#i love installation art and being in it and experiencing that stuff
Text
RE: Guilty Queer 2: The Sequel
Way back in 2019, I wrote a piece for this blog about the Guilty Gear series and how it had played a big role in my own journey through life and gender. Guilty Gear is a franchise spotlights the character's growth and allows them to change based on the events of the storyline. I mean, just look at Ky’s transition into a thriving wifeguy and father.
Like the metal genre that inspired many of the game's motifs, Guilty Gear has always been pretty gay. The most recent installment in the series, Guilty Gear: StrIVe (get it because IV is 4), turns the volume up to 11. After the reintroductions of Testament and Bridget after a decade+ long absence, Strive has some of the best queer representation I’ve seen not just in video games but in media overall.
(Spoiler and note: I’m going to use They/Them and She/Her to refer to Testament and Bridget respectively)
I didn’t expect that either of these characters would come back to the series. In prior installments, Testament was an antagonist turned brooding recluse. Prior to Strive, their story dealt mainly with their lingering guilt and their inability to forgive humanity for what they experienced during the crusades. Their only remaining purpose in life being to protect Dizzy who leaves on her own adventure at the end of the game.
Fast-forward to their reintroduction and Testament is now at peace with themselves having adopted a more fluid sense of gender coupled as well as an androgynous presentation. With Dizzy gone and too much free time, they also picked up a pages long list of hobbies including streaming, failing to improve at art and building gunpla. There is even some subtext implying Testament and Johnny are more than friends. We just love to see an empty nested gay thriving.
This kind of stuff is what makes this series so special to me. Testament’s arc wasn’t just tacked on for representation points. It was earned through over two decades of storytelling. The focus on character development makes it easy to feel invested in these characters that aged and matured along with me since I picked up a copy of Guilty Gear XX.
High School was not an easy time for me. I was an effeminate kid and used to get regularly beaten up and called slurs by my peers. It got so bad that my parents pulled me out of public school and put me into a private all boys high school. During that same time, I also started to go through puberty (the first on anyway). I learned how to front machismo enough to get by in a school where the halls were permanently stained with axe body spray and the dress code required students keep short haircuts. Meanwhile, my body was changing in ways I didn’t want and didn’t understand. Some nights, I’d lay in bed imagining a different life where I had been born a girl and cry. In the morning, I’d put on a polo shirt (shirt and tie on Church days!) and go back to school.
There has never been a point in my life that I did not know I was trans. From the point I realized boys and girls were different, I knew I would rather be a girl but I resigned myself thinking that I had drawn an unfortunate lot in life. I wanted to make my parents happy and correctly assumed they would not accept a gay child. The 90's hadn't been a kind decade for trans representation either. Finding Bridget in Guilty Gear was a light bulb moment for me. Here was a story about a character pressured by her parents to present in a way she didn’t want while still striving to carve out her own form of masculinity. It wasn’t a 1:1 fit but her story got me thinking that maybe I too could find my own niche that would feel right for me.
She was the first character I ever “mained” in a fighting game. I played her story modes over and over again trying to tease out every bit of her characterization. Through Bridget, I found and projected onto other otokonoko media, started learning about makeup/cosplay in secret and started eating a lot of soy thinking it would turn into estrogen in my body.
Over the course of several years, I got interested in weight lifting which led to a desire to build the body to cosplay Gilgamesh from Fate. My connection to Bridget and other otokonoko characters waned as my body became more muscular but my interest in feminine things and expression never fully went away. At a fighting game tournament, my then girlfriend surprised me with a Bridget keychain knowing how much I still loved the character. That keychain has been in my wallet or hanging on my purse ever since.
It took many years, but I did it. Outwardly, I was an extremely attractive man. I looked in the mirror after hitting my goal weight but couldn't see that in myself. I had all the things I thought I wanted and the affirmation of colleagues, friends and family but it felt empty. Sure, I was fine in my day to day life, but I couldn’t envision a future for myself where I wasn’t either dead or a woman.
Fast forward and I’m now approaching my five year HRT anniversary. The endocrinologists I’ve worked with have told me that this is where most people stop seeing non-surgical changes. There have been some tough feelings coming to grips with that. My relationship with my body is better but remains complicated. One of the last things I expected over the last few days was for Bridget to come back into the Guilty Gear franchise.
Strive takes place 7 years after XX where Bridget last appeared meaning she’s probably around the same age I was when I decided to transition. Her story picks up with having the fame, wealth and affirmation she was looking for but feeling lost regardless. After soul-searching with Goldlewis (who I read as a gay man regretting denying his sexuality when he was younger) and Ky, she decides to accept herself as a woman. After having a feminine identity pushed onto her, she’s found her own sense of femininity on her own terms. I cried when I first watched her arcade ending. I cried again when I watched it a second time on stream. I’m crying while I’m writing this.
twitch_clip
It’s hard to express how it feels to have this character reappear at this junction in my life. In some ways it feels like meeting an old friend again and realizing you’re both girls now. On top of that, the way the voice actors, directors and writers handled this scene is incredibly nuanced and sensitive. It’s one of the last things I would have expected from a video game with such sparse dialogue, but this is Guilty Gear.
Outside of a loud group of weirdos that don’t understand Japanese and insist Bridget being trans is a translation error, the reception I’ve seen has been gushingly positive. People with no prior interest in fighting games are thinking about learning Guilty Gear because they want to learn more about this character.
I still have a lot of feelings about this but I’m not sure how to best express them. I guess I’m just really happy to see my friend again and excited that a whole new generation of people get to meet them too.
Maybe she can be to some other people in need what she ended up being to me.
31 notes
·
View notes
Text
Jedi: Fallen Order liveblog
Warning: there are a lot of complaints here. A lot. Seriously, I’m a glass half empty person, and I wrote down everything that annoyed me. I’ve done the first objectives on Zeffo and Kashyyyk, and I have no problems with what little of the story I’ve experienced, but I’m not happy with the gameplay-story balance and many things about the gameplay itself.
Anti shout-out to whoever packaged the game because 1) installing it took 45 minutes with my CPU loaded to 98-100% 2) it tried to restart my PC after installation. What the fuck? I guess if you can’t buy a game legally you have to pay with bullshit instead...
Would it have killed them to accompany the tutorial level with a, you know, actual tutorial?! I kind of figured you jump with the spacebar because it’s common across games, but I had to open a walkthrough to find out, after about 5-10 minutes of walking around and dying repeatedly, that there’s a rope somewhere in the dark (foolish me following the game’s advice on brightness settings) and you also jump onto it with the spacebar. Dropping down from the grates didn’t work with the specified key either, I had to mash the whole keyboard in blind rage until something finally worked. And then the game froze on the “lock target” tutorial, twice.
Am I or, for that matter, the other characters really supposed to believe that a normal, non-force sensitive person can perform all these feats of acrobatics?
Ideologically it’s very funny you’re supposed to replenish the force meter by attacking enemies. Are you sure I’m a light-sider?
Alright, the droid is super cute.
I am continuously amazed at how well-animated and expressive Cal is. (I’m so spoiled by good mocap in newer games; if the next DA game won’t have it I’m going to be disappointed.)
Once again, a tutorial that doesn’t fucking tell you what to do...
At first I had flashbacks to a certain planet from KOTOR, but now I’m more reminded of Inquisition (especially due to the art style) and Andromeda (the Vault, huh). Nothing new in video games...
Why would there be a list of force-sensitive children if the Jedi take infants as soon as their force sensitivity is discovered?
Oh cool, I can customize my lightsaber already!
God I must have done the jump with two ropes about 20 times... The one time I got to the other side I got immediately overpowered by the enemies. The second successful attempt was many reloads later. At least there's a save point right before it...
Oh god this was so fucking stressful. I made a series of successful jumps and then failed some and then I had to walk a pretty long way with literally zero health and healing items knowing I’d have to redo it all, possibly several times... I was so relieved to get to the meditation point at last.
Sick of getting killed by these stupid rams. I’m switching to story mode.
Finally! I was getting sick at looking at these pushable objects and being unable to push them.
And here we go to Kashyyyk again, hunting down memories encoded in mysterious orbs. It’s as if I never left KOTOR.
Diversity win: an ancient sage interred in this sarcophagus used they/them pronouns.
I managed to lock myself in a fucking tomb?? After a few minutes of panicked running around the small chamber and slashing at the bars, I reloaded and redid the last step of the puzzle before that, then watched a walkthrough. Apparently, the chamber was supposed to lock, because it’s actually an elevator, but in my case it didn’t seem to activate. (This part of my gameplay was sponsored by the Buried and Edgar Allan Poe. Legitimately triggered my normally nonexistent claustrophobia...)
I LOVE it when I try to wall run and instead I smash into the wall and am thrown into the abyss.
I had to read the walkthrough and backtrack from the crash. Why give me access to an area if I can’t explore it?
This planet took FOREVER. There’s way too much stuff and almost no plot. And after that hell, it’s very immersion-breaking to see Cal swagger onto the ship and casually chat with Cere. He should be falling onto the nearest surface and sleeping for 8 hours! Also, aren’t you all on the run from the empire, why aren’t you rushing to buckle up and escape into hyperspace?
I do not understand what the fuck I’m supposed to do.
Oh hi Saw Gerrera! I just saw you in a movie yesterday!
I see, it’s a “fuck the arachnophobes” planet.
The lack of the current quest objective on the HUD or at least somewhere in the menu hurts sometimes. Coming back to the game in the morning, I couldn’t remember what I was supposed to do next, and had to look it up in a walkthrough.
Fuck these double ropes and whoever designed them! After about 20 tries, several deaths and two videos I finally figured out that you need so swing not only forward but also backwards to achieve enough momentum, and even after that I needed several tries to actually execute it. Sometimes I couldn’t even grab onto the rope properly: jumping onto it didn’t work, and instead I jumped straight up and fell to my death. I couldn’t figure out by myself the puzzle with the propeller you need to activate either.
Had to go revenge-kill a security droid for the XP and then got to the roof for the surprisingly huge fight and had to take another one of those again -_- As usual, enemies that specialize in CC are infuriating. How dare you hold me in the air by the neck, you stupid Vader wannabe?!
My Inquisitor from DAI, now in third person! I had to listen to this random NPC’s voice for a few seconds before I figured out who it belonged to.
There’s another tomb? Another area of the same size on that godforsaken planet?
Omg, this cute critter is now mine? :O
The game wanted me to go onto the ice slide. I did it flawlessly on the first try. Then I walked in a dark corner, it turned out to be an elevator, and it brought me... back to where I started. I thought “well it’s an elevator, I’ll just get back down on it” but it didn’t work. I had to slide on the ice through spinning turbines again, and this time I fucked it up several times. Then I fell off a wall. Then I got killed by a ram. Rinse, repeat, get killed by the same ram again. Then I gave up on the XP and decided to get to the objective a different way. I tried to trek around the entire area I’ve already seen just to get to a place I’d already visited but couldn’t do shit because it became accessible before it became plot relevant. Then I realized that the way I got to the crash site seemed to be blocked now, wandered around for a long time looking to a way back, then discovered with the help of a video walkthrough that the only way out was to go forward through a ton of environmental obstacles like the damn pulverizers and the double ropes I complained about earlier, and make a giant loop... ending in the same place in the ice caves with the turbines, the elevator and the ram. So, lots of time wasted for nothing. Great game design, folks!
---
Alright, I reached the quest area and I'm going to pause there. It’ll be a few days until I can play again, so here are some of the impressions outside of what I wrote about in the liveblog:
Exploration: Way too much work for almost no reward. The more I play, the more frustrating the collectibles and echoes become. If 99% of unlocks are cosmetics, couldn’t you make them varied and interesting instead of recolors and tiny pieces of lightsaber decor you never see anyway? Echoes are so flavorless and empty it feels like the writers are afraid to step on the canon’s toes. As for the level design, see the numerous complaints above. I do like that the items and pathways are color-coded to indicate whether you can interact with them right now or not. I also like that, at least so far, there’s no pressing emergency “save the world”-type narrative that would conflict with the incentive to explore.
Mechanics: There is way too much parkour and, unlike combat, you can’t turn down the difficulty. Well, maybe “difficulty” is not the right word, because my real problem is how unreliable and unresponsive it often is. The difference between failure and success can be a split second or a camera angle, and you get no indication of what you did wrong. In combat, I keep attacking air even after turning the auto-targeting on. The skill tree doesn’t have much to be excited about. Unlike many other games, I don’t look forward to coming back to the game just so I could use a favorite combat skill of mine. Fus-ro-dah-ing enemies off of ledges is fun, but I can also do that in Skyrim or Mass Effect. I do enjoy that we can use the same skills on both in combat and on the environment. It’s good that the enemies aren’t health sponges, and that difficulty settings are about something other than HP numbers. I appreciate that respawning doesn’t undo your progress, but the lack of inability to make multiple manual saves makes me nervous: what if I get stuck, or what if my only save gets corrupted?
Story, progression and immersion: The story is hard to judge at this point because there’s been so little of it. At the beginning I was excited, but turns out, it was just an intro, and the main part of the game is 95% gameplay (which I’m not a fan of). I’m glad the PC isn’t immediately overpowered, but it’s immersion-breaking how he can dispatch trained anti-jedi troopers but has problems with wild animals, and especially how he takes so much time to remember and relearn the basic things he learned years ago. Seriously, it’s been so many hours and I still can’t pull things with the force! The writers also didn’t make even the slightest attempt to justify the respawn mechanic in-universe. The planets look more like playgrounds than real places; at some points stormtroopers yell something like “how did this guy get in here” and honestly I sympathize, but also, how do you get places, did you hang up all of this parkour equipment for yourself? At least for the first tomb they gave the excuse that it was something like a training ground. Another shadow hanging over everything is that during the OT there aren’t supposed to be any Jedi except Luke, so should I not get attached because all of these people are going to be dead within 15 years?
Overall, the game manages to remind me of half the games I’ve ever played even though I have not played anything from the genres it belongs to according to the internet. It feels more like Generic Video Game than like Star Wars, at least so far. When I think Star Wars, I don’t think “parkour and grinding for collectibles”, you know? I have problems with pretty much every aspect of game design; the older I get, the less patience I have with the games that fundamentally don’t respect the player’s time. When I looked up the playtime for this game, I assumed it would be much, much tighter. I don’t know how much time I’ve spent on it so far, but I doubt my playthrough is going to fit within the 17-30 hours that the internet described. People have called it “story-driven”! If 90% gameplay/10% story is story-driven then what counts as not story-driven, irl Lego?!
Still, I am not frustrated enough to quit. I look forward to exploring the next areas and experiencing the story by myself instead of relying on random youtubers. I’ve seen too many spoilers already, and I hope to encounter them in the actual game sooner than later.
8 notes
·
View notes
Text
My notes while listening to Misha’s comments on the podcast: (grab a snack!)
In light of the most recent fandom drama I decided to listen to *that* podcast and take notes as I went along about what was actually said and then give my take on it as objectively as possible. This is basically an essay so strap in!
He complains about not getting a trailer on set that’s the same as Jared and Jensen’s. Even though he has one that can accommodate 3 people. This was the first point of discussion inspired by opening up the interview with a brief chat about Misha currently being in his camper van and how he’s sleeping in it even though he’s still home in Bellingham. The whole hour and 26 minutes has an undertone of complaining and ego stroking by all involved.
Says he’s sad he didn’t get to be there for the final days of filming.
Seems a little nervous about if friendships made during the shows run will last now it’s over.
Admits he has no plan in place or anything coming up career wise and he’s unsure of his future. This is where he brings up Walker and The Boys and says if he had shows like that to go to he wouldn’t feel SPN ending was so monumental. It is said with a slight tone of bitterness.
Side note: the hosts Alaina and Malik seem to be fine with running with the narrative that Misha was part of the show it’s entire 15 year run. Misha clears this up eventually by saying he joined in season 4.
Misha says that he realized about six years ago that SPN could run as “we” wanted it to, implying he has any say in keeping the show going or not. He asserts that he would have been on the show up until the very end in any case. But he didn’t feel that way the first few years he was on the show. So that makes me think something or someone involved gave him the feeling he could be confident in being in the cast for however long SPN aired. Maybe this was after Sera left? Maybe this was when he agreed to a significant pay cut and demotion? Either way it seems he felt SPN = job security.
Misha doubts he’ll have the feeling of job security again.
Says from around age 11 he wanted to be a politician.
Says he saw “successful, untalented” actors and decided “I can do that”. He realized that was naive and it’s actually not easy to be that successful and by the time he got his career going he was basically just in it for the fame it’s not anything he took seriously.
We find out his wife did a doctorate in gender history... for some reason.
That Marilyn Monroe was some sort of baseline for him about creating a public persona (🤷🏽♀️) except for getting cosmetic surgery he points out.
Talk about how he got started. Acting classes, improve groups. Moving between Chicago, DC and LA.
Discussion about the differences and similarities between Hollywood and Washington.
States he got a consultant to help him cultivate a fan base and image to connect with an audience after getting on SPN. Admits that was a double edged sword because an anonymous public start thinking that they really know you and things start getting weird.
Mentions trying to find a balancing act of being authentic and having a private life but still keeping your fans.
He admits that the fan base he grew for himself by seeming accessible has caused him to attract people who don’t have any boundaries. This is when he claims the “dialing it back” in regard to how much he shares and mentions his kids specifically as something he doesn’t feel comfortable with putting out there. Uses the word “unhinged” to describe them.
Malik mentions “crazy fans” who seem to know too much about you and finding out where you are etc. Using the example of fans turning up at an airport wanting autographs and you wondering how they even knew you’d be there and what flight you taking. He asks Misha to share experiences about his own crazy fans.
This is when Misha uses the example about having fans who think that when he tweets something out he’s communicating with them personally.
Alaina then says that in the Supernatural fandom people fight each other to protect Jared, Jensen and Misha and it’s “very bizarre”. She volunteered that people think Misha secretly hates Jared and that it’s not true. Not sure why she decided to direct the conversation to a place that would cause drama and give Misha a chance to play victim.
And then...
That’s when he claims that he was public enemy number one with super fans of the show because he’s taking attention away from Jared and Jensen.
That’s when he brings up the alleged organized attack to take down his Facebook account. He says they reported him for... *pauses... claims to not know what. But that whatever it was “Facebook bought it and took it down”. Facebook deleted/deactivated his account but he eventually got it back.
Side note: Facebook (like all social media) have always been bias when it comes to people with leftist views and let them have free reign on the platform. So he must have done something that they would decide to suspend him. I don’t think J2 fans can be blamed for the content he posts and if it violated any ToS. As we know he can post some inappropriate things on social media.
He then brings up the allegations of him taking money out of his organization. Stating it’s “categorically untrue” is all he brings forward as evidence to the contrary.
Side note: I don’t know why then that there’s no receipts or transparency. Why is his mother a beneficiary, why do people who mention he owns Stands get blocked, why set everything up in Delaware and have your for profit and so called non profit interests so entangled etc etc) I guess fans are just supposed to have faith and take his word for it.
He says that ALL of them (Jared, Jensen and himself) have people who hate them in the fandom. But overall the fandom is lovely and supportive of the cast and each other. Makes an attempt at stating there’s no kind of competition or animosity between he and Jared. I think this is like the 3rd or 4th time in the interview either he or Alaina bring up Jared but keep the focus on how Misha is the one facing “character assassination.”
Finally says that all of them have nasty things done to them and they all have had to consult security because of threats to their families etc, doesn’t specify which faction of the fandom that’s coming from. Mentions people filing police reports in the fandom but doesn’t say regarding who or what. Alaina reacts like it’s the first time hearing of this happening. Misha just goes “yeah!” Then they move on to talking about living situations.
Apparently Alaina and Misha were neighbors in LA but didn’t take advantage of that. She doesn’t live in LA anyone, wants a new adventure.
Misha mentions Bellingham is another thing about his future he’s unsure about and how his kids flourished there.
Brings up not being present with his kids even when he’s home because of work and side projects and that the one thing he’s enjoying right now it spending time with them. That he used to operate from a place of guilt because his kids felt like they only have one parent. He and Malik briefly spoke on how their careers have negatively affected their love lives.
Misha says he’s not really involved with Random Acts or running it anymore. (Ummm... what)
He and Alaina discuss Haiti and Nicaragua for a while.
Says he may try to get into directing. Says he likes having creative control. Mentions he likes doing his art installations.
Admits that getting a bit of success made him very entitled and wanting of special treatment. But claims he’s trying to keep that in check (where?) and he’s just like everyone else (well duh!). But he “trades on his celebrity” to get stuff and it makes him feel dirty (I think everyone with any kind of following does that though so nbd)
Talk of how TV/film is more diverse in telling minority stories these days.
Was asked by Malik if he has any kind of chip on his shoulder career wise and Misha says the chip on his shoulder is being bored. But says he needs to work on being more engaged.
He then abruptly wants to end the interview. Saying he has to pick up his kids. Malik wants another question. He asks how Misha has been hurt or healed by his career.
Misha then brings up the movie Karla. Again admitting to becoming more like Paul psychologically irl. But says knowing he has that type of evil in him somewhere (and says that we all have that in us) made him more empathetic to the human condition.
They then say their goodbyes. End of interview.
——
My takeaway. The worst thing he can think to say the people who don’t like him in the fandom did was trolling to get his Facebook deactivated? Also that people can see the suspicious nature of his businesses? It would be really easy to settle that with actually being transparent about the finances, which they aren’t and not having close family as benefactors though. Also, I can only speak for myself. But I never hated him. I actually loved Castiel (before his character was there just to be there in recent seasons and Cass wasn’t Cass anymore. I think Misha’s need to pander to shippers/stay on the show was a great disservice to Castiel and his arc) I was a huge Misha fan, and participated in RA and Gish a lot. I absolutely adored Misha, I led myself to believe he was the most amazing person in the world, obviously that’s the reaction he wanted to cultivate from us. Unfortunately I learned too much, experienced first hand and heard too much to be able to keep cheerleading for him. I feel bad for the people still under the spell of feeling like it’s their job to keep being defensive and unreasonably loyal to someone who you can’t and don’t really know and only have a superficial “relationship” with. Seeing the ever more unhealthy and toxic lengths people feel they need to go to to prop up his ego etc. The constant investment emotionally and financially that goes into it and the “sunk cost” if you let reality in makes it hard to let go I guess. Even he knows that what he’s done to gain and maintain relevance has attracted what he called multiple times an unhinged fan base he has to try and balance without losing his influence. I think he maybe had or has good intentions but his fame hungry drive and narcissistic personality traits win out in the end. The Heller’s seem to have, as always, taken what was said and blown it out of proportion, twisted things and created their own narrative. I do see them using key words from the interview a lot suddenly though to bully for him. So, I guess the dog whistle to the sycophants worked out. I hope that a time comes where they can have a more healthy relationship with the media and public figures they choose to gravitate towards. We can all get over zealous with things but there’s lines that shouldn’t be crossed. For some that seems sadly unlikely. I hope that Misha does indeed one day get himself in check as he calls it and I can feel comfortable to support him again. But so long as he’s being enabled and not held accountable again that seems sadly unlikely. Even though I do occasionally find myself being drawn in by the facade again a little and quickly retreating because the issues remain the same. There is a problematic dynamic in the Supernatural fandom for sure. That’s why for a long time I opted out and just watched the show separately from fandom. It’s why when I found out it was ending I had this odd sense of relief I wasn’t expecting to feel and it made me sad. I hope that now the show has aired its finale we can all reflect on things, hopefully be more self aware and objective and most importantly honest about what really has gone down and why. When things started turning sour there have been plenty of times it could have been nipped in the bud yet wasn’t. People who used this silly yet special show in selfish ways, times when walking away would have been better than sticking around trying to make things and people into something never intended to be, giving into tribalism while claiming we’re a family... for that I think we all hold a little piece of responsibility.
You can listen to it yourself on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/0m07her5JUf0JGGtDVohtJ?si=c-RdyZzFQmSzffgNzZhkQg
#anti misha#anti misha collins#misha collins#supernatural#fandom#anti destihellers#strap in its a long one again#opinion#trying to be objective#alaina huffman#malik yoba#anti minions#misha#collins
135 notes
·
View notes
Text
How 9/11 Became Fan Fiction Canon
Every fictional character you can think of has experienced 9/11 in fanfiction.
A Clone Wars veteran with two lightsabers is on United Airlines Flight 93 and prevents it from crashing. Ron and Hermione get caught up in the chaos as the towers fall. Buffy the Vampire Slayer and her friends watch the attacks unfold on TV from Sunnydale. We have spent 20 years trying to process what happened on 9/11 and its fallout, and that messy process can be tracked through the countless, sad, disturbing, and sometimes very funny fanfiction left across the internet.
Many of the fanfics written in the weeks and months following the 9/11 attacks seemed to directly respond to the news as it happened, processing the tragedy in real-time through the eyes of characters they loved. In the absence of a canon episode where Daria Morgendorffer paid respects to those lost, writing fanfic about these characters also experiencing trauma helped fans cope.
One YuGiOh fanfic published on fanfiction.net in May 2002 could have been ripped exactly from what this writer experienced that Tuesday morning. “It started as a normal day,” user Gijinka Renamon wrote. Yugi and his friends were in school, where their teacher informed them of the attacks and sent everyone home from school.
“After reading people’s 9/11 fics, I decided to write my own, and put a certain character in it. And Yugi and his pals were my first choice,” the author's note reads, explaining the connection they felt to United flight 93 and the World Trade Center attacks. Given that they lived in Pennsylvania, and “it’s close to New York, I felt really sad about it.”
Stitch, a fandom journalist for Teen Vogue, told Motherboard that this reaction to 9/11 is not at all uncommon in fandom.
"Fandom has always been a place that positions nothing as 'off limits,'" she said. "Historical tragedies like the Titanic sinking and atrocities like… all of World War 2 show up regularly across the past 30 years of people creating stories and art about the characters they love. So, on some level, it makes sense that 9/11 and the following 20-year military installation in the Middle East has joined the ranks of things people in different fandoms turn into settings for their fan fiction."
Reactions depicted in a handful of Buffy the Vampire Slayer fanfics published in the weeks after the attacks ring a little truer to the characters. “Tuesday, 11th September 2001,” written by Anna K, almost echoes the lyrics from “I’ve Got a Theory,” one of the songs in the musical episode that aired in November 2001. “We have seen the apocalypse. We have prevented it. Actually, we’ve prevented quite a few. So we know what they look like,” they write, before taking a darker turn. “They look a lot like…New York today.”
Killing demons and vampires doesn’t phase the Scooby Gang, but when preventable human death is brought into the picture, it’s gut wrenching.
“What am I supposed to do…When I can’t do anything to save the world?” Buffy cries into Spike’s chest, watching the attacks unfold on TV in a fanfic the author described as being “about feeling numb and helpless.”
In “Blood Drive,” Kirayoshi writes about Buffy and her friends saving a van full of donated blood meant for victims of the attacks from a group of thirsty vampires. One Buffy the Vampire Slayer fic even takes a blindly patriotic turn, where noted lesbian witch Tara McClay helps Xander hang an American flag from the window of the magic shop to make Anya feel better.
Experiencing 9/11 as a young teenager was overwhelming not just because of the loss of life. Almost immediately after the event itself, it was as if the entirety of American culture re-oriented itself towards an overtly jingoistic stance. As we get distance from the attacks, seeing the tone of television and movies from the early 2000s is jarring, and some have gone viral on Twitter. In the world of pop music, mainstream musicians like the Chicks, formerly known as the Dixie Chicks, were blacklisted from the radio while Toby Keith sang about putting a boot up the ass of terrorists. On the Disney Channel, a young Shia Labeouf reading a poem he supposedly wrote about the events. The poem concludes with the line, "it's awesome to be an American citizen."
In a world so completely saturated with this messaging, it is not surprising that fanfic authors started including 9/11 in their work so soon after the event. Even The West Wing had a strange, out of continuity, fanfic-esque episode where the characters reacted to 9/11. In some cases, it made sense that the characters in the stories would be close to or a part of the events themselves.
"For characters like John Watson or Captain America, the idea works to an extent," Stitch told Motherboard. "In the original Sherlock Holmes works and the 2011 BBC series, Watson had just returned from Afghanistan. For Captain America and other Marvel heroes, 9/11 was something that was addressed in-universe in The Amazing Spider-Man volume 2 #36. Technically, 9/11 is 'canon' to the Marvel universe."
In “Early Warning: Terrorism,” a fanfiction for the TV show Early Edition in which a man who mysteriously receives tomorrow's newspaper, predicting the future, avoids jingoism, but tries to precent 9/11 from happening. This fanfic remains unfinished; it’s unclear if the characters successfully prevent 9/11 in this retelling.
Largely in fanfic from the era just after 9/11, when many young authors were trying to emotionally grapple with it, the characters don't re-write or undo the events themselves. It's this emphasis on the reaction to tragedy that colors the fanfiction that features 9/11 going forward.
Although fanfiction authors have been writing about 9/11 consistently since soon after the event, whenever that fanfiction reaches outside of its intended audience, it looks bizarre.
A screenshot of a Naruto 9/11 fanfic on the Tumblr subreddit comes without any context, or even more than two lines and an author's note. It’s impossible to suss out if this falls into the category of sincere fanfic without the rest of the piece or a publication date, but modern-day commenters on the Reddit thread see it as classic Tumblr trash.
Screenshot from r/Tumblr
“Bin Laden/Dick Cheney, enemies to lovers, 10k words, slow burn,” one user joked in the replies, underscoring the weirdness of Naruto being in the Twin Towers by comparing it to a What If story about Cheney and Bin Laden slowly falling deeply in love.
It’s hard to tell how much of the 9/11 fanfic and fanart starting a few years after the attacks is sincere, and how much of it is ironic, and trying to make fun of the very concept of writing fanfiction about 9/11.
A 2007 anime music video (in which various clips, usually from anime, are cut together to music) that combines scenes from The Lion King with Linkin Park’s “Crawling” and clips from George Bush’s speeches immediately after the attacks feels like the perfect example of this. Even the commenters can’t seem to suss out if this person is a troll or not.
There’s no way that My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic 9/11 fanart could be serious, right? Especially if the description pays tribute to “some of the nation's most memorable buildings,” and features five of the main characters as child versions of themselves. The comments again are split between users thanking the artist for a thoughtful remembrance post, and people making their own headcanon for why Twilight Sparkle is surreptitiously absent from the scene.
Screengrab via DeviantArt
There’s Phineas and Ferb fanfic that combines a 9/11 tribute concert with flashbacks to Ferb being rescued from the towers as a baby, written on the 10th anniversary of the attacks. It jumps from introspection to lines like, “‘Quiet Perry the Platypus. I’m trying to listen to these kids singing a 9/11 tribute.’”
The author's notes make it more likely that they meant for this to be a tribute piece, but it doesn’t quite make sense until watching a YouTube dramatic reading of it from 2020, fully embracing the absurdity of it all.
“For me, 9/11 is synonymous with war. It completely changed the course of my life," Dreadnought, the author of a Captain America fanfic Baghdad Waltz that sees Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes fall in love over the course of the war on terror, told Motherboard. "It’s the reason I joined the military, and I developed deep connections with people who would go on to deploy to Afghanistan and Iraq. These very much felt like my generation’s wars, perhaps because people I graduated high school with were the youngest folks eligible to serve at the time.”
Dreadnought told Motherboard that although they didn't deploy, their career has kept 9/11 and the trauma from it in their mind. After seeing that people who fantasize about Steve and Bucky getting together seemed particularly interested in reading fanfiction that related to 9/11, they decided to try their hand at it.
"I had to do something with all of that emotionally, and I’m admittedly a bit emotionally avoidant. So I learned through fic that it’s easier for me to process those feelings and the knowledge of all the awful stuff that can happen in war if I can turn it into something creative," Dreadnought said. "Give the feelings to fake people and then have those fake people give the feelings to readers!"
To Dreadnought, who is a queer man, the experience of researching and writing this was more cathartic than they first expected, especially as a way to navigate feelings about masculinity, military culture, and queer identity. But they said the research they did, which included watching footage of first responders at ground zero, was what helped them finally process the event itself.
"It was like a delayed horror, and it was more powerful than I expected it would be." Dreadnought said. "When I was eighteen, I was pretty emotionally divorced from 9/11; I just knew I wanted to do something about it. So coming back to it in my 30s while writing this fic, it was a very different experience. Even the research for this story ended up being an extraordinarily valuable exercise in cognitively and emotionally processing 9/11 and all of its second and third order effects."
Fanfiction that features 9/11 provides an outlet for people who still grapple with the trauma from that day. But Stitch warns that the dynamics of fandom and how it relates to politics can also create fiction that's less respectful and more grotesque.
"With years of distance between the stories written and the original events of 9/11, there seems to be some sort of cushion for fans who choose to use those events as a catalyst for relationships—and Iraq and Afghanistan for settings," Stitch said. "The cushion allows them room to fictionalize real world events that changed the shape of the world as we know it, but it also insulates them from having to think about what they may be putting into the world."
The tendency of turning these events into settings or backgrounds for mostly white, male characters to fall in love has the unintended effect of displacing the effects that the war on terror has had on the world over. Steve and Bucky might fall in love during the war on terror, but they would also be acting as a part of the American military in a war that has been criticized since it started. Fanfic writers in other fandoms have come under fire for using real world tragedy as settings for fic before. In the aftermath of the 2010 Haiti earthquake Supernatural fanfiction about the actors Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki going to the island to do aid became controversial within the fandom. There have also been fics where characters grapple with the death of George Floyd that is written in a way that displaces the event from the broader cultural context of race in America.
"A Captain America story where Steve Rogers is a 'regular' man who joins the US Army and 'fights for our freedom' post-9/11 is unlikely to deal with the war’s effect on locals who are subject to US military intervention," Stitch said. "It’s unlikely to sit with what Captain America has always meant and what a writer is doing by dropping Steve Rogers into a then-ongoing conflict in any capacity."
After enough time, “never forget” can even morph into “but what if it never happened?” A 19k+ word Star Wars alternate universe fanfic asks this question, wondering what would have unfolded if someone with two lightsabers was on United Flight 93. This fic, part of a larger fanfic series with its own Wikia, considers what would have happened if Earth was a military front in the Clone Wars.
In this version of events, a decorated general who served in the Clone Wars is able to take back control of Flight 93 before it crashes, landing safely and preventing even more tragedy from happening that day. In the end, all of the passengers who made harrowing last calls to their loved ones before perishing in a Pennsylvania field survive thanks to the power of the Force, and are awarded medals of honor by President Bush.
Twenty years after the attacks, it’s painful to think about what would have happened if people got to work 15 minutes later, or missed their trains that morning. There weren’t Jedi masters deployed to save people in real life, but for some of the fanfic writers working today, the world of Star Wars might feel just as removed as the world before September 11, 2001.
Fiction serves as a powerful playground for processing cultural events, especially generational trauma. The act isn't neutral though; a decade's worth of fanfiction that takes place on or around 9/11 shows how our own understanding of a traumatic event can shift with time.
How 9/11 Became Fan Fiction Canon syndicated from https://triviaqaweb.wordpress.com/feed/
7 notes
·
View notes
Text
My Top 30 Favorite Video Games
Inspired by @ultraericthered’s Top 30 Favorite Anime post.
Although I’m doing mine in countdown form, ‘cause it’s more fun that way!
30. Super Mario Bros. - Arguably the first “blockbuster” game to be released, not only does Super Mario Bros. still hold up over 35 years later but it’s a gift that keeps on giving with how many different incarnations, remixes, fan games using its assets, etc. that we have now.
29. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - OBJECTION! While I cherish the entire original Phoenix Wright trilogy of the Ace Attorney franchise, I’ll always be the most partial to the original outing. The sheer audacity and hilarity of the concept, which is grounded by endearing characters and compelling mysteries, shines brilliantly in this little, easily accessible game.
28. Trigger Happy Havoc: Danganronpa - While similar in many ways to Ace Attorney, Danganronpa boasts a variety of more actual gameplay than mere point-and-click text scrolling. But what really makes this stand out, beyond gameplay or even the strength of its concept, story and characters, is the atmosphere it creates. For good and for ill, traversing the pristine, neon-lit hallways of the abandoned Hopes Peak Academy looking for clues as I’m forced to play by Monokuma’s twisted rules is an experience that will stay with me forever.
27. Star Fox 64 - Beyond all the entertainment this game provides through memes, it’s really just a fun, reasonably simple but just moderately complicated enough game that’s accessible to any player even if they usually don’t go for aerial shooters. It’s also one of the earliest console games that I ever played, so of course it’s going to hold a special place in my heart.
26. Batman: Arkham City - It’s an impressive feat when an open world game can still feel so claustrophobic in all the right ways, and that’s what Arkham City accomplishes. This game is essentially The Dark Knight to Arkham Asylum’s Batman Begins, escalating the action, suspense and sheer Batman-ness, providing unlimited opportunities to enjoy yourself playing as Gotham’s defender and facing down the greatest Rogues Gallery in comic book history.
25. Red Dead Redemption - Look, I know that Red Dead Redemption 2 is technically the superior game. But its complicated story, sprawling cast of characters, and vast canvas of a world can be pretty daunting, whereas I feel like the original Red Dead Redemption struck a much better balance. Allowing open world freedom within the confines of the straight-forward story of John Marston’s redemption really makes you feel like you’re in an old Western film, and the way that choices you make as a player impact the way that film ultimately turns out is one of the strongest arguments for video games being worthy of consideration as true art.
24. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim - So, ten years ago an open world adventure video game series releases its fifth entry...and to this day, we’ve had no sixth, in favor of expansions and updated re-releases of said fifth entry. But that’s not a sign of laziness; it’s a sign the developers know they hit such a peak in quality that they have no need to rush anything further out the gate, as Skyrim is a gift that keeps on giving. Addictive in how unlimited in possibilities it is, with each playthrough never being the same as the one before, Skyrim is a gaming masterpiece that I don’t think I’m going to get bored with playing anytime soon.
23. Super Paper Mario - This may be an unpopular opinion, but I vastly prefer this game’s action-platform-RPG hybrid gameplay style to the prior installments’ traditional turn-based RPG style, which feels more at home in stuff like Super Mario RPG and the Mario & Luigi series. But gameplay aside, I think this has the strongest story of any Mario game, trading in the usual “save the kingdom/princess” fare for saving all of reality, with legitimate emotion and drama and even character development. It’s one of the Wii’s shining gems, to be sure.
22. Epic Mickey - This game’s graphics are by and large unremarkable, its gameplay is fraught with issues (that camera is unforgivable), and it’s nowhere close to the best on its system or genre. But Epic Mickey is a case study in where the effort put into crafting the game’s world and story, not to mention the obvious love and respect for the material being worked with, pays off. Any Disney fan will love this game for its story, which puts Mickey front and center as an actual character rather than a mascot and dives deep into his history as he meets his “half-brother” Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, and its mystical, unique atmosphere - what the graphics can’t deliver, the fucking music more than makes up for. All of the game’s flaws mean nothing compared to the sheer heart on display, and I treasure it greatly as a result.
21. Batman: Arkham Asylum - I already mentioned that Arkham City is the superior game, but as was the case with Red Dead Redemption and its sequel, personal preference strikes again. The simpler story and narrower confines of Arkham Asylum just appeal to me slightly more, and I feel like the borderline horror atmosphere this game has could never fully be replicated by all of its sequels and spin-offs. Also, you can play as the Joker in this. WIN.
20. Metal Gear Solid - And on the subject of Arkham Asylum, it owes much to this game, which created the template of a lone badass hero having to use stealth and weaponry to liberate a government-owned island from the lunatic terrorists that have taken over. Hideo Kojima famously never wanted this game to have any sequels, and I can definitely see his point, as it’s a complete and wholly satisfying experience in of itself and I don’t feel like it’s ever been topped. At the very least, it’s certainly the most enjoyable of the series to me.
19. The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask - Also, speaking of “borderline horror atmosphere”, we have the freakiest game that the Legend of Zelda series ever put out. What was supposed to just be a gaiden to Ocarina of Time mutated into this beautiful monstrosity that’s become just as iconic. Nobody who plays this game is ever going to forget that fucking moon and all the constant jumping back and forth in time across three days as you try to prevent the apocalypse of Termina. It’s the kind of gaming trauma that’s well worth experiencing.
18. Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories - Like Majora’s Mask, this game is a case study where you can take a bunch of recycled assets and gameplay, and then make something unique from it if you have a well-crafted story with a dark and disturbing atmosphere. It’s hard to experience or appreciate the transition between Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts II without playing this midquel, which takes the narrative and characters to deeper levels without being pretentious about it and sets the stage for the proper console sequel perfectly. And if you can’t get into it being on Gameboy Advance, then just play the PS2 remake (which is arguably the superior version anyway) and you’re good! Just...don’t mind the cards, OK?
17. Sonic CD - And now we have another game about jumping back and forth through time to prevent an apocalypse! See the common threads at play here by this point? Sonic the Hedgehog is at his best in 2D gameplay, and I personally enjoy this the best out of all the 2D games in the series. As obscure as the Sega CD was as a system, it was powerful enough to take the blue blur’s speed to its maximum level, set alongside beautiful graphics and a kick-ass soundtrack (well, two different kick-ass soundtracks; and I actually prefer the US one).
16. Pokemon Black & White - While there were advancements made to story and graphics and gameplay features in the third and fourth generations of the Pokemon series, nothing felt as truly ground-breaking as the second generation games until the fifth gen with its Black & White games. This was arguably the game series’ peak in quality on all fronts, but its specifically the story that lands it on this list, as its well-written and paced, subverts many formulaic elements from the previous games, is set in one of the most unique regions in the Pokemon world, and has a timeless message that has only grown more relevant with age.
15. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate - The whole series could really go here, but fortunately the most recent entry is the perfect embodiment of said series, with every playable character there’s ever been and then some. The sheer variety is unmatched by any other fighting game out there, and its story mode, “World of Light”, is quite possibly the greatest video game crossover in history given how many characters are featured as both fighters and spirits.
14. Super Mario 64 - I’m pretty sure this game used to be higher in my favor, but replaying it on the Nintendo Switch recently has made me aware of how, as the first game on the Nintendo 64 and the first 3D platformer, it’s poorly aged in several areas. However, I must stress that it is still a very good game. The fun of going to the various worlds within paintings in Peach’s Castle hasn’t changed, nor has how smoothly and seamlessly Mario managed to make the jump from 2D to 3D. Just like Super Mario Bros., the number of games that owe something to this one is too great to count, and that’s an achievement that remains timeless.
13. Dark Chronicle - Also known as Dark Cloud 2. I hadn’t heard a damn thing about this game before renting it on a whim many years ago, and I was caught off guard by just how good it was. It’s got a simple but effective story and likable characters, a timeless atmosphere, beautifully cel-shaded graphics, dungeon-crawling gameplay, action-RPG combat gameplay, literal world-building gameplay, and even a fishing minigame! This game can actually stand besides the Zelda series without shame; it’s truly an underrated gem.
12. The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess - Oh, speaking of Zelda, this game goes full Lord of the Rings-style epic fantasy with it and it is glorious. Between the near perfect gameplay, beautiful 3D graphics, and one of the best stories in the series (with one of the best characters: Midna), Twilight Princess’ most prevalent complaint from critics all the way up to its own developers is that it wasn’t even MORE expansive and awesome given how long it was hyped, and if that’s the biggest issue with the game then I’d say it’s in pretty good shape.
11. Super Mario Galaxy - Super Mario 64 may be held back a little by how its aged, but no such thing is holding back Super Mario Galaxy. Super Mario Odyssey might be as good or possibly even better, but I just don’t hold the same feelings of amazement and respect toward it that I do for this game. From the blitzkrieg-style attack on the Mushroom Kingdom by Bowser to the discovery of Rosalina’s space station, this game had me hooked from the first few minutes, especially with it blaring that awesome orchestral score the whole way through. To this day, I maintain that this is Mario’s greatest 3D adventure. It’s simply magnificent.
10. Final Fantasy X - Ha! See what I did there? This game has caught flak for some of the awkwardness that comes from being the first fully 3D entry in the series, but I think that’s tantamount to nitpicking when compared to all it does right. To me, this was the last really good installment of the main Final Fantasy series, with a story and world so brilliantly developed that the game earned the immediate breakthrough success and acclaim that it found in its native Japan. 20 years later and, as the HD remaster has shown, it still holds up as one of the most engaging JRPG experiences I’ve ever had the pleasure of having.
9. Banjo-Kazooie - At the time, this was basically Rare’s copycat version of Super Mario 64, although considered about as good. Now, however, there’s a difference: the aging issues I mentioned for Super Mario 64 don’t apply for Banjo-Kazooie. Whether replaying it on the Nintendo 64 or on whichever Xbox you’ve got, this game is still just as fun, imaginative and hilarious now as it was back then. It’s quite possibly the greatest 3D platformer ever made.
8. Pokemon Crystal - The definitive edition of the Gold & Silver games of Pokemon’s second generation, taking what was already a phenomenal advancement and improvement to the first generation and making it even better with additional features such as the ability to play as a girl for the first time and a more clearly defined storyline centered around the legendary Pokemon featured on the game’s box art. Pokemon had been written off as just a passing fad up until this point. This was when its staying power as a video game juggernaut was proven.
7. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild - Talk about a win right out of the gate for the Nintendo Switch! This game returns the Legend of Zelda series to its roots while also applying all that has been made possible in video games since the original game’s release, and the result is an enthralling, addictive, open world masterpiece that has set a new standard of quality for both the Zelda series and for many modern video games in general.
6. Kingdom Hearts II - The Final Mix edition to be precise, although in this day and age that’s basically the only edition people are playing anyway. This game is the apotheosis of Kingdom Hearts as both a video game series and as a concept; filled to the brim with Disney magic and Square Enix RPG expertise and paired with some of the most refined action-based gameplay there is. And when it comes to bringing the original Kingdom Hearts trilogy’s story to a close, does this game ever stick the landing. The series could have ended right here and I would have been completely satisfied (and its reputation would be a lot better off, too!)
5. Pokemon Yellow - While I maintain that this game, the definitive edition of the original first generation Pokemon games, still holds up as fun to play even now, I’ll admit that it’s pure bias that it ranks so high. It was the first proper video game I ever played, there was no way I was leaving it off the top 5! Its blissful nostalgic atmosphere is always such a delight to return to.
4. Banjo-Tooie - Remember when I said Banjo-Kazooie was “quite possibly the greatest 3D platformer ever made”? The “quite possibly” is because its in stiff competition with its own sequel! And personally, I’m in Banjo-Tooie’s corner; something about how inter-connected its worlds are and the addition of so many things to do all while maintaining your full moveset from the original game is just beautiful to me. Both it and its predecessor are like obstacle courses that I never tire of running through, which is the hallmark of brilliant game design.
3. Kingdom Hearts - Another case where the sequel may be the superior game, but my own personal preference leans toward the original. And in this case, it’s a highly personal preference: this game and my memories of playing it for the first time are so very dear to me. The characters and worlds of Disney put into an epic crossover RPG was like a dream come true for me and no matter how far the series it spawned has deteriorated, nothing can detract from the magic of this game. It’s got a certain, indescribable feel and atmosphere that’s never truly been replicated, and that feel and atmosphere still holds up whenever I revisit it. The gameplay may not be the best, particularly when compared to Kingdom Hearts II’s, but the charm of the story and the characters and the world and the very concept more than makes up for that. As far as I’m concerned, it’s one of Disney and Square’s greatest masterpieces.
2. Final Fantasy VII - I was aware of the hype this game got and was totally ready to call it overrated, but damn it, it got me! I don’t know what it is about this game with its blocky early 3D graphics, poor sound quality to its excellent soundtrack, and frequently mistranslated script that proved to be so gripping and enjoyable to play through, but man did it ever Limit Break its way into my heart. This is considered a JRPG classic for a damn good reason.
1. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time - Do I really need to explain this one? It’s famous for being frequently cited as one of the greatest video games ever made, and like Final Fantasy VII, its hype is well-deserved and totally justified. Whether you’re playing it on the Nintendo 64, the Gamecube, the Wii, the 3DS, and hopefully the Nintendo Switch in the future, there is a magic quality to this game that permeates through every step you take in its fully 3D world. It’s a triumph that has stood the test of time, cementing the Zelda series as truly legendary.
11 notes
·
View notes
Text
Finding You (Part Fifteen of ??)
Goodness gracious, I’m back, and excited to be here. I just had the weirdest two weeks, so I apologize about not updating last week. Luckily, I just stayed home today and was able to write most of this chapter. Here is a link for anyone who’s new and wants to start over at the beginning: Part One.
A couple notes: I totally forgot I wanted to add a dream sequence to part fourteen, so I added it first thing in this update. It is a rewrite of part of Satan’s “The Search of Self” Devilgram so there might be some spoilers. I also missed you all so much! Honestly, I’ve been feeling kinda down lately and haven’t even had much motivation to play Obey Me (or do much of anything), so being able to hang out on Tumblr today and see all the posts has helped me get some of my inspiration back! I also bought a Chromebook and I'm still getting used to it. If the formatting goes weird, please let me know so I can fix it.
Tags for the beauties: @simpingforsatan @naimena @hachimochi @wrathandgreed @magi-minminxiii @rensphilia @a-dream-at-night @chloelikesobeyme @getbehindme-satan @theuglypugling @oofthelazyweeb @mammonismyfirstman
Word Count: 3293
Warnings: Possible spoilers for the first season (though I think I’ve had some before so...), spoilers for Satan’s “The Search for Self” Devilgram story (it’s not the full story and I added a lot)
Mc followed Satan to a fairly large building. Satan, still so weird to say, had asked her if she wanted to go around the Devildom with him. The letters above the door were illegible, seeing as how the Devildom had their own language and alphabet, but she instantly knew where they were when they walked in, “You took me to an art gallery?!”
“Oh, seems like I made a good choice,” Satan looked a tad shocked, but then smiled, “I like to come here to get away from stuff and clear my head.”
“So, are these like human art galleries?” Mc asked.
“I think so? Naturally, they have older, historically significant paintings, but they also exhibit pieces created by young, up-and-coming artists. And they’re always holding interesting events. It’s a lot of fun… Are you interested in art, Mc?”
“Yeah, I am,” Mc answered.
“Ah, is that so? I’ve got a feeling you and I might get along, then. I really love art.”
Mc felt her heart thill at his words. She’d been interested in the blonde fourth-born the second she’d seen him, and her interest seemed to be well founded.
Satan continued on about why he loved art, and though there was brand new art for her to look at, all she could do was hang watch Satan and hang onto his every word. He wasn’t saying anything she herself didn’t think, but just being here with him was giving her butterflies.
“... If you’re nervous about coming here alone, then say the word, and I’ll join you anytime.”
“Ah, that’s so nice of you. Now that I know this place exists, I’m definitely going to need to visit often.”
“You’re really excited about this, aren’t you?” he was watching her, eyebrow quirked, but with a soft smile.
“Of course! Not only do I have a whole new history to learn about, but there’s even new art!”
Satan chuckled, “Well, I’m glad you’re actually interested in art. It really is important not to focus only on your outward appearance like Asmo, because the person you are on the inside has a way of showing through on the outside as well.”
“I agree. Too many people’s beauty is only skin deep.”
“Exactly. Incidentally, it looks like they’re having a contemporary art exhibit here today. Shall we go check it out?”
“Definitely. I hope demon modern art is better than, “Four Blue Squares on Canvas”.”
“Wait… Really?”
“Yup. It’s a real art piece I saw in my University’s art museum.”
“So, was it really…”
“Just four blue squares on a white canvas, all equidistant from each other.”
Satan blinked a couple times, “Well, I hope ours is better too.”
They entered an exhibit space. Mc found herself a little disappointed, as she saw some of the same stange, abstract, postmodern art she would’ve seen at a human art gallery. Satan noticed the change and hurried to explain, “This is the human art wing. Many of the “lost” art pieces you’ve heard about can be found in collections here in the Devildom or in some of our galleries. This gallery is curated by Lord Diavolo, as advised by Barabatos, Lucifer and myself. Right now I believe this collection was put together by Lucifer.”
“Ah. That makes sense,” Mc stated, lips pursed as she looked around, making Satan laugh.
The duo continued through the gallery, Mc stopping every-so-often to examine a piece that caught her eye. Satan knew the artist’s name and the medium of almost every piece, though there were a few that were new to him too.
“Check out this work here. The use of color is so novel, so original. It’s very eye catching.”
Mc leaned down to read the museum label, “You know, that reddish color really reminds me of… Oh…”
“Human blood? Yeah, I thought as much. Though the smell had been dampened, probably diluted with water, it’s still unmistakable,” Satan answered absentmindedly. Finally seeing Mc’s discomfort, he quickly tried to backpedal, “I’m sorry. I forgot human noses aren’t as... sensitive as demons. This artist makes pieces that stimulate multiple senses. She’s an acquaintance of mine. This piece in particular incorporates the blood of… Seven distinct creatures, demons included.”
“Oh… Which one is the demon blood?”
“The black. If I’m not mistaken, she used her own blood for this piece,” Mc nodded, the art more macabre than she’d originally thought, “Well, there’s a lot more to see than just this. Let’s see, what’s over here in this space?” They walked through an archway into a room that held a huge installation. A lot of strange items filled the room, some on pedestals, or the ground, while others hung from near translucent strings from the ceiling. The lighting in the room was generally low, specific spotlights or illumination obviously very strategically placed. A low glow on the floor marked a pathway that allowed the viewer to wander around the room.
“Wow! Now this is very interesting,” Satan breathed, eyes glittering, “See? Check it out. At first glance it looks like a bunch of random stuff scattered all over the place, doesn’t it? But actually, every piece of rope, string and crumpled paper has been arranged very meticulously. It actually depicts a war between a dragon and an army of angels. If you want proof, look at it from the side. It looks as if the dragon is over powering the army. Buuuut,” Satan continued excitedly rushing over to the other side of the room, “When you look from this other angel here, it seems the angels have the upper hand.”
“Interesting, because, from where I’m standing, I can see Earth.”
“Wait, really?” Satan moved to where Mc was and bent down so he could view it from her height, “Would you look at that. I don’t think I ever would’ve seen that. How interesting… Very nice find,” he complimented, his smile, words and proximity making Mc’s cheeks heat up.
They spent some more time in the room, though they didn’t find any other secrets. They both vowed to come back however to search some more. They then spent more time in the gallery before Satan suggested they head out to get some refreshments at a new cafe in the Devildom.
“Thank you for that Satan,” Mc grinned, “That was some much needed mental refreshment.”
“No, thank you Mc. It can be difficult to get any of my brothers to spend time with me in a manner that I enjoy, and even harder still for them not to annoy me in the process, so I usually end up going around on my own. It was invigorating having someone with me who also appreciates art,” He grinned at her again, making her heart flutter. She could definitely get used to spending time with the Avatar of Wrath.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Mc blinked awake. That was the second dream she’d had that seemed more than just a dream. She could still remember the first in clear detail, though her dreams usually started fading once she woke up. The only other time she’d experienced something like this was her memory of being a Wanderer. But… This couldn’t possibly be like that. That was a memory, and these were just the result of finally being able to talk to and spend time with the demon she’d admired for so long… Right? She shook her head, the large questions the dreams brought up already giving her a headache. She grabbed her DDD blinking at the light it gave off. After her eyes adjusted she saw a new message alert. Opening it she smiled. Seems like he'd finally opened up her letter
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Dude, just read it.”
“Easy for you to say.”
Belphie sighed and got up, grabbing the letter off of the kitchen counter.
“What are you doing?” Satan asked.
“Well, if you’re not going to open it, I will. I can’t believe you didn’t read and respond to it that night. Honestly, you’re one of the most powerful demons in the Devildom and you can’t even-” he was cut off by Satan grabbing the letter from him, the seal already halfway broken.
“I will open it myself, thank you.”
“Then do it,” Belphie said, unaffected by Satan’s anger.
Satan narrowed his eyes, and turned back to the letter in his hands. Logically, he understood why he was nervous, and usually knowing the why behind a feeling would help him get it under control, but that had never worked with any feelings toward Mc. He had hoped this time around would be different, and he was almost more nervous than before. There seemed to be so much more riding on her returned affection than before. Cautiously, he broke the rest of the seal on the envelope, and pulled the letter out/
Dear Satan,
I would love to get coffee with you sometime! If I can be even half as engaging as last time, I’ll consider it a job well done. To help us plan that and talk more easily in the future, I included my number ;) Once you text me, I have a secret to share with you.
Satan blinked a couple times. He turned the letter over to see if she’d written anything on the back. No such luck. Was that really all she’d written?
“Forever the tease I see.”
“... Did you just read that over my shoulder?”
“Well, when you delay as much as you did, and then have that kind of reaction, who wouldn’t? Anyway, you should text her.”
“I… Yes, you’re right. I definitely should,” Satan said grabbing his DDD. He opened the messaging app, typed in her number and… just sat there.
“You good?”
“Hmmm? Oh, yeah. I’m just not sure how to start the-”
He was cut off by Belphie grabbing his DDD, typing something, and then tossing it back to him, “There you go. I’m going to go sleep now. It’s way past my bedtime.”
“Wait, what did you even-”
“Night,” Belphie called from the doorway before walking out.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Satan was reading when his DDD meowed that he had a message. He almost threw the book he was reading into the air as he lunged for his DDD which was on the table next to him. He didn’t even have time to be embarrassed at his over-the-top-reaction.
Satan: A secret?
Mc: Yes :D
My name is not Jane Doe, though
I’m sure you’ve already
surmised that much
Satan: I thought as much, though it really isan ingenious alias.
Mc: Thank you! I thought so too
Satan: So… Do I get to know what you’re
real name is?
Mc: Hmmm… What if I want to go get
that coffee with you before
I divulge that information?
Satan: We’ll just have to go get that coffee then.
Mc:
When?
Satan: Whenever you’d like. I am free today.
Only if you want though.
Mc: Okay! Shall we say… 16:00?
Satan: As long as there’s no last minute RAD Student Council meetings called, that should be perfect
Mc: Well, if there is, I’ll just have to come
tell everyone you already made plans.
I’ve been meaning to visit RAD anyway.
Satan:
Oh how I’d love to see Lucifer’s reaction
to that.
Mc:
Satan: Wait… Shouldn’t you be asleep right now?
It’s rather late.
Mc: I was asleep, but…
Satan: Bad dream?
Mc: No actually. Quite the opposite.
I just can’t stop thinking now.
Satan: Ah. I understand that.
Anything I can do to help?
Mc: Would you talk to me a bit longer? Maybe tell me about thelatest book you’ve been reading?
Satan: Of course.
Though he wished Mc would talk to him about what was bothering her, he figured this was probably the better option. They hadn’t met many times, and prying might upset her. So, he simply started telling her the basic plot of the new novel he’d picked up. Eventually, she stopped responding, and the messages stopped being shown as read. Satan smiled at that, texted her good night, and snuggled down into bed himself.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“I’m sorry!” Mc’s voice brought Satan out of the book of poetry he’d been reading, “Not only did I fall asleep while texting you last night, but then I was late today and I set the meetup time? Ugh, I feel so bad and I’m so sorry!”
“You’re alright,” Satan smiled, not wanting to acknowledge how much anxiety had been eased up by her appearing.
“I woke up late, and I dropped my DDD bad enough that we have to get a new one all together, and then Michael was asking me about native Devildom fabrics and if he should get a new outfit made in one… It’s just been a day so far.”
“Like, I said, it’s all okay. I’m sure you would’ve messaged me if you could.”
“I would’ve. I still feel bad… But thank you for being okay with it,” the look of anxiety to joy that she gave him made every second he’d spent waiting worth it.
“O-Of course,” he got out.
“So, what were you reading?”
“A collection of Arabic love poems.”
“Ah, “... When I love, / I become liquid light,” and “... If the devil was to ever see you, he’d kiss your eyes and repent,” Mc sighed, resting her chin on her hand. Then, as if remembering her current company and current residence, she shot up, “Sorry! I just really love that line.”
Satan laughed, and then said a quote of his own, “My lips and fingers were pens on her flesh. / I memorized her in every alphabet and memorized my memories until they multiplied…”
“I look at you and I dream of snow, I look at you and I await autumn…”
“My temptations in your eyes, And the cities of your grief,” Satan quoted just then realizing they were both leaning in towards each other. He leaned back a bit abruptly and cleared his throat, “Anyway, I really enjoy Adonis’ work.”
“Me too,” Mc answered, leaning back as well. Fortunately, a waiter came up to them to take their order, helping resolve the awkward air his sudden retreat had created. He tried to collect his thoughts as she ordered. He could only think of one thing to talk about though.
“So… Your name is not Jane Doe.”
“Nope.”
“So... What is it?” Didn’t they have this conversation last night?
Mc looked disappointed for a second, but then she was back to normal, “It’s Mc.”
“Really? That’s a lovely name.”
She looked up, eyes measuring him, “You think so?”
“Of course! It suits you really well,” Satan said.
“Well, there’s actually an interesting story behind that. Usually when an angel becomes an angel, they receive a new name. Back in the past, they used to allow them the choice between their new name and their old one. This resulted in too many angels remembering their human life, so they stopped allowing it. I’m the first angel in quite some time to keep the same name as I had in life.”
“Really?”
“Yup. Apparently Sim and Luke were insistent on it. Luke didn’t have a ton of clout upstairs at the time, but Sim does. I promised I wouldn’t question them too much about my human life.”
“They were huh? That’s interesting…”
“Why?”
“Oh, uhhh… Just general curiosity. I’ve been trying to pin down what kind of person Simeon is since the first exchange program,” Satan scrambled, actually managing to sound convincing.
Mc just hesitated and then nodded, not keeping eye contact with him.
“I’m sorry. I’m just nervous that I’ll make a fool of myself and ruin this time like I have the other times we’ve talked,” Satan confessed in Latin, his brain still on the last language he had been reading. Saying the things that had been bothering him started when he became more comfortable around Mc the first time around. He found saying the things on his mind out loud usually released much of his nervous energy, helped him understand what and how he was feeling without doing things to make Mc uncomfortable, even if she hadn’t understood most of what he’d said. It had become something they had shared, causing her to work hard to learn other languages so she could catch the little embarrassing things he said.
Mc gave him a look before replying, “Well, you didn’t mess up last time.”
“Well, I-” Satan cut off when his brain caught up to his mouth. She had just responded. In perfect Latin. His brain flipped back to their discussion on Arabic poetry and he realized she had been quoting that in Arabic too, “I hadn’t realized… Of course you speak other languages.”
“I have to read it in its original tongue. Translations generally don’t do the original justice,” Satan was still trying to think of an appropriate response when Mc spoke again, “Question though: Why did you say that in Arabic?”
“I… I fell into that habit awhile ago.”
“I thought a lot of demons knew different languages.”
“Well, I don’t do this around other demons. I don’t care what most of them think of me…” Satan cut off as the waiter came back with their drinks.
Mc sat in thought for a second before realization dawned on her, “Oh, was it because of…” her face fell before she could continue her thought.
“Hmmm? Did you say something?”
“No, just a stray thought that slipped out.”
“Hmmm… Well, do you want to tell me more about yourself?”
“Only if you tell me more about yourself.”
“Sounds fair to me. We can trade off asking questions.”
“Okay,” Mc seemed very excited by the prospect, and Satan found it infectious. The questions were a bit stilted at first, but they slowly fell into a comfortable space. Though the answers Mc gave, it seemed she was the same person essentially, but a lot more educated, even more opinionated, and with a different upbringing. He found the fact her personality had remained intact very interesting as well as relieving. He found the fact she was now an angel not as terrible as he thought it’d be. Sure, she spoke about saving souls and bringing people to the light, but with what she’d done for him and his brothers, it seemed a perfect fit. He’d always known she was a really good person. At times it had almost made him try to give up on their relationship, not wanting to corrupt her, but also feeling it in his very nature too. Now however, he didn’t necessarily feel that for her. She was an angel and it took a lot to corrupt an angel. He didn’t feel any animosity towards her and found her to be a lot like Simeon in her regard to demons. He found himself thanking Simeon for keeping her intact. If they couldn’t give her back to me, this is probably the next best thing.
They were both surprised when Mc’s DDD rang, a call from Luke asking if she’d be back in time for dinner. While she was on the phone, Satan received a similar call from an annoyed Beel telling him it was time to come home. Lucifer wouldn’t let him eat until he’d gotten home. They both got off the phone at the same time.
“I… actually have to go. I hadn’t realized how late it’s gotten.”
“I didn’t either. I have to go as well. There’s a hungry Avatar of Gluttony at home and a stupid Avatar of Pride that won’t let him eat until I get back.”
“Well, I really had a good time tonight. We should do this again sometime.”
“I agree,” Satan smiled, “Today was amazing.”
Mc smiled and blushed a bit, “I’ll text you later then?”
“Definitely. Bye!”
Mc waved cutely and then started running off in the direction of the castle. Satan watched her until she was out of sight, smiling softly the whole time.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
So, yeah. Arabic love poems make me live. I apologize if the translations are weird. I literally found them on a twitter post someone had posted on Tumblr. Here’s the link: https://twitter.com/rosewatwr/status/1292487129793208320?lang=en
Can we also take a moment to talk about how absurd it is that Satan, of all people, was having trouble eating properly with a knife and fork?! Are you kidding me?
Part Sixteen
#obey me#obey me!#obey me satan#obey me! swd#obey me belphie#aspenflower17#finding you#obey me fluff#obey me angst#obey me mc#obey me satan/mc#obey me satan x mc#obey me long fic#obey me swd#can you guys believe it's part 15?!#also#there was a part I was going to add on that was pretty angsty and Read My Heart came on shuffle when I was writing it
33 notes
·
View notes
Video
youtube
In 1993, Billy Idol--yes, that Billy Idol--went completely mad and made an electronic album full of futuristic themes, samples, and techno beats. Many consider Cyberpunk one of the worst albums of all time, but on this week’s installment of Great Albums, we provide a somewhat more positive approach. Check out the video, or read the transcript below the break!
Welcome to Passionate Reply, and welcome to Great Albums! In this installment, I’ll be taking a look at an artist one might not normally associate with the usual “pantheon” of synthesizer jockeys I usually talk about: Billy Idol. Initially known as the frontman of punk outfit Generation X, Idol found success as a solo artist in the early 1980s, fusing tough-as-nails punk aesthetics with a lavish, almost camp sense of glam, and his visually arresting pop-rock made him an MTV-friendly star of the “Second British Invasion.” While one couldn’t fairly argue that Idol was an “electronic musician,” his early work does contain moments of mild electro-curiosity, perhaps most notably the mercurial ballad, “Eyes Without a Face.”
Music: “Eyes Without a Face”
But despite the minor synth touches of the hit single “Eyes Without a Face,” few in the 1980s could have possibly expected the turn Idol’s career would eventually take by the time of his 5th studio LP: 1993’s Cyberpunk. Cyberpunk is, of course, an album with a reputation that precedes it, and that reputation is not a particularly good one. Cyberpunk is a deeply fraught album, which commercially underperformed upon release, and did even worse in the eyes of critics, with the magazine Q dubbing it the 5th worst album of all time. In the nearly 30 years since the album’s release, opinions on it don’t seem to have softened that much, either. But as with everything I choose to talk about, I think Cyberpunk is worth listening to. I think it’s a daring and challenging work of art, and one that stands on its own terms when approached head-on. Whether you’re familiar with this album or not, I encourage you to give it a fresh listen, and a fair shake.
Music: “Wasteland”
Perhaps the most immediately apparent feature of Cyberpunk is its increasingly electronic soundscape, including a prominent sample-based hook on the track “Wasteland.” The album was created in less than a year, and chiefly through use of computers and digital audio software, which Idol evidently found easier to explore and use than earlier forms of music technology. I’m partial to the argument that sees the use of digital software as perfectly compatible with the famed DIY ethos of punk, and hence, not far from Idol’s wheelhouse at all. In the 1990s, computers were still something that far from everyone owned, but in our contemporary world of Soundcloud rappers on seemingly every street, it’s easier to accept the notion of computer music as a grassroots, egalitarian field where even the unskilled are welcome--perhaps even moreso than punk ever was, in the 20th Century. This is one sense in which I think Cyberpunk has aged better than anyone could have possibly imagined. Besides pushing the texture of Idol’s music into new territory, Cyberpunk is also a fairly risky album structurally, opening with a sort of manifesto being read, and peppered with brief interludes between its tracks proper.
Music: “Interlude 3”
It’s only fitting that an album so concerned with the bleeding edge of technology might also try to push the boundaries of the still-fresh CD age. Liberated from the confines of designing chiefly for vinyl, artists like Idol were empowered to create CDs that ostensibly had 20 “tracks,” with no need for empty grooves to separate these brief interludes from the album’s major compositions. This avant-garde touch adds significant amounts of texture to the album, and, dare I say, a sense of world-building. Undoubtedly, one main reason why this album was so poorly received at the time is that it is, quite simply, not what one expects a Billy Idol record to sound like--at least, with the possible exception of its second single, “Shock to the System.”
Music: “Shock to the System”
“Shock to the System” feels like something of an orphan in the tracklisting of Cyberpunk. While tracks like “Wasteland” certainly maintain a rough-edged rock mentality about them, and could never be confused for straightforward techno floor-fillers, “Shock to the System” feels more like it was tacked onto the album just so that it would have something that appealed to those who exclusively prefer Idol’s earlier style--and, given that most of Idol’s greatest hits compilations tend to include “Shock to the System” and nothing else from Cyberpunk, this may have worked. Cyberpunk, as a genre, is often concerned with political themes--its great literary progenitor, William Gibson, once said that “the future is already here, but it’s unevenly distributed,” epitomizing the extent to which the intersection between technology and class is a central issue in cyberpunk media. “Shock to the System” is the most overtly political track on Cyberpunk, inspired by the wave of riots that broke out in Los Angeles following the acquittal of police officers alleged to have used excessive force in the arrest of a Black man, Rodney King. While the role of computers in daily life has changed a great deal since the 1990s, police brutality and anti-Blackness have sadly remained quite similar.
Few have commented on the perhaps uncomfortable implications of Idol’s dramatization of the LA riots from outside, which seems to transmute the scene into one of high-tech fantasy while largely eliding over the racial implications of why people were rioting in the first place--something that seems particularly strange when one learns how upset members of the underground “cyberculture” were about the alleged co-opting and appropriation of their culture. Some have characterized Idol as an honest appreciator of cyberpunk who just wanted to make art that engaged with its ideas, and others more cynically consider him a profiteer who thought he could commercialize a more palatable version of the counter-culture. While the latter hypothesis may well be true, I’m not sure if it can rightfully be said that Idol had “no right” to mine cyberculture for inspiration, particularly since cyberculture has often encouraged amateur participation. Still, as a sometime fan of the literary genre myself, I’m tempted to agree with those who have questioned how deep Idol’s understanding of cyberpunk actually was, particularly when faced with tracks like “Neuromancer.”
Music: “Neuromancer”
In William Gibson’s novel of the same name, Neuromancer is a super-advanced AI with the ability to preserve people’s personalities in virtual reality...though you probably wouldn’t have guessed any of that from this track. Many who interviewed Idol seemed to think he had a weak grasp on the finer points of cyberculture, and even Gibson himself, upon meeting Idol, failed to take him seriously. Still, I don’t think it’s entirely fair to draw a line in the sand, as some have done, and say that Idol was particularly, individually, responsible for the dilution of cyberpunk ideals, as presented by authors like Gibson. While it may be easy to poke fun at the clownish, overwrought figure of Idol, as the embodiment of people who love books they don’t understand, it’s not like that many people owned this album. I think the success of popular films like Blade Runner and The Matrix has done much more to simplify and proliferate ideas cribbed from Gibson.
But however you feel about this, it’s clear that Cyberpunk was an album that ended up appealing to nearly no-one--it alienated Idol’s existing fans with its stylistic diversions, as well as feeling too commercial and inauthentic to cyberpunk enthusiasts. Something else that I haven’t seen mentioned in discussion of this album is the fact that Billy Idol really wasn’t the first to combine the ideas of cyberpunk and music. By the early 1990s, industrial acts like Front 242 and Front Line Assembly had already been making electronic music about cyber brain implants for years, albeit largely underground and often unnoticed by rock-focused critics. I can’t help but think that the prior existence of this stuff was yet another factor that caused Cyberpunk’s failure to thrive. Compared to the electronic body music scene, Cyberpunk comes across as less subtle, less insider, and much more surface-level.
The cover art of Cyberpunk has attracted nearly as much derision as the associated music. The image of Idol’s face bleeds and distorts “into” and “against” a gridlike field, perhaps the greenish terminal of an early computer screen, a representation of the hacker figure entering the virtual world of cyberspace, and identity blurring along those lines. With its wobbly image distortion and queasy complementary colour palette of yellow and purple, it instantly evokes not only cyberpunk aesthetics generally, but more particularly the fusion between cyberpunk and another popular aesthetic of the early 90s: psychedelia, which experienced a substantial resurgence around this time, related to rave culture and its embrace of hallucinogenic party drugs. So-called “cyberdelic” themes abound on the album as well, particularly on the hypnotic “Adam In Chains,” a track that sounds less like 80s New Wave, and more like 90s New Age.
Following the release and subsequent panning of Cyberpunk in the 1990s, Billy Idol went silent for over a decade. While he claimed that his disinterest in making new music was rooted moreso in mismanagement by Chrysalis Records than it was the album’s failure, it’s very tempting to look for a correlation here. Over the years, Idol was often asked if he ever planned to make more electronic music, and consistently claimed that he was chiefly interested in guitar-centric rock, while never completely trashing his vision for Cyberpunk. True to his word, when Idol finally did return to music with 2005’s Devil’s Playground, he delivered on his “classic” sound, and he’s continued to do so ever since.
Music: “Scream”
My favourite track on Cyberpunk is its lead single, the total showstopper “Heroin.” “Heroin” is actually a cover of a song by the seminal Velvet Underground, and it’s everything I think a cover ought to be: exciting, bizarre, and capable of taking something familiar and kicking it into a whole new territory. What’s the point of covering something without changing it and doing something a bit different? “Heroin” is naturally one of the most psychedelic-oriented tracks on the album, being a cover of a drug-themed 1960s classic, as well as one of the tracks with the most influence from dance genres like techno, boasting a very appealing extended outro that makes it feel like a 12” remix. While I think Cyberpunk is a fascinating album, “Heroin” is the one track I think really crosses the bridge from being interesting to being, quite simply, good, and it’s something I’m much more inclined to sit down and listen to recreationally. That’s everything for today--thanks for listening!
Music: “Heroin”
11 notes
·
View notes
Note
Just wanted to drop by and say that I’m sorry for the stress you are experiencing at college. Hope things slow down for you and you get to have a break soon!
If I may, can I ask about general information about your OCs and the story, the Porcelain King, I believe it is call? (It can be just even rambles about characters and stuff if you don’t want to get into it all). The character(s) look really cool! Hope you have a good day!
:,D thank you so much anon, that's so sweet of you!!
And ehehehe I'd LOVE to talk about my stories!! I love my characters so much, I could ramble on about em forever, it's literally my favorite thing ever LOL. In fact, I'm working today on revising a chapter of Porcelain King for class tomorrow, so perfect timing!
Lemme give you the basics to start, while trying to avoid spoiling the major storyline points. Porcelain King is the first installment in a fantasy series that takes place in a universe called Alora, where the forces of nature are sentient god-like beings called Rift Lords. The series focuses on the perspective of these Rift Lords, exploring the psychology and culture of immortals and their unique experiences with trauma, grief, memory, purpose, and so on.
Azurifel (he/him) is the star of Porcelain King, who begins the story as an apprentice to the god of nightmares. The book is all about his personal downward spiral due to his unwillingness to heal from trauma in his past and change his destructive habits, and the far-reaching effects this has on the world and everyone who cares about him. It's a pretty heavy story, honestly, and it deals with some very serious topics, but I really wanted to explore the psychology of a character who from any other perspective would be considered the villain—not to excuse their actions and be like "aw they're just misunderstood!", but to examine how easy it is, how human it is, to become set in unhealthy ideas and to go down the wrong path.
If you've ever seen the show Infinity Train (HIGHLY recommended!!), season 3 did a fantastic job of this with Simon. He's shown with all his likeable and good qualities right alongside his really bad and destructive ones, and though the audience is rooting for him to improve and redeem himself and he has plenty of chances to do so, it's his own choices to refuse to change that hurt Grace and Hazel and eventually lead to his own destruction. That's what I'm trying to do with Azurifel and Porcelain King, just on a larger scale.
Azurifel is a really, really fun character to write, too! He's funny and clever and charismatic, and his creativity and intelligence makes it really enjoyable to see him outwit other characters and solve problems. He's curious and driven and capable, this mans can literally do anything he sets his mind to, and he's got fantastic hair and a great sense of style, too. He's someone you really want to root for, who you really want to like, but he's also very, very deeply flawed (which is also very fun to write lol). He sabotages all his meaningful relationships, he lashes out at those who try to help him, he gets in the way of his own schemes by being impulsive and confrontational, and he's got a whole lot of unresolved hate balled up inside of him. That's not even to mention all the murders!
Basically, he's a problems man out here causing problems!
Other fun characters from the story include: Icellus, the god of nightmares who is totally overwhelmed trying to corral and train two apprentices who hate each other; Yehennis, Azurifel's long-suffering and sarcastic advisor from when he takes over a human kingdom; Thalara, the goddess of memory who owns a giant library and tells bad jokes; and Laurel, Azurifel's wife who has even cooler hair than he does and who he's madly in love with (until things go very, very wrong)
Thanks for letting me ramble, anon! I wanna draw and share more about these guys and this story here, from memes to serious art to character profiles, so hopefully I'll have more free time to make art soon! My "Porcelain King" tag should have all my previous and future posts about this particular story, and my "alora" tag will have everything from the series and it's related characters and world. And, uhh, if anyone would ever like to read the first couple chapters of the book, it's still a draft but I'd be happy to share!
#i love u anon 💖💖💖 ur so sweet 🥺#porcelain king#azurifel#alora#emma writes#my ocs#sorry this took a while to answer--it was a lot to write lol
7 notes
·
View notes
Text
2020 Fic Recap
I really like writing these and 2020 has been a HELL of a year, so here we go lmao. It’s been a wild ride for sure
Total wordcount: 88 109 words (note: I’m subtracting the ‘sorry I didn’t finish this, here’s a summary of the remaining plot’ that I published for a fic in a previous fandom from this since it’s not relevant here). Overall I wrote less than last year, but given all that happened in terms of the world and personally and fandom-wise and all of it, I don’t feel too bad about it lmao. I also have a lot of WIP words of half-finished things and some planning and such so I feel okay with this
Favours, 4906 words, posted Jan 4
This was a weird one cause this is a two chapter reader insert fic, the same story but told with both Phasma and Hux. I originally wrote this for Phasma, but later decided it would be easy to tweak into a Hux story (which it was lmao) and figured people might like that, so I did both. I had fun doing it, even if this is kind of a very small niche ship and trope wise
Know Your Shadow, 5022 words, posted Feb 16
Ah yes, here we are, the first foray into renben, a ship I had NO idea would grab me so hard but here we are lmao. I’m not done with them either yet, don’t you worry. There’s something about the corruption angle I really like, also Ren is HOT, and it’s also interesting to think about Kylo truly getting to find himself and be who he wants to be. Canon didn’t really satisfy on this, but the concept still interests me and it’s what had me writing this fic. Also, Ben losing his virginity to an older man like Ren is just *chef’s kiss*
Public Indecency, 3719 words, posted Mar 1
And my second renben! This was partially inspired by art and partially by just the idea of not giving one single fuck, and how thrilling that must be for someone like Ben to experience. Ren and the KOR truly do not give a shit and it’s really beautiful in a way. Plus some hinting at found family with the KOR. Ngl, Ben/Kylo finding his place and acceptance with the KOR makes me so Soft and there’s so many words I could write about it. Plus public sex is very hot lmao
Beautiful, 3254 words, posted Mar 8
Back to kylux, and this one was an old WIP I started back when the prompt was first posted on KHK in like 2019 or something. I got stuck on it and then left it for a while. I was digging through my old WIPs, looking for something that might catch my interest and boom, this one did, so I finished it and then posted it. I quite like the fic and it’s a bit more in the ~classic~ style. It’s also always a good feeling to get an old WIP done lmao
Choose Your Destiny, 5077 words, posted Mar 20
More renben and this was my fix it fic for ROKR vol 4. I talked about this more on twitter at the time and why I found the story as it was unsatisfying, but ultimately it’s really just a case of rushed writing and playing into established bad writing (e.g. showing a fall from grace by having someone kill someone eviler than themselves). I also really liked Ren and I felt like Kylo didn’t really get to have enough agency in like... any of it. His motivations were weirdly absent as well, despite this being ostensibly about him. So I wrote this, which I think handled how the story should have gone a lot better and, plus, it’s got smut!
(Okay and the rest are behind a cut for length)
Show of Devotion, 2479 words, posted Mar 28
Renben once again and this time, I mean, it’s all inappropriate use of lightsabers lmao. I was looking at the Ren and was like ‘wow that is SO phallic’ and then the horny brain turned on and, well, here we are. I also wanted a side of found family with the KOR and I think got that with this. It’s horny. It’s fun. What more could one want?
Aural, 2729 words, posted May 12
Okay this one... I have absolutely no excuses for lmao. I’m not even sure where the inspiration came from, I just remember I was in an online work meeting that was boring and the entire sequence of events played itself out in my head. It was all I could do to focus on work for the rest of the day and not immediately write this cursed creation lmao. The worst part was I’d been totally blocked on writing since March and this, THIS, was what eventually broke out of me. In case you haven’t read this one, it’s ear sex. Hux’s dick, Kylo’s ear. No, I don’t know the logistics either. But hey, I had a blast with it, both in terms of writing it and the reactions lmao. Someday I gotta write a follow up involving a nose too
Missed Chances, 10 749 words, posted Jun 7
Ah yes, this is the point where my renben met my kylux and created this absolutely enormous peanut butter cup of a fic lmao. It really was supposed to be like half the length it was, but alas, it was not. Also cockblocking kylux was SO hard, they wanted to fuck SO bad, but I had to stop them, the story demanded it lmao (and people in the comments were MAD, which is always excellent). It’s also when my renben series really started to have like, an overarching plot (aside from the modern au fics which I’ll talk about later). I even still have more instalments planned
Free Use, 6971 words, posted Jun 23
Another one that turned out far longer than initially planned, and also my most popular fic this year! I’m both surprised and not cause like. It’s a complete smut fest + my heavy headcanoning of the personalities of the KOR. People like smut, but I also feel it’s kinda niche considering how deep I’m in for the KOR lmao. So idk, I guess the smut won out. I did have a lot of fun with this one and there’s a lot of characterization thought put into each KOR, so it was really nice to see people loving that as much as I did. Canon gave us crumbs, but I just used them to make meatballs
Eat You Up, 1573 words, posted Jul 5
There’s not a lot to this one, it’s really just renben rimming cause the sexual dynamic with renben is so fun. Kylo/Ben is inexperienced yet eager and depraved enough to impress Ren, which is something considering I think of Ren as Very Experienced lmao. I really do love this ship; it’s a lot of fun to play with
In the Vents, 2002 words, posted Aug 3
Ah and this was my first piece for the stuck inside event on twitter, which I had a lot of fun with. Stuck fetish is one I’ve always wanted to explore, but never had any concrete ideas for. This event led to me finally getting to have Kylo stuck in a wall (plus more as well), which was fun. Also I spent far too long thinking about Hux’s vent contraption set up cause I knew he would never let Millie go anywhere that might hurt her, so I had to come up with a way to make the vent safe and here we are lmao. Hux being an engineer and also the most extra cat owner in existence worked out very well indeed. This was also the start of my creativity boom near the middle-end of the year that uh kinda burned out in a not so great way, but I’ll talk about that later lmao
Distraction, 3658 words, posted Aug 6
Another for the stuck inside event and another kylux/renben sandwich! Also featuring the KOR this time! Listen... it’s a gangbang, it’s got renben, it’s got kylux, it’s got Kylo getting stuffed from all ends... this is the kind of fic that, to me, is pure indulgence lmao. I had a tremendous amount of fun with it
Entrapped, 3484 words, posted Aug 8
So this was also for the stuck inside event (yes, I wrote 3 fics in about a week lmao - I don’t know how I did it either) and it’s darker than the sort of things I usually write. I enjoyed exploring something like this though, something outside my usual purview. It didn’t perform super well, but tbh the dark ones rarely do so lmao
Pit Stop, 1505 words, posted Aug 31
Welp, this is just an excuse for watersports lmao. I like piss, what can I say? And I’ve done it to kylux, so I had to do it to renben, and the modern au ‘need to pee on a road trip’ seemed like the perfect opportunity for it. Not much to say for it really
The Deal, 2431 words, posted Sep 3
Ah and this one here was the first for the throwback event I ran on twitter! The event itself ended up kind of being tainted by drama from one singular person who kind of ruined it by being a jerk for literally no good reason, but I’m not going to talk too much about that. Even with that, I still greatly enjoyed it and this piece might be my favourite from it as a whole. Kylo Amidala, political scandals, neither of them being nice... ahhhh yes, it definitely brought me back lmao
Devotion, 1929 words, posted Sep 10
Another for the throwback event, this time with Emperor and Hound dynamics which, unf, yes, I will literally never get tired of it. I really had fun with every fic from this event and this one was great because I so rarely get to write real action scenes, even if they’re in a flashback here. That and the dynamic itself really made it fun
To Be Wanted, 10 473 words, posted Sep 16
Ah yes, and here is my KBB for the year! I did a minibang this time, as, well, everything was going horribly wrong around the time of sign ups and I thought a mini would be more realistic. I think I was right on that and I’m glad I did it, even if I was torn at the time. The idea itself is one I’d been thinking about for a while. I can’t remember if I thought of it after seeing the leaks for tros or after watching the movie itself, but it’s been with me for a while and while I dithered over whether or not to sign up this year, the idea came back and was just perfect for a minibang. Plus I got an absolutely amazing and wonderful partner, which is really what makes the experience of doing bangs so great. I love this fic, I LOVE the art for it, and the whole experience was definitely a highlight to 2020 as a whole, both overall and in terms of my fandom/writing experience this year
Floss Me, 2033 words, posted Sep 21
My third for the throwback event and also the dental fetish fic I’ve wanted to write for a while now lmao but could never figure out a scenario for. As some of you may remember, 2018-2019, I went through some pretty horrific dental stuff and ultimately I think it kinda gave me a fetish lmao. Also I feel like there may or may not have been a kinky flossing prompt on one of the prompt sites at some point, but I looked everywhere and couldn’t find it so. But anyway, it was a fun fic for a kink I think is quite underrated tbh
The Cost of Certainty, 2541 words, posted Sep 25
My fourth and final piece for the throwback event, and this one is also a contender for my favourite piece from that event. I have always loved the idea of Hux being a serial killer and this was a perfect excuse to write it. I’d also recently finished a rewatch of Hannibal and, well, you can see where this came from lmao. I love writing tension and it was just very fun all around. I almost wish I’d done something like this as a long fic but tbh I don’t think I would’ve enjoyed writing it as much
Huxloween Drawings, 676 words, posted Nov 1
So this isn’t a fic but rather the drawings I did for huxloween, but people wanted them on ao3, so posted they are. Now, I mentioned above that I had this massive creative boom in Aug-Sep, but that it burned out rather badly. This is when that happened. I got into this place where I just... felt like everything I made wasn’t wanted or needed in the fandom. That everything I like is so unpopular at this point that I should just give up and leave. That I’ve spent all this time and energy over the years trying so desperately to get people engaged and so few ever cared and I just... ugh. It was bad. It was really bad and definitely partly fuelled by the bullshit that someone brought up regarding the throwback event (and I still believe that they are the sole cause of it’s poor reception). I, uh, am doing better now and still working through it all but it was a really rough time. But I found myself still wanting to be creative so I decided to draw. I am not good at drawing. I am not an artist. But that’s what made it fun: I went into each drawing knowing it wasn’t gonna look great. That wasn’t the point. So I never got upset about it. I think it helped me a lot tbh and I did really enjoy it and I’m glad I did it
Unconventional, 7243 words (in progress), updated Dec 20, first posted Nov 18
So the next part of me trying to fix the bullshit in my brain creativity-wise was to post the first chapter to this fic. This is a piece I’ve been working on since 2016-2017 (I don’t remember exactly when, but it was pre-TLJ, and I’ve gotten a new computer since so I don’t have the original creation date of the document) but I could just... never get a plot together for it and ever since I abandoned a fic in my old fandom (and this year I finally posted the ‘sorry this isn’t getting finished, here’s a closure summary’ chapter), I’ve been hesitant to post WIPs before being at least 80% done. So I said fuck it, I’m gonna post this and not be scared. Is this fic complete? Nope, but the plan is starting to come together. Do I know exactly where it’s going? Nope, but I don’t need to. Is it self-indulgent as all hell? Absolutely. I love this fic and I love this story and I love the concepts within it. So I posted it and tbh, it really helped. And I think this, combined with my writing break where I drew for 31 days straight lmao were really my saving graces here
Test Run, 3661 words, posted Dec 31
And now my final fic of the year! Which is a ship I honestly wasn’t super into (I don’t hate it, it just generally doesn’t do much for me) but then I did that thing where I thought ‘hmm but could it be written in a way that I am into?’ which, in my experience, always leads to me writing exactly that. Which is what I did here lmao. I’m pretty happy with it though and despite it being very strange to write, as I really had to work to get these two to get where they were going lmao, I had fun with it. I honestly doubt I’ll write more of them, but I’m glad I wrote this one, and I think it’s a good experiment to close out the year with
What have I learned?
Honestly, this year was a clusterfuck lmao. 2019 wasn’t great for me either, but we all lived through this and it was certainly An Experience. I think what this year really helped me focus on was what made me happy. I ended up in some dark places and I don’t want to go there again. It feels repetitive to say that, once again, I have learned that writing what I want is key when I say that every damn year, but tbh I think 2020 underscored it even more so. Spite as a motivator, when used to much, smothers the spark of creativity and the joy of creation. The most important lesson I learned this year by far is to not let that take the driver’s seat. A dash here and there? That’s fine. But as your main motivator? That’s just not healthy. And I need to work to keep it from consuming me like it has been for too long
Goals for 2021?
So last year I didn’t set any hard goals and boy, is it a good thing I didn’t, cause I achieved none of them lmao. I didn’t write more words (though I did write more individual fics, and the word count gap between this year and last is about the size of the difference between a big bang fic and a mini bang fic so really, I think I did okay), I didn’t even write a single fic for BTHB, and, to be really honest, I did not manage to keep my love for writing alive the whole time. I was in a really dark place a few times this year, but that drop in Sep-Oct was the worst from a creative standpoint. I feel like I’m mostly out of it now, even if I still have some work to do maintaining it. I’m hopeful for the future in that regard. The only thing I really did accomplish was that I feel positively towards all the fics I wrote; I’m happy and proud of all of them
So what is my goal? Honestly, I feel like every year I have to relearn the lesson of ‘write what you want, have fun, be self-indulgent, fuck expectations, etc.’ and my goal this year is to not have to relearn that again, but to keep that energy and carry it with me for the whole year. I realize I may have to put some effort in there, but I’m okay with that. I don’t know what 2021 has in store, but if I can just keep my passion alive and not fall into that pit again, I’m calling it a win
#kylux#renben#hey I'm not late this year lmao#it's been an interesting one that's for sure#anyway I'm happy with all my fics this year which is good#but I need to keep working at keeping my head in the right space#which will likely take some practice#but I'm off to a good start#and I have good feelings about the future in that regard#so here's to a 2020 full of writing about kylo getting railed to high heaven#and to a 2021 full of the same!#my fic#long post#shut up nerd
32 notes
·
View notes
Text
Sorry I haven't been updating this blog that often. I mostly just share short little updates on twitter. Cazza being around makes me less compulsive about keeping up with social media.
Cazza has a vet appointment in a little over a week and she'll be getting a checkup and shots.
Her tag also arrived in the mail so there's the relief of people being able to call my number if she gets lost somehow.
I am finally working on my childhood computer. The one that's been in pieces for years and years that I've been not strong enough to work on. Well now I am. Only thing I need to do now is get off all the rust on the metal case with CLR (the hardest part honestly) and get a compatible power supply and I'll be able to see how healthy the parts are. I know already that the floppy drive works because I installed it into Big Boi to work with the stinky floppy disks. I'm most worried about the ports on the motherboard because they were exposed to the outside air for the ten plus years the computer was kept outside, and the hard disk. Because if the hard disk is dead all the old childhood games and paint art and stuff will be gone.
Still remorseful that my mom recycled my teenage computer without my consent but as I was recently clearing out some backups from that time and found MSN messenger chatlogs where I got groomed at 13, maybe that era being lost forever is for the best. That's the era where I experienced the worst of that.
I'm still feeling stressed about the situations involving my housemates. It's something I have no control over and can't fix though so I try to just ignore it.
Still wishing my creative strength and drive would "return" but the more I think about it the more I'm realizing that this is my undiagnosed ADHD catching up on me and I'm not going to be functionally consistent with doing things, even for fun and recreation, unless I'm receiving help in regards to that. Annoying that my psychiatrist seems convinced we have to only work on "more important things" first. I personally think my PTSD would be easier to handle if I was medicated for what is quickly becoming apparent as ADHD which would allow me to focus more on creative endeavors that while I have plenty of ideas I just can't get past the executive dysfunction to actually focus on them. The whole notion of triaging a disorder over a developmental condition frustrates me because they're all impacting my brain and I don't see why they can't work on things that aren't as immediately pressing or dangerous.
I feel that stopping my dysfunction from holding back the things I want to do and create will give me a better headspace to work through trauma.
I usually love participating in april fool's day but for some reason this year I just couldn't. I even had an idea for a silly little easy to edit bait and switch video but I just didn't have the drive to make it.
Cazza does wonders helping me with my depression and loss and lack of a will to live but as wonderful as she is she can't cure executive dysfunction.
I will say though I do feel I have been getting more things done with her now though. Like my technology spring cleaning.
She's lying next to me in my bed, her head on my lap and fast asleep as I write this. She is legitimately the most beautiful little darling in the whole wide world and part of me wishes I could just stare at her and not do anything else.
My friend Will is going to be working on something cool and HoD-related for me soon. Which I am excited for. I'm also hoping that I can finally get back into streaming games on twitch.
That's all I can think for now. I don't know why I've moved my more memey jokes and casual updates over to twitter. Maybe I just get more interaction on there. But I'll still try to keep you guys up to date.
2 notes
·
View notes
Text
Charming Man
Steve Harrington x Reader
Word Count: 5, 618
Warnings: Cursing, Unwanted Male Advances
Author’s Note: I hit 2K!!! I had no idea I would ever get to such a milestone, much less in such a short amount of time! Thank you to everyone whose joined me on this tour of an ocean of flavor!
Tag List: @hotstuffhargrove @moonstruckhargrove @carolimedanvers @alex--awesome--22 @thechickvic @lilmissperfectlyimperfect @so-not-hotmess @agentsinstorybrooke @sunflowercandie @kaliforniacoastalteens @songforhema @spidey-pal @mickmoon
Steve Harrington was a nuisance. He didn’t know when to quit. If he asked you one more question about the stupid Wham! album, you were going to scream. But there you, with your big, fake smile that made the corners of your mouth hurt, nodding along to whatever Harrington was droning on about. You thought he was still contemplating the choice between the single and the whole record. He had made some comment about only needing the song Careless Whisper off the record and the salesgirl in you had tried to up sell him, suggesting buying the cassette and the single, to ensure that he didn’t need both. It was a terrible idea-singles were in essence, an awful to buy, but so was buying both the full cassette and the single, since it would cost twice as much than just buying the record. But you believed Harrington was just dumb enough to fall for the scheme. You’d gotten smarter boys to buy more than they needed. Last week, you’d been able to convince Keith to buy singles of a bunch of your favourite songs, purely because he was shamelessly trying to impress you. He failed to do so, but you might be getting a mix tape out of it, which wouldn’t be terrible. You collected mix tapes, especially mix tapes about broken hearts or first love. You planned to make an art installation with them, but for now they sat in a shoe box under your passenger seat.
“So, you think I should get the cassette and the single on record?” Steve asked, drawing you out of your thoughts. Your smile dropped slightly, trying to piece together what he was talking about.
You found it fast, nodding too enthusiastically “Yeah! I mean, between you and me, it’s a better deal...” you said, keeping your voice low as if it was a big secret what you were telling him.
“Is it?” Steve asked, crossing his arms over his chest, the record and tape still in hand, each poking out on either side of him. You stifled a yawn, nodding again. You’d been there since seven that morning and the mall was closing in an hour. You were beyond exhausted, but Tiffany Michaels called in sick, again, and so you had to cover again.
“Yeah!” you let your cheery tone fall away a bit, hoping the irritation slipping through would give him the hint to clear off. This interaction had been going on for a half hour now. It had started with him asking for record suggestions, which you took to mean ‘tell me the albums the popular hits on the radio are coming from’ and pattered off the top selling records from memory. You’d sold more copies of Madonna’s Like a Virgin in the past week than you could possibly keep track of, purely because people wanted the album with Material Girl or Like a Virgin or Into the Groove on it. Steve had gotten unsurprisingly interested in the album with Careless Whisper on it, as did most horn dog, wannabe players who came strutting into your store. You were more than happy to sell him the record and get on with your shift, but he wasn’t letting that happen.
“Cause, the full record’s like eight bucks.” He held up the tape “But the tape’s like six, plus three bucks for the single that’s like nine bucks, that’s more than the record.” He grinned, placing the tape on top of the single, handing them back to you as if they were yours.
You felt your face colour, in part because he’d taught you in your lie, but in part because he seemed genuinely proud of that mental math. “You’re...you’re right. I wasn’t thinking, sorry ‘bout that.” You said easily, shrugging as you placed the single back on the shelf and the tape into the plastic shopping basket on your arm. He’d caught you shelving tapes in the easy listening section half an hour ago and you weren’t allowed to shelf while talking to a customer, meaning you were forced to lug them around with you as Steve wandered, asking questions. And those things were heavy all lumped together! There had to be at least a hundred copies of Kate Bush’s Running Uphill and Whitney Houston’s Whitney Houston in your stupid basket!
“It’s cool, no biggie...I think I’ll just get the single, come back for the record if I like the song enough.” He decided with a small nod.
You grit your teeth. You wanted to scream about how singles were a waste of money and how you’d make no money on commission for that. Instead, you nodded “Great! If you just head to the counter, Michelle can check you. Enjoy your record!” you said, turning on your heel and practically rushing out of the stereo accessory section he’d dragged you to. You only had forty minutes to shelf all the tapes on your arm, or else you’d have to stay passed close to do it, which both your closing manager and you would hate.
“Hey, uh wait!” he called, chasing after you. You let out a small sigh, turning back with a painful smile. “I was sort of wondering, well maybe if you’d wanna maybe go out this weekend? They’re showing Dawn of the Dead at the theatre, I’ve heard it pretty good...” he rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly, eyes drifting to the ceiling instead to yours.
Your brows furrowed. You weren’t expecting this from him. But, of course, he was not the first boy to ask you out while you were at work. It was a distressingly common theme. You assumed that guys liked that you had to be nice to them, or that they didn’t realize that you had to be nice and assumed that you were flirting. “Oh...um I’m working this weekend...” you said, shuffling on your feet. Most of the time, when guys ask you out at work, they seemed so confident and cocky, it was easy to reject them. But Steve looked genuinely nervous and you couldn’t place why.
Steve’s smirk only grew, he leaned in closer, trapping you against a rack of blank tapes “Aw come on, have a little fun, come out with me instead.” He said. You’d heard this shtick before, Billy Hargrove had tried it on you just a couple weeks prior. Having it come from Steve ‘The Hair’ Harrington, made you want to puke. Because you knew exactly where he’d been. With Billy, it was unclear; lots of girls lied about what they did and didn’t do with that boy. But everyone knew who did what with Harrington. You weren’t too interested in being put on a list.
“Yeah, I actually need the money so…no.” you replied, pushing out from under his arm and away from him. Steve stumbled back, shocked and a little mortified by how you’d reacted to his flirting.
Steve’s head dropped, his gaze focusing on his scuffed converse before he looked at you again “Yeah...yeah no that’s cool, no biggie. Some other time then...” he said awkwardly, brushing the singular strand of brown hair from his face. You didn’t say anything, what were you supposed to say? That you thought he was a douche and had zero interest in doing anything with him? That kind of language could get you fired. And you needed this job, you desperately needed a car for next year.
“I’ll see you around?” Steve tried awkwardly, his smile turning into a frown fast as you didn’t respond.
“Yeah sure.” You nodded “I gotta go shelf this stuff before the mall closes.” You headed back towards the easy listening section, trying not to cringe at the awkward interaction you’d just experienced. It was so very awkward! It was more fun to reject assholes who treated you like a well dressed object to leer and gawk at. Sam Goody didn’t have uniforms per say, simply a dress code to uphold; it was encouraged to look cool, hip, and young. As long as your shoes were black sneakers, your hair wasn’t fully in your face, and you could see your bottoms under your tiny apron, you were good. Which meant you chose your clothes carefully. Generally, you went with a patterned button down, which you could pop as many or as few buttons on as you want. That meant that you could be remembered by your male and female customers alike could either remember you by your name or as the chick with the great tits. It worked well.
But it also meant that guys like Steve Harrington talked to your chest.
And it was weird for Steve to talk to your chest! Especially since you and Steve had never had a conversation. Like ever. If you weren’t wearing a nametag, you’d be utterly shocked that he knew your name. Because he was the proverbial king of Hawkins and you were a nobody. Well, a nobody until someone wanted to use your employee discount. Then, suddenly you were the most popular girl in school. Hell, you should’ve gotten a job sooner, maybe you would’ve had a date to the spring formal last year.
Steve did buy the single. Even though he hated singles. Who wanted to listen to one song over and over again? Even if it had a B-side, it wasn’t worth the price. He bought it, he made sure to say that you helped him, and then he left. The mall was closing down, save the movie theatre, and he wanted to get home as soon as possible. That was so embarrassing. He didn’t even know why he tried, it wasn’t as if she had any pretence to him. All the other girls he’d been hitting on that summer were his age, they knew him and his style. They also knew about the most humiliating moment in his life, a lot of them were even there to experience it second hand. But you had only the rumours of his dickish tendencies to go off of. That wasn’t enough for anyone to work with.
But stupid Dustin had gotten it in his head that he had to get a girl, that Robin was the right girl. But Robin wasn’t the right girl, no way in hell. So he went in harder on trying to get a date. Every girl his age got hit on, he’d nearly got his ass beat by Justin Gardner after hitting on his girlfriend in front of him, but how was he supposed to know Justin was dating? Justin was a benchwarmer who couldn’t get a date if he paid them in school. Now suddenly he could get a hottie? Unbelievable.
It didn’t help that Dustin had a girlfriend now. And yes, it was embarrassing that Steve was jealous of a thirteen year old for having a girlfriend, he would never admit it out loud. But even though he didn’t believe that Suzie actually existed, it was slightly annoying that his dorky little friend could get a girlfriend and he couldn’t. He used to be able to get any girl he wanted! What happened? Did Nancy spread a rumour about him that he hadn’t heard yet? Was it because he lost a fight to both Billy Hargrove and Jonathan Byers? Or was it because he wasn’t going to college in the fall?
He was almost certain it was because he wasn’t going to school in the fall.
That and the dorky sailor outfit he had to wear at Scoops Ahoy!
The dumb Dixie cup hat and sailor shirt were totally throwing off his game. That’s why he was looking forward to going to the mall that day, out of uniform, to scope babes. He didn’t have much success, but he was a little bit excited to see you out of uniform. He’d seen you about a dozen times, all while you were at work, leaned over the counter, sometimes chewing on the end of a pen, sometimes laughing with coworkers or customers. You always looked so...well beautiful. He had to see it up close. And you just a beautiful up close, but it was obvious that you were uncomfortable too. Still, you were cute. He wished that you were a year older, that you already had all the context to his life. But what could he do? He wasn’t going back in there, not with you wandering around with your judgy eyes. It would be humiliating.
And he was already humiliating himself enough that summer.
You finished shelving the tapes in record time, mostly because the shop was empty and Michelle was thoroughly annoyed by your usual slow closes. You wanted to do a good job with your work and not rush the job, whereas Michelle just wanted to leave as fast as possible. After Sean, your least threatening manager, locked up the shop, the three of you all headed towards the exit. You rode your bike to work, since your mother almost never lent you the family car, but at night you felt less and less comfortable riding home. Sometimes Sean would offer you a ride, but ever since he and Michelle started hooking up, the rides got less and less frequent and when they did happen, Sean would spend the whole time complaining about the ambiguity of his relationship with Michelle. You didn’t take the rides home too often anymore. Not that one would be offered tonight, Michelle had latched herself onto his arm and had nuzzled so deep into his neck that you wondered if she could even see where she was going.
“You want a ride, Y/N?” Sean called as you exited into the parking lot. Sean’s burgundy pickup truck was parked so close to the doors and your legs were so tired. But taking the ride home meant that you’d either have to sit next to them on the front seat or in the trunk part with your bike. And neither option sounded too much better than peddling home.
“Nah, thanks though, I’d rather ride home.” You said with a smile, heading over to the bike racks and pulling the key out from around your neck and off your head, jabbing it into the padlock and clicking the lock open, wrapping the chain around the neck of your bike.
“You sure? It’s pretty dark already...” Sean replied, looking around the desolate parking lot, more concerned than he really needed to be.
“Baby, she said she’s fine.” Michelle said, resting a hand on his chest. Sean didn’t argue passed that and you turned on your bright bike light, swinging your leg over the seat and propped your foot on the peddle, pushing off.
You sped home, making it back to your house in record time. Your mother had left you a note by the door, explaining that she’d taken your younger sister to ballet class and she’d be home late. You crumpled up the note paper, tossing it into the waste paper bin by the powder room door, climbing the stairs and heading into the bathroom, turning on the hot water in your tub and letting it start to fill up. You were rifling through the pile of magazines next to your bed, trying to find the latest issue of cosmo you’d nicked from the corner store just a couple days ago.
Across town, Steve was hiding in his room. His father had ripped him a new one. Again. Turns out, his sailor suit was still laughable a month in to him having to wear it. He still wasn’t over the fact that Steve hadn’t gotten into college and he couldn’t get a better job than ice cream scooper part time. His standards of jobs in Hawkins was a bit too high, in Steve’s opinion. Still, his degrading of him at every turn was getting exhausting. He flopped on his mattress pitifully.
“This whole summer has been a nightmare…” you both muttered, you as you slipped into the steamy water, Steve as he kicked off his thick white socks.
Working at Sam Goody had many perks, like not having a stupid uniform and not smelling like spoiled food all the time, but you spent your time surrounded by assholes. You wanted to meet one nice guy. One guy who didn’t leer down your top and talk to your tits, who didn’t smirk at you or call you ‘baby’, ‘sugar’, or ‘honey’. Just one descent guy who’d treat you like a person instead of a sex doll. God, you would’ve said yes to Harrington if you weren’t working, at least at first. Once he pulled the macho, ‘I know you want me baby’ shit you were out completely. But for a second, when he was rambling on about Dawn of the Dead, you felt like you could stomach a night out or two with him
Meanwhile, Steve just wanted to feel like himself again. His whole last year of high school had been hell on his confidence. First, Nancy dumps him, then Billy Hargrove takes over his team and steals all his friends, then he didn’t get into college, and then Scoops Ahoy? It was all too much. He’d never felt like a loser in his life. He used to be liked, he used to be popular. And yeah, being popular didn’t really matter anymore, but for one last summer before everything changed on him, he wanted to be someone again. Just for a minute. And maybe that’s why he was acting like such an asshole. Because he needed some control over his life. He wished he could’ve gotten in under control when he was talking to the pretty girl in the record store, he made himself into such a douche. That wasn’t who he was, but she didn’t know that. God, he wanted to curl up into a ball and die.
You turned your head up to the ceiling, letting your sweaty neck stick to the cold tile behind your head. You didn’t want to go to work the next day, at least you had the morning shift. Tracey Lords would hopefully make into her shift that day. She hated opening shifts, so the pair of you often traded. You’d still have to stay behind if you got a bit of a rush, which you were expecting. Tomorrow was Friday, when the buses filled with the townies from the neighbouring towns and cities, all coming to bask in the free A/C and glorious shopping experiences. You hated Fridays, they always brought in the worst types of people, mostly shoplifters, who totally ruined your sales for the week. You vowed to stop stealing magazines from the Pick n’ Save after you saw your commission rates plummet after last Friday and a terrible group of greedy kids stole up your section.
Steve really didn’t want to go to the mall at all the next day, if only because he didn’t want to see you in his stupid sailor and hat, walking around like the geek of the week. He just wanted to hide away every shift. But the malls back hallways didn’t lead to any bathrooms, so he was forced to wander the mall like an idiot every time he needed to alleviate himself. He didn’t want you to see him like that. His confidence was already so low, he didn’t need to crumble up what was left of it.
Steve fell asleep that night with dreams of a face, undefined beyond a set of eyes, a nose, and a wide smile. No matter what he said in the dream, the person, a girl his dream decided for him, just smiled and laughed. The eyes were so deep and wide, they took up most of his memory of the dream, although he couldn’t even really place the colour of them, just that they looked at him so lovingly. The way he longed for someone to look at him. He woke up the next morning still in his sailor suit, with the eyes following him to work.
Across town, you woke up from a deep, dreamless sleep. You woke up well rested for the first time in weeks, it was as though someone slipped a sleeping pill in your bath water the night before and it sent you crashing into the pillow with your whole body ready and willing to sleep. You went into work happier than ever, high on the endorphins a good night’s sleep gave you.
Both you and Steve left for work at the exact same time that morning, unaware of your paths even crossing. You headed upstairs to meet Toby, who had the keys to unlock the store, and set to work straightening up the shop and opening your register for the day. Kim Rein sauntered in twenty minutes late, fifteen minutes before the mall opened and you tried not to give her too much side eye. Steve started his own open a level below, restocking cones and cups and filling his soap and sanitizer buckets under the counter.
Once the mall opened, you suffered through four hours of stupid people with stupid questions about terrible albums. You sold three copies of Kate Bush’s Running Uphill, which was an accomplishment for you, since her last album was the only popular due to the hilariously weird Wuthering Heights. You were bored by two in the afternoon, when Toby finally sent you on break. All you wanted was a damn Orange Julius and you’d pay any amount for one.
Likewise, Steve was very much over his shift around the same time when Robin finally agreed to let him go on his damn break. He just needed to get out of the stupid shop. He was going to go to the cheap vending machine, the one by the cafeteria bathrooms, to get a can of Coke. Both of you headed into the shopping mall, trying to avoid anyone you knew.
Unfortunately, you ran directly into Tommy Hanson.
Tommy Hanson was an asshole and a bully. He didn’t know how to treat anyone decently. He stepped all over people. Was it any wonder that Carol broke up with him at least twice a year? It just so happened that Carol dumped him during the summer.
And now he was standing in front of you, blocking your way to the sweet, sweet Orange Julius.
“Y/N, baby, looking foxy as always.” He said, running his tongue over his upper lip. He’d stolen that look from Billy Hargrove and it didn’t work for either of them.
“Tommy.” You replied, skirting passed him and into the short line, keeping your eyes on the board above the shop.
“Why you rushing off, baby?” he asked, following behind you “I just wanna talk for a second…” you didn’t reply, ignoring him as best you could. ”You’re stunning, you know that? Absolutely gorgeous…” his eyes ran over your body like a tongue; his gaze was thick and hot, it made you want to cringe and pull away.
“Thank you.” You said shortly, getting to the front of the line and ordering quickly.
“What’d you say we go into the back, fool around for a bit?” he asked in your ear. You grimaced, glaring at him before moving out of the way for the next person.
“Don’t make me puke, Hanson.” You snapped, grabbing your blended drink from the poor server having to watch the scene going on between you and Tommy.
“Aw come on, don’t be such a bitch, Y/N.” Tommy whined, grabbing your drink from your hands “You know you want to...”
You reached for your drink, but Tommy just pulled it away. God, he was such a damn child. “Tommy, give me back my drink.” You said sternly.
“Come with me, I’ll give it back when we’re done, you’ll need it more then anyway.” He replied cheekily.
Steve saw this scene going down from the vending machine. He contemplated going over there when Tommy first walked over; he knew that the guy had gotten pretty scummy since he started hanging out with Billy. But when he starting grabbing things from you and taunting you, Steve couldn’t help but go over there.
“Dude,” Steve said, grabbing the drink out of Tommy’s hand, hovering over him. “You wanna try to get a decent personality?”
You looked between the pair of them, trying to decide if you could run off while they were arguing. But you paid good money for that drink and you really wanted it. You realized quickly that Tommy wasn’t going to let this go, and you really couldn’t stand the kid as is. You made your move fast.
“Steve!” you gasped with a shrill giggle “There you are!” you walked over to him, taking the drink he offered shyly and wrapping an arm around his waist. “So are you gonna take me out this weekend or not?” you asked, batting your eyelashes up at him. Steve looked utterly startled, but he didn’t react poorly.
“Course, darling...” he cooed. Steve could’ve died; you made such a disgusted face at the nickname he would’ve happily melted into the tile and be mopped up by Larry the janitor. But you didn’t pull your arm away.
“Walk me back to work?” You asked sweetly. Steve nodded, not trusting himself to not say anything embarrassing. You waved to Tommy, letting Steve lead you away from him, taking a long sip from your drink. It was already melting, but it was still sweet and cold, so you didn’t mind. And Steve had helped you out, although somewhat unwillingly, which was certainly an improvement.
Steve looked back only once, but the look on Tommy’s face was priceless. He looked so annoyed and more than a little broken up about his snatching away of you. His ego hadn’t been this inflated since October of last year. He felt like he was on cloud nine, like he was finally himself again. And even when you let him go, he still felt good about himself.
“Thanks for the help, Harrington.” You bit out once you were far enough away from Tommy.
“Sure, no problem. You want me to walk you back upstairs or are you good?” Steve asked, cracking his can of New Coke. He didn’t love New Coke, but it was all the vending machine was serving and he was just desperate enough to drink it.
You sighed “No I’m alright, I’m still on break, so I’m just gonna go hide somewhere.”
“You can hide at Scoops.” Steve blurted. He mentally kicked himself in the ass, it was such a stupid idea. The upstairs stores had break rooms, you didn’t need to hide with him.
You raised an eyebrow, watching him carefully. Steve swallowed, finishing the thought “The place is busy enough as is and if Tommy walks in, well he already thinks something is happened with...us, he won’t try anything else.”
“Won’t your boss get mad if I’m in there, not eating ice cream?” you asked.
“Oh he’s never here. Me and Robin have keys so we switch between opening and closing. You’re totally good.” Steve explained, scuffing the toe of his shoe into the ground, making a black mark on the white and teal tiles.
“Robin...like Robin Buckley?” you asked, stopping dead in the middle of the hall.
“I think that’s her last name?” Steve replied, scrunching up his face in thought.
“Oh I can’t. She hates me. My friend Tammy told everyone in our sophomore year history class that she was weird and avoided her for like a month. I didn’t do shit, but you know, loyalties and shit.” You explained, running your hands through your hair, slightly embarrassed by the memory.
Steve thought for a moment, an idea slowly coming into view. “She won’t even know that you’re there, come on!” he said, grabbing your hand and dragging you off. You gasped, laughing as you ran to keep up with him.
Steve dragged you through the back halls and rooms leading behind the shops. You hadn’t been through the lower level’s back halls and they were much more expansive that the upstairs halls. The whole space still felt eerie, but much cooler than the upper level. Steve pulled you into one of the rooms and you spotted the nautical theming of the shop. Steve rushed and shut a divider themed with dark wood and glass bricks.
“There, she won’t know that you’re here and you can hide from Tommy. Easy.” Steve said proudly, hopping up on the ledge.
“Can’t she hear you talking to someone?” you chuckled, pulling out the awful plastic folding chair and sitting down.
“Eh, we’re busy enough for her to not notice or care. Probably think I’m talking to myself or something.”
You leaned back in your chair, letting the front legs of the chair raise into the air as you crossed your arms over your chest. “You talk to yourself a lot, Harrington?” you asked cheekily.
Steve shrugged “Only when I’m really trying to break something down.” He replied. You were surprised and a little refreshed by the honesty. You didn’t expect him to be honest with you; you expected him to lie or try to pull some cool line. It was nice that he wasn’t trying so hard.
“What about you? I bet you’re the stone silent type, keeping it all inside.” Steve added, leaning his elbows on his knees.
“You’re not wrong...” you grinned, cocking your head to the side. You let the front legs drop back down to the ground with a tinny smack, your arms unfurling themselves to balance yourself. “But I sing to myself all the time.”
Steve’s grin turned lopsided and you wondered what exactly what was going through his head. “Really?” he asked.
“Yeah...I find it calming. It helps me to focus my mind, sometimes it just a singular line of a song, over and over again until I get whatever I’m trying to do done.”
“Doing a lot of singing nowadays?”
You sighed “Pretty much...you doing a lot of talking?”
“All I do is talk now.”
You nodded to yourself, forcing the chair to turn towards Steve and centring yourself on it, resting your arms on your knees and looking up at him. “Alright, what’s happening with you?” you asked.
Steve turned away slightly “Ah geez...I mean haven’t you heard? I’m like the only guy who didn’t get into any colleges. I’m stuck here for another year, working and trying to get my shit together.” He ran his fingers angrily through his hair, ripping at the strands as if they hurt him personally.
“I mean...that fucking sucks. But you’ll be okay.” You replied “I mean, look on the bright side, you have another year to be something else.”
“What do you mean?” Steve asked, furrowing his brow.
“You get a fresh start in a world you already know. You don’t have to be the jerk everyone in school knew you as. And you don’t have to mope around either. You can just be...you.” You smiled to yourself over that answer. Steve had given you a hard puzzle to solve, and while you couldn’t solve it for him, you were glad to have an answer at all.
Steve chuckled, although he wasn’t sure why, nor did you. “Oh yeah? And who is me?” he asked.
You shrugged “I have no idea. I don’t think most people do.”
Steve’s expression changed to one you couldn’t read. He nodded to himself, leaning back onto the glass. He let out a deep sigh “Honestly? I don’t even know anymore...” That wasn’t a shock to you, but you didn’t say that out loud. Steve cracked a smirk “Who did you think I was?”
“Oh...I have no idea.” You leaned back in your chair, letting out a big breath “I didn’t really know you, just your reputation. I only knew the bad stuff, which made you seem like an asshole.”
Steve’s smile dropped and he looked away “Yeah...you aren’t the only one who thinks that...” he admitted sadly.
“But...I mean I didn’t have any proof till yesterday. That guy was a real asshole.” Steve’s face dropped further, but you didn’t try ease the blow you’d just sent him.
“Yeah...I’m sorry ‘bout that.” He muttered, looking up to finally meet your eye.
You nodded, sighing softly “It’s alright, no biggie. I get it now.” You said.
Steve found a small smile again “What do you think of this guy?” he asked, unashamed of the slightly embarrassing question.
You placed a finger on your chin, raising your eyes to the ceiling to truly think. “Hmm...I think I like this guy better.”
Steve smirked “Yeah?” he hopped off the ledge, inching towards you. You didn’t move, watching him stalk over to you.
“Just a little...” you pinched your finger and thumb together, showing an inch in between. “I’d like you more if you wore normal clothes.” Steve rolled his eyes, his hands coming cautiously to your face, pulling it up to kiss you. You didn’t resist his grab, easing yourself out of the chair, shoving your hands into your back pockets.
“Alright, what the hell is going on in there?!?!” The divider slammed against its sleeve violently and Steve snapped his head around. Robin was staring at you incredulously. She looked more than a little furious, but it melted away when you met her eye.
“Oh god, really dingus? Her?” Robin scoffed. Steve merely shrugged, turning his attention back to you without a word.
“You mind shutting the divider, Buckley?” you asked “Harrington’s a bit busy...” you grabbed his fake tie, pulling his lips to yours, the sound of the divider slapping shut the only sound left in the room.
#stranger things#stranger things 2#stranger things 3#stranger things imagine#stranger things headcanon#steve harrington#steve harrington x reader#steve harrington x you#steve harrington imagine#steve x reader#steve x you#steve x y/n#steve harrington imagines#steve harrington headcanon#steve harrington headcanons#steve harrington au#steve harrington aus#steve harrington fanfic#steve harrington fluff#steve harrington fanfiction
626 notes
·
View notes
Text
My Sanskrit Story
I am an ardent student of Sanskrit.
Over the past few years, I’ve been learning Sanskrit in a slow, schizophrenic manner – a few weeks of frenetic study of grammar and literature with long months of lackadaisical, lukewarm engagement with the language, mostly through ‘study circles’ (we’ll come to this later) that I’m a part of. But I have kept at it constantly and never regretted it once.
My earliest exposure to Sanskrit was perhaps at the age of two. Born and raised in a typical Hindu middle-class family, I was taught simple shlokas and stotras. My father took me to Cubbon Park or Ulsoor Lake on Sunday mornings and on the way he would teach me verses from the Mukunda-mala (a poetical work composed by Kulashekhara azhvar, a ninth century king and poet-saint). My grandmother taught me the Krishna-ashtakam (usually during power-cuts) and my mother taught me verses from the Venkatesha-suprabhatam. At age three or four, I became a sort of ‘installation art’ at weddings where elders gathered around me, coaxing me to recite verses from the Mukunda-mala. (But of course, getting children to recite verses is not uncommon in our families. Many of you might have experienced this in your childhood.)
That was it, pretty much: Some stray verses committed to memory and the strong notion that Sanskrit was a great language. In spite of my rejection of orthodox theism, rituals, and outdated religious/superstitious practices during my rebellious adolescent years, strangely, I never lost respect for Sanskrit.
Most of my cousins studied Sanskrit in school but I didn’t have that good fortune. I wanted to learn the language but I didn’t know where to start; for years it remained a pipe dream.
By sheer chance, I got involved in co-writing a translation of the Bhagavad-Gita with Dr. Koti Sreekrishna in 2006. At that time, I didn’t know any Sanskrit. My role was to review and edit the English; after Dr. Sreekrishna produced a rough translation, I would work towards presenting the verses in the simplest way possible. By the time we published the book five years later, I had learnt a few words here and there, particularly when we discussed the meaning of difficult verses.
In early 2011, when the manuscript of our Gita translation was being sent to reviewers, someone suggested that I get the opinion of the renowned scholar, poet, and polymath Shatavadhani Dr. R Ganesh. Until then I hardly knew anything about him. When I phoned him, he spoke in an encouraging manner and I felt like I was speaking with a family elder rather than a celebrity-scholar. He graciously reviewed the manuscript and gave his feedback. I casually mentioned to him about my interest to learn Sanskrit and my helplessness at not knowing where to start. Not only did he give me general guidance but he also taught me some of the basics of Sanskrit grammar like noun forms, verb forms, sandhi, and samasa. More importantly, he taught me the real value of learning Sanskrit in today’s world.
The rest of this piece comprises what I’ve learnt from Dr. Ganesh about the study of Sanskrit coupled with my personal experiences. It might be of value to those interested in learning the language.
~
Why Study Sanskrit?
Given that learning Sanskrit—or any language for that matter—consumes considerable time and effort (and some money), it’s a good idea to think for a moment if it’s actually worth it. Now, the worthiness can be decided only by one’s intentions – Why do I want to study Sanskrit?
In my case, I love learning languages when the opportunity presents itself. The process of learning itself is a great deal of fun for linguaphiles like me. So if you are a language-lover, there’s no need to think any further. Go and learn Sanskrit!
There is a widespread notion that Sanskrit is a sacred language meant solely for rituals and that its literature is entirely ‘spiritual stuff.’ So if you’re someone who likes that sort of thing – tradition, philosophy, scriptures, and so forth – you might be thinking of learning the language. The good news is that you probably don’t need to learn Sanskrit.
If you are just interested in the Vedas and want to connect with the tradition better, you could consider learning Vedic recitation, which is definitely easier than learning Sanskrit. In addition, you can read a book or two on the philosophy of the Vedas or listen to lectures on the topic by scholars like Dr. Ganesh. Even those of you who are interested in philosophy can get by reading reliable translations of the Upanishads and Bhagavad-gita as well as general works on Indian philosophy by scholars like Prof. M Hiriyanna.
There is a feeling among the culturally inclined nationalists that it is our duty to preserve Indian heritage and showcase the glory of India’s past. Triggered by this missionary zeal, some people might wish to learn Sanskrit. This often leads to a narrow interest in hunting for science in ancient India, or in the study of traditional works of polity, economics, architecture, law, or other secular subjects. Again, the good news is that you don’t have to learn Sanskrit to accomplish this.
You can always look into reliable translations of works like Artha-shastra, Manu-smriti, Surya-siddhanta, or Brihat-samhita. You can also peruse through books on Indian history, ancient Indian mathematics, temple architecture, and so on. You could even take up the study of a serious treatise like P V Kane’s History of Dharmashastra. That will satiate your thirst to a large extent.
When something can be effectively translated from one language into another—particularly when the objective is to provide information or teach certain concepts—then there’s hardly a case for learning the source language. If I can give you the exact translation of a verse from the Gita and you understand it without any transmission losses, then why do you have to spend ten years of your life learning Sanskrit?
But there are things that simply can’t be translated. Jokes, for instance, are untranslatable when they employ puns or have strong cultural references. The same goes for poetry, where the structure and the substance are closely intertwined. So if you’re interested to explore the vast landscape of Sanskrit literature—Kalidasa’s masterpieces; the two great Epics (Ramayana and Mahabharata); Bana’s Kadambari; Shudraka’s Mricchakatika; Bharavi’s Kiratarjuniya; Vishakadatta’s Mudra-rakshasa; and many other poems, plays, and prose compositions—it is worthwhile taking steps to learn Sanskrit. Stories about gods and goddesses, romantic escapades, nature descriptions, episodes from the Epics, idiosyncrasies of public life, the history of a kingdom, tales of commoners – all this and more can entertain and enrich several lifetimes.
In addition to being a wonderful treasure trove of literature, Sanskrit is also a window to our past. Therefore, any serious student of Indian history, archaeology, sociology, culture, sculpture, philosophy, and so forth will benefit immensely if s/he learns Sanskrit. Here I wish to make a distinction between one who is interested in Indian history or philosophy or culture and a full-time student of these subjects (like a BA or MA student). Those who are merely interested to know more about a certain era in Indian history can read a book by R C Majumdar or Jadunath Sarkar and be fulfilled. But for students of history, the knowledge of Sanskrit will enable them to read inscriptions, contemporary literary works, and so on, which will prove invaluable for their careers.
However, if you’re looking to improve your knowledge of physics, become better at technology, get a promotion at work, or win an election, you will benefit from doing other things than learning Sanskrit.
Is Sanskrit Difficult?
A good way to learn a language is like how we all learnt our mother tongues – by listening and repeating, then slowly moving towards understanding and speaking, and then eventually starting to read and write. If you wish to learn Russian, Spanish, or Japanese, this approach works well. But Sanskrit is not a widely spoken language. And our motivation to learn Sanskrit is not so much trying to communicate with other people as it is to read and savour ancient (and modern) literature.
Although there are a number of people who fluently speak in Sanskrit, it is almost impossible to find a person who knows only Sanskrit and no other language. It’s therefore obvious that you don’t need Sanskrit to communicate with others; you can get by speaking Kannada or Tamil or English. (On the other hand, if you’re visiting the UK and can’t speak a word of English, you’re going to be in trouble!)
To learn Sanskrit, you might have to choose an approach that’s different from what’s popularly known as ‘immersion’ in language-learning circles.
There are some people who think that Sanskrit is extremely difficult and wonder if they can approach it at all. In fact, those who are familiar with one or more Indian languages already have the basic equipment to understand Sanskrit. The nuts and bolts of the grammar can give you sleepless nights but it’s probably not as hard as you think.
At the other end of the spectrum, there are people who think that attending a ten-day Sambhashana course or reading a ‘Learn Sanskrit in 30 Days’ book can give you mastery over Sanskrit. That’s a dangerous notion to harbour if you really want to learn the language.
So, the one line answer is that if you’re interested and pursue it sincerely, it’ll get easier along the way, and more importantly, the journey will be great fun after the initial fumbling about.
Learning Sanskrit
Where do I start?
The answer, surprisingly, is: anywhere. Just start. Sanskrit is an ocean and where does one begin to swim in an ocean? Somewhere. Put your feet in the water, slowly get inside, get used to the cold, and before you realize it, you’re already kicking your legs and having a good time.
And that’s what I did: just started at some point.
I would read a verse from the Gita and then read the English translation. I had learnt Kannada and Hindi at school and as a result, many of the words were familiar to me. Reading the translation after reading the original Sanskrit verse exposed me to new words. I committed verses to memory and later replayed them in my mind, trying to check if I remembered the meaning completely.
That said, the most suitable works to start off learning Sanskrit are lucid compositions like the Ramayana or the Pancha-tantra. Get hold of a reliable translation of one of these works (preferably in an Indian language); start by reciting the original Sanskrit verse or prose passage a couple times, then read through the translation, and go back to reading the Sanskrit – this way you slowly make connections between the words and their meanings. Instead of diving into the technicalities of grammar straightaway, spending time with literature will help you experience the beauty of the language.
Three to six months after commencing the study of a Sanskrit work, you can start learning up some grammar – by reading good books, watching online tutorials, or learning from a teacher.
I’m extremely fortunate that Dr. Ganesh taught me the basics of Sanskrit grammar. That set me off on a winding path of reading different aspects of grammar and trying to wrap my head around them. This continues even today. The more I hunt for rules, more the exceptions I find. My advice: Keep aside logic while learning basics. In the initial stages, don’t ask questions; simply accept things as they are. It just makes life easier. Over time, you’ll develop an intuition for the correct form of a word.
All said and done, it’s easy to start but difficult to keep going. What’s the solution for sustained study?
In my experience, learning a language requires both self-motivation and external agency. Unless one is driven from within, no amount of external push will be fruitful; when self-motivation is present, external agency becomes invaluable. For instance, Sanskrit is taught in schools and colleges – this is a push from outside (i.e., external agency). But only those with self-motivation learn the language well and continue reading literature long after they have graduated.
When I met Dr. Ganesh in 2011, he told me about a fortnightly ‘study circle’ he was conducting and extended an invitation to me. I had never heard the term before so I asked him what that was. A group of friends would catch up every other Saturday and read the Raghu-vamsham of Kalidasa.
I started attending the study circle. This went on for close to a year and I learnt a great deal. Owing to various reasons I became irregular in attending the sessions and after I shifted to another end of the city, I practically stopped going. During the years 2013–16, I moved around quite a bit and finally I shifted to Malleswaram in November 2016.
There came an inflection point in my Sanskrit study in 2017. Around that time, my good friend Raghavendra G S had started his PhD program in IISc. and my house happened to be a sort of midpoint between the metro station and his lab. One day I casually suggested that we should meet once a week and read a Sanskrit work together. He readily agreed and we started reading the Krishna-karna-amritam (a poetical work by Lilashuka). By the time we finished reading the text in early 2018, a few other friends showed interest in coming together to form a study circle. And so, in April 2018 we formed our Sanskrit study circle and have continued ever since. I also got the opportunity to join a few other study circles and this ensured that my Sanskrit study is ever fresh; over the past three years, not a week has gone by without a few hours of Sanskrit reading (unless I was travelling or unwell).
So if you want to learn Sanskrit, try to find even one other like-minded friend and get started. Even better if you can find more friends – especially those who know more Sanskrit than you. The ideal is a group of four to six, meeting once a week, for about an hour or ninety minutes. (You can meet in person or online – it shouldn’t make too much of a difference.) There are ample online resources and translations available for various Sanskrit works. Start reading a work together. Take turns to read the verses aloud. (Even when you’re reading Sanskrit by yourself, it’s useful to read aloud). Then look at the translation. Discuss. Read the original verse again. Then move forward. In the first few sessions, you may read just three or four verses in an hour but as you go forward, your speed will drastically improve and you’ll start getting comfortable. After a while, refer to the translations only after you’ve made an attempt to understand the original. This will slowly push you to rely on your memory and learning.
And once in a while, when there’s an opportunity to meet during a long weekend, you can take a short poetical work like Niti-shataka or Kali-vidambana and read the whole thing in one marathon session.
There are many possibilities with study circles. In fact, it can prove to be the mysterious ingredient to accelerate your learning. That’s been the case with me for sure. I’ve still got a long way to go before I can say that I’ve learnt Sanskrit but the journey itself has been incredible so far. Dr. Ganesh and friends have been largely responsible for what little Sanskrit I know. And for that I’m ever grateful.
Hari Ravikumar
August 2020
Thanks to my friends Pratap Simha (for getting me to write this piece), Arjun Bharadwaj (for his valuable inputs), and Sudheer Krishnaswami (for his review and feedback).
2 notes
·
View notes
Text
oc facts: frankie
once again no one tagged me, i just need a warm-up after not writing anything sorcione-related for nearly a year. might as well talk abt frankie.
(frankie when she first met mac gargan / frankie currently telling the story to spider-man)
PLACE IN SOCIETY
✖ FINANCIAL – wealthy / moderate / poor / in poverty
this one is actually a tiny bit complicated. frankie used to be filthy rich - but that changed after she cut her wealthy family off. she doesn’t actually have any actual financial issues, and is still able to afford living in a comfortable new york apartment - but she most definitely couldn’t afford a ferrari, for example.
✖ MEDICAL – fit / moderate / sickly / disabled / disadvantaged
frankie is definitely fit and agile, having practiced martial arts, gymnastics, yoga and running from early childhood. she also used to spar with mac... but those sessions usually just ended in bed. assuming he even agreed to them, as he wasn’t a big fan of physically fighting his Tiny Wife.
✖ CLASS OR CASTE – upper / lower / middle / working / unsure
whether she likes it or not, she is a member of new york social elite. her family’s name - moretti - carries a lot of weight; her father - bartolomeo - used to be a consigliere and confidant of cicero, one of the maggia dons. and frankie herself almost became a part of don fortunato’s family, having nearly married his son; they are still on good terms, and don fortunato still calls her by her first name.
✖ EDUCATION – qualified / unqualified / studying
frankie never went to college, as her mother emotionally manipulated her into working at her bakery instead. agreeing to it is one of her biggest regrets, as she feels she had missed out on a lot.
(she still reads a lot though, and has a genuine interest in psychology and sociology.)
FAMILY
✖ MARITAL STATUS – married, happily / married, unhappily / engaged / partnered / divorced / widow or widower / separated / single / it’s complicated
frankie is - happily and lovingly - married to mac gargan, one of spider-man’s biggest enemies. their marriage isn’t perfect though, as she hadn’t seen her husband in months.
✖ CHILDREN – has children / no children / wants children / adopted children
she has no children and she very much wants it to stay that way, as she has negative interest in motherhood.
✖ FAMILY – close with sibling / not close with siblings / has no siblings / siblings are deceased / it’s complicated
she has an older brother - takeshi - and she hates him. she hates him and their parents to the point of turning to maggia for help in getting away from them.
her brother had always had a weird obsession with her, obsession that eventually unfortunately turned sexual. their parents knew about it - and pretended like everything is fine.
she’s not on speaking terms with her family anymore.
✖ AFFILIATION – orphaned / adopted / disowned / raised by both parents / it’s complicated
she was raised by both parents, and it sucked. her father was mostly absent, and her mother was emotionally abusive; eventually frankie cut them off - and in response they promptly disowned her.
TRAITS & TENDENCIES
✖ disorganized / organised / in between
to put things simply: frankie has her shit together. she always knows what time it is, where her keys are and how much money she has in her bank account. she likes to get up late, yes; but most the time she gets up when her alarm starts to go off.
✖ close-minded / open-minded / in between
she has to be open minded - she lives in new york. the avengers are there, spider-man is there, rhino is there, the maggia is there... she simply has to be open to new experiences and discoveries, because otherwise - she’d go crazy.
✖ cautious / reckless / in between
most of the time, frankie strategically plans her every move; but then again - there also are times where she decides fuck it and goes with the flow.
✖ patient / impatient / in between
oh she IS patient. doesn’t mean she doesn’t get annoyed at people who are late though.
✖ outspoken / reserved / in between
it all depends on her relationship with people around her, really. around angelo - her best friend - she’s outspoken and chatty; but around his father - don fortunato, the don - she’s reserved and cautious, meticulously cherry picking her every word.
✖ leader / follower / in between
frankie was forced to be obedient her entire life; now she just craves giving orders. her end goal is to become maggia’s first ever donna.
✖ sympathetic / unsympathetic / in between
frankie actually has a lot of sympathy for others, mostly due to what she went through. the thing is - she absolutely can’t express it without coming off as awkward at best or patronizing at worst.
✖ optimistic / pessimistic / in between
that entirely depends on the scenario - but most the time she can’t even be bothered to think about actual outcomes. she’d rather stick to planning instead.
✖ hardworking / lazy / in between
frankie is, without a shadow of the doubt, the most hardworking person amongst her social circle of maggia kids. but the thing is - she truly, madly, deeply hates it. given a chance, she’ll sit around and do
nothing
all day - but there’s no rest for the wicked. first she worked on her grades, then she nearly worked herself to death in her mother’s bakery, then she had to try to make ends meet after moving in with mac, and then - she had to work on getting him back.
she simply has no chance to ever not be hardworking.
✖ cultured / uncultured / in between
partially thanks to her father, partially thanks to the necessity of getting along with don fortunaty, and partially thanks to her own gothic interests frankie is actually very well-versed in literature, history, theater, opera, art, and food.
✖ loyal / disloyal / in between
despite what “she cut her family off as soon as she got the chance” might sound like - frankie is actually very loyal. but the thing is - her loyalty does not come easily. you have to work for it.
✖ faithful / unfaithful / in between
frankie is as faithful as it gets. once she’s in a relationship - she’s not gonna cheat on her partner, literally no matter what.
SEXUALITY & ROMANTIC INCLINATION
✖ SEXUALITY – heterosexual / homosexual / bisexual / asexual / pansexual / omnisexual / demisexual
even though she doesn’t have tons of experience - she is bi, with a slight preference for guys. her best friend’s tall, muscular bodyguard was her first crush, when she was around 12.
✖ SEX – sex repulsed / sex neutral /sex favorable
all in all, she’s generally sex positive - even if she finds talking about sex a little bit awkward, especially with people who are not her current partner. she also gets very flustered very fast when her partner begins to talk dirty - there is something about merely hearing about all the things the other person wants to do with her that gets her all worked up.
but yeah. she likes sex. it makes her feel good, plain and simple - and she likes the sense of connection between her and her partner, as well as feeling comfortably vulnerable.
also she simply likes it when other people make her feel good.
✖ ROMANCE – romance repulsed / romance neutral / romance favorable
romantic love is something she enjoys - but at the same time she did spend many years without it, and it didn’t really do her any harm. but, if there is someone who has feelings for her, and she finds herself returning them - she’s not gonna be scared.
✖ SEXUALLY – sexually adventurous / sex experienced / naive / inexperienced / curious / uninterested
she enjoys having sex, and trying out new things, and she does have her fair share of fantasies. they are not particularly wild or kinky - but they are there.naturally there’s also a fair share of things she’d never try with anyone.
ABILITIES
✖ COMBAT SKILLS – excellent / good / moderate / poor / none
while she’s no superhero - she’s actually rather good at hand-to-hand combat, thanks to having spent years training. she often sparred with mac, and he taught her quite a few things - but she could never best him in actual combat. but, assuming she fought a regular security guy, or even a cop - she could stand her ground.
✖ LITERACY SKILLS – excellent / good / moderate / poor / none
she reads a lot and is actually very good at critical analysis and interpretation.
✖ ARTISTIC SKILLS – excellent / good / moderate / poor / none
frankie is actually a great poet and a self-taught painter. her poetry is evocative and raw and her paintings are realistic, yet hauntingly unreal; if she had a chance - she could be america’s next top artist.
except - she was never given said chance, and never approached any of her talents as anything more than a casual pasttime.
✖ TECHNICAL SKILLS – excellent / good / moderate / poor / none
this one is interesting. years of working at her mother’s bakery made her excellent at handling various kinds of dough, shaping intricate designs and working quickly with her fingers - but that does not, at all, translate into being good with electronics.
she is, and i cannot stress this enough, a femme fatale of the engineering sphere. she is absolutely awful when it comes to screwdrivers and wrenches and bolts and all that stuff. she’s kinda decent with computers and smartphones - but only on the software level. if you asked her to install more RAM in your desktop pc - chances are you wouldn’t have a pc anymore.
and it’s not like she’s an expert hacker anyway - her proficiency is around as high as mine. she can pirate software, and use vpns, and knows the difference between ipv4 and ipv6...... but writing her own pieces of code? absolutely the fuck not.
3 notes
·
View notes
Link
Newlyweds Jenna Johnson-Chmerkovskiy and Val Chmerkovskiy are both professional dancers on Dancing With The Stars (if they ever choose to have a child the odds of them being born with one tap shoe and one ballet slipper already on are pretty good).
Luckily for Johnson and Chmerkovskiy, working together isn’t anything new. In an interview today with Showbiz Cheat Sheet, Johnson says that, now that they’re married, working on Dancing With The Stars together is “even better.”
“We experienced the show dating as well so we got to experience it already before being married and it’s even better honestly. I feel like we’re this little team. I help him, he helps me. And I love his support. He is so supportive, so loving and caring. He wants the best for me and he cares about my success just as much as he cares about his,” she shared.
Jenna Johnson and Val Chmerkovskiy like to keep work at work
However, Johnson and Chmerkovskiy do have one rule when it comes to their work: it stays at the studio.
“We have a rule that, at home, there’s no work talk. When we’re in work mode we’re definitely there to help each other and discuss it and perfect it but once we get home it’s all about our dog, it’s all about our relationship, catching up on our Netflix shows, and eating yummy food,” she said.
Right now, the couple’s watching Netflix’s Abstract, but Johnson is hoping to get her husband “hooked on Peaky Blinders because I’m just obsessed. So we’ll see how that goes.”
When they’re not catching up on shows or “eating yummy food,” Johnson says they spend a lot of time looking at art, a passion of Chmerkovskiy’s.
“My husband loves art so we love to go to museums or we love to go to little farmers markets where there’s art installations going on. I was never into that stuff until I met him. Our whole house is covered in art that Val collected through the years so that’s something that I’ve kind of fallen in love with through him and with him,” she said.
Going to the movies is another favorite pastime of the newly married couple.
“We love going to the movies, eating so much popcorn,” Johnson said excitedly.
Johnson was a big fan of Joker, calling it “absolutely breathtaking.”
What’s next for Jenna Johnson and Val Chmerkovskiy
As the current season of Dancing With The Stars wraps up, Johnson and Chmerkovskiy will be preparing to go on tour.
“Starting January going through April,” she said.
After that, Johnson has her sights set on a new aspiration.
“And then, I have this little dream to be a host. I’m excited to take a few steps further in that little dream of mine,” she said.
“What kind of host?” I asked.
“Anything honestly. I just really enjoy it. I feel comfortable in front of the camera. I feel comfortable speaking,” she responded.
Recently, Johnson dipped her toes into the waters of hosting when she and Karamo guest-hosted for Entertainment Tonight. She said the experience gave her “so many butterflies.” She loved it.
“I’m still learning but I’m ready to tackle it,” she said
#yesssss hosting#also why are they so cute lol#art loving favs#jenna johnson chmerkovskiy#val chmerkovskiy#valenna#interviews
17 notes
·
View notes
Text
Weird Anime Night Redeemed
guys, can I please talk about Hi Score Girl
I have talked about this in the past, but there is a really big soft spot in my heart for romance anime. I love romance anime, I will occasionally jump from show to show for a while, just wallowing in the stuff. I think its the drama of them, but also like, usually they’re about falling in love in middle school, and trying to make it work, and I’ve been dating the same girl since i was 13 so like, that shit resonates with me on a deeeeeep level. figuring out how you feel about girls, while also trying to figure out how you feel about A girl, beauty.
I also have talked about how I have a deep deep love of arcade fighting games, like a mild addiction to arcade fighting games, like I build fighter pads,
and for a hot minute I also made a few super guns so I could play LEGIT versions of those games at home. (for the uninitiated super guns look like this)
that cable is a JAMMA harness, that connects to the JAMMA edge on an arcade board, and the box is for you to plug in controllers, and plug it into your tv. its an arcade game console....I have since mostly moved over to a MAME console built off of a raspberry pi and my dreamcast, because collecting arcade boards is a very expensive hobby to have, and have since sold off most of my boards....I also had a consolized MVS, and had a couple of neo geo games, but I quit that fast, 150 bucks for a dang cartridge is stupid, no version of king of fighters is worth that
OKAY SO ABOUT THE ANIME
__________________________________________________________
THIS IS A ROMANCE ANIME ABOUT TWO-ish KIDS WHO FALL IN LOVE AROUND AND BECAUSE OF ARCADES IN EARLY 1990′S JAPAAAAAAAAAN
AND BECAUSE JAPAN IS LIKE 5 YEARS AHEAD OF AMERICA THE ATMOSPHERE OF THE ARCADES THEY PLAY IN FEEL LIKE THE ARCADES I GREW UP IIIIIIIIN
I 100% remember when I first played street fighter alpha and wondering when the fuck 3 would come out just like the protag in this did. okay okay jesus I am rambling about this show too much
WIKI SAYS
The story revolves around the life of gamer Haruo Yaguchi, the coin-op gaming scene, and the changes that develop within both over time. Known as a ’90s arcade romantic comedy, the series is notable for its unique art style, and thoroughly accurate depictions of the multitude of gaming software, hardware, and even culture that are featured.
our main dude is Haruo Yaguchi a young man who is dismal in various facets of life: He's not academic, not athletic, and not very attractive. The only thing he's got going for him is an insane amount of mad gamer skills. He rules the arcade scene as "Beastly Fingers Yaguchi ", until he meets his match during a fateful encounter with Akira Oono while playing Street Fighter II. Undeterred, he seeks to challenge and one day out play her, considering her his rival.While he starts off as a snarky brat with an ego bigger than any winning streak he could rack up in Street Fighter, he eventually grows out of it. However, he never abandons his dedication and love for gaming, which almost borders on unhealthy obsession. On the bright side, this pure passion for gaming is what leads him to finding some of his closest friends.
and then theres the main love interest Oono
The daughter of the Oono zaibatsu, Oono is rich, popular, and multi-talented -- the polar opposite of Haruo. However, in attempt to escape the strict educational regimen she faces at home, she sneaks away every so often to play in game centers where she showcases her exceptional gaming skills.She initially encounters Haruo during a match of Street Fighter II, and from then on bonds with him over their mutual love for gaming. She never talks, and communicates solely through gestures and facial expressions.
I will say the fact she doesnt talk is kinda problematic to me personally, but hey, no story is perfect, and her being silent is offset byyyyyyyyyyy
Koharu Hidaka,
who is the left leg in the love triangle, and IMHO a much stronger character than Oono, but....well we’ll get to that later.
She’s a girl in Haruo's class throughout junior high. Goes to an all-girl school with Onizuka throughout high school. Previously an introverted girl who spent much of her time studying alone, she develops into a more sociable person and develops an interest in gaming after spending time with Haruo over a new Neo Geo MVS that gets installed in front of her family's store.She has a natural instinct for fighting games, which transforms her into a powerful force to be reckoned with as both a gamer, and a rival for Haruo's affections. After a fateful showdown at her and Haruo's usual stomping grounds, she developed a bit of a sadistic side whenever Haruo's around. This frightening skill garnered the attention of the "Mizonokuchi Force" leader, Nikotama, who helped Koharu truly awaken her love for fighting games.
she sort of gets side tracked by some stuff in highschool, and takes a weird turn...but again we’ll get to that
so this show is fucking amazing
I binged it in one night, and I loved it so much, that I actually went out and read a bunch of scanulations of the manga because the show pulls A GOD DAMN INUYASHA and just stops at the half way point. i havent hunted down the manga side of a show to finish it since Suzuka, another love triangle romance anime....hmmmm
the entire show is on netflix as an original series and its animated in this really cool CGI/ cell shaded look that feels like oldschool anime, but also like an old mmo or something, its weird, but so so so so good.
please stop now and go watch every moment of it, trust me you will love it
____________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________
OKAY SO WE CAN TALK ABOUT THAT
wowowowowowowow some spoilers ahead yall wowowowowowowowow
so I want to talk about the second half, which I experienced via manga, manga from less than great websites, and because....my experience is via scanulations and sometimes those are less than reliable, anyway, they fall into some sort of gang arcade scene in shibuya in the second half, which is weird, and its painted pretty weird in the manga, but I think the show will sort it out more when the OVA comes out in march, yes netflix is going to finish it with 3 OVA’s which I assume are going to be like 45 minutes to an hour each
anyway, in the manga I dont really like what they did to Hidaka once they get into the gang stuff, she got really angry, and sad, and sadistic, which I mean....she didnt do anything to deserve that heel turn. but hey, this show is amazing, and the manga is amazing and the ending IS FUCKING WORTH IT and I have eaten up about 40% of your dash, really sorry phone users, but hey. I do what I do in the name of good animes, and I feel like I had to make up for that sack of crap I gave you all the other night
please go watch hi score girl, its amazing.
197 notes
·
View notes
Text
I’m a LOUSY Blogger!
But Let’s Get To Improving That!
Well, obviously, I forgot for a while that I even had a Blog! Shame on Me! That being said, let’s start by Re-Introducing who I am, what I do and what we’re all doing here in the first place!
I am Melisa. I’m 51 years of age and I have been married to my high school sweetie since 1988 and his name is David. We’ve been together for 33 years in 2020. David and I share three beautiful grown daughters, Brittany, Kymberly and Krystina. We have six grandchildren: Jessica is 11, Rebecca is 10, Katherine is 7, Joshua is 7, Annalyna is almost 3 and our newest is Zanora, born October 18th of this year. We also have four “Fur-Babies”. A Chihuahua/Pomeranian mix named Peanut (She’s almost 9 years old), a Papillon named Popcorn (She’s almost 5 I think!), her full blooded sister Caramel (If Popcorn is 5, Caramel is 4!) and our most recent addition is Bella (she’s about 5 too, I think) Bella was my Mom’s baby. My Mom passed away a few months after she got Bella. At the time of my Mom’s passing, we didn’t want to give Bella away, and Krystina adopted her and loves her to death. However, with the recent new addition of Zanora to the household and Annalyna being a normal 2 year old, Bella inevitably “nipped” at Annalyna. So, we took Bella….for now. Who knows, she might go back to Krystina’s house, only time will tell.
What do I do? Well, I’m actually a trained Medical Assistant and Phlebotomist. I worked for a handful of doctor’s in my native state of California after graduating from school. One of my favorites was working at an Urgent Care facility where I got to see all kinds of illness and injury. But the job I enjoyed the most, was working for the Chief FAA Medical Examiner of Los Angeles County. I was in charge of the lab, ran all kinds of tests, took X-Rays as well as a myriad of other things. I loved the patient interaction and helping people get and maintain the ability to fly, through their Federally Mandated Physicals. However, David works in the Aircraft Industry, which at times, can have a high turn over rate, so you go where the jobs are (The main reason we’ve lived in 6 states throughout our marriage!) and we ended up moving to the state of Arizona from our home state of California. After graduating school and working in my field in those offices, I eventually found work with the local school district my daughter attended as a substitute Health Office Technician. After a couple more moves, and a couple health issues on my part, as well as the death of my Dad from throat cancer, we moved back to California to be closer to my Mom and Sister, Annette. Because of my love of cooking, during this time in California, I also attended Culinary Arts School. However, my husband David was working in the aircraft industry and after 9/11 happened, unfortunately the jobs in that industry dried up and he had to find “side hustles” to make ends meet as he looked for other employment within the industry. Then one day, one of the job applications he put in, panned out! The Federal Aviation Administration called and offered a job, and he took it, which facilitated our move to the state of Kentucky where we had lived before when David was serving in the U.S. Army during Operation Desert Shield/Storm. We had always said we loved Kentucky and had talked about retiring there, so THAT worked out well!
After moving to Kentucky, our two youngest daughters finished high school and our oldest daughter’s then husband, had joined the military and she came to live with us while he was doing some training. She brought with her our Granddaughter Jessi and her pregnant tummy! As my birthday approached, so did her due date, and on my Birthday (November 19), I took her to the doctor and they announced she was going to have a baby that day! So, Rebecca (Nicknamed Reba!) was my Birthday Present that year!
During Brittany’s stay I ultimately had my first back surgery where I had a titanium cage installed and a fusion done. At this point, I was no longer physically able to stand for 8 to 10 hours a day meeting the physical demands of the job I enjoyed. So, I threw myself into my hobbies of counted cross-stitch, crocheting, reading, cooking and scrapbooking.
After living in the suburbs of Louisville for a couple years, we bought a house 30 miles away in the little town of Shelbyville. By this time, Kymberly had moved back to California after graduating high school, and Krystina had just graduated. Brittany had moved back with her then husband, out of state again. (😥)
Krystina moved out eventually and it was just David and I our dogs Rotunda (another Chihuahua/Pomeranian mix who was 12 years old), and our puppy, Peanut. Kids and grandkids grew, families grew and, as most “empty nesters” David and I began to enjoy our time together as “just us”.
Then, at a family get together (I actually don’t remember the date. One of those “health issues” I experienced was a mini stroke when I was 30 years old caused by birth control pills and my morbid obesity at the time, they concluded. Thus, the stroke obliterated my able to remember things as well as it use to!) I noticed that Reba was having, what I thought at the time was, dry skin issues. I began to take notice and pay attention to the things with other family members and their skin. ( I guess that was Medical Assistant in me!) I was trying to figure out what was causing the problem for her because she complained that the patches itched and sometimes hurt. Around the same time, David had to have major surgery. He was diagnosed with an Acoustic Neuroma. It had attached itself to the working parts of his ear, his facial nerves and his brain stem. Ultimately, they removed all but a very tiny piece of the Neuroma as well as all of the workings of his ear, so he became completely deaf in that ear, and had a second surgery to install a Cochlear Implant. As he was healing from that, he neglected to shave and I noticed that he, too, was getting these dry, flaky, itchy patches where his mustache would grow. And the research began in earnest!
Because I am a redhead (As is Kym, Reba, Annalyna and we haven’t figured out if Zanora is or not!), I have struggled with sensitive skin issues since I was a kid. I never got a “tan”, I got “pink”, “lobster red” or obtained more freckles. As I got/get older, I develop(ed) more and more sensitivities to things like laundry detergent and shampoos/conditioners. So, using my own experiences the first thing I looked at was laundry detergents. From there I looked at the shampoo/conditioner, and from there it lead me to the “soap” we used in the shower/tub.
The information I was gathering was quite interesting and little shocking, to say the least. Since I was a kid, I remember seeing commercials on TV about how actual “soap” was bad for the skin, that using XYZ Brand of this or that was more “moisturizing” and better for your skin. These commercials through my youth, told me that using “soap” was drying, contributed to wrinkles as you age, leaves a “film” on your skin, makes your tub/shower have excessive “soap scum”, etc., but as I was researching, what I found astonished me. Especially since the TV told me how bad actual SOAP was!
My first thought after going down this rabbit hole of research was, “Wow, maybe I need to change the stuff we’re washing with”. Why? Well, I learned that what I was using at the time, a liquid body wash distributed by a company who’s named after a small white bird (😉) could not legally be called “soap” even though that’s what we all call it. The process used to make this body wash literally removes the glycerin (something called a “surfactant” that does actually help to moisturize to an extent, but is defined as a compound that lowers the surface tension between two liquids, between a gas and a liquid, or between a liquid and a solid. Surfactants may act as detergents, wetting agents, emulsifiers, foaming agents, and dispersants.), only to add it back in, and the additional additives they actually added to make it “better” for your skin, as was their “claim”, were actually not necessary and were detergents as well.
“DETERGENTS?!”, I thought to myself….”like, I’m actually washing my body with laundry detergent?” Um… yeah-you are (🤨)! So, I grabbed my bottle of body wash and started to actually read what I was putting on the biggest organ my body has. The organ that absorbs everything from environmental pollutants, to what you put on it, to what you ingest. (Medical training kicking in here again.)
The ingredient list was LONG, containing words I couldn’t even pronounce. (Can you?) Then I thought to look at the “soap” and “body wash” that Reba was using, and read the same ingredients; detergents, etc. The only difference was they added extra stuff to balance the pH to the eyes (making it “tear free”), rather than the body. What does the pH actually do? Let’s look at that…
pH stands for potential hydrogen with the “p” meaning potential and the “H” standing for hydrogen. The pH scale is a scale that is used to rank the relative basicity or acidity of substances to other substances, based on the amount of hydrogen ion activity in a substance. (sciencetrends.com)
Now, I could go into and define and describe all the ingredients I’m talking about, but that would be a science lesson in and of itself. Suffice to say, I didn’t like what I read and learned and thought there had to be something better that would help the dry, itchy skin my loved ones were experiencing. So, I looked into actual “soap”. As I was reading about soap I came upon the different FDA laws regarding the making of “soap” both in solid and liquid forms that we were all using. The FDA has a law that states that the items used to actually wash your body, that you buy at places like the grocery store, or big box stores, cannot legally be called a “soap”. Because of the additives and processes used to create what we were using, the law states that they have to be called something else. So, corporate America gave these items names like “Facial Cleansing Bar”, “Moisturizing Body Wash”, etc. Wait! What? You’re telling me that almost 99% of the stuff at the store I buy my family to wash with on a daily basis couldn’t legally be called soap because they’re “detergents” and corporate America is conning the populous at large? That would be a hard yes. Well, then… (Go look at the wrapper or container your current stuff comes in the from the store and see what it’s called… I’ll wait.)
What did washing with detergents do to the skin? It makes it dry, flaky, itchy and it can exacerbate skin issues that may be underlying such as eczema, psoriasis, allergic dermatitis, the weather, etc. Well darn! How do you fix THAT issue? Back to actual “soap”…
I started to google “soap” and all the sudden a new world opened up to me. I found all kinds of places that were selling the ingredients to make your own soap at home, videos that showed you from start to finish. The different ways to make it. The different ingredients and their benefits… the lists went on and on. I actually got quite overwhelmed. So, I just started making notes, and doing more research and watching more videos. I learned that you can’t make actual SOAP without Sodium Hydroxide (Lye). Even the “Body Washes” and “Beauty Bars” have Sodium Hydroxide in them. (Or it’s sibling Potassium Hydroxide, which is used to make a liquid “soap” or “wash”.) HOWEVER…..
While watching and reading about making SOAP, there were CONSTANT warnings about Lye Safety and how dangerous it is to work with Lye. The kinds of safety equipment that would be necessary to work with it, and honestly, I got intimidated and scared. But then I saw something called “Melt and Pour”. This is a Glycerin based soap that is already “made”, having gone through the processes necessary to make it SOAP. All you had to do, was melt it in a microwave, color it, add any fragrance or essential oils to it, and pour it in a mold. You simply let that cool and harden and BOOM, a handmade bar of soap that you’ve made at home.
It was a fun learning experience for sure. To this day, I still make some of the Melt and Pour soaps and add them to my other soaps and I let the grandkids work with it to make their own for gifts for family members. But I really wanted to be able to use those fantastic oils and butters that really benefit the skin! So, I took my Culinary Arts training, and bit the bullet. Because you’re following a recipe and a technique, it was quite similar to actual cooking! I watched a thousand more videos, including the ones about Lye Safety, over and over and over again, just to be sure I KNEW what I was doing and felt comfortable enough to work with it. In the Culinary world we have something called “Mise en Place”, which basically means “everything in it’s place”. You should get everything out that you plan to use, weigh, measure, the tools, etc. Everything should be ready before you start. So, I did that. Then, I set to work making my first bars of soap made with Sodium Hydroxide, in a design called a “Tiger Stripe”. I honestly can’t tell you what the scent was, or the colors that I used. But I remember it was fun! I was so very proud, looking at that wet soap in the mold… Now for the Saponification Process.
What is the Saponification Process? Saponification is a process by which triglycerides (fats) are reacted with sodium or potassium hydroxide (lye) to produce glycerol (emollient) and a fatty acid salt, called “soap.” The triglycerides are most often animal fats or vegetable oils. When sodium hydroxide is used, a hard soap is produced. (thoughtco.com) This process renders the Sodium Hydroxide (or Potassium Hydroxide) completely inert. It’s done it’s job of turning the oils, butters and water into a bar of soap. So, the Sodium/Potassium Hydroxide will in no way negatively affect your skin at all, whereas when soap hundreds of years ago was made, it was hard on the skin. In fact, my Grandma’s generation still viewed “lye soap” as something quite harsh. Basically because the lye that was used was made from wood ashes, wasn’t as pure and the science that we use today (computer programs that help to determine the proper amount of Lye, water, oils and butters that will make the best bar of soap, with proper hardness, moisturizing properties, cleansing abilities, bubbles and no harsh or adverse effects from the lye.) hadn’t been invented yet. They also didn’t have any of the additives that we use today like colloidal oatmeal, milk powders, etc.
So, 24 hours after I made that first loaf of soap, I cut it. It was the best bar of soap I’d ever seen! I cut it with a knife I bought specifically for soap. I cut it unevenly, and I didn’t care. Then I had to figure out where to let it “cure”. Curing is where you set the newly made soap aside for 4 to 6 weeks and allow all the excess water left in the soap, after the saponification process, to evaporate, leaving the bar as hard and as long lasting as possible. I found the perfect place, in my foyer. Then I immediately wanted to make more…and more… Pretty soon, my foyer was filled with newly made, curing soap! Anyone that came to the front door, or entered the house, always asked what smelled so good!
I tested the soap 5 weeks later, as did David, in the shower. It was bubbly and it was a different feeling on my skin than what I was use to, in a good way. I felt… cleaner? Was that the word I’d use? Yes, it was! I felt like there was just clean skin there, not something else. I don’t quite know how to explain it, other than I didn’t feel like I had a thin film of “slime” on my skin that the aforementioned body wash I had been using, left on me that was meant to make my mind think this was a “conditioning, moisturization” of my skin. It was “slime” to me, now that I had used my brand new bar of soap! Well, now I was hooked! David’s skin, after about a week, showed improvement as well! Holy Heck, what did I just find!?
For the next solid year, I played with different recipes, different oils and butters, different molds, different colors, different additives…. I found a recipe I seriously loved. I shared the bars with family and friends and finally was told so many times..”This stuff is great! You should sell it because I’d buy it”. So, I did. And Bluegrass Bubbles was born… We got a business license and became official, then started our website, bluegrassbubbles.com
In the next installment of the blog, I’ll continue some of the story! Please remember to share and invite your friends to the blog! Feel free to ask questions and interact!
If you’ve not already, please follow us on all our social media and visit our website and sign up for our newsletter! I share behind the scenes pictures, videos and every now then, a Giveaway where you can win Free Products, including the Candles and other things I make!
#handcrafted#soap#candles#soycandles#natural#skincare#kids#family#bathtime#bath#bathbomb#essentialoil#waxmelts#waxmeltaddict#homedecor#gifts#shower#presents#selfcare#homeopathy#aromatherapy
1 note
·
View note
Last Seen Blogs
note-to-self-chronicles
Kind-sight: The Hindsight of Insight
maplefoxart
MapleFoxArt
edinit
Untitled
sweatpeeee
“forever And Always”
replicadesignerbags-blog
Replica Bags