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thaddeustucker · 4 years

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{ lukas alexander von horbatshewsky / trans male / he, him } – ☼ { THADDEUS TUCKER } is finally here! They’ve lived in Athens for { FOUR YEARS } and are originally from { ATHENS, GEORGIA }. They are a { TWENTY-TWO } year old { STUDENT / CASHIER } and live in { DOWNTOWN ATHENS }. Those who know them personally know them to be { + CARING } and { + INTELLIGENT } as well as { - ANXIOUS } and { - SELF-CONSCIOUS }. But we’ll let you be the judge of that! – ☾

Basic Information

Full Name: Thaddeus Deacon Tucker

Nicknames: Teddy

Birth Date / Age: October 19th, 1997, Twenty-two

Gender: Trans Male

Orientation: Gay

Hometown: Longtown, Cumbria, England

Occupation(s): Cashier and Student

Pet(s): None

List of some likes: Reading, cosplay, cooking

List of some dislikes:

Tattoos / Distinguishing Marks: No tattoos, septum piercing

Brief Description of Familial Relationships: His relationship with his adoptive parents, along with most the extended family he was ever close to, is very bad. He’s never known his biological parents and he does have one uncle on his father’s side who he has a slightly emotionally distant relationship with but who he trusts as much as he’ll trust any of his family.

Additional Headcanon(s)?:

Additional Information

Hogwarts / Ilvermorny Houses?: Hufflepuff

MBTI / Known Labels?: INFJ, Enneagram type 2

Special Talents / Gifts?:

Cautious or Daring?: Cautious

Coffee or Tea? How do they take it?: Tea, with milk and honey

Musical Taste?: [x]

Obsessions?: Hamlet, TikTok

Crunchy or Smooth Peanut Butter?: Smooth

Pen or Pencil?: Pen

Favorite Books / Movies: Percy Jackson Universe, Les Misérables, Hamlet

Favorite Color(s):

Favorite Food(s)?:

Favorite School Subject?: English

Favorite Quote or Life Motto?:

What does their bedroom and/or workspace look like?: [x] When he’s working he prefers to go to libraries since his room is a bit cramped

Describe their morning routine if they one:

Life goals? Long or Short Term: Get a PhD, find his birth parents

Night Owl or Early Bird?: Early Bird

Guilty Pleasure?:

Smoker? Drinker? Drug user?: Drinks socially and smokes weed

Fashion Style?:

Hobbies?:

Favorite Season(s)?: Fall

Bio

warning for mentions of transphobia and child abuse

Thaddeus, or Teddy, he has no preference for either name so both are options, doesn’t know anything about his life before he was four months old and was found in a baby box at a church in Athens, Georgia.

He was given a birthday after being seen by a doctor, four months before the day he was found, and a new birth certificate since they had no way of finding his original one.

He’s been trying to find his birth parents since coming to school in the US but so far that’s still all he actually knows, his efforts showing little for all the work he’s done.

Initially the pastor of the church he was left at cared for him, though he knew that he couldn’t raise a child long term he wanted to make sure that Thaddeus had a loving home for now, until he could find a family to adopt him.

That family ended up being a cousin of the pastor and his wife who lived on a sheep farm in Cumbria, England, near the Scottish border.

Things went well for Thaddeus until his toddler years, when he got to an age where he could start to actually understand gender, and have a sense of his own.

He doesn’t really know how it managed to all feel so simple early on, it certainly wasn’t how his parents raised him, but early on all he was really missing were the words to properly explain what was going on and support.

He was quite vocal about correcting people early on but that was quickly stamped down by his parents and preschool teachers, and he learned that his parents love was entirely conditional and how to get.it.

He doesn’t really see it as love anymore and while he still desperately wants that parental type love he knows his parents will never actually love him, not if they actually knew him, and you can’t love a person you don’t know.

Survived is really the proper word for what he did during his childhood, he spent most his energy just trying to get from one day to the next.

He got fine grades, though school was always a struggle when he wasn’t feeling good, and he basically never felt good.

His parents noticed him struggling and did try to help, but at that point he wasn’t going to open up to anyone, so there was never really all too much they could actually do.

