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another-sonic-blog · 4 years

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shadamy but somehow they turn into real hedgehogs and have to find a way to turn back to normal

Unexpectedly Good ShadAmy 3K

It was one of the few times Silver got to visit Amy's cafe. He had been out of town for a couple of weeks and as his pink friend suggested, they were going to meet today.

Momo cafe had a calming atmosphere. A soft green decorated the walls as flowers and plats were placed next to the crystal clear window. The tables and chairs were made out of wood, which was accentuated perfectly the cozy atmosphere of the place. Fairy lights hang from the ceiling and Silver wonder that it must be a beautiful thing to witness at night.

It was late afternoon and the and sun was starting to set, as he entered the cafe he noticed Amy over the cash register and immediately waved side as they noticed each other's presence.

"Well, you are early I am about to close," Amy said as she watched Silver jump over the counter, joining her side.

"Of course, I won't miss tonight-" Something caught the white hedgehog's attention. As he looked over the cafe, he noticed that on a faraway table a black hedgehog quietly looked over them.

He perfectly knew who this hedgehog was and although he didn't want to interrupt his calm moment, Silver was just too excited to see him.

"Hey, Shadow!" Silver screamed across the cafe and Amy was glad that there were only a few costumers left at the cafe. "Come over with us!"

Shadow pretended not to hear him as he hides his face with his hand and Silver was still clueless as ever. "Hey, Shadow!!!"

"Silver, you are embarrassing him." Amy faced her white friend and with the softest look she could give him, she placed a hand on his shoulder. "Shadow is my top client, he comes here at the same time every day and orders a black cup of coffee... Don't scare him away."

Silver gave the pink one an intrigued look. A part of him didn't believe her. The white hedgehog placed his back on the counter's edge. No longer facing the cafe but the kitchen of it. "What are you talking about? Shadow hates coffee."

"What? No, he doesn't!" Amy said as she took off her pink apron and placed it on top of the counter. "If he didn't, he wouldn't come here."

"He can't even stand the smell! I remember the other day he-"

"Hello,"

The pink and white hedgehog froze as they heard a deep voice behind him. They slowly turned around and they noticed the black hedgehog had placed a white cup on the counter, signifying that he had finished the coffee.

"Hey, Shadow," Amy said as she waved at him, a bit embarrassed at the possibility that Shadow might have heard their previous conversation. "Did you enjoy the peach coffee?"

"Indeed,"

The white hedgehog was intrigued by the black one. Shadow always had that firm stance, as if he was ready to attack at any time. However, today he looked very ... soft. He looked a bit timid even.

"Since when do you like coffee?" Silver asked. "I gave you a coffee scented candle for your birthday and you almost threw me out of your apartment."

"You gave him a scented candle for his birthday?" Amy asked.

"Don't people on your time usually do that?"

Amy was thinking about giving him a remark but now that she thinks about it, he wasn't wrong. Both hedgehogs looked over to Shadow and they were waiting for an answer.

"Actually, I am only capable of enjoying Amy's coffee," Shadow replied, he looked over the room nervously. Alright, Silver was detecting something about his red striped friend. It was s strange sight and one that Silver had never seen before.

A few seconds passed where none of them spoke. Amy and Silver waited for Shadow to continue as it seemed like the black hedgehog had more to say.

However, he actually walked away. The pink and white hedgehog looked at each other in surprise, they knew that Shadow was a mysterious hedgehog but this was different.

"Actually, Amy ..."

All of a sudden, Shadow was there again looking more nervous than ever. He scratched the back of his head as he looked to the other side, not making eye contact with the pink one. Silver examined the black hedgehog a crazy thought came to his mind. No ... it couldn't be ...

Shadow let out a sigh as he mustered all the courage he had inside and said, "Are you free tonight?"

"I can't believe you are making me go on a date with Shadow tonight!" Amy complained as she stood in front of her futurist friend. The sun was completely down already even though it was only 7 p.m. The two friends were walking down the street as they headed towards Amy's house. "Besides, we had plans"

"Amy, Shadow doesn't just go out for fun," Silver said as he walked next to the pink one. "He must really like you ... besides, I'll be staying over your house. We can do a sleepover after your date today."

"I still can't believe it," Amy sighed in defeat. It wasn't that she didn't like Shadow, it was that she had never seen Shadow in a romantic light before. Probably, it was because he was her number one customer and never really interacted only when it came down to take his order. "Well, at least I know he is going to bring with him the magic book I lent Rouge."

Silver and Amy could see a pink house from afar, it has been a while since he had visited her home. If he was completely honest, a nostalgic sentiment overtook him. It had only been a few weeks .. maybe he was just sentimental.

"Magic book?" Silver asked as Amy opened up the door for him. He stepped in and immediately turned on the lights. The one thing that he enjoyed the most about his friend's house was the smell. It smelled like vanilla, and cinnamon very home-like.

"Yes, I lent her a magic book I got from when we went to visit Blaze ... remember?"

The name of the purple cat made a small electric shock run down Silver's spine. The pink hedgehog noticed this and walked towards her black sofa, inviting Silver to sit down next to her. An evident blush tinted the white hedgehogs' cheeks.

"Shadow won't pick me up until 9 ... So, we got time to talk about you."

"I am done with part of the deal, now give me the keys to my motorcycle."

Pointing at the beautiful bat, Shadow wasn't having the greatest time. He was beyond annoyed at the moment and it seemed that the bat only took more pleasure at seeing him in such state.

"Not until you take Amy out, then I'll give you the keys." Rouge was peacefully watching a movie in the living room of the apartment of the famous Team Dark. She was having a good time until her black friend appeared to annoy her, or better say tell the news. "You should be grateful, I doing you a favor."

"How is forcing me on a date a favor?"

Shadow was standing between Rouge and the TV, impeding her from enjoying her telenovela. Not like Rouge minded too much because at the moment there were only commercials. She muted the TV to give Shadow her full attention, hoping that something that she says will go through his thick skull.

"Because of me, you are going on a date with the girl you like, how is that not a favor?" Rouge finally made eye contact with Shadow.

"I don't like her."

"You go to her cafe everyday although you hate coffee," Rouge replied.

"I like coffee now, that doesn't-"

"You put a sticker of a rose in your motorcycle because that reminds you of her."

"No, I actually-" Shadow tried to interrupt her but Rouge had the upper hand.

"She came to G.U.N. once," Rouge stopped him midway, again. "You sneezed, she said blessed you and you had the biggest smile on your face for the whole week."

A few moments passed where Shadow and Rouge were battling to see who would win. The black hedgehog was throwing mental daggers at her but it seemed like Rouge was immune to his attacks. Finally, Shadow sighed in defeat. He placed a hand to his forehead as he felt that it started to hurt.

"It's ok handsome," Rouge said, finally giving him a reassuring simile. "You will get her, just open up a little more and-"

"It pains me," Shadow said and this time, he placed his right hand on his stomach.

"Love hurts sometimes-"

"Not like that!"

All of a sudden Shadow ran across the living room into the closest restroom. He kicked it open as he felt that the liquid forming in his stomach could spill out at any moment. He heard steps follow close up behind him but he didn't care, he went straight to the toilet, open up the lid and started to throw up.

He didn't know what it was ... if it was the coffee that he drank earlier or just the thought that he was on a date with his love interest that made him sick to the stomach.

Rouge stood behind him. She bent down next to him and for a few seconds, Shadow looks at her ... Wow, he did look sick.

A few more minutes passed in which Shadow kept vomiting with a few minutes of interval. Rouge and Shadow had come up with the same conclusion, Shadow the Hedgehog was sick. It didn't matter if it was because he was nervous or because of the coffee he drank earlier, they needed to do something about it.

"What am I going to do?" Shadow said as he kept his face closer to the toilet. "She can't see me like this!"

"You could reschedule," Rouge said, "I think that's-"

"No, it has to be tonight,"

"Why?"

"Silver is with her."

Rouge inclined her head mostly at the fact that she had never seen Shadow in such a state. She couldn't tell exactly what was going on but she knew that she had to continue to dig dipper into the matter to find out. "And that matters because?"

"He is a good hedgehog ... unlike me." Shadow's voice trembles as he uses his arm to clean out his mouth. "What if something happens between them tonight? I need to go out with her ... tonight."

There was such a preoccupied look on Shadow's face that it took the white bat by surprise. Her heart throbbed the moment they looked at each other. She knew that Shadow liked Amy, but now she knew to what extent. Rouge just couldn't bear to see him like that, so lost ... Then, a thought crossed her mind. That magic book Amy lent her.

"I know what to do!" Rouge said excitedly, "You stay right here Shadow, you will go to that date I promise!"

One moment ago, they were talking about his and Blaze's relationship and suddenly Amy turned into a hedgehog.

An actual hedgehog.

She was extremely tiny and had pink quills, she moved around as she followed her nose. Silver wouldn't believe it but because he saw Amy transforming there was no doubt. It happened so fast. With a poof sound and a bright light coming out of her body, she was now rolled into a ball.

There were Mobians and there were animals. Animals were the ancestors of Mobians and they were highly respected in the community.

Silver delicately grabbed the small pink hedgehog in his hands and as he did so, Amy popped out of the ball.

She was just ... so adorable.

"What if I keep her like this?"

The thought crossed his mind but Silver quickly shook his head as the thought went away. It didn't matter how cute the pink hedgehog was, he still preferred the talkative Amy the one who would listen to him.

Suddenly, a rush of panic began to overtake his body. This was such a drastic change, it happened out of nowhere and the white hedgehog didn't know the reason as to why she changed. What was he supposed to do in these circumstances?

As if Chaos heard his prayers, a strong knocking came from the door and Silver reluctantly stood up from the sofa with Amy still in his hands. He mentally prayed that whoever it was, it was his salvation.

He opened the door where a very unexpected person showed into the picture. She smiled awkwardly and waved from side to side. It didn't take long for the bat to notice the small pink hedgehog in Silver's hand. Just like Rouge, Silver noticed a small black and red hedgehog, softly being held in Rouge's right hand. A few seconds passed where the two Mobians were trying to understand what happened, Silver analyzed the black hedgehog and if he didn't know better he was sure that Shadow ... even like an animal hedgehog, he still hand that angry look on his face.

"Are you going to let me in handsome?" Rouge asked as it made Silver go back to reality. He nodded as he opened the door for her and the bat made her way inside. She looked around the house and she made a mental note to compliment Amy on her house decor.

But this wasn't the moment to think about that right now.

"I'll go straight to the point," Rouge said as she turned around to look at Silver who was closing the door behind him. "I gave Shadow a magic potion and I read the ingredients wrong and I accidentally turned him into a real hedgehog."

Silver came to an abrupt stop as he approached the bat. That was a lot of information to take in and he had a lot of questions.

"Alright first," Silver walked towards the dining table which was right next to the living room's sofa. He placed Amy there and kept a close eye on her. "Why did you give Shadow a magic potion and why does it affect Amy?"

Seeing how comfortable look at the dining table, Rouge placed her small black friend next to the pink hedgehog so she could focus on her next conversation with Silver.

"Shadow was nervous about the date tonight, he was throwing up and he was really determined to go to the date ..." Rouge said. "I couldn't stand him to see him like that and I remembered the magic book Amy lent him ... So, I gave him a confidence potion."

"Confidence Potion?"

"To give him the confidence to tell Amy about his feelings ... that's how she got affected too,"

Silver sighed and he placed a hand on his forehead, frustration evident on his face. "How do we get them back to normal?"

"Well, since this is a confidence potion, Shadow has to-"

The pink and black hedgehog only stared at each other, trying to understand each other's presence. They got closer as they took a good sniff of each other, trying to get familiar with the smell.

"You are like me!" Amy made small noises as she tried to interact with the black hedgehog in front of her. She couldn't understand the bigger white hedgehog that was taking care of her. Her small heart hopped that she could make a small connection with this one.

Shadow only got closer to her, trying to look at every inch of her small body. He did a few laps around her and noticed that she was worthy of his presence.

The black hedgehog faced her again, red eyes met green.

"I like you," Shadow said as small noises came out of little his mouth. "Do you want to be with me forever?"

"There's no way Shadow is ever going to confess to Amy, we need to think of another idea!" Silver said, a tint of desperation on his voice.

But as if Chaos wanted to contradict him, a bright light was coming from the dining table. The hedgehogs shone together and with a 'pop' sound, they were back to normal.

Amy and Shadow were sitting on top of the dining table. It took them a few seconds to realized what just had happened. Shadow was the one to react at almost immediately as he felt how his left hand was softly holding into Amy's right hand. A soft blush landed on cheeks and still, he didn't let go. Amy was still in trance but was soon taken back to reality as she felt Silver's arms around him.

"I was so worried that you were going to stay like a hedgehog forever!" Silver said, he felt relieved as he felt that Amy had returned his hug.

"Yeah, I am good-" Amy said and wanted to continue to comfort him but in an abrupt moment, she wasn't able to feel Silver in her embrace any longer.

"Hey, stay away from her!"

Shadow was fast to stand up from the dining table and pushed Silver away from the pink one. He stood up between them and it took him a few moments to realize what he had just done. Everyone had just stared at him in amusement and once again, the black hedgehog could feel his cheeks getting warmer by the second.

"I mean ... We just turned back, you could hurt her," Shadow said and quickly, added, "But it's not like I care ..."

"Come on Shady," Rouge walked towards her friend, prepared to tease the hell out of him. "You did confess to Amy already, didn't you?"

Once again, there was that blush on Shadow's face. He covered it with one of his hands. He mentally cursed Rouge and swore in the name of Chaos that he would have his revenge.

"You are not one to talk! Because of you, we were turned into animal hedgehogs!" Shadow said almost screaming.

"Yes, but I ended up confessing to your crush. So at the end of the day, I made you a favor!"

"Alright this is it, I am leaving!"

Shadow just couldn't take the teasing anymore. There was just so much he could take although he was used to Rouge's constant teasing, the thought of Amy seeing him as this concerned him the most. He must be looking so pathetic, now she is never going to look at him the way he wants her to. His only chance to go on a date with Amy had gone to the trash.

Shadow opened the door, ready to exit out and go somewhere he could freely feel ashamed of himself.

"Shadow, wait!"

Her voice felt like a sweet melody to him. His heart skipped a bit as soon as Shadow saw the pink one walk towards him. A soft smile landed on Amy's face and for a moment, Shadow forgot about his previous embarrassment.

Amy softly held Shadow's hand and at this moment he felt his heart could leave his body.

"Do you still want to go on a date tonight?"

A/N: This was harder to write than I expected. I know that the scene where they turn into real hedgehogs is kinda short but that was the best thing I could come up with without making this request too long. I hope you liked tho, thank you for the request!

#Shadamy #shadow and amy #shadowxamy #shadow the hedgehog #shadow #Amy Rose #amy #shadowandamy #shadamy fanfiction #sonic fanfiction #sonic fanfic #sonic

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discotenny · 4 years

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Corner Store [2]

Description: Arthur Kirkland had owned and run a corner store for the past 15 years. He is determined to go through the rest of his life with minimal change. However, when he takes notice of three high school boys, his world gets turned around as he tries to piece back his life in a way that he thinks it's supposed to be. Word Count: 2.5k+ Warnings: Obsessive behavior, underlying issues, panic attacks, divorce, OCD, I don’t know perhaps slight blood mention? Characters in Chapter: Arthur Kirkland[Britain], Francis Bonnefoy[France], Feliciano Vargas[North Italy], Lovino Vargas[South Italy], Elizabeta Héderváry[Hungary], Yao Wang[China], Roderich Edelstein[Austria]. Characters Mentioned: Matthias Nilsson[Denmark], Gilbert Beilschmidt[Prussia], Alfred Jones[USA], Peter Kirkland[Sealand], Toumas Nilsson[Finland], Kiku Honda[Japan] Ship/s Mentioned: AusHun[Elizabeta & Roderich]{Brief interaction} AU: !Corner Store AU! !Human AU!

I doubt I’m going to finish this story though haha. It was fun to write, and there was a third chapter planned to post[ perhaps I’ll post a bonus later or something], though Hetalia has been in the back of my mind with the creation of this blog. Don’t worry babsies [is that the plural form of babs?] Mod Ioten will post BSD stuff soon lol

Despite the disruption in peace yesterday, Arthur opened the store with a smile on his face. Francis followed shortly, clocking in while Arthur was eating his morning sandwich and drinking his first cup of tea of the day. “Bonjour mon ami!” Francis hummed, walking in from the back.

“Did Alfred get home okay?” Arthur couldn’t help but ask, blowing on his tea before taking a sip.

Francis’s eyes softened, and he looked down at the coffee in his hand. “Yes, he is alright. Merci Arthur for allowing him to wait here with his friends. I will have to call Matthias’s guardian to share my thanks as well.”

Arthur coughed a little bit, choking on his tea a bit. “I-It’s no big deal,” Arthur got out through coughs. “I would want someone to do the same for my own son if the same situation arose with him.”

The Frenchman looked up in surprise, “You have a little boy as well?”

Reaching into his wallet, he pulled out a small Christmas photo taken last year. “His name is Peter, Alfred acts quite a bit like him,” He chuckled, handing it to Francis.

“He’s a beautiful boy…” Francis mumbled, looking over the photo. “Is this your wife?” He asked, pointing at the woman who held her hair neatly in a partial ponytail.

Arthur looked away awkwardly, “Oh- uh. Yes. Peter is much closer to her than me.” He didn’t really want to discuss any more of it, so he attempted to change the subject. “Are you close with Alfred? He talks about you a lot.”

“He talks… about me?” Francis seemed shocked. A spark lit inside, and these eyes opened wider than before.

“Does he usually not?” Arthur questioned, setting down his tea.

“Alfred at home is much more… let’s say reserved at home. He doesn’t talk much nowadays.” Francis took a drink of his beverage, turning around to begin his shift.

Arthur leaned over the counter to look at Francis going to the other side of the store. “The fruit needs to be rearranged to make it look like there’s more than we actually have!”

He waved Arthur off, and the man relaxed a little bit. Finishing up his breakfast sandwich, Arthur got up to begin sweeping the floor. There were forty-five minutes before the store had to open up; Arthur could prepare it in twenty. Thinking back to yesterday, he took note that Francis was right in that the store had an odd sour smell to it. He would never admit it though, but the itchiness in his palm crept back into his mind. He tried to rub it against the broom handle, seeking some, any relief from the result of the new revelation. However, nothing seemed to help him. In Arthur’s frustration, he stomped over to the back room. Mumbling curses to himself, he grabbed a can of air freshener and started spraying around the store.

Francis watched in bewilderment at the scene, freezing while still holding an apple. “Mon ami I do not know if it is my place to speak on your…choices. But what are you doing spraying that can like a mad man?”

“The store smells bad” Arthur mumbled, turning to the direction of Francis, getting ready to spray.

“Hey hey hey! You will poison our produce!” Francis grabbed Arthur’s shoulders, turning him around. “What is wrong with you!”

Arthur scrunched up his face when the powerful waft of fresh linen hit his nostrils. He started coughing, crouching over. “We can open a little bit later if it helps you ca-”

“No!” Arthur yelled, shooting back up. “We-” He coughed a little bit more, “We can’t afford to open later than the morning rush!”

Although it made moderate sense to Francis and was a good enough reason for him to back off, Arthur knew that wasn’t the truth. It wouldn’t be normal for him to open up the store later than 6:30 in the morning. It wouldn’t be right. “To get rid of this…aroma, may I suggest we turn on our air?” Francis suggested, and Arthur begrudgingly agreed. Francis looked on in concern as Arthur sludged over to the thermostat, turning and twisting knobbles and bobs. He knew the signs of trouble when he saw it.

Though the owner and his employee found themselves in hot water in the morning, that didn’t stop Arthur from opening up at 6:30 AM. Sitting at the counter, he sipped at his tea waiting for the customers to roll in.

A few moments later, the sound of the bell that filled him with so much joy rang; and he was filled with the euphoria that rushed over him every time a body entered. As customers filed themselves in, each one took a look at their preferred groceries. A line began to form as the first batch of customers gathered their usual items, some chatting casually with each other as they waited for Arthur to check them out.

His first customers were a pair of twins that he knew very well. The Vargas brothers, one more comfortable in the public atmosphere than the other.

“Buongiorno signore Arthur!” Feliciano set down a bag of biscotti and a sewing kit. As he bounced and made small comments of the climate of the day, his brother bashfully brought a bag of tomatoes to the counter. The twins were students who used to babysit Peter before he went off to elementary, so Arthur knew them on a more personal level than the rest of his customers. “The weather has been unpredictable lately,” Feliciano whispered, rattling his hand on the counter.

“Indeed it has,” Arthur mused, weighing the bag of tomatoes and slapping a sticker noting that it was paid on the front. “If I’m correct it’s supposed to clear up by the end of the afternoon. It’ll be a nice change of pace from all of the rain we’ve been getting.” Arthur smiled to himself as he continued the routine he’s been doing for the past fifteen years. Checking out and conversation, what more could a man need?

“Really!” Feliciano gasped excitedly and grabbed his brother’s arm. “Lovi, we can play football together then!”

His brother, Lovino, looked at him angrily. “I told you not to call me that dumbass!” He said it in a whisper, though most people around the twins could hear their conversation. Lovino jerked his arm away from his brother, who still held the excited demeanor as before.

“Your total is 12.94,” Arthur gave a polite nod to the pair as they scrambled to get their money out. With random coins and a couple of bills, their groceries were paid with exact change. “Have a nice day you boys!”

“Say hi to Peter for me! Ciao!~” The two grabbed their respective items and walked out the door, Feliciano chatting to himself while Lovino took a bite out of one of the tomatoes he had bought.

As the two walked out, the same lady who had bought his gummy bear supply walked up to the counter. She didn’t hold anything in her hand, and there wasn’t anything on the countertop either. “Hello miss, can I help you with anything today?” Despite his polite form, Arthur’s hand began to itch at the prospect of something wrong with the customer’s visit.

The young lady ducked under the counter, and Arthur leaned to see what she was doing. She was snickering to herself, and placed down the box of gummy rolls that Gilbert had purchased yesterday. She was just about to pull out her money to pay for the rolls until someone called her name, causing her to turn around.

“Elizabeta! Can you pay for this too?”

A tall, awkward man emerged from the end of the line, walking slowly up to the girl. He seemed to be in poor health, heaving with every step he took; as if just being alive took a heavy toll on him. Elizabeta sighed, taking his energy drink and cheese stick and placing it down onto the counter. “Are you okay Roderich?” She asked, reaching her hand up to caress his face as Arthur scanned their items.

“I’m fine,” He sighed, batting Elizabeta’s hand away. “Thank you for paying.” Roderich leaned into her as she got her pocket money out.

“Are you a fan of these gummies?” Arthur asked as he was halfway through scanning the 34 rolls in the box.

Elizabeta laughed, “Oh no I’m not. I have a friend who is a big fan of them though. A couple bucks to see his face when he comes to school, finding out I bought all of his favorite candies, is worth it all the way.”

Arthur smiled to himself at the childish scheme. “Well, as long as I’m getting the money for the product,” he laughed along. “Would you like separate bags?”

Elizabeta and Roderich looked at each other before Roderich turned to Arthur, replying with a short no thank you. “Very well then,” Arthur smiled, carefully placing all of the gummy rolls around the boy’s Red Bull and cheese. When the exchange of money and product finished, Arthur waved goodbye to the pair. Roderich and Elizabeta turned around to say a quick goodbye. Arthur saw them lace their fingers together, and he smiled seeing them casually walkout.

The morning rush continued with familiar faces, casual acquaintances, and the same customers who would always come in the morning. Arthur felt good, despite the incidents in the morning and yesterday afternoon.

Time seemed to fly by as he and Francis guided people into making purchases, cleaning the store in the downtime, and checking out customers. Soon enough, Francis had to leave to pick up his son from school; and Arthur was left to his own thoughts.

His mind steeped into unhealthy territory. Every single detail of his life, every single constant he thought over as he drank his tea and ate his afternoon sandwich. He smiled as he reminded himself that nothing would be changing, that everything would and could not shift.

It couldn’t happen; he wouldn’t allow it.

He thought over the boys that he’d grown fond of. A shift, maybe, but a slightly more pleasant one than the changes he’s used to. But he had thought it over, saw where they would fit in his world that never changed.

They would come in every day, that's a plus. Always ordering the same items? Even better. Then he thought further. What would happen when he would retire? What would happen when the boys graduated? What would happen when the divorce went through, and he could only see his son for three days every week?

Arthur stopped moving when his teacup was six inches from his face. He sucked his breath in, and slowly set his cup down. He felt an itch creep up into his palm, worse than all of his other incidents. He couldn’t breathe. He had to get out of such a suffocating environment. As if he was in a daze, Arthur stood up and walked towards the door. Reaching towards the sign hanging on the inside of the door, he turned it so that the ‘open’ sign faced him. He finally allowed himself to let the air in his lungs flow out. He opened the door and walked through, turning around to lock it. He scratched his hand, walking through the streets of his familiar town with a thick haze surrounding his aura.

Arthur was wandering for a while. He didn’t know how far he’d walked until he found himself at the intersection which separated the stores from the roads leading to the major highway. Turning around, Arthur found himself at his rival’s grocery. Waddling in, he kept quiet. A bell sound, different from the one he had in his store rang. The smell was completely different too.

Why was he here? Arthur couldn’t answer the question himself. He had the afternoon rush to wait for after all. However, it was too late to turn back, he’d already entered the store and caught the attention of the clerk.

“Arthur Kirkland.” He turned to the side, seeing the Chinese man that tormented his business for the past 10 years. “Come to buy something different than European product?” Yao asked, folding his arms on the counter.

“I-I…” Arthur stuttered out, not able to come up with something suitable to say. With a cocky brow raise, Yao stood up and made his way over to the unusual guest.

“If you are looking for something we have it,” Yao said proudly. “You want bowl? Soap to brighten skin? I have Kiku cut pig blood for your cooking!”

“No thank you…” Arthur moved his arm in a shooing motion.

“You walk into my grocery and say you not need any,” Yao rolled his eyes, growing frustrated with the Brit. “Why are you even here?”

Arthur stood stiff, staring at the store, at the unfamiliarity of it all. Walking off, he wandered deeper into the aisles of foreign goods. Boxes of products he’s never seen, lines of items he wouldn’t dare to carry in his store; he leaned against a shelf for support. Faintly, he could hear Yao yell a little and then give up, walking back to his counter.

Suddenly, his whole body itched, and no matter how much he tried to relieve himself, the uncomfortable sensation never ceased. His nails dug into his skin as he scratched vigorously at his palms. In addition to his discomfort, he felt skin break and a stinging feeling begin to set in. He stumbled into the next aisle, scanning the items to try and find some sense of familiarity. Boxes of medicinal tea lined the shelves, and he was comforted somewhat by the leaves he used every morning. Then he found it.

He ran towards a box that held the black tea he drank every morning and held it as if it was gold. Shaking, he palmed his pants to see if he had his wallet. He felt a wave of relief when he felt the bump in his pocket.

Arthur walked over to the counter, presenting Yao with a hesitant smile. The man behind the counter looked at him through suspicious eyes, and took the credit card Arthur held out. “What bring you to my grocery today Mr. Kirkland?” A thick Chinese accent laced the man’s tone. Arthur found it funny that the long ponytail that Yao held his hair in swayed whenever he spoke.

“A-” Arthur found his throat to be unusually dry. “A change of pace is good sometimes.”

Yao didn’t reply, only humming as he handed back the card, giving Arthur his tea in a plastic bag.

Quickly, Arthur bid Yao goodbye and ran towards his own establishment. While the itchy feeling never went away, the dryness in his throat sure did with the enormous amount of tea he drank when he got back.

He almost forgot to turn the open sign back around before sitting down at the counter. Everything was okay, Arthur told himself. All he had to do was wait for the afternoon rush.

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mystery-deer · 5 years

Note

ray goes all out for kevin’s birthday

(I tried to write a fic but I got bored halfway through but I didn’t want to NOT answer this so ple ase enjoy this half finished fic as best you can!)

___________________________________________________________ “Look at you all…just talking. Talking away like this is business as usual.”The nine-nine looked at each other, they were used to being interrupted from arguments by their captain but this time felt different. Mostly because they were not in argument or shenanigan and were instead working with only slight breaks to chat.

“Uh…sir? Is everything alright?” Terry asked, getting up from his desk. “Is there a problem?”“No.” The captain sighed. “You’re not even looking at the problem. What’s the problem Jeffords?”Silence as the bull pen exchanged worried looks. “Uh…”“What is the problem Jeffords?”“I…um, moral?”“No. What’s the problem Peralta?”“Did your sister visit and turn your baseball cap around backwards ag-”“No. The problem that we’re trying to solve is,” Holt said, his voice heightening to signal that whatever speech he’d been leading up to was beginning. “That there are good days and there are bad days and then there’s suboptimal days and then there’s this. We are the last dog at the bowl, the runt of the litter and we are going to die out there if we waltz in unprepared!”“Oh my God…” Santiago cried, standing abruptly from her desk and covering her mouth. “It’s Kevin’s birthday tomorrow isn’t it?”“Bingo!”_______ “I can’t believe you forgot your own husband’s birthday Captain!” Scully scolded.“Yeah that’s real irresponsible of you.” Hitchcock chimed in smugly, rubbing shoe polish in his hair. “You’re literally rubbing shoe polish in your hair.” Rosa pointed out, both her feet kicked up onto her desk. “I’m trying to get out the gray spots!”“It’s all gray spots.” Rosa sneered.“Enough. I didn’t forget Kevin’s birthday but my plans…changed a few times.”-flashback-Kevin is reading the paper over what seems to be lunch and Raymond is scribbling away in a notebook. “Ah, Francis is having a big party this year.” Raymond pauses. “What do you…think of that?”“I don’t know, it seems a bit tacky. He’s almost as old as me, making such a fuss.”Raymond crosses out whatever he was writing and nods in agreement.__ “I was thinking, why don’t we go down to that bakery on 5th and purchase a pie?” Raymond asks casually, walking down the street with Kevin. “Oh no thank you. Martin is going on some sort of diet to prove that it’s medically unsound and I promised to participate as well as he wanted multiple testimonies.”“Hm…” Raymond hummed, nodding. He sneakily takes out his phone and frantically hits ‘cancel order’ on 10 pie deliveries.__ “Honey.” Raymond quickly shuts the closet door and turns to Kevin, who walks into the room. “I- what were you doing?”“Nothing. You were about to say something?”“Yes. I’m writing a paper about the prevalence of alcoholism in the gay community due to the chief lgbt spaces being bars and such. Because of this young people in the community begin drinking earlier than they might have otherwise due to wanting to be social and make friends with people they can relate to.”“…Ah. Did you need something from me in relation to that?”“No. I just enjoy keeping you up to date on my work.”“How romantic.” Raymond smiled and Kevin returned the gesture, walking out the room and closing the door.Raymond sighed dreamily and the closet opened to reveal Debbie, also smiling. “So is wine tasting out out?”-flash back ends- “Don’t you guys always go out to dinner or something lame like that?” Diaz asks. “Well yes but I…wanted to make this one special.”“With all due respect sir-”“Peralta.”“Kevin’s not a hard guy to impress…when you’re Raymond Holt and no one else. He thinks you’re the best thing since sliced bread.”Amy and Holt share a smug look and chuckle. “Oh Peralta I hardly think me and Otto Rohwedder are even comparable in the mind of any sane man.” Amy lets out a bark of laughter and Holt leans back in his chair, satisfied.“God, I hate when you guys are like this.” Rosa moans.“Enough chit chat!” Everyone turns to the door, where Charles is standing, holding a large binder covered in lisa frank food and heart stickers. Amy gasps as the binder is tossed onto the Captain’s desk and Jake tilts his head, trying to determine if it’s the size of the binder or the way it’s casually tossed onto the desk that caused the outburst.“Let’s plan this baby.”_____________________ Kevin got off the train and began walking home, yawning. He checked his phone and read a text from Gina. Gina: Heyy so hows the plan goin??? Along with a string of boxes that always accompanied Gina’s texts. He had no idea what they meant and at this point it would be a bit awkward to bring up.You: Very well. Raymond is home and we are having a quiet night in.Gina: brb just got a text from JakeKevin put his phone back in his pocket and took out his keys, unlocking his door and stepping into his home to see-“CHARLES I SWEAR TO GOD IF YOU SUGGEST A MASSAGE LINE AGAIN I’M GONNA SQUEEZE YOUR HEAD LIKE A WATERMELON!”Utter chaos.His phone vibrated and he took it out again, feeling shell-shocked. Gina: oohhhhh maybe not THAT quiet ____________________ An hour later the following events had transpired. Amy had nearly fainted when Martin recognized her and asked how her teeth were doing.Terry and Charles had gotten into a long argument about romantic gestures which led to both of them spending five thousand dollars in gifts to their respective wives.Rosa had brandished a machete to cut the cake that Charles had made, which proved a mistake as the cake was for some reason made of meat. Specifically fish.Amy had to down two bottles of her allergy medication after Cheddar had gotten loose and chased her around the house, thinking they were playing some sort of game.Scully and Hitchcock attempted to sell Debbie Nutriboom smoothies.And Jake had proposed they play Just Dance which he was so horrendous at that he nearly had some sort of heart attack from all the exertion. Rosa meanwhile crushed everyone in her path to victory. “Hey, where’s Kevin?” Asked Charles, looking away from Rosa’s fantastic moves to ‘Circus’ on extreme mode.“I don’t know, I’ll go find him.” Terry said, getting up and searching the house. He found him upstairs in what seemed to be a room entirely devoted to paperwork. He had Cheddar on his lap and both of their eyes were closed. “Is Terry interrupting something?” Kevin opened his eyes but Cheddar’s remained closed though his tail began wagging. “Oh, Jeffords. Welcome. To the pity party.”“What’s wrong? Was it the ice sculpture of you that Jake broke the head off of?”“No.”“Was it that Charles’ meal was entirely fish based?”“Oh no I didn’t eat any of that. Did you know that he put fish in the water?”Terry nodded gravelly and Kevin placed a hand on his back in consolation. “I appreciate that this all for me and that you all went through the trouble of making this night rather extravagant but what I really wanted was-” The door behind them opened suddenly and when they both turned to look they saw Holt closing it again, glancing around as if worried. “Raymond what are y-”“Kevin? Why are you and Jeffords in here?” He sat down next to them. “Were you capitalizing on your seven minutes in heaven?”“You don’t know what that is.” Terry pointed out, looking around the room. “Terry’s gotta ask…is this room really just for paperwork?”“It’s for taxes.” Kevin replied in a tone that suggested Terry was the weird one for not having an entire room devoted to taxes.“Right…the tax room. Anyway, now that you two are here I’ll be heading back to the party. Terry’s not going to have anyone beating him at Boogie Wonderland. Especially Francis.” and with that the man left, leaving Kevin and Raymond alone.____________________________________________So the plot of this fic was going to be that Holt wanted to make Kevin’s birthday very special bc he wants to properly propose and ask that they renew their vows while Kevin wanted to have a quiet night in so that he could properly propose to Holt and ask that they renew their vows.In the end they, in the privacy of this room with the party raging downstairs, ask each other and they both accept. They have a lot of fun at the party and at the end of the night they make some very casual mention of the fact that they’re happy about deciding to renew their vows and everyone’s like “WHAT!?? WHEN DID THAT HAPPEN!??” Also, can you guess what I’m parodying in the…I guess cold open?

#Q&A #anon #thank youuu~!!!#b99

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magalarajoonideprohvetid · 6 years

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blackouts [transgressive anthropology]

«Wow! I thought the lights went out!» (sudden exclamation by prof. Carlo Cubero at Debates in Anthropology lecture on the 15th of March 2018)

This moment is embedded in my memory, an ultimate manifestation of honesty, said out loud with no restraints, the peak of the lecture, the peak of the whole course – a sudden darkness. I do not know about you but I have on several occasions felt a sudden blackout, like the blink of an eye and I am not sure – did I just blink, did the lights go out for a micro-second, did my brain shutdown for a second, did I have a stroke, did only I (not) see it? Usually I have had others around me to calm me down, «Yes, we saw it also, I think the electricity flickered for a moment.» Is it you, Niko, sending us inter-dimensional messages through your most known invention, chthonic news through alternative current? If there would not be electricity in our households, would I even be writing about this phenomena, is momentary blackout a ‘thing’ without the light bulb? Or am I writing about something completely different, the blackout our unconsciousness creates when our consciousness is not ready for the incoming message?

writing culture

If there are any dogmas in anthropology, it is the inclusion of fieldwork into the methodological frame - for it to count as anthropology, a researcher needs to step out of academia and come back with outsourced data. Yes, it is extremely valuable that there is something new added to the usual academics circular referencing, agency has been given to the unheard and original voices. But in the same time questions arises - what is and when is anthropology? Is it students reading the theories? Or is it anthropologist on the fieldsite? James Clifford analyzes the cover picture of Writing Culture, where Stephen Tyler is writing during his fieldwork:

«In this image the ethnographer hovers at the edge of the frame—faceless, almost extraterrestrial, a hand that writes. It is not the usual portrait of anthropological fieldwork. We are more accustomed to pictures of Margaret Mead exuberantly playing with children in Manus or questioning villagers in Bali. Participant observation, the classic formula for ethnographic work, leaves little room for texts.» (Clifford, 1)

This picture gives the impression than an anthropologist does everything in the field, he participates, observes and simultaneously writes. In reality the ‘real’ writing happens retrospectively, and that might be one of the biggest problems of anthropology – there is no anthropology of the present, the reproducible anthropology is classically done in the post-fieldwork stage. This is valid for both ethnographic writing and film, as both ‘texts’ are produced afterwards. Doing currently auto-fieldwork, being on ‘ramadan-mode’, I am deeply stressed as I cannot do much writing, my notes are scribbles bearing no great weight, I am too heavily influenced and too stuck in the actual experience to do any reflective writing. Vincent Crapanzano says similar things about Goethe’s experience of the carnival:

«A conventional Ash Wednesday meditation, perhaps, Goethe's conclusion marks are turn to contemplation, introspection, and concern for the meaning of what we do. His “return” parallels a return in the ceremony he describes. During the carnival there is no reflection, just play, masquerading, and, as we say nowadays, acting out. With Ash Wednesday begins a period of penitence, and, we must presume, a return to introspection, order, and individuality.» (Crapanzano, 68)

After the experience thou, the author becomes active and starts to describe the lived experiences; how the description is done, how it is reflected and to whom it is directed, that depends on the author. Crapanzano describes the ethnographic encounters of George Caitlin with the Mandan tribe in North America and their initiation rituals of O-Kee-Pa:

«Here Catlin moves from his (objectifying) metaphorical perspective to that of the tortured; despite this move, his intention is not phenomenological, but rhetorical: He does not describe either the Indian's or his own experience of the torture. The ��imps and demons as they appear» (to whom? to Catlin? to the Mandan?) is stylistically equivalent to «there is no hope of escape from it.» They are directed to the reader, and it is the reader's reaction that will guarantee Catlin's perceptions.» (Crapanzano, 57)

So Caitlin’s intention was to captivate the reader, to tell the story in a way that it works specifically on the reader, it is not him nor Native Americans in the story he has written, it is the reader he is trying to drag into the story. In Caitlin’s case, the author is playing around with the reader’s morality and the reader’s possible endeavor toward morality. Crapanzano gives another example, where the author is more inclined to play on the ‘dirty’ thoughts of the reader by using contemporary puns:

«The title of Clifford Geertz’s essay «Deep Play: Notes on a Balinese Cockfight,» written about the time the film Deep Throat was all the rage, announces a series of erotic puns—puns, Geertz maintains, the Balinese themselves would understand—used throughout his essay. Puns are frequent in ethnography. They position the ethnographer between his world of primary orientation, his reader's world, and the world of those others, the people he has studied, whom at some level, I believe, he is also addressing (Crapanzano 1977a). Through the pun he appeals collusively to the members of one or the other world, usually the world of his readership, there by creating a hierarchical relationship between them. He himself, the punster, mediates between these worlds.» (Crapanzano, 68-69)

Crapanzano’s general theme for the article in Writing Culture is anthropologist/ethnographer as god Hermes, someone who is always bringing messages, someone who is a translator between ‘gods’ and ‘humans’, but whose messages might not contain the whole truth, they (singular!) might be lying for the sake of themself, the informants or for the sake of the readers, they needs to make a convincing case (Ibid, 52).

transgressive fiction

If I have to name three books from high school that really influenced me (both literally and literary), then these books were not and most probably will not be in the obligatory reading list. Two of them were loaned to me by friends, they had read them and suggested that I would be interested – Dead Babies by Amis Martin and The Beach by Alex Garland. Both stories travel in closed communities where sex and drug usage is common among the characters, where atrocities happen to them, and in general the environment of the book, its locus is a degenerate one. If one is to make charts, then Dead Babies is in my opinion a few grades more on the transgressive fiction side than The Beach. Now the third book was Check-out by Estonian author Kaur Kender, the first and last book in Estonia that has had «PARENTAL ADVISORY EXPLICIT CONTENT» sticker on it (only for advertisement reasons, there has not yet been such restrictions in the literary scene). The protagonist of this book is a filthy rich business-man, whose main efforts in life revolve around fornication and intoxication, both fueled by boredom and leading to the humiliation of others as he is capable to do whatever he wants with other people, it is self-destruction and liberation, mirroring society back at itself. Having grown up watching movies like Pulp Fiction and Dobermann, where protagonists are the ‘baddest’ on the conventional moral and ethical paradigm but in the same time there is something likable about them, they stand on the right side of life whilst doing bad things, Check-out did come as a shocker because there was nothing good about the main character, he was utterly bad, none of that misunderstood Robin Hood type of ‘badness’. For the first time I had been transgressed by the author, and I transgressed into the character. In retrospective Kender has said (heard it on a public event of the re-release of the Check-out in 2016), that the character was based on the stories he had witnessed and heard of local businessmen, and of his own alcohol and drug addictions (especially the ending of the book, where the protagonist starts using heroin). His book was based on participant observations and autoethnographical method.

Chuck Palahniuk is most known for his novel Fight Club, made famous by movie adaption and Brad Pitts’ six-packs’. I have not read that novel but I have read Haunted by Palahniuk (that one also has a PARENTAL ADVISORY sticker on the cover, Kender’s book was released almost a decade earlier). It tells the story of a group of people who apply for an experimental creative writing course and are then locked up in an abandoned art-house cinema. Every chapter consists of a poem about the main character of that chapter, a story of her/his origin, and a part of the main narrative with her/him as the leading character in it. The first chapter tells the story of a character named Saint Gut-Free, it consists of three different stories about ‘masturbation gone wrong’, onanism that might have killed the onanists. On page 17 of this 400 page modern horror story I have a blackout, the story becomes so disturbing, so real in my head, every word brings me closer to the conclusion of the story, and in my mind I already know where it is leading, Palahniuk has given enough hints, there is no happy ending, and every word brings it closer and my heart is rushing and I feel noxious… I blackout, I skip a paragraph (of course I read it later), I calm myself and continue reading. Palahniuk writes in the afterword a longer explanation how this story came to life, and how the reception has been so far. We tend to hope that the craziest stories are not the ones taken from real life, that these are made up, the fruit of fantasy. Palahniuk ruins the illusion the same way Kender did:

«No, this week, my writer friends just laughed, and I told them how the three-act story of ‘Guts’ was based on three true anecdotes. Two had happened to friends, and the last had happened to a man I’d met while attending sex addict support groups to research my fourth novel. They were three funny, gradually more upsetting true stories about experiments with masturbation gone wrong. Horribly wrong. Nightmarishly wrong.» (Palahniuk, 407)

Without mudding the water, I say out that in my opinion he was performing a participant observation, he, as many other writers, are ethnographers without the academia and without theory. Palahniuk’s emphasis is not on the credibility, it is on style and on affect:

«Reading ‘Guts’ takes a full head of steam. You don’t get many moments to look up from the page. But when I did, the faces in the front row looked a little gray. Beyond that were questions and answers. The book signing. The End.

It wasn’t until I’d signed the last book that a clerk said two people had fainted. Two young men. They’d both dropped to the concrete floor during ‘Guts’ but they were fine now, with no memory of anything between standing, listening, and waking up surrounded by people’s feet.» (Ibid, 408)

I could have been one of these two fainters, or at least fluctuating between consciousness and blackout. The main question for me is in the affect of the text, how something that is usually considered ‘unreal’ can make us feel physically sick?

transgressive ethnography

In a way, ethnographers have always written transgressive texts, most of the texts describe social norms and activities very different from the one of the audience of these texts. One of the dogmas for transgressive fiction is that the protagonist emerges through the violations of norms as a free(er) individual. One way of describing anthropologist is that they are like translators, who translate different cultures to an understandable format (as a colonialist discipline it used to be for the Europeans but things should have changed?). Another way of describing anthropologists is not so much as an interpreter but an inventor, s/he invents a culture, dogmatizes its principles into an ethnographic ‘holy book’, how this culture should be, has been, and will be, not understanding that it is not how it used to be, that is not how every single person inside that environment and/or space relates to that culture, and people do not have to spend their lives fulfilling the dogmas set in the ethnographer’s ‘holy scripture’ (most probably half a year later there will be a missionary there and everyone is wearing pants and singing songs of our Saviour Jesus). Vincent Crapanzano unites these two description into one:

«Like translation, ethnography is also a somewhat provisional way of coming to terms with the foreignness of languages – of cultures and societies. The ethnographer does not, however, translate texts the way translator does. He must first produce them.» (Crapanzano, 51)

Lets take for instance the infamous case of Margaret Mead and the Samoans. As we know by now, Margaret Mead went to do fieldwork with Samoan, came back and wrote an awesome ethnography on how Samoan teenage girls are sexually liberated. Derek Freeman waits a few years after Margaret Mead’s death, publishes a book on how she was wrong and that Samoans have actually very strict rules for sexual conduct. Now, there are several interpretations for this controversy, and explanations, some of them, like Paul Shankman’s The History of Samoan Sexual Conduct and the Mead-Freeman Controversy gives more ambivalent interpretation to the sexual norms and behaviors in Samoa (Shankman 1996). It could be possible that both Mead and Freeman just saw different sides of the same society, if there only would not be this moment when one of Mead’s informants tells a retrospective view of the incident:

«Yes she asked us what we did after dark. We girls would pinch each other and tell her that we were out with the boys. We were only joking but she took it seriously. As you know Samoan girls are terrific liars and love making fun of people but Margaret thought it was all true.» (Heimans 1988, 3:36)

So what did she do – ‘translate’ the culture in the wrong way, had wrong data, or maybe she was in a way creating something the readers wanted to hear? Looking at both Mead and Palahniuk I must come to the following conclusions: Samoans lied and we were happy, Palahniuk presumably told the truth and it is disgusting. We as readers, we like to read about ‘sexually liberated’ women, and Samoan girls played that role in Mead’s ethnography really well. In a way, Mead’s ethnography tells more about her own society and herself than about the Samoans, she was giving liberation to the Western world and to herself.

In a discussion about transgressive fiction, we cannot continue without talking about Untitled 12, a modern horror story by Kaur Kender, where the first person protagonist is a pedophile (and sadistic sexual pervert in general). I read the whole story on Nihilist.fm on the night it came out and it was a devastating experience, I skipped parts of it as I was not capable to read even the obviously exaggerated and absurd descriptions of sexual violence, I felt hollowed after that experience, and that was something he wished to accomplish (Kender 2015). What happened was that someone reported to the police, that it might be child pornography (Estonian laws include a very wide range of material from pictures and videos to written text as it might depict underage children in pornographic situations), and police went after it. It was taken to court and got media coverage even outside of Estonia (as it is not usual any longer in Western societies that known writers have been taken to court for these specific charges) (ERR 2017). In the end he was declared innocent by two levels of court, and has since then left Estonia with a promise to never write in Estonian again. But what was very interesting with this case was the possibilities for alternative situations and how would they have been perceived. For instance, if it would have been someone’s personal experiences, someone who had been raped as a child and if that someone writes about this experience with graphic details, could that be also considered child pornography? Or if someone describes their sexual experience as a minor (depending on the explanation of the Penal Code it could be either under 14 or 18 years old), could that be considered child pornography? As a reader, was I consuming unknowingly child pornography if Kender would have been found quilty? These may sound as hypothetical questions, but if one is active in literary world (both as producer and consumer) then these questions become rather substantial.

Untitled 12 is made up, it is fictional, and from this fictional world it became very realistic, I was in court during a few of the open hearings and those benches, the jury and the prosecutor, they were all very real. But how is this all connected to anthropology? In some cases anthropologist are not the good guys, friendly scientist, who participate with respect and observe with sincerity. For instance José Padilha’s documentary Secrets of the Tribe deals with several controversial incidents what different anthropologist researching Yanomami tribe had caused. One of these anthropologist was Jacques Lizot, who according to his victims had raped and sexually abused several young Yanomami boys (Padilha, 42:44-55:08). This was known by other anthropologist and researchers, but it was overlooked for many years and until today there has been no court cases nor other serious consequences for his real transgressions. He transgressed in real life, not in a fictional world, his victims are real human beings and not made up characters. His contribution to anthropology? Yanomami dictionary, with specific terms for sexual activities like masturbation etc.

Lizot case is a real pedophilia case, this kind of behavior is not accepted in the current Western society nor in Yanomami society, it is a taboo. Gilbert Herdt’s case is a little bit different, but the similarities reside in the transgression, in his case it is the witnessing and writing part what matters. Herdt has done fieldwork with the ‘Sambia’ tribe (pseudoneum he created for the tribe) in Papua New Guinea and has published several articles on them and a collection of these articles Sambia Sexual Culture: Essays From the Field (Herdt, 1999). The Sambia tribe used to have a rather controversial initiation rituals for young boys (current situation with these rituals is unknown for me) – they were taken from their mothers at age 9, put through painful purification ritual of bloodletting from the nose, and then forced to perform oral sex on older boys. Later on they become the boys who receive oral sex, and after that they become adult man who will marry a woman and presumably only participate in heterosexual activity. Reasoning behind the ritual is that the bloodletting will purify them from the attachment to their mother (and women in general), and that men are born without semen and to have semen one has to digest semen. Herdt seems to view these rituals from a less negative stance, as a form of bisexuality and gives agency to free sexual desires. James Giles, who has written a review of Herdt’s book, is less enthusiastic about it and clearly questions the rituals as in his opinion they are not connected to desire at all:

«… sexual behavior can be engaged in for numerous reasons, many of which have nothing to do with sexual desire (Giles, 2004). This fact is especially important to be aware of when one is studying the sexual desires of people from a sexually nonpermissive and prescriptive culture like that of the Sambia.» (Giles, 2004, 414)

Now my point is neither condemning of Sambian rituals nor Herdt’s presentation and analyze of them, my point lies much more in the product, in the ethnography. If an anthropologist writes on a similar topic, something that is in generally considered a taboo topic, that s/he describes with graphic details, then there is a chance, at least in Estonia, that someone might complain to the police, as was the case with Kender’s book. Police will then forward it to the “Porn-committee”, expert committee in Ministry of Culture, who will then decide if it is pornographic or not. We might say “But this is science and it is protected by the constitution”, but this was also the case with Kender – both are protected by the constitution:

«§ 38. Science and art and their teachings are free. Universities and research institutions are autonomous within the limits prescribed by the law.» (The Constitution of the Republic of Estonia)

What is problematic, is the Penal Code, definition of child pornography is rather broad and thus it can include different forms of it:

«§ 178. Manufacture of works involving child pornography or making child pornography available

(1) Manufacture, acquisition or storing, handing over, displaying or making available to another person in any other manner of pictures, writings or other works or reproductions of works depicting a person of less than eighteen years of age in a pornographic situation, or a person of less than fourteen years of age in a pornographic or erotic situation, is punishable by a pecuniary punishment or up to three years’ imprisonment.» (Penal Code)

I have been so far talking only in the context of written text, most probably the situation becomes more difficult if the text includes pictures, Allah forbid if it is not text but a film. In case it includes pictures, or if it is a film, then we have a serious ethical and moral problem, and that is not even connected to the child pornography laws. It is a question for us anthropologist, can we and should we show visual data to others, are we abusing the right for privacy, are we exploiting our informants? A great friend of mine had a self-made zine which he called National Pornographic, he had taken old National Geographic editions, cut out all pictures of naked ‘indigenous’ people and glued them together with added sensual texts. He did it purposely to show how Western society has sexualized the ‘natives’, how their breasts and nipples can be shown without censoring, as if the same rules do not apply to ‘them’ as do to ‘us’. National Geographic is a safe haven for monsters like Lizot.

[non]clusion

There are occasions when anthropologists truly transgress. And there are occasions when anthropologists write truly transgressive ethnographies. Unfortunately it usually happens after they themselves have been transgressed. Such is the case when reading Eva Moreno’s chapter Rape in the field in collection Taboo: Sex, Identity, and Erotic Subjectivity in Anthropological Fieldwork (Moreno 1995). First, and basically the foremost, she builds the story (ibid. 219-232), like the rapist built the assault on her, she builds it the same way as Palahniuk built his story, the reader is obviously hinted from the title that there will be rape but she is calmly leading the reader toward the rape, adding with the suspension until one fatal page she hits us with it. And I do blackout again, skipping paragraphs ashamed as I have a privilege to do it, she did not have a chance to skip it. The reflection part of the chapter (Ibid, 236-248) adds other layers, it elongates the rape but in a weird way calms the reader as you will see the surviving after the rape. I do not know her feelings about the chapter and writing it, but it does feel as if she has done something that is more on the positive side than on the negative one, that this text has been written with traumatic emancipation.

What seems to be essential in this inner discussion is the role of the author. These texts (both literary and audiovisual ones) would not exist without the author, people and culture and practices and incidents would abide in their own realm as they are, but these texts need the author. And as much as these texts need the author, so does the author need the texts, it is a validation of their experience. Having just finished Michael Muhammad Knight’s Osama Van Halen, sequel for his debut novel Taqwacores, I feel compelled to do something with the author. Knight’s take on the author was that he included himself as character into a fictional story, as Michael Muhammad Knight and as ‘the author’, he tossed himself around in the novel until he is beheaded by one of the main characters, by ‘burqa wearing riot grrrl’ Rabeya (Knight 2009, 207). Is the symbolical beheading of the discipline, the removal of the ‘mind’ and revival of the body, is that something that I am after as an author? Sometimes we need to blackout to flashin.

«Sun set a few hours ago, and moon is not around. Sky is striped with clouds, stratocumulus and stratus clouds, altocumulus and altostratus clouds, they are all there. Midnight prayer was already 2 hours ago and I look on horizon as the rays of dawn shine there. Smoke diffuses and the bud drops in the ashtray, I recede to lay on my bed and to watch the first season of Narcos. As the violence on screen escalates, I have doubts in my sanity, I think I am hallucinating as I continuously see flashes of lightning outside of my window. Delusions were happening already on the first week of Ramadan, I saw glimpses of movement, small swirls of energy in midair, flashes of something from the corner of my eye. Today there is lightning I see from the corner of my eye, moments of flash/ins instead of black/outs. It’s not raining and the clouds are not dark, air doesn’t feel as it has been electrified to that extent. Kristi is sleeping and I can’t get verification from anyone. After the first flash I think maybe it was some kind of trick my mind played on me, after second one I think maybe it was a reflection from TV, after the third one I assume it was an ambulance car light (I live next to a hospital). After the fourth and final flash I am afraid to look out from the window, instead I drink my last glass of water and pray dawn prayer. 17th day of Ramadan has a weird start. As I fall to sleep, I hear the rain arriving, it sooths my fears of going insane. I saw the lightning and heard the rain, but I didn’t hear the thunder nor see the drops.» (Fieldwork notes; 17th of Ramadan, 1439 / 2nd of June, 2018)

References

Clifford, James. 1986. Introduction: Partial Truths. In James Clifford & George E. Marcus (Eds.), Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography ( 1 – 27 ). Berkeley, California and London, England: University of California Press.

The Constitution of the Republic of Estonia.

Retrieved June 5, 2018 from

https://www.riigiteataja.ee/en/eli/530102013003/consolide

Crapanzano, Vincent. 1986. Hermes’ Dilemma: The Masking of Subversion in Ethnographic Description. In James Clifford & George E. Marcus (Eds.), Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography (pages of chapter). Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press.

ERR. 2016. Finnish PEN club: Kender’s ‘U12’ is a ‘grotesque thriller’, not child porn. Eesti Rahvusringhääling (ERR). Retrieved June 5, 2018 from https://news.err.ee/118569/finnish-pen-club-kender-s-u12-is-a-grotesque-thriller-not-child-porn

Garland, Alex. 1999. Rand [The Beach] (Turu, Rein, Trans.). Tallinn, Estonia: Varrak.

Giles, James. 2004. Book Reviews: Sambia Sexual Culture: Essays From the Field. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 33(4), 413–417.

Heimans, Frank (Director). 1988. Margaret Mead and Samoa [Documentary]. Cremorne, New South Wales: Cinetel Productions. Retrieved June 5, 2018 from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8puR-AaSrg

Herdt, Gilbert. 1999. Sambia Sexual Culture: Essays From the Field. Illinois: University of Chicago Press.

Kender, Kaur. 2001. Check out. Tallinn, Estonia: Pegasus.

Kender, Kaur. 2015, January 14. Mõned sõnad Untitled 12 kohta [Few words about Untitled 12] [Web log post]. Retrieved June 5, 2018 from http://nihilist.fm/moned-sonad-untitled-12-kohta/

Kender, Kaur. 2014. Untitled 12. Nihilist.Fm : ZA/UM

Knight, Michael Muhammad. 2009. Osama Van Halen. Brooklyn, New York: Soft Skull Press

Martin, Amis. 2000. Surnud lapsed [Dead Babies] (Metsaots, Kati, Trans.). Tallinn, Estonia: Olion.

Moreno, Eva. 1995. Rape in the field. In Don Kulick & Margaret Willson (Eds.), Taboo: Sex, identity, and erotic subjectivity in anthropological fieldwork. London, England: Routledge.

Padilha, José (Director). 2010. Secrets of the Tribe [Documentary]. Brazil: Avenue B Productions Zazen Produções. Retrieved June 5, 2018 from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zd7SXbsn0hU

Palahniuk, Chuck. 2006. Haunted. London, England: Vintage Books.

Penal Code of the Republic of Estonia. Retrieved June 5, 2018 from https://www.riigiteataja.ee/en/eli/522012015002/consolide

Shankman, Paul. 1996. The History of Samoan Sexual Conduct and the Mead-Freeman Controversy. American Anthropologist, 98(3), 555-567.

#anthropology #transgressive #transgression #autoethnography #literature #eesti kirjandus #kirjandus #ethnography

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livelikebrent · 6 years

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Stop 7: Winter Park + Boulder, Colorado

Have you ever broken somebody’s heart? Maybe it was with a significant other and ended things. Whether you’re on the giving or receiving end of it...it’s an awful feeling, isn’t it? Have you ever had to do it one dozen times in the span of maybe an hour? I remember shaking and trying to clear my throat as I dialed, Amanda, Danny, Amy, Adam, Josh, Brendan, John, Ryan...this list continues. I don’t even know how I knew who to call, or who I probably should’ve called but my mind had turned into liquid. Amanda had been texting Brent a day or two prior and had a bad feeling when he didn’t answer the text messages. She texted me earlier in the morning asking if everything was okay. I think I started these phone calls somewhere around 11am and 12noon on Saturday, July 15th. I just remember how quiet or how short some people were (not in a bad way by any means) when they spoke to me. I think it was shock, taking in the information and not knowing what to do with it. Others instantly started crying or tried so hard to hold back tears as they asked me to explain. I tried to explain as soon as I broke the news so they didn’t even have to wonder. I tried to explain that he was already heavily medicated and asleep so he didn’t know what had happened. I remember calling Josh as he and Hannah were driving to his sibling’s house. Hannah started screaming. I remember Adam driving, Danny and Dana sitting on their couch getting ready to leave for vacation later in the day. Danny said he knew as soon as he saw my name come up on their phone that something wasn’t right. Some didn’t even have my number at that point and didn’t know who was speaking to them initially but quickly learned. But to break the hearts of some of Brent’s best and my dearest friends from the last few years...broke my heart even more that it already was that morning.

I talk about these people a lot. I talk about how grateful I am to have them still in my life. I’m about to talk about them some more on how a few joined me on my 7th stop on Tour de Brent: Colorado. I’ll say it again and again...I’m so happy and grateful that they joined me on this trip. One of the first places Brent and I had on our bucket list was snowboarding in Colorado. Brent knew I loved camping and hiking the Adirondack mountains in New York. He also knew I’d never been out west. So he wanted to take me snowboarding in Colorado, explore Boulder and to meet a close WVU friend of his, Lindgren.

Six of us met bright eyed and bushy tailed at the Philadelphia International Airport around 7am on Friday, February 9th. Skis, snowboards and bags had been checked, coffee in hand along with eagerness to depart from the City of Brotherly Love. While the crew was eager to shred some serious mountains, I was eager to finally meet Lindgren. Since I had several hours to kill on the flight, my mind wandered and remembered Brent taking calls from Lindgren. Or just chatting about him and his now wife, Nicole. I remember their save the date on his refrigerator right until we cleaned out the apartment. The first time I had ever contacted Lindgren was on July 24th with an apology. I apologized for not being able to make the wedding with Brent. But what I really ended up apologizing for was how sorry I was that Brent never had to the opportunity to introduce us. I also explained I had planned on still making it out to Colorado to check it off of the list for Brent. I heard back from Lindgren the next day and I just remember how nice it was to hear him say, “...I honestly feel like I know you, from all of the pictures of you and Brent on FB, to all the wonderful things he told me about you. So, in a way, we’ve already been introduced, and I consider you a friend.” I think the people one surrounds themselves with speaks volumes about that individual. The people that were current in Brent’s life have been some of the nicest and raddest people I have met. Lindgren quickly made the list of friends I am grateful for today.

We landed in Denver and I had previously asked Lindgren for suggestions on lunch. He told us to check out Vine Street Pub while still in Denver and that it was a solid spot for a burger and was Stout Month there. I smiled as we approached the establishment. The place we were about to enter is one of the Mountain Sun locations. I think we all know that Brent LOVED stickers. After he had passed, I sifted through his collection...some were recent finds and some extremely old. He had a ton of Mountain Sun stickers. I recognized the logo as soon as I saw it entering the pub. We ordered a round of drinks, lunch and checked the weather. Snow was in the forecast for Saturday which was ideal as that was going to be our first day out on the mountain. I knew I wanted to place a sticker at this location and as I was walking back to my seat from the bathroom, what do you know? They had just a small section of a wall FILLED with stickers. After we paid our bill, I found our waitress with two other employees and explained why we were there from Philadelphia and asked if I could slap a sticker up. Her response was, “OF COURSE! We have stickers for you too!!” She gave me a reel of the same stickers Brent had. Then we found a place on their wall.

We jumped in our cars and made our way out to our Airbnb in Fraser, Colorado. Fraser is just north of Winter Park where we planned on spending our entire Saturday. With all of our gear and crew in tow, Brendan and I made our way through the mountains, around the mountains and then up the mountains. It was so beautiful. The brief video clip below doesn’t even do justice as we got closer to the mountain range.

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Oh. Did you know that elevation sickness is actually a real thing? I will have to say that I had been warned. But as we climbed to over 9,000 feet in elevation to the towns...so did my stomach. I pounded waters to keep myself hydrated. Then by the time we went grocery shopping (conveniently located at the bottom of the hill from where we were staying), my feet started to cramp up. Thankfully, I got over it after a while. We settled into our ski themed Airbnb, made ourselves right at home and ordered pizza (including my fave, Hawaiian).

The answer to your question is yes. The place looked just like it does in the photos above from Airbnb. Believe me, I’ve been to Airbnbs where I’ve walked in and I had to double check the address because it looked nothing like it did in the photos. But you can view more photos and the entire place here! I don’t think we were there for even twenty minutes when we started posing on the faux bear rug in front of the fireplace. It was just such a cozy place for the weekend. But we were pretty tired from traveling and knew we had a long day ahead of us so we laid low for the first evening. Josh and his girl, Katrina came out to the place to hang for a smidge and say hi. I’ve met Josh a handful of times. The first time I met him was two years ago at Carve 4 Cancer. He flew in for the event and busted his knee on his first run of the day. Classic. He was one of the friends that came and visited with Brent when he was sick..which truly raised his spirits.

Josh showed up for Brent’s wake, the funeral and Carve again in 2018. As hysterically funny as he is and a joy to be around, he was genuinely a good friend of Brent’s. I asked Josh how he met Brent. He honestly didn’t know and felt like they just had always been buds since school. Brent would talk about Josh a lot and how Josh’s mom would take them out of school early, throw them in the car and drive up to Vermont to hit the mountains all of the time. I think I’ve heard that about half a dozen times from Brent.

The next day we got up, ate breakfast and realized it had been dumping and dumping and dumping snow overnight...and it wasn’t stopping any time soon. So we made a pot of coffee, breakfast, geared up and made our way over to Mary Jane Pass. To be quite frank the only downside to all of the snow was that it was snowing so much that we could hardly even see the mountains that were surrounding us and off in the distance. Honestly, it was fine though...we were so excited to be skiing and snowboarding in a storm on fresh powder. Cars filled the lots and lined the long, winding drive up to the base of the mountain. I think I heard, “NO FRIENDS ON POW DAYS!” Probably a dozen times in lift lines, on the mountains and in the lodge.

The snow was awesome. The trails took longer than 45 second to bomb down and you weren’t on top of one another for how busy the mountain was either. At this point, I started to understand why Brent wanted to take me out west to snowboard so badly. The snow was soft, there was hardly any ice if any at all, you could hop off the trail and wind your way through the trees and even though it was a pow day...you were on the mountain with some of the best people waiting for you around the next turn. We took a break for lunch at the lodge about half way through the day, hit the mountain for a couple more runs and then made our way back to the car and ultimately to the Airbnb.

The boys made a mouth watering dinner for everyone. While we were in the super market the day prior, they found surf and turf packages for basically $10 a person. I SAID TEN DOLLARS. It most definitely didn’t taste like a $10 meal either. Lobster tails, steak, brussel sprouts, cocktails and beer.

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After dinner, we cleaned up and decided to check out some of the local spots in Winter Park and ended up at Idlewild Spirits Distillery.

It is a distillery pub nestled in the basement of a strip mall on the main drag of Winter Park. There’s a bar and plenty of seating in the main room of the establishment. We sat in the back room with rows and rows of barrels of their liquor. It was pretty cool. Each barrel had the type of liquor and the date. It had a rustic yet industrial feel to the place. Caitlin had suggested the place since she is one who greatly appreciates a fine cocktail. Sidenote, the first time I met Caitlin and Adam...they took Brent and I to a place in Manayunk, The Goats Beard, for cocktails. So we ordered a round of cocktails, “snacks” and hung out for a while recapping on our first day and plans for the remainder of the trip. As we wrapped up and paid the check, our waiter suggested to check out a little bar called The Basement. Are we picking up on a theme here yet? Apparently, Winter Park doesn’t stay open terribly later. But this little hole in the wall did...and we didn’t mind going to a local’s bar. Brent would’ve liked it. Skateboard decks hung above the counter with beers available. You felt like you were in the basement of your friend’s house back in high school and you were waiting for the crowd to show up to start the party. There were video games, a couple of tvs, an area for a DJ or band and some arcade games. A couple of guys were sitting at the bar still in their snowboarding gear with a pie of pizza they probably carried in themselves. It was a place where you went for a cheap après ski.

As drastically different as these two spots were, Brent would’ve thoroughly enjoyed them. We ordered a couple of Rolling Rocks for $3 each. I SAID THREE DOLLARS. It most definitely tasted like a $3 beer. As we sipped our drinks, Caitlin was passing out at the table from the long day for shredding the gnar. I think half of us made Ryan slug back our beers before we made our way back to the place and called it a night.

Sunday rolled around. Josh took Ryan out back country skiing, Caitlin and Adam hit up Grandby Ranch Resort to get a couple more turns in, and Brendan, Koren and I wanted to check out the town for the day and explore after we already arrived at Grandby. (Whoops!) As the three of us were driving out of the resort, I saw a small hill with a gazebo on top. I figured it had a pretty cool view of the ranch below and mountains that surrounded us. So we parked the car and went to walk up the hill. This turned into THE MOST tiring task of the weekend. We should not have been as winded as we were walking up this hill...mind you that we weren’t used to the elevation but it was embarrassing how bad we were sucking wind once we got to the top. I think I had to take a breather for about 5 minutes before I could even think about taking photos. But below us sat the ranch, cattle, and these adorable craftsman houses that sat on the mountain side. (Que ‘Weeds’ theme song here).

We hit up an antique store we saw along the way, stopped at Cooper Creek Square to buy stickers, shirts and gifts. The shops were cute. I think Koren bought a gift for about everyone in her entire life. Brendan bought gifts for his niece and nephew. We decided to find something to eat and right across the street was a place called The Ditch on 40. It ruled. It was a small spot on the second floor of a strip of stores. (Actually a spot not in a basement!) It had a deck which I’m sure gets packed on a mild blue bird day. The place described itself as “A family-run, roadside bar and grill, where it's all about the red and green... chile, that is. We start from scratch! Using only chile from Hatch, NM. We serve great burgers, tasty sandwiches, authentic New Mexican food and the best margaritas in town!” I’m sorry, but did you know that Colorado is known chile peppers? Well, it kinda is. If you want to read up about it and the great green chile debate between Colorado and New Mexico, click here! But I digress, it had a locals vibe to it with license plates on the walls along with ski trail signs from Winter Park’s trails, skis and snowboards hanging on racks from the ceilings. We figured the place got rowdy at night and was probably a pretty solid time with the après ski crowd. We shared some sliders, tacos and had a round of drinks. I do need to point out the beer that Koren ordered though. It was an oak aged sour stout with cranberries named Blucifer from Odd13 Brewing. Blucifer is the demon horse of the Denver Airport ...it is a bright blue mustang standing at 32 feet tall and 9,000 pounds with glowing red eyes. I am not joking. Although the Blucifer beer sounds odd for a stout to be sour - it was mighty delish. Also, we need to note the artwork on the can quickly...and yes, that’s Santa’s sleigh.

As soon as we had walked in the door I knew I wanted to place a sticker there for Brent. This was most certainly a place I could picture him after spending a day out on the mountain together. As soon as I asked one of the waiters he immediately said, “Yes! Of course!” and he had the same reaction when I asked if he wouldn’t mind capturing the placement in a photograph for me. There was a perfect spot, dead smack in the center of the mirror behind the bar.

After lunch, the three of us made our way back to Mary Jane’s Pass to check out the gift shop in the lodge. Apparently, this portion of Winter Park is the most difficult and it’s where we started and ended our first day out on the mountains. So Brendan and I bought a handful of stickers and Koren bought more gifts. I need to figure out how to get on her gift list. After lunch, we made a pit stop so Koren could get her ice cream fix and made our way back to the house. I tried to capture more of the mountains and the trees that were lightly coated in fresh snow...but, these photos don’t do any justice. There was so much texture.

When we got back, Caitlin and Adam were right behind us followed by Ryan and Josh who found the local Irish Pub (shocker. not.). We hung around, Ryan showed off the photo that Josh took of him and we had a couple of drinks and hot teas.

Eventually, we got ready and made ourselves presentable for a nice dinner out in the town at Deno’s Mountain Bistro. We snagged some seating by the bar as we waited for a table. This place had everything from wings to a steak dinner and a wine list that was 16 pages long. SIXTEEN! We had ordered everything from biratta, steaks, poke bowls, wings and pasta. Ryan was in his prime that night and Josh had us all laughing so hard during the entire meal.

The next day we packed up and left Fraser/Winter Park and started to make our way towards our next destination, Boulder. On the way, we stopped at Arapahoe Basin. It was another gorgeous ride up and through the mountains. We drove through Loveland Pass and the Continental Divide which was stunning. Koren and I had no shame in asking Brendan to pull the car over (more than once) to take photos.

We got to the parking lot and started to gear up for the day when I noticed Arapahoe’s logo. It’s the letter “A” with a design around it. I had seen it a dozen times in Brent’s sticker collection. Even when I visited Drew and Amanda in Syracuse, I remember looking through the collection with Drew and asking what logo or brand it was and he had no idea. Well, apparently this was a fave mountain of Brent’s and here we were about to spend the day shredding there.

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Now THIS is what I envisioned snowboarding in Colorado to look like. Mountains were EVERYWHERE. Winter Park was a great time and all but if you told me I was at a ski resort in update New York on that mountain, I’d believe you. But the setting at A-Basin was just absolutely incredible. We were surrounded by high peaks near by, mountains in the distance and tons of trees.

I think every time we were on the lift up the mountain I said something along the lines of, “I can’t get over how beautiful this is!” THIS was when I completely understood what Brent wanted me to experience. I just knew it. THIS was where he would’ve taken me (or Breckenridge - next time!) to tear up a mountain together. An old colleague of mine went hiking in Yosemite National Park last year. I remember her posting a photo of her with in front of a stunning backdrop and the caption reading, “Sometimes it’s good to feel small.” That is 100% true and that’s how I felt riding the lift when we got to the top of the mountain at the Montezuma bowl. But right as we got off of the lift for our first run of the day, there was a work bench for binding adjustments next to the map of the mountain. It happened to be covered in stickers. I couldn’t think of a better mountain to place a #LiveLikeBrent sticker.

I know this is an obvious statement but the mountains were so big! There are so many trails and options! It was an amazing time. At one point, Koren and Caitlin found an alpine trail on the mountain called Moose Hollow. They took a photo for me knowing that moose are my favorite animal and that I’d do anything to see one in person. So the next trip up the mountain they took me through the trees on this trail. Mind you, I never take these trails because it’s a bit more difficult if you’re on a board. It’s even more difficult if you get stuck. Never mind that, it’s freaking EXHAUSTING if you fall and need to get yourself up. If you’re on skis you at least have both feet and two poles to help get back up. We went down this trail twice, I hopped over one of the divets successfully the first time. But there was one slight jump I couldn’t get over and lost speed both times. I honestly had to lay there and give myself a minute after trying to get myself up the first time.

After a stellar day on the mountain, we packed up and made our way to our Airbnb in Boulder so we could get ready for dinner with Lindgren. This place was adorable as well. You can view more photos and the place we stayed here!

Lindgren asked where we wanted to get dinner and I requested any place that he would take Brent if he were in town visiting again. He suggested a Nepal/Tibetan/Indian spot called Sherpa’s Adventure Restaurant & Bar. It’s a restaurant that is in an old Victorian home...so yes, you felt like you were dining in somebody’s home. It was so great to finally meet Lindgren. I asked him how he met Brent. He said one time he was eating dinner at WVU and this shaggy, bleached, long haired, guy came over and sat down with him at the table. Lindgren said, “He just started talking to me and kept going. Somehow we got on the topic of snowboarding and he was SO passionate about it. At the time, I hadn’t had a lot of experience on the mountain. But we somehow just became immediate friends. He kept going on and on.” Ah yes the gift of gab, a gift given I’m sure by his father, was one of Brent’s best qualities. Shortly before Brent went in for his stem-cell transplant, he came to a wedding with me to celebrate my friends, Bit and Asad. I was parking my car for the wedding and feeding the meter as Brent went inside the beach bar of the hotel to get more quarters. I noticed he took a long time. It turns out it was because he was chatting up one of my college friends at the bar, Joe. When I went inside, Joe, looked at me and exclaimed, “AIS!!! DO YOU KNOW THIS GUY? He walked in and now all of a sudden we’re like BEST buds.”

After Brent passed Joe wrote, “Been thinking of you and Brent so much the past few days. I've never been so inspired by the spirit and fun vibe of a person after hanging out just one time with him. Just wanted to share these fun shots. So glad I got to spend that night with you two. Love you Ais.” That’s the kind of guy Brent was though. He met Joe once. He spent maybe a total of 8 hours with him. Like Lindgren said - that’s all it took.

Anyway, I digress! Lindgren became one of Brent’s close friends from WVU and described him as his only “frat friend.” Lindgren said one time he was at his fraternity house and he received a phone call from Brent. Brent said, “Are you home?” Lindgren told him he was and Brent continued, “Go outside RIGHT NOW!” Lindgren was hesitant but went outside. Brent and his friend Tony were throwing giant tires down the hill Lindgren lived on and wreaking havoc. Remember at Brent’s funeral when the priest joked he wasn’t a Saint? Case and point.

As we ate dinner (which was top-notch), Lindgren also shared one of his proudest moments with Brent. Brent flew in to visit with Lindgren with the obvious goal to go snowboarding. Lindgren said he told Brent that they’d be snowboarding Vail that day with one of his friends. Cool, right? Lindgren also added in that they would be snowboarding with Owen Schmitt. Ha! He was a football player at West Virginia and had moved onto the NFL after college. I’d say that’s a pretty solid proud moment. Lindgren’s bud went to high school with Schmitt who still clearly hung out. I do vaguely remember Brent telling me about this and he somehow got Schmitt’s phone number...he made up and excuse when he asked for it like “Just in case we get separated on the mountain.” Brent then added him on Snapchat and I’m pretty sure vice versa. What a Brent move.

As we were finishing our meal, Lindgren suggested a place to check out next he liked called The Sundown Saloon. It had a cool name, so we were down for it. Nicole, Lindgren’s wife, showed up as we were paying the check and met everyone. When she heard where we were going for drinks she looked at Lindgren with concern and said, “You’re taking them there???” We asked what was wrong with it and she described it as a hole in the wall dive bar. I remember saying, “But...that’s our kind of place.” It really was. But before we left, Lindgren and Nicole chatted with the owner. I’d say they’re pretty darn close to being regulars. Then we took a quick group photo. Again, it looked and felt like we were in somebody’s house for supper.

As we approached the doors...guess where it was located? Yes, in another basement. The Sundown Saloon is tucked underneath the walking mall that is Boulder’s Pearl Street. I decided to place a sticker here because it was a place that Lindgren would’ve taken Brent. After being inside it was like Murphy’s back in East Falls with Billards. I’m NOT calling Murphy’s a hole in the wall dive bar, mind you. There was a lot of wood going on, a fun crowd, and photos on some of the walls like Mike has up.

We walked in and there was a juke box, dart board, foosball and shuffleboard table, a handful of pool tables, Christmas lights that covered most of the ceiling, and plenty of cheap beer and whisky. If I lived in Boulder, this would certainly become a regular spot for a drink or two with a crew. We pushed together a bunch of tables, watched Shaun White slay the Olympics, drank and chatted. Then, who shows up? Josh and Katrina. Josh definitely spoiled us with his presence that weekend. As we sat there, some a little more buzzed than others, Caitlin looked at me across the table and smiled, “Looking around this circle makes me really happy. Brent brought us together.” It was true. Who travels across the United States to meet a stranger and his wife? We did because Brent only surrounded himself with the most amazing people. I’ve learned many things over the last year and one of them is that the people you surround yourself with are a reflection of who you are as a person. I think that’s important to think about. If you sit back and think about the people in your life, who are they? How do they act? Are they some of the funniest people you know? Maybe they are the most thoughtful and caring. Or maybe they simply inspire you. I’ve decided to continue to surround myself with people that make me happy and that want to be in my life. What I do know is that as you get older your circle of friends tend to get smaller. But mine has only been expanding and I’m extremely thankful for it and everyone that has become a part of my life.

We said our goodbyes, I gave Lindgren one of Brent’s beanies he wore in the hospital all of the time, Never Summer. The company is based out of Colorado so I figured it was fitting. We didn’t talk about what happened to Brent. But Lindgren did look at me and say, “I’m just so glad he had you for the time that he did and everything he went through.” He started to get tears in his eyes and these are the types of things that make me cry...Seeing any of Brent’s friends hurt or upset about what happened. He continued to say things that were truly touching to hear. I hugged him a couple of times and told him I was so glad to have finally meet him.

P.S. Nicole SLAYS in foosball. Don’t let her fool you.

Photo Credit: Airbnb, Caitlin, Koren, Brendan, Josh, Joe, Odd13 Brewing

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serahne · 7 years

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this question is silly tbh and i just started to check your blog lately so from curiosity i couldn't keep this question to my self it's fine if you want to ignore the ask though :) , but why you shipped komahina or why you choosed it over hina//nami , sorry if this ask was rude for you

Hi there ~ Don’t worry, there is no silly question and you aren’t rude at all ( good god, each time someone is saying that to me I wonder if I’m really that scary ). I can definitely explain why I enjoy Komahina more than Hina/nami, please remember that it’s mostly based on my own interpretation of the characters, and that someone else’s interpretation is just as good as mine.

Except when people claim that Hajime is a Griffindor. I’ll bite.

Why do I ship Komahina ? Well…

( You may think it’s a joke but wait to read my answer, and you’ll see it’s not )

Anyway, if you even glanced at my blog you know that I’m unable to shut up, so under the cut !

To anwer your question, my main reasons to ship Hinata with Komaeda are… the characters themselves. Let’s start with Komaeda, because it’s easier. Shorter. Something.

Komaeda is a character who doesn’t do emotional connections. He has this kind of unbreakable mindset that is fascinating to study, mostly linked to his past and his luck where he seems absolutely unable of sympathy and rationalizes all his feelings. I’m not going to say that Hinata is the only person he ever developed feelings for, we can’t know that. But he is the first person he realized he developed feelings for.

Until then, he didn’t need to think about it. Of course he liked Hinata, Hinata is a symbol of Hope, he is talented and so better than he is ( there is… more to it especially the ‘I feel like we are similar but I promised to keep it short ). The equation was I love Hope = Hinata is Hope = I love Hinata. There was no… internal contradiction in him. And then, of course, chapter 4 happens and it’s the worst. Hinata isn’t talented. He is despair. Worse, he is actually Izuru Kamukura, some kind of abomination who is one of the leader of the Despair Team. And yet, he still has feelings for him. The equation doesn’t work anymore, Komaeda is broken, his world is falling apart, he is willingly pushed into a character development that he didn’t ask for, and it’s so painful for him that he kills himself, trying to take everyone else with him.

That’s… fascinating. Sad, too. But damn, Komaeda.

Dr:ae showed us that he could evolve, though. His mindset wasn’t set in stone. With time, with new objectives, he can accept that someone who didn’t have any talent ( Naegi ) was able to beat despair. Actually, he even says that someone who doesn’t have talent, who isn’t praised and elevated by the society, beating despair, is even more hope-inducing. Which is why I think he will come to respect Hinata, and by extension, himself. With time.

So Hinata is Komaeda’s hope to change. To get rid of this stupid mindset Hope’s Peak’s world gave him. Obviously after dr3 being with Hinata would also allow him to not suffer from his luck, which would also help him to develop real relationships with people without them dying, so it’s good for him.

Now, Hinata.

I’m absolutely fascinated by this boy, and I even started to write a complete analysis of his character here and here ( for now I only covered Hinata before Hope’s Peak Academy and Hinata in dr3 but it’s already giving you a lot of keys to understand how I see his character ).

To be short, Hinata is someone who is always trying to find a way to run away from an unpleasant reality. He numbs himself to block out the exterior world and not face it the way it is, because it’s easier. It’s easier to play video games with a cute Ultimate girl and forget about Hope’s Peak segregationist system ( Dr3 ), it’s easier to convince yourself that you are an Ultimate too and fit with everyone ( Sdr2 ), it’s easier to think that it’s going to be okay, that they’ll do their best and will get out of it without problem, it’s easier to think that they are good people who can do no wrong.

And that’s where Komaeda comes in. Komaeda doesn’t allow Hinata to take the easy way. Never. From the first chapter, can you guess what would have happened if everyone had taken the easy path and voted him as culprit after his breakdown ? Because that’s the logic though to have right ? The only one who can do something bad is someone who is unstable, right ? Wrong. And thanks Mikan to save the day, because Hinata would have ran into this one if you hadn’t been here.

Through the whole game, Komaeda is someone who motivates Hinata to face the truth. Not only Hinata, mind you ( In chapter two, he pushes Koizumi to play the game too ), but especially him. He is the one who spit out Hope’s Peak ideology, how people are born for greatness and can rise through society or are born to be trash and will never become anyone ( which is a terrible thing to think, but is nevertheless what’s Hope’s Peak is all about ), something that Hinata refuses to accept even though he suffered through it. Of course, he is also the one who tells him that he isn’t an Ultimate, and repeats it, again and again, so he won’t run away from it. Hell, in his FTE, Hinata tells Komaeda that he is trying to understand him, and Komaeda replies that it’s really brave, to try and understand someone that you don’t. And I agree. Hinata is never braver than when he is facing him.

Chapter 5 is everything. Komaeda’s final test. Hinata is the only one who keeps going, you know. Who refuses to vote a suicide, even though everyone is almost begging him to, that he doesn’t want to think about another possibility, that they are all so damn tired. He keeps going. And after that, he does something even Komaeda didn’t expect : he understands him. He understands his luck, his hope, his goal and he beats him. At this moment he doesn’t need to be scared of Komaeda anymore, because once you understand something, you stop being scared, that’s just as simple as that.

On a lighter note… I admit I adore how Hinata can’t help but care about him. How angry he is with himself when he realizes he is super worried about Komaeda when he is sick, how embarassed he is when they joke about the sticker, how upset he is when Komaeda starts treating him coldly and I love how hyped he is anytime Komaeda speak during a trial and how attentive to him he is. That’s the cheesy part of me talking, sorry.

I think after dr3, Hinata would need some time to think about himself, the world, the meaning of life, whatever else, for a while. So he wouldn’t rush into a relationship with Komaeda or anyone else. I’m just saying that after sdr2 these two have such amazing connection that it could definitely lead to something great, whether they get together or not.

TLDR ; I love that Hinata is the way for Komaeda to change, and I love that Komaeda is the way for Hinata to accept himself, as hard it is after everything he’s done and become. It’s… honestly so rare to find such amazing bond between two characters who are so-well written, without one overshadowing the over but completing each others.

You don’t have to read it if you enjoy Hina/nami, but since you brought that up, here is why I don’t like it : The reason I dislike Hina/nami, it’s that Nan/ami’s role is the exact opposite of Komaeda. Her role is to shelter Hinata, as part of the Neo World Program. Her goal is that he never remember who he was, that he erases from his past every bad things he did and never have to face them. If you observe her in the game, she is the one who always go for the ‘easy’ route. She is the one who suggests Komaeda as the killer, she is the one who stops Hinata to go through the Final Dead Room and to face whatever is inside, she is the one who say to Hinata that it doesn’t matter if he has talent or not.

That’s just what she is coded to do, but that’s also what dr3!Nan/ami does. She brushes off Hinata’s insecurities, saying that the only thing that matters anyway are friends, not realizing that it’s a very easy thing to say when you are a sheltered, privilegied girl who is adored by everyone for her talent while he is struggling with what looks like depression. She is always painting Hinata a reality that doesn’t exist to make him feel better and hum… I feel like he deserves more than a not-super-bright girlfriend holding his hand through life and forbidding any development on his part. Doesn’t mean he doesn’t care about her, by the way, she probably brought him comfort when he needed some.

#answer #komahina #kinda anti-hinanami at the end #I'm so sorry it was so long but I feel like I'll be able to link it to anyone asking this question in the future #so I didn't write all this for no reason at least haha

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minute20 · 6 years

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Mother of transgender daughter kept out of locker rooms during lockdown drill speaks out – ThinkProgress

Over the previous week, a narrative has gone viral nationally a couple of Virginia transgender scholar who was forbidden from sheltering in a locker room along with her classmates throughout a lockdown drill. However, as the scholar’s mom defined in an unique interview with ThinkProgress, that incident follows years of discrimination she’s skilled on the faculty.

Amy, who requested solely to be recognized by her first identify for her household’s privateness of their small city, advised ThinkProgress that her daughter “Paige” (a pseudonym) has been prohibited from utilizing any gendered facility on the faculty for practically 4 years. That’s why, in response to Amy, “there was an amazing quantity of confusion about the place precisely my daughter ought to shelter” in the course of the drill. Paige is actually forbidden from getting into both the boys’ or women’ locker rooms, so when the drill happened, her academics truthfully weren’t certain whether or not an exception might be made.

“That is exhausting work,” Amy defined. “I shouldn’t should battle so onerous for one youngster to simply be capable of go to high school and be secure along with her friends.” But regardless of the nationwide consideration and uproar that erupted after the incident, the college board at its assembly this week introduced no speedy coverage proposals to forestall it from taking place once more. The superintendent, who’s new to the district, did apologize to the household, however nothing has in any other case modified. Within the meantime, Paige continues to be not permitted to make use of the women’ services.

“It’s the duty of not simply our colleges, however our college boards and all of the folks concerned in our college system to ensure that each single youngster feels taken care of,” Amy mentioned. “And my youngster has not felt taken care of by her faculty board.”

Years of discrimination

When Paige first got here out as transgender at age 10 again in 2015, she was the primary transgender scholar the Stafford County Faculty District administration had ever been requested to accommodate. And at first, Amy remembers, they have been truly very supportive, permitting Paige to make use of the women’ rest room at her elementary faculty. “They requested lots of questions, they requested her lots of questions on what she wanted, they usually did the very best they might to accommodate that.”

That lasted all of two weeks — till a gaggle of indignant mother and father carrying “Save Our Colleges” stickers confronted the college board about their accomodations. Amy described them as talking “very disgustingly in opposition to my youngster” and “saying very, very terrible issues,” equivalent to calling her a “predator.” The Stafford County Faculty Board unanimously agreed to reverse the college’s resolution to let Paige use the women’ restroom.

Elsewhere in Virginia, the Gloucester County Faculty Board had made the identical resolution to limit Gavin Grimm’s rest room entry simply three months prior. Grimm, a transgender boy, was mounting a authorized battle in opposition to his faculty, making it a “scorching matter” on the time. (Grimm’s case is definitely nonetheless ongoing over a 12 months after he graduated.) Amy feels that Paige, as the one out trans scholar in Stafford, was equally made an instance of.

Not like in Gloucester, nonetheless, Stafford didn’t go any written coverage governing how the district would deal with transgender college students. They solely decided about Paige particularly, leaving it to the person colleges throughout the district to make their very own selections about how one can reply in different circumstances. “That clearly hasn’t labored very effectively for us,” Amy mentioned, stating that Paige is now in her second faculty within the district and neither has accommodated her. She’s additionally heard from mother and father throughout the district whose trans children are dealing with related restrictions.

Since that 2015 faculty board resolution, Amy has needed to meet with faculty officers each summer season to speak about how one can defend Paige’s security and guarantee she receives the very best schooling attainable, however that has by no means resulted in permitting Paige to make use of the restrooms. It has resulted, nonetheless, in ongoing humiliation and ostracization for Paige.

In elementary faculty, courses can be taken to the lavatory as a gaggle, with the scholars divided by gender on both aspect of the hallway. They’d then go into the restrooms two at a time. “It was humiliating for her,” Amy defined, “as a result of she must stroll down a totally separate hallway to go use the lavatory.”

Likewise, in her center faculty, Paige is compelled to make use of a toilet positioned in a important hallway closely trafficked by all college students — and nowhere close to her classroom. She will not be permitted to make use of the health club’s locker rooms, which suggests she is denied entry to a health club locker. She alone should carry her health club garments along with her in a bag and alter in a separate restroom. When she stays after faculty to hold along with her girlfriends, Paige can’t go to the lavatory with them. One time she tried, and a instructor truly pulled her out.

These are experiences that transgender college students have reported throughout the nation, and research have proven such isolation can have a damaging affect on their psychological well being, how secure they really feel in school, and their educational efficiency. Some even keep away from utilizing the restrooms completely, which may have severe repercussions for his or her bodily well being.

“It’s embarrassing,” Amy defined, “and one thing that makes me probably the most unhappy about that’s that I don’t assume it makes her that upset anymore. She’s used to it and doesn’t know something completely different. She’s recognized two weeks of freedom.”

She’s recognized two weeks of freedom.

However regardless of her courageous, resilient demeanor, current occasions have proven that Paige continues to be very a lot affected by this every day discrimination.

The drill

On Friday, September 28, Paige was in PE, her fourth block class, when a lockdown drill started. Whereas the scholars and workers retreated into the locker rooms, the academics at first had Paige stay within the health club sitting in a chair with a instructor. After the academics brazenly debated what must be executed, they determined to maneuver Paige to simply contained in the locker room door, however she was saved remoted within the entry hallway away from the remainder of the scholars, who have been within the locker room correct.

The humiliation of the entire expertise brought on Paige to have a panic assault. In keeping with Amy, a few of the academics thought she was simply upset as a result of the drill was scary. “One instructor acknowledged what was actually happening and why she was upset,” Amy mentioned. After the drill, “she advised [Paige] alone privately that she didn’t perceive why they have been doing it that approach, that it wasn’t proper, and that if she ever wanted something or help or somebody to speak to, she was at all times there for her.”

Amy doesn’t completely blame the opposite academics, as a result of she acknowledges that the coverage could have put them in a troublesome state of affairs. “They’ve been advised she’s not allowed to enter the women’ locker room,” she defined. “So if you’re advised that by these above you, whether or not that’s administration or the college board, that that is the rule… they have been most likely afraid in the event that they let her in there that their jobs have been in danger.”

“A part of me want to assume we will simply use some widespread sense and say, ‘It is a lockdown drill… It is a state of affairs the place we’re practising for one thing that might occur and we’d like to verify we do it proper,” Amy mentioned.

However as Paige defined in a word to the college board this week, she felt like “an afterthought.”

The varsity board assembly

Information of Paige’s expertise first began circulating due to a word posted on Fb final week by Equality Stafford, a gaggle that promotes LGBTQ inclusion in Stafford County colleges. The word inspired the group to point out as much as this week’s faculty board assembly and present their help, which they did.

Paige wished to talk for herself on the assembly, however the board’s guidelines require that any public speaker share their identify and deal with, and Amy wasn’t comfy that it might be secure for her. In truth, Amy wasn’t even certain she was comfy letting Paige attend the assembly, however Paige was insistent. As powerful because the drill itself was, Paige appeared to “bounce again fairly shortly” and wasn’t bothered by the eye the story was receiving.

They agreed to let Paige craft an announcement about her expertise that didn’t embrace any figuring out particulars, and on the assembly, Amy requested her aunt to learn it to go away room for some anonymity. “When my aunt began studying, by the top of the primary sentence… Paige began bawling. She set free a puff and he or she simply began bawling.” This cascaded to different folks, as household mates and strangers alike started crying upon listening to Paige’s story. “I believe she had been holding that in for a short time,” Amy mentioned. “And I believe listening to her phrases learn out loud by a member of the family who additionally acquired choked up whereas she was studying it — I believe it simply hit her in that second.”

In her assertion, Paige described 4 years of struggling, “being handled like an outcast.” She recounted the occasions of the drill and the way it made her really feel to be handled in another way from the opposite college students in a disaster state of affairs. “If we have been practising our security, why was I first made to sit down within the hallway of the locker room dealing with a wall, alone, by the door?” she wrote. “The door by which, if there was somebody armed in my faculty, I’d have been the primary one gone. I felt like an afterthought.”

“Blame is pointless now,” she insisted. “I wish to cease being handled like an afterthought. I would like you to cease treating me like I’m a predator. It’s time so that you can repair this.”

“She was stunned she acquired so upset listening to it,” Amy added. She’s at all times admired her daughter’s resilience, however she additionally worries in regards to the cumulative impact of all this rejection. “That’s rather a lot for any grownup to cope with,” she mentioned, noting that Paige’s story is on no account nameless amongst her mates and group. “She cried and cried and cried, after which she was okay.”

Superintendent Scott Kizner, who’s solely been serving the district for a couple of month, publicly apologized at Tuesday’s assembly. Amy acknowledged that he has apologized to her and to Paige privately as effectively, which they respect. “It’s the one apology we’ve ever gotten by way of all of the years we’ve been within the faculty system… for the way in which she’s been handled.” She believes the apology was essential to see for LGBTQ college students and workers all through the county who can’t be out and open and he or she hopes it units a tone for transferring ahead.

“On the similar time, phrases are low cost,” she countered. “I wish to see change. It’s appreciated, but it surely doesn’t change something. Till one thing modifications, I’m going to maintain working to verify it does. The very fact is: When my daughter went to high school right this moment, she nonetheless had to make use of a separate rest room and he or she nonetheless needed to change in a workers rest room. The apology didn’t change something for her as a result of she nonetheless has to go to high school the following day and cope with the fallout.”

The very fact is: When my daughter went to high school right this moment, she nonetheless had to make use of a separate rest room and he or she nonetheless needed to change in a workers rest room.

Amy is optimistic about change, however she doesn’t wish to drive that change by way of authorized channels. She desires the college to acknowledge that it’s the precise factor to do. Tuesday’s faculty board assembly, she mentioned, “was the primary time that I’ve felt optimistic they have been prepared to implement coverage and trainings as a result of it was obligatory and significant.”

Alongside the way in which, there have additionally been “wonderful” academics who’ve handled Paige as if she have been their very own daughter. “If it wasn’t for these academics, I don’t assume I’d have such a powerful, resilient youngster that has wonderful shallowness, and will get straight A’s, and is standard and is considered a pacesetter amongst her friends.”

Amy is left to think about what it might be like if each instructor within the district felt like they might absolutely help their LGBTQ college students with out the constraints imposed by the board and directors. “What a distinction that might make,” she mentioned. “Not only for the LGBTQ children, however to that straight child that doesn’t have lots of mates or appears like an outcast, or for any child who feels a bit completely different — they usually all do — to simply see that help and that love from academics. I don’t assume that simply helps LGBTQ children, I believe that helps all the children.”

The post Mother of transgender daughter kept out of locker rooms during lockdown drill speaks out – ThinkProgress appeared first on Breakig News.

source https://www.20minute.info/mother-of-transgender-daughter-kept-out-of-locker-rooms-during-lockdown-drill-speaks-out-thinkprogress/

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whatdoesagoodgirllooklike-blog · 6 years

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The ‘Girly’ Series

Essay: Basic Bitches Lou Stoppard asks why women want to be girls

BY LOU STOPPARD ON 6 NOVEMBER 2014.

Our generation has been forced into a time warp, cruelly prevented from ever growing up like some sad passive female Peter Pan in American Apparel disco pants. Masculinity is in crisis. We all know that. Hey, Shortlist magazine have even set up a whole initiative to mentor lost young men, those poor bewildered twenty-something blokes who have no idea what their place in society is or who even cares about them anymore. Look around at young guys - once, as a collective, the nation's sweethearts, marching off to defend King and Country and wooing British beauties down the dance (all the clichés your grandparents go on about) – and you’ll see they've become mindless Superdry-wearing morons, neknominating themselves into oblivion while 'ripping the piss' out of their mates and quietly sinking into a shallowly-masked, confused comedown that lasts their whