I know a lot of people say the opposite happened for them but I find I am much less tolerant of being alone for prolonged periods of time after quarantine happened. Maybe that’s due to the fact that even before quarantine I was typically alone; and now that I’m moved out of my parents house I actually have opportunities to hang out with people and have used those opportunities often, I now know how it feels to not be alone constantly. It’s nice to not be alone all the time but sometimes I miss the fact I would be able to just do stuff alone more often. Now it feels almost impossible to do things without even the motivation of showing someone what I’ve done

Fat people deserve mobility aids, too. No matter if it's connected to their fatness or not, because having a mobility issue that is connected to one's fatness won't change that they're still fat and still have the issue at hand. Fat people don't deserve to "tough it out" because fatness should be this divine punishment doled out to those who "deserve" it. Fat disabled people deserve to have the peace of mind that they can exist in whatever way is most comfortable and accessible to them

anyone else have multiple traumatic memories associated specifically with holidays/family vacations? because that is a topic I never see discussed in all the So You Had A Shitty Childhood, Now What? self-help books i've been reading. but for me, it was a significant thing. and the more i think about it the more it seems like this would be an (unfortunately) common experience. would be grateful to hear if this matches other peoples' experiences...

you wanted to be a good friend, because you loved your friends, but the truth was that everyone else somehow had a pamphlet on being normal that you never received. most of the time you learn by trial-and-error. you are terrified of the next big mistake you make, because it seems like the rules are completely arbitrary.

you've learned to keep the prickly parts of your personality in a stormcloud under your bed - as if they're a second version of you; one that will make your friends hate you. it feels feral, burning, ugly.

instead, you have assembled habits based on the statistical likelihood of pleasing others. you're a good listener, which is to say - if you do speak up, you might end up saying the wrong thing and scaring off someone, but people tend to like someone-who-listens. or you've got no true desires or goals, because people like it when you're passive, mutable. you're "not easy to fluster" which is to say - your emotions are fundamentally uninteresting to others around you; so you've learned to control them to a degree that you can no longer really feel them happening.

you have long suspected something is wrong with you, but most of the time, googling doesn't help. you are so-used to helping-yourself, alone and with no handbook. the reek of your real self feels more like a horrible joke - you wake up, and, despite all your preparations, suddenly the whole house is full of smoke. the real you is someone waiting to ruin your other-life, the one where you're normal and happy. the real-self is unpredictable, angry.

your real self snarls when people infantilize the whole situation. because if you were really suffering, everyone seems to think you'd be completely unable to cope. but you already learned the rules, so you do know how to cope, and you have fucking been coping. it's not black-and-white. it's not that you are healed during the other times - it's just that you're able to fucking try. and honestly, whenever you show symptoms, it's a really fucking bad sign.

because the symptoms you have are ugly and unmanageable for others. your symptoms aren't waifish white girl things. they're annoying and complicated. they will be the subject of so many pretentious instagram reels. if they cared about you, they'd just show up on time. you care, a lot, so deeply it burns you. you like to picture a world where the comments read if they loved you, they'd never need glasses to see. but since that's a rule you've seen repeated - "one must never be late or you are a bad friend" - you constantly worry about being late and leave agonizingly early. there are no words for how you feel when you're still late; no matter how hard you were trying.

so you have to make up for it. you have to make up for that little horrible real you that you keep locked in a cabinet. you are bad at answering emails so every project you make has to be perfect. you are weird and sensitive so you have to learn to be funny and interesting. you are an inconvenience to others, so you become as smooth as possible, buffing out all the rough parts.

all this. all this. so people can pass their hands over you and just tell you just the once -how good you are. you're a good friend. you're loveable.

feel free to impale me messmer- *blood curdled cough*

found an old ekurei comic rotting in my files, decided to finish it. upon my rewatch of mp100 i kept noticing how many times dimple was referred to as a pet- but he's not ! ! ! he's a friend :)

Still thinking about just how deep in it Liliana Temult is. Like in the eyes of the narrative she went from

absent & possibly dead, very sad -> alive just estranged?? mysterious! -> possibly involved in a cult, tragic, can her daughter reach her? -> uncomfortably high up in said cult -> the cult's goddamn General and striking such terror into the local population of the Ruidus that they are afraid of even her appearance or someone who looks like her

Ordinary people who are trying to resist the dictatorial Imperium/Ruby Vanguard alliance and their iron control of the populace are terrified of her. You don't strike terror just by "being there". Terror happens because of actions. And it leaves us to wonder what exactly Liliana Temult has done during her time on the moon to make the citizens fear her so much.