He graduated high school on time, barely, but he did manage it, and the main thing that he wanted now that he was about to go off to college was to get far away from his parents and find his biological parents in the hopes that they’ll be more accepting and supportive.

He spent the four years of his undergrad out while in school and closeted when he went back home to visit his parents during breaks.

His parents want him to come home and help take care of the farm now that he’s done with his undergrad so that he can inherit it when they get to old, but he’s finally starting to say no to them, planning to start grad school in the fall

With his visa he’s allowed to work 20 hours a week while school is in session so right now he works full time as a cashier at a local independent book store, working part time during the school year, along with running a small YouTube channel about books that he only just managed to monetize over summer break, most of the money that he earns going into a savings account to pay for transition and school expenses.

Does really miss being around sheep all day and that’s about it for what he misses about home.

Has basically no romantic history, he’s far too nervous about dating and he doesn’t have much confidence so he’s never been able to be the one to make the first move and no one’s ever flirted with him in a way he could recognize or asked him out.

Also super gay.

He’s currently renting a house with four friends from school near campus.

Wanted Connections

Friends

Coworkers

Classmates

Neighbours

Family

Past crushes

Roommates

High School Friend/Crush

#about

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supersaiyansadie · 6 years

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Fist chapter of my WIP

You can find my hip page here: https://supersaiyansadie.tumblr.com/OtherLiesWIP

Chapter one

It’s funny, I think, how quickly your life can change. Like… Maybe one day you’re living the poor life, living paycheck to paycheck, wondering where your next meal’s coming from, and poof! You win the lottery and all your financial problems melt away. Or maybe, your life is going great until you get hit by a bus, and just like that, it’s over. April 19th was the day everything changed for me. Before you ask, no, I didn’t get hit by a bus, though at the time, I probably would have preferred it.

I awoke to my twin sister, Maria, making entirely too much noise in the bathroom. I groaned, and turned over, trying to stifle the noise with my pillow. I cursed my sister and everything she stood for. She was an honor student, one of those over-achievers who enjoyed waking up at six in the morning to go to class at eight. And me? On my best days, I preferred to sleep until noon-ish.

Eventually, I got the memo that I wasn’t going to be able to go back to sleep. I rolled out of bed.

“Every day. Every fricking day.” I grumbled. I joined my sister in the bathroom.

“Crap, did I wake you?” She asked, as if this didn’t happen every morning. She was straightening her hair. I checked my reflection. The bedhead is strong with me today. I grabbed a towel off the rack.

“No.” I told her, climbing in the shower. “I always wake up at the butt crack of dawn.”

“Sorry.” She said. She turned down the radio.

A little late now.

“So, you never told me what happened with that guy. The one from class?” She asked.

“Still nothing. I swear to god, he’s clueless.” I replied.

I had a thing for this guy, Coltin, in my Physics lecture since the first day of class. Miraculously, we ended up in the same lab section. Call it fate, if you will. I sure as hell did. My friend, Jenna, and I sat behind him in lab so that I could ask him for help whenever I wanted. Not that I needed it, of course. He was always friendly and we joked around a lot, but that’s as far as it ever went.

“Maybe he’s gay?” Maria offered.

“God, don’t say that.” I whined. The last (and only) guy I’d dated was gay. I had decided to ask him out in the tenth grade, and he said yes. Two years I’d spent on him. We were the perfect couple, or so I thought. A week before Prom, he came out and broke up with me. Don’t get me wrong, I was cool with it, and I was glad he could accept himself and all, but I was more than a little irritated that he didn’t tell me that before I wasted two years on him.

“Maybe you should let it go.” Maria advised. “If he’s not interested, he’s not interested. You can’t force it.”

I turned off the shower and went back into our bedroom. I grabbed one of Maria’s skirts out of the closet. When I was dressed, I started on my make-up. I had to give it one last try.

“Jesus Christ, Allison.” Maria said, when she saw what I was wearing. I glared at her. “Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize to me.” I told her. She rolled her eyes and crossed herself.

“What are you wearing?” She asked.

“Your skirt. Your top.” I shrugged. “You don’t mind, do you?”

“The top’s fine, but that skirt? That’s short, even by my standards. You don’t even look comfortable.”

I tugged at the hem. She had a point. “Why do you have it if it��s too short for you?”

“I got that when I was, like, twelve or something.” She said. “If this works…”

“Yeah?” I asked. I spritzed on a little perfume.

“If it works, maybe he’s not worth dating.” She replied. “I mean if it takes that skirt to do it…”

“I got it.” I shook my head. “We need to go.”

I grabbed Dad’s keys off her dresser and headed out.

“I’m driving.” Maria said, trying to grab the keys. I pulled them out of her reach.

“Fat chance.”

When we got to school, Maria ran off to her Intensive French class. I still couldn’t understand why she’d take a French class this early. I can’t even English before ten. Sighing, I headed to the Quad. I sat on the edge of the fountain and fished my writing notebook out of my bag.

I had played at being a writer since I was six years old. Occasionally, I’d stumble onto a halfway decent plot, but I’d always lose interest in it after a few chapters. The most I had ever written on a single story (till now at least) was a couple of thousand words. Still, I kept at it. Maybe one day, I would actually publish something.

I was currently working on a story loosely based off of Greek Mythology. I had always been interested in Mythology. When Maria and I were younger, Dad would read us bedtime stories every night. He’d let us pick what we wanted to hear. One day Maria would pick, and I’d pick the next day. Maria always picked The Frog Prince. Always. (If I end up in hell, it’s just going to consist of Lucifer reading me that story over and over again ad infinitum.) I always picked myths. Athena and Arachne, The Odyssey and The Iliad, Greek, Roman, Norse, name it. Myths fascinated me.

My dad, ever interested in his daughters’ lives, and having absolutely nothing in common with me, decided to take an interest in writing. Every week, we’d shut ourselves into his den and work on our respective projects. For hours, we’d stay in there, bouncing ideas off each other and researching necessary information.

My dad had a considerable amount in common with Maria, though. She was his favorite. She was always interested in the research he did. She was currently working on her bachelor’s degree in Economics. The two of them could go for hours on end chatting about graphs and diminishing returns, and… I don’t know. I had diminishing interest in their conversations. But, for a couple hours a week, Maria could shove it.

I flipped through my notebook. I was about halfway through my planned plotline. Hopefully, I’d actually finish this one. Then the real work would start. Getting a first draft down was daunting enough. The concept of editing and rewriting seemed overwhelming.

“Maria!” A guy called from across the Quad. I just waved. Maria was a party girl, always had been. The downside of having the same face as her (one of many at least) was that people always thought I was her. Always. It never seemed to happen in reverse, though. Maybe I was too much of a shut in.

My pen hadn’t even touched the paper when I felt a shiver run down my spine. I glanced around the Quad. It was deserted save the guy, who bounded up the library steps in front of me. The Quad was surrounded on all sides with buildings, so I scanned the windows. As far as I could tell, nobody was there either. I shrugged off the feeling, and went back to my notebook.

I got a sentence and a half written down when the feeling came back. Despite the warm morning, I had goosebumps. I looked around the Quad again. I still didn’t see anybody. I shoved my notebook back in my bag and headed into the alleyway between the library and Weir Hall. I heard footsteps behind me. I glanced back, but nobody was there. I quickened my pace. I was nearly running when I passed the smokers’ area. I ducked into the bushes behind the Graduate School offices. A small blonde girl jogged past. I stepped out behind her.

“You’re a jerk, Jenna.” I told her. She turned on her heel, grinning. Her radiant green eyes sparkled.

“You spook so easily.” She said, giggling. “How could I resist?”

I shook my head, but a smile slipped out. “You’re the worst.”

“So, what’s the occasion, cutie?” She asked, looking me over. I tugged at my hem.

“Bad decisions.” I frowned.

“Oh, come on.” She said. “You look hot. I didn’t know you had a skirt that short. There’s no way your mom knows about that.”

“It’s Maria’s.”

“That figures.” Jenna said. She pursed her lips. “It seems like Maria’s style.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked. I felt my face grow hot. It was no secret that Jenna and Maria had some kind of blood feud going, but that didn’t mean I had to like it. Jenna shook her head and took my arm. She led me through Meredith’s Circle. A chill ran up my spine. I glanced over my shoulder. There was a guy sitting on the patio of the Library, but he seemed absorbed in his work. I pushed the feeling away as we headed into Lewis Hall. We hung out in the Physics tutoring room while we waited for lecture to start. Just after nine, Maria showed up.

“Jenna.” She said.

“Maria.” Jenna replied.

“Allison,” Maria said, turning to me. “I don’t have another class until one. Do you want me to go back home and get you something more comfortable?”

“What’s wrong with what she’s wearing?” Jenna asked, glaring at her.

“Stay out of this, Sorority Girl.”

“What’s wrong with it?” Jenna asked again. “I think she looks good.”

“That doesn’t surprise me.”

“Would you two stop fighting for five seconds?” I cried.

“She started it.” They said in unison.

“Maria, go. I have class. Jenna… just… stop.”

“Do you want me to get you something to change into?” Maria asked again.

“I’m fine. Go.” I ordered. Jenna stuck her tongue out at Maria, who flipped her off.

“Bitch.” Jenna muttered after Maria had left. I shot her a look. “Sorry.”

I suppose it’s time for me to confess something that I wouldn’t even tell Maria: I like my Physics class. The material was interesting, and the professor, Dr. Jones, did lots of demonstrations in class. For example, one day, he got one of his Graduate students to come in and laid out a bed of nails. Dr. Jones laid down on it. The Grad student put a 70-pound weight on Dr. Jones’ stomach and pounded it with a sledge hammer. Dr. Jones got up a minute later perfectly fine. Or the time when we walked into class to see a dinner table set up. We sat there for a while wondering what it was for, but Dr. Jones walked into class and just yanked the tablecloth away, leaving the dinner set behind. He was either really good at Physics or he was a part time magician. Maybe both.

I walked into the lecture hall, and looked at Coltin’s seat. He wasn’t here yet. I frowned. Coltin was always the first person in class. He’d better show up, I thought. I’d put way too much effort in my appearance today for him to miss it.

“Oh God, Allison.” Jenna said when she caught me looking. “I really should have guessed.”

“I have no idea what you’re referring to.” I replied.

A few minutes later, Dr. Jones walked into the lecture hall, chatting with Coltin. I think that’s what initially attracted me to Coltin, his laid-back style. He chatted with strangers like they were old friends, and his smile was so easy. It was almost like a smile was his default expression. His blue eyes radiated certitude. I caught myself staring.

As Dr. Jones and he parted ways, Coltin headed to his seat. We locked eyes for a moment. His smile faltered for a second. I hugged myself. He headed my way.

“Well, somebody’s looking good today.” He said. “What’s the occasion?”

“Just felt like looking cute.” I replied.

“Well, not for nothing, but you don’t need to dress up for that.” He said with a wink. He opened his mouth to continue, but Dr. Jones called for everyone to take their seats. Coltin pressed a finger to his lips and sat down.

I had a minor conniption in my seat. If he thinks I’m so cute, why won’t he ask me out? I fumed. I turned back to Jenna, who raised a brow.

“You need to get laid, girl.” She whispered.

“One step at a time.”

“Yeah, yeah.” She shrugged. “You’ve got that whole marriage first shtick going on.”

“It’s not a shtick.” I said.

“Relax.” Jenna raised her hands in front of her, palms out. “I’m only teasing. There’s nothing wrong with it.”

“Maria gives me a hard time about it.” I told her. “Sorry.”

“Yeah, well that’s because Maria’s conjoined at the crotch with her boyfriend.”

“Didn’t you flake on me three times last week to ‘hang out’ with Paul?” I asked, suppressing a smile.

“I fail to see the relevance.”

“Right.”

When class ended, Coltin cornered me in the hallway.

“Hey, Allie.” He called. “Wait up.”

Play it cool, girl.

“Hey, so I was wondering if maybe you’d want to go out sometime?” He asked, his easy smile faltering. My heart did a cartwheel and landed in my throat.

“Oh, yeah. That sounds… That’d be fun.” I stammered. Real cool.

“Sounds good.” Coltin’s smile returned. He got my number and hurried off. I tugged at my hem.

“You sure you don’t want something to change into?” Jenna asked. “Cause… Mission accomplished. We can run back to my Srat house and find something.”

“It’s fine.” I said. I tugged at the hem again. I glanced around the hall. Two guys (and a girl) averted their eyes. I felt my face get hot.

“Obviously.” She said.

“I’m fine.” I insisted. “Besides, I have class.”

I trudged through the Grove. The worst part of taking a History class, I’d discovered, was that it was so far away from my other classes. Still, I trudged through the grass, my mind reeling with visions of trebuchets and guillotines and empires. Oh my.

I checked the time. I had five minutes to get back to Lewis before lab started. My hair was probably a mess and I had finally come to the conclusion that my skirt was too short, but there was little that I could do about either problem before lab started.

I checked the time again when I got to Lewis. I bounded up the stairs. I was already late, so I figured that I might as well check to see if I looked as crappy as I felt. I heard somebody mount the stairs behind me. I headed into the ladies’ room. A hand clamped down on my shoulder. My heart lurched. I tried to turn, but they pushed me into the bathroom. The lights went out.

#Other Lies #WIP #Chapter One #Excerpt #my writing #writeblr #writers of tumblr #in need of beta readers #plz #wip page #novelists of Tumblr #read my writing fool #young adult fiction #young adult #YA

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margaretrosegladney · 4 years

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Activism and Involvement in Racial Justice and Issues of Civil Rights

Gladney was in 7th grade when President Eisenhower ordered federal troops to enforce the desegregation of Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. Gladney recalls a conversation on the playground at lunch where she told her classmates that she didn’t think her parents would object to Black students coming to their schools. That discussion continued in the classroom, and the teacher said to Gladney, "If that's what you think, why don't you go on over to Mayfield," the school for Black students in Homer, LA. Gladney was very embarrassed and remembers thinking that she would have gotten up and walked out if she knew where Mayfield School actually was. Mayfield School was not far away, being only a few blocks from Gladney’s maternal grandparents, but she had never been to that part of town because growing up White and female in a racially segregated town in the 1950s entailed not being allowed to go to certain parts of town due to racial fear. When Homer public schools were desegregated, Gladney’s parents, aunts and uncle, helped build Claiborne Academy--an all-White academic institution to deter desegregation--and following this, her mother taught there and her younger siblings graduated from there (1972, '74, '76).1

By 1961 Louisiana law required all high school students to take a six-week course on communism. Though Gladney had attended a school sponsored anti-communism crusade in Shreveport, she thought that The Communist Manifesto had some good ideas. Gladney would continue to have a complicated relationship with communism, exemplified through an interaction she had when she attended a Presbyterian Missionary conference in Montreat, NC. Gladney was standing in line for dinner next to African American girl from Arkansas who asked her, “Do you believe in integration?” Gladney wanted to say yes but had been taught that racial integration was part of the communist agenda, so she answered, “I don't know.”2

Recommended by Northside H.S. principal, Gladney attended seminar at Memphis State U. In “Teachers of English to Culturally Deprived Children,” she met some of the most experienced and highly qualified African American teachers in Memphis city schools. From them, she learned and also grew in dissatisfaction with the policies of the Memphis City school board. They had only one black member and had failed to promote Black individuals in upper levels of administration. Soon, she became friends with Eloise Forrester, a teacher in Albuquerque, attending the seminar because she could leave her daughter with her mother in Alabama. Eloise was a lifesaver to Gladney when she moved to Albuquerque for graduate work. Gladney then returned to Northside HS, ready to implement new ideas in her classroom. At her first faculty meeting, she sat with two colleagues, Bernice Burton and Frances Gandy, and heard about organizing a meeting of AFT. Attending this meeting, she saw several of the teachers she had met through that summer seminar. She was chosen to be one of the organizers, so that it would not be seen as an all black union. From then on, to the White faculty Gladney was “outside” a person of suspicion. Gladney felt naive, sure, but she didn’t really know what she was getting into. In these efforts, she marched and supported “Black Fridays” by wearing black when students boycotted schools to protest . Ultimately, she testified in court in support of reinstating students who had been expelled for protesting. The students were reinstated and she was informed she would not be rehired. Gladney then challenged this, knowing she could afford to do so because she had no family to support and didn’t have to stay in Memphis, as other activist teachers did. When the school board met, Southwestern college students protested in Gladney’s favor outside while that school board meeting was going on. The Board decided to reinstate her, dock her 2 weeks pay, and send her to one of the oldest black schools in Memphis (Manassas), where the principal was known to be very strict with teachers. That was Glandney’s first law suit. She won, but chose to go to grad school rather than to Manassas High.

Margret Rose Gladney was also extremely implicated in the issues of racial justice because of her connection to her hometown of Homer, Louisiana. Within her parish, following the legal imposition of integration, White fear and racial prejudice from community leaders and White parents led to the establishment of private academies. These private institutions provided modes for all-white education--avoiding the integration of the American public school system--that were supported by the wealth, time, and talent of several White communities. Meanwhile, as a teacher in Memphis attempting to create harmonious relationships between the Black and White students of the Memphis public school system, Margret Rose Gladney came to hate the presence of racism perpetuated by White folk in the South. In fact, Marget became especially upset because of the involvement her family held in the creation and continuance of the all-White Clairborne Academy: her father and uncles donated the land for Clairborne Academy, her mother taught at Clairborne Academy, and her brothers, sisters, and cousins all attended Clairborne academy. Consequently, her family grew increasingly divided as she vocally detested the existence of all-White private academies and the participation of her family in these institutions. Fueled partially by the hate of racism in the South, Gladney left the South to study at the University of New Mexico in the American Studies program. At UNM, Gladney obtained a PHD in American Studies and went there because she was interested in studying AF-AM lit. A professor had told her there is no such thing as African American lit, all protest lit., but if that’s what you want, look into American Studies. Using her academic platform, Gladney wrote a dissertation about the history of private, all-White academies--using the Clairborne school as a frame of reference for the totality of her dissertation. Through this dissertation, Gladney denounces the existence of these all-White institutions because of the way they recreate and perpetuate racism and elitism of the American public education system and American society more broadly.3

Furthermore, as part of her academic career, Margret Rose Gladney was able to delineate the southern history of race and queerness through the letters of Lilian Smith. In 1970 Women’s Studies was just beginning. The first WS course taught for credit at UNM was offered through the AMS Dept, spring 1972, Women in Literature. Gladney audited it. The Frist question presented to her was “Are you a feminist?”. Which she responded with “Sure, I believe in women, I’m a feminist.” Her class pushed her to read Lillian Smith, Killers of the Dream(KOD), which is how she was introduced to Lillian Smith. Reading KOD, weeping, Gladney told her roommate, “This woman is writing my life.” Here was a white Southern woman who could have been a younger sister to her maternal grandmother, yet she was explaining and challenging everything she was trying to understand about racism, and sexism, and she had chosen to stay in the South and challenge all its taboos, and she had managed to live and write there. Lilian Smith, despite being a White women, presented herself as one of the most vehement critics of the South, America, and the rampant social and racial injustices she had viewed.4 She showed Gladney it is possible to live in the place you love, with people whom you both love and whose beliefs and values you see as only destructive and dehumanizing. But, Gladney could not write her dissertation on Lillian Smith because her life was too large. Also, she felt she had to confront her own immediate struggle with her family’s commitment to maintaining racism through building segregated private schools to avoid public school desegregation and thereby destroying public school systems. Instead, by exploring Lilian Smith’s queerness through the love letters between Smith and Paula Snelling, Gladney was able to add a deeper dimension to southern activism by exploring the intersection between race and sexuality.5

Notes:

1:Gladney, Margret R.(1974) . I’ll take my Stand: The Southern Segregation Academy Movement. University of New Mexico. 2:Ibid. 3: Ibid. 4: Jackson, Jacquelyn L. (1994). Clearinghouse Column: Letters of early advocate for racial justice. Center News, 6. 5: Sears, James T (1997). Lonely Hunters: An Oral History of Lesbian and Gay Southern Life, 1948-1968. Milton: Routledge.

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cosmosogler · 7 years

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the other day on the phone mom told me that dad’s feelings were hurt because i didn’t say goodbye to him enough when i left.

ha ha ha, ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

i woke up this morning. i wish i could remember my dreams a little better. it feels like there’s something that keeps happening over and over and i can’t ever remember what it is no matter how many times it happens.

maybe it’s just that feeling of deja vu more than actually experiencing the same... “thing” in my dreams night after night. the ones i’ve written down only had a common thread of feeling, like, resigned. tired. quiet.

i’m not sure how to say what i’m thinking right now. i’ll try to work up to it i guess.

the internet was out all morning so i didn’t get to bum around on tumblr or check my emails. i filled up my water bottles and put them in the fridge. i’ve got seven water bottles stored for the ~2 projected days of the hurricane. that should be enough. i don’t think the power or water would be out for that long. and if it is out for that long, the storm will have passed by the time i’d need to leave the apartment.

my sister isn’t willing to send over ANY gamecube games for the console here. so that plan is a bust i guess. i keep forgetting i can’t really... well, i can always expect for her to do what she wants.

oh. the governor just closed every school in florida. tomorrow. through monday. current projections put the hurricane directly over my town. as a category 3.

welp! i am SUPER glad i decided to bring all my textbooks home today *just in case*. i’ll have something to do for the next four days.

haha my comments in the grad chat won the honor of being the first-ever liked text message in our channel.

guess i don’t have to worry about going to bed exactly on time tonight then. i’ll keep writing.

i taught for four hours straight today. i’m upset at how many dumb, careless mistakes i’ve been making. i tell myself i’m doing the best i can and then i just... forget things. they don’t even occur to me until it’s too late. the absolute worst though was when the student from my third section who doesn’t speak a lot of english came in. i called him by the wrong name. there were two names on the roster i recognized as chinese and i... picked the one i remembered calling him last week. so not only was i wrong this time, i had been wrong last week when i’d been talking to him. jesus christ. i examined some of my priorities and tendencies to rush into things after that for a while.

i apologized twice and also tried to call him by the right name a couple times while talking to him about the lab afterward. he did pretty good this week though.

after that i don’t really know what i did. i guess i must have had a snack. i’m kind of drawing a blank on what happened between 2 and 4 though. maybe i just watched youtube videos in my office... i’d meant to read but i never really got to it. i did eventually buckle down and find and call a dentist, and get all my other medical paperwork sorted. i did Actual Work until near 6 even though none of it was schoolwork. i waited a half hour for the bus and then when i got home i made cauli tots.

cauli tots are like tater tots, but with cauliflower instead of taters.

snoopy was a little more receptive to playing today. i was so proud of her when she batted at the toy i was waving in front of her.

then i watched youtube videos all evening!!! like a punk!!!!!!!!!!!

suicidal thoughts are weird. to experience, i guess. like i am continually bombarded by the realization that i am currently sitting in some kind of mysterious box with light coming out of the top. and i am looking at a couple pieces of metal with a glowing thing. and then i think, “wow, i am really good for nothing, i am really unhappy, i am really not a good person to know, i am really just going to be a sad irredeemable lump for the next 20 years just like the last 20 years.”

i just. i guess when i realized i was going to die someday (at ~5 or 6) there was a kind of relief? in knowing i could do it myself, maybe? maybe i am misremembering my years before christian school. i know i was experiencing symptoms of depression before christian school. but i didn’t have those words so i wasn’t really... looking for those symptoms or recognizing that they weren’t the same as what other people were experiencing throughout childhood.

there’s a certain sort of resignation you get when at an early age you think, “something’s really wrong with me.” and then you’re proven right over and over and over. heart defects. depression. being Pretty Gay.

i know none of those things are “wrong” but as a kid different is always wrong.

taking the physics prelim. “no, you don’t understand, i felt REALLY bad about how i did on this test.” “you’re fine! everyone was nervous!” “no, you really don’t UNDERSTAND.”

i was right.

i keep telling myself i’m not stupid like someday i’ll believe it but i keep getting reminded over and over again how stupid i really am, how many stupid careless mistakes i make, how little energy i can commit toward being not stupid and dumb and bad.

like, “kill yourself” is such an easy thing to think. it’s so disorienting to actually think it though. to get from

“i complain about everything even though that never fixed anything” ->

“i needed help and no one came, why can’t i recognize and react to these patterns, complaining is useless but i do it anyway” ->

“complaining is annoying AND i can’t trust people, i’ll never have close friends” ->

“i want to die.”

dying is fine! they’ll just write me off as selfish anyway!! i’m turning into one of those CRAZY crazies who can’t/just WON’T get better!!!

i don’t like the way the world kind of warps when i get those thoughts. words stop meaning anything. feelings stop meaning anything. the way the scab on my finger knuckle hurts when i bump it doesn’t mean anything.

writing all these journal entries, spending 40 minutes spewing all my thoughts everywhere on a blog every day... it looks like i am doing a lot of hard work examining myself! but it’s not hard work. it’s fake work. it’s fake. i can’t get better because i’m not working hard enough to change. i can’t do better at physics or therapy or whatever the hell until i start putting in real work instead of fake work.

and i’m stupid because i can’t tell what the difference is.

i’m... seeing the new psychiatrist in 11 days. they will probably want to change up my meds. but i’m tired of wanting to just sleep all the time. well, i mean, i want to sleep all the time anyway, but with meds this ineffective i can push away that feeling and keep going! “keep going,” i say, as i talk about how i very specifically do not want to keep going.

i was trying to figure out how to explain my depression to taylor and luis in the office today when luis asked what i had, that i was getting accommodations. i wanted to say “it used to be worse but now it’s kind of settled into a casual nihilism that i think is funny and charming but it mostly just makes everyone worried.”

i say it used to be “worse” but i’m not sure what worse means here. like the feeling was a lot sharper five years ago, sure. it was a lot more painful when it got bad. my grades were somehow even worse than they are now. i didn’t want to talk to anyone.

i guess it was worse then. now it’s just like, oh, this again. guess i gotta get up and Face The Day; nothing better to do.

that’s the worst, i think. my group therapist at the hospital pointed it out. “why are you here?” she would ask. “eh, nothing better to do i guess,” i’d answer and kind of half-smile. she’d express concern at my lack of commitment. maybe that’s what really killed my ability to get better using that therapy in the end.

everyone else participates and sometimes doesn’t come if they don’t wanna. i come every single time but don’t really participate. i fake participate. i mostly only share things i know don’t matter that much. i put my foot in and hope that’s good enough, that maybe the pool will swim for me if i show up wearing a swim suit.

isn’t that what i’m really doing? i’m having trouble breaking down what’s going on there. i can’t tell. i can’t tell what “real” effort is and what “fake” effort is. i guess fake effort is, like, playing it safe? only changing things i feel comfortable changing?

but like... how am i supposed to make changes i’m not comfortable with? i think about this stuff all the time. i feel that i should be able to adopt healthier coping/boundary strategies without fundamentally changing the way i approach interactions with other people. that feels like something i shouldn’t change, not just something i don’t want to change. how am i supposed to become the person i want to be if i don’t like the way i am changing?

i mean i don’t like the way i am changing either way but going for it deliberately feels like a betrayal.

i’m so stupid. i keep asking mom for advice or comfort even though i know 100% that i am not going to get it from her. she has maybe said one useful thing to me in my life and i don’t think it’s something she also thought was actually useful. maybe i still want someone to just tell me what to do and mom was such an effective all-consuming eldritch helicopter parent that i just look to her EVEN WHEN I DON’T WANT TO. i mean, i don’t even like other people’s parents! i don’t like other people’s parents BECAUSE of my parents!! and i still keep going to them???

i don’t know what to do. i want someone to tell me what to do so i don’t have to figure it out myself. i’m so tired all the time it feels like i’m never going to figure it out. i can’t tell if i’m an effective problem-solver for little problems that require improvisation or if i’m just really good at googling stuff and following those directions, written by someone else. every problem i solve i feel like i should attribute to someone else even when i never actually asked for help or looked anything up. i can’t even remember any examples off the top of my head. i don’t think about them. i just do them.

i said “i” a lot today. i always talk about myself. even though this is my journal and is specifically meant for me to talk about myself? i feel like i’m doing something wrong. even using “i” statements when being honest and direct with people feels like... i’m being selfish by talking about myself. even though that’s what you’re supposed to do, that’s what therapists teach you to do to communicate effectively.

i promise i was this miserable this afternoon. i didn’t “ruin a good mood” i had tonight by focusing on just the negatives. i just plain feel bad!

#tw suicide

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