone of me keeping fics up, I can only assume that negative experiences would likewise been the cornerstone of taking them down. And if getting rid of that fic helps your mental health, or solves a bullying problem, or just makes you happier… that, to me, is always more important than the fic itself.

But, of course, it’s still devastating for everyone who loses the work, which is why my compromise-y answer is to embrace options like AO3’s phenomenal orphaning policy. That’s a fantastic middle ground between saving fanworks and allowing authors to distances themselves from them. I’ve also gotten a lot more proactive about saving the works I want to have around in the future. Regardless of whether we agree with deleting works or not, the reality is we do live in a world where it happens, so best to take action on our own to save what we want to keep around. Though I respect an author’s right to delete, I also respect the reader’s right to maintain access to the work, once published, in whatever way they can. That's probably my real answer here: authors have their rights, but readers have their rights too, so if you decide to publish in the first place, be aware that these rights might, at some point, clash. I download all my favorite fics to Calibre and, when I’m earning more money (lol) I hope to print and bind many for my personal library. I’m also willing to re-share fic if others are looking for them, in order to celebrate the author’s work even if they no longer want anything to do with it. Not fanfiction in this case, but one of my fondest memories was being really into Phantom of the Opera as a kid and wanting, oh so desperately, to read Susan Kay’s Phantom. Problem was, it was out of print at the time, not available at my library, and this was before the age of popping online and finding a used copy. For all intents and purposes, based on my personal situation, this was a case of a book just disappearing from the world. So when an old fandom mom on the message boards I frequented offered to type her copy up chapter by chapter and share it with me, you can only imagine how overjoyed I was. Idk what her own situation was that something like scanning wouldn’t work, but the point is she spent months helping a fandom kid she barely knew simply because a story had resonated with her and she wanted to share it. That shit is powerful!

So if someone wants to delete—if that’s something they need right now—I believe that is, ultimately, their decision… but please try your hardest to remember that the art you put out into the world is having an impact and people will absolutely miss it when it’s gone. Often to the point of doing everything they can to put it back out into the world even if you decide to take it out. Hold onto that feeling. The love you have for your favorite fic, fanart, meta, whatever it is? Someone else has that for your work too. I guarantee it.

So take things down as needed, but for the love of everything keep copies for yourself. You may very well want to give it back to the world someday.

#fandom #fic things #mymetas #never any easy questions on this blog huh? lol

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senzasord · 2 years

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I haven't written a new years post since the end of 2018, so I thought maybe I should get back to it. This one won't be as long as usual because I'm quite tired (I had an OT appointment this morning and it decked me).

What did I do this year? I'm in my second year of masters of teaching, which I've been saying I wanted to do since I was in school myself. I won't finish until next year because I failed some classes last year and this year, but that's nothing new, and i know by now that that doesn't reflect my ability. Just the fact that I'm doing it is an accomplishment, and I need to remind myself that I actually love it too, when I'm beating myself up about not passing things. I do love it, and I'm going to finish. I have been doing it, and I can do it.

My health started getting better this year after being quite sick for a lot of last year. I've also actually been going to the GP to figure out what's up, which I wouldn't have done when I was younger. I think getting better at looking after myself is quite an accomplishment.

Other than that, not too much this year. It's been a quiet year, what with it being a plague year and also being so snowed under with uni. But I finally started being less awkward around my music classmates, which I'm glad about because they've always been lovely people. I've tried to stay better in touch with my friends as well; I don't think I always succeeded, and I think it's always going to be on my list of things to be better at, but I've felt very loved this year, and I hope they have too. Also for the first time I've got some online friends! Both from here, and also from a fandom discord I joined this year. I don't chat to them very often at all, and I should drop by the server and hang out because it's been a long time, but that was definitely one of the best parts of this year - crying over a series together, and just chatting with neat people. My musicianship also ended up developing more from it, too, because it drove me to start doing my own arrangements of things, which I've never done before. As an aside, this year and last year is probably the first time I've ever felt comfortable calling myself a musician. It's taken me a long time to get to that point, but it feels very good.

I also finally fulfilled my goal that has been hanging around for a while to contact my old choir director and get singing lessons. I've only had two lessons, as we start properly in the new year, but I've gotten over one of the hardest hurdle, which was showing up, so we're getting there.

(I always say these are going to be short, and then they're not lol).

Probably a bunch of other stuff happened. Stuff I'm proud, and not proud of. Such be a year. I just need to remember to hold onto the stuff I am proud of, and learn from the stuff I'm not. I'm lucky to be surrounded by lovely people who support me though, and also let me support them. I hope I keep doing that into the new year.

Speaking of which, goals for the new year?

- Keep plodding along with uni! I may even graduate, who knows? That's the plan, but best laid plans, etc. I think maybe this goal should be rather, then, to continue to get better at self advocating, so I ask for extensions and help when I need them, instead of dropping off the radar. Almost there, just gotta keep plugging away

- Continue working on my health - keeping working with the GP to find out what's up, try seeing my psych regularly and see how that goes for once, keep building safe practices in to my music-making and working on my tension. And also keep going running. I've missed it so much, so it's good to get back to it

- Be less anxious about being out around people. This was originally going to be 'come out to mum before my 30th birthday' but I think that's a lot of pressure to put on myself, so I'm just going to keep reminding myself how good it feels to be out around people and be myself, and hopefully the rest will follow

And because I need a couple of concrete things: finish the first trumpet book (yes I finally have a trumpet!!), and survive a trip to Canberra, which is happening late January (pending covid). Oh yeah, and also maybe finally empty my drafts folder and stop the bad habit of saving drafts instead of reblogging lmao. We'll see about that. Edit: Also pass the numeracy LANTITE. That seems like a reasonable goal!

This is so long and WAY less focussed than usual - can you tell I'm tired? But I like this tradition, and I'm glad I chose to go back to it this year. Hopefully next time I'll be a bit more focussed (also I reserve the right to edit this a bit later when I'm a bit more cognizant - I probably won't, but I still reserve the right).

To past me:

You've had a bit of a shit year. Not as shit as a lot of people, because Perth has been quite safe, and not as shit as last year because you can actually eat solid food again. But it's felt like a slog, particularly since it's been a bit of a trigger year. So here's the reminder that you're doing just fine. You're safe, and I'm so proud of you, even though it doesn't feel deserved right now. Bird by bird, my friend. You got this.

And future me:

Whatever happens in 2022, you're going to do your fucking best. Here's the reminder to try smarter, not harder, sometimes. Here's the reminder that you don't need to guard your heart. The plan is to graduate in 2022, so in case I don't, here's also the reminder that it's not a race. And if I do graduate? Hell fucking yeah!? Either way, it's going to be a hell of ride to find out. And there's things to learn, and people to love, and music to make, all the way in between, so I can't wait to find out what you do. Best of luck <3

Happy New Year, y'all. I'll see you tomorrow :)

#2021 #2022 #new years #happy new year #me #personal #long post #every time #every time i say it's going to be short and then it's not #lmao #sorry #but you all know im like this by now #i also kind of want to learn to crochet #so i guess we'll see what happens there #have a good evening and see you next year

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