The True Heir

Danyal Al Ghul was the one and only heir to the Demons Head.

Then, he died.

The obvious solution was to put him in the Lazarus Pits and resurrect him. Although there was always a risk of him going mad, the pros far outwayed the cons.

Except the Pit didn't give him back.

Ra's, unwilling to lose his perfect heir, turned to cloning. The result? Many, many failures, and finally, one Damian Al Ghul.

Damian wasn't perfect. Far from it, really. He differed from Danyal in such critical ways, from their mannerisms to their loyalties, but.

Ra's had his heir, and that was enough.

I've been thinking recently about Gale, and how much of a romantic he is. He says he wishes he had time to do things properly, when he tells you he loves you. As though he has a specific idea in his head of what wooing and romancing were meant to look like.

Which lead me to wondering what kinds of things he might have imagined for himself when he was young, before Mystra fully got her claws in him.

Did Morena read him fairy tales - beautiful stories of romance and true love and happy endings? Did he find such stories himself, as he devoured book after book? Did he graduate to romance novels eventually, stories full of passion and adventure? Did he see elegant couples about town, and imagine one day being among them?

Did he daydream about heartfelt declarations? Of grand weddings? Of sweeping some future beloved off their feet and riding off into the sunset? Did he dream about building a life with someone? Did he imagine having kids? We know he's had mortal lovers before - were they mere dalliances, or something more? Did he dream of someday proposing to any of them? Of finding his own happy ending?

How many dreams did he give up, in devoting himself to Mystra? How many ideas about his future were sacrificed at her alter in return for her favor, and her promises which turned out to be empty?

How many dreams, once left forgotten in the dusty corners of his heart and mind, is he able to consider again, having found someone who loves and accepts him as an equal? Someone who he's actually able to pursue those fantasies with?

There is a cyclic tragedy inherent to Mori's character wherein he's actually a deeply lonely man, but it's mostly because his resolve to do morally reprehensible things and think of people as pieces on the game board is something he prioritizes over his relations with those very same people, and this inevitably pushes them away (for very understandable reasons). And it kind of sucks honestly because the most frustrating thing about Mori is that he 100% has the potential to be a fantastic teacher and mentor, and more than that, I think he loves it! Just look at Beast! But for as long as he decides he needs to be the one to make "the hard calls" to "preserve peace", then Mori will inevitably continue in this cycle of alienating all the people he has a fondness for.

I do feel as though Mori's loneliness is something he views as a necessary sacrifice that he is making for the greater good (and if he is so willing to sacrifice, then Dazai's unwillingness to do the same comes out of left field because - "what do you mean? you're supposed to be just like me!").

Anyways.

Mori voice: "I'm so alone"

Also Mori: *continues to prioritize pure logic over the emotions of his people and himself*

The people: *get rightly angry and/or become extremely traumatized and leave him*

Mori voice: "I did what needed to be done"

Mori: "..."

Mori: "..."

Mori: "I'm so alone"

Sir. You are doing this to yourself.

Contrary to popular assumption, being evil doesn't necessarily make a person hot. Choosing to do the right thing even when it's the harder option and you're so tempted to do the wrong (and easy) thing, on the other hand.....

"The world's lucky to have you."

An aspect of Hilda the series that I feel isn’t talked about enough is the colonizer’s guilt and how it affects the main character.

What made me write this was watching the third episode of the new season, but honestly, it’s something we see throughout the whole series. Starting out with the elves in the northern counties, and moving on to trolls and now giants. Every season that came out gave us a chance to see Hilda deal with the feelings that arise from living in a society she knows is built on the occupation of another people’s native land and the oppression of those inhabitants.

She knows it’s not her fault, she knows she’s not the colonizer, but she’s well aware that she’s in the privileged side of her society. Seeing her grapple with the fact that her very existence in these spaces is only possible because someone else is getting the short end of the stick, to me at least, makes her that much more interesting of a character.

Because it’s not a matter of fixing what she’s done, but the privilege is still there and not even well hidden when she sees the day to day life of the people whose land has been occupied by humans/trolbergians. So whenever we see her rush to aid them, her borderline desperation to fix what’s been broken, it’s even more captivating because it’s not just the usual “I love helping people and having adventures” gist, there’s always this undertone of guilt for something she hasn’t personally done but still knows has to be held accountable for.

Hilda knows the type of oppression that people like her get away with. And she wants no part in it.

How do the girls get along

Pretty great actually!

Jenny and Kim are very good/close friends, since they met relatively early compared to others (they actually met each other first out of everyone, then others at one point and another) and had a shared adventure sometime after the ends of their respective shows (wink wonk).

But, their first meeting was not actually very um, positive. There was some conflict, but after it was resolved both of them gained a very solid friend for life!

Jenny, was glad to meet someone else (beside Brad) who treated her like a person/normal teenager (instead of an 8th wonder of the world or a freaky robot) and not to mention she got a fellow superheroine girl friend! After Misty, she kind of missed having someone like that to kick butt with (considering that like, 70% of her friends are dudes) or just hang out.

Kim was fascinated by Jenny, not because she is a robot (tho she does think its pretty cool) but because it kind of gave her a contrast to her own life in a weird way? Like, Kim was a normal teenager who got into superheroing on accident and just went with it, while Jenny was created with a goal of being Earth's defender but rebeled to have some sort of normal life. And now they both live those weird semi-normal lives, that led them to meeting each other.

Jun is around 5-6 years their junior and while they met each other much later on, when Jun was a little older (like not 11-12 age of the show), she still kind of looked up to them and both Jenny and Kim felt an instant kinship with the girl.

Before she met Jenny and Kim, Jun only knew a couple other guys as fellow heroes/magical protectors (guess who ;D lol), and while she had plenty of female role models (Ama/Jasmine being the most prominent) and friends, she kind of enjoyed meeting some cool older superheroines to bond with! It also helped that despite the age difference, both Jenny and Kim never looked down at her when it came to superheroing/fighting, but respected her abilities and expertise (considering that Jun was practically an apprentice to her Ama since at least 8-9ish of age, when her powers first awakened, she has a lot of experience).

They both are kind of like cool older cousins to her, who travel a lot for their work and come visit to hang out often and tell/share stories about their adventures. Their and her lines of work while similar, also run in completely different circles (human/interplanetary vs magical/supernatural), so its always a treat to hear about the things they do.

(And yes sometimes she feels jealous about the fact that both of them get to travel all over the world, and despite the developments, more often than not she has to stay town locked and limit her excursions to magical realms.)

Silly thing, but Jun absolutely adores Jenny, for one simple fact that she can travel to space just like that (she and Danny, fellow astronaut/space fans, share that, despite the fact that Danny kinda can travel to space just like that too.)

I just. What do you think was going through his mind when his car exploded into pieces in front of him and the piece that landed next to him was a hand crank? Like the world was ending around him, he'd just gone through the rollercoaster of losing and then finding his angel again, and from the burning bones of the Bentley fate offers him an echo of the same object he'd once been given divinely. What did it feel like to reach for a souvenir and find that object given to him in this new context? What did it feel like to use that again in this moment of once again offering the fate of humanity up to the choice of one it's own? To be able to hold this thing, born again from a human made object, and say this time I am going to use it to give them the opportunity to choose their own fate?

ok I have A Lot of thoughts about the staircase confession (well really about Edwin's whole character arc, but all roads lead to rome) but for now I just wanna say that, yes, I was bracing myself for something to go terribly wrong when I first watched it, and yes, part of me was initially worried its placement might be an uncharacteristically foolish choice made in the name of Drama or Pacing or Making a Compelling Episode of Television but at the expense of narrative sense--

But I wanna say that having taken all that into account, and watched it play out, and sat with it - and honestly become rather transfixed by it - I really think it's a beautifully crafted moment and truly the only way that arc could've arrived at such a satisfying conclusion.

And if I had to pinpoint why I not only buy it but also have come to really treasure it, I'd have to put it down to the fact that it genuinely is a confession, and nothing else.

That moment is an announcement of what Edwin has come to understand about himself, but because it takes the form of a character admitting romantic feelings for such a close friend, I think it can be very easy, when writing that kind of thing, to imbue it with other elements like a plea or a request or even the start of a new relationship that, intentionally or not, would change the shape of the moment and can quickly overshadow what a huge deal the telling is all on its own. But that's not the case here. Since it is only a confession, unaccompanied by anything else, and since we see afterward how it was enough, evidently, to fix the strangeness that had grown between him & Charles, we're forced to understand that it was never Edwin's feelings that were actually making things difficult for him - it was not being able to tell Charles about them. 'Terrified' as he's been of this, Edwin learns that his feelings don't need to either disappear completely or be totally reciprocated in order for him to be able to return to the peace, stability, and security of the relationship with which he defines his existence - and the scale of that relief a) tells us a hell of a lot about Edwin as a character and b) totally justifies the way his declaration just bursts out of him at what would otherwise be such a poorly chosen moment, in my opinion.

Whether or not they are or ever could be reciprocated, Edwin's feelings are definitively proven not to be the problem here - only his potential choice to bottle it up - his repression - is. And where that repression had once been mainly involuntary, a product of what he'd been through, now that he's got this new awareness of himself, if he still fails to admit what he's found either to himself or to the one person he's so unambiguously close with, then that repression will be by his own choice and actions.

And he won't do that. Among other things, he's coming into this scene having just (unknowingly) absolved the soul of his own school bully and accidental killer by pointing out a fact that is every bit as central to his self-discovery as anything about his sexuality or his attraction to Charles is: the idea that "If you punish yourself, everywhere becomes Hell"

So narratively speaking, of course it makes sense that Edwin literally cannot get out of Hell until he stops punishing himself - and right now, the thing that's torturing him is something he has control over. It's not who he is or what he feels, but what he chooses to do with those feelings that's hurting him, and he's even already made the conscious choice to tell Charles about them, he was just interrupted. But now that they're back together and he's literally in the middle of an attempt to escape Hell, there is absolutely no way he can so much as stop for breath without telling Charles the truth. Even the stopping for breath is so loaded - because they're ghosts, they don't need to breathe, but also they're in Hell, so the one thing they can feel is pain, however nonsensical. And Edwin certainly is in pain. But whether he knows what he's about to do or not when he says he 'just needs a tick,' a breather is absolutely not what's gonna give him enough relief to keep climbing - it's fixing that other hurt, though, that will.

Like everything else in that scene, there's a lot of layers to him promising Charles "You don't have to feel the same way, I just needed you to know" - but I don't think that means it isn't also true on a surface level. It's the act of telling Charles that matters so much more than whatever follows it, and while that might have gone unnoticed if anything else major had happened in the same conversation, now we're forced to acknowledge its staggering and singular importance for what it is. The moment is well-earned and properly built up to, but until we see it happen in all its wonderful simplicity, and we see the aftermath (or lack thereof, even), we couldn't properly anticipate how much of a weight off Edwin's shoulders merely getting to share the truth with Charles was going to be, why he couldn't wait for a better, safer opportunity before giving in to that desire, or how badly he needed to say it and nothing else - and I really, really love the weight that act of just being honest, seen, and known is given in their story/relationship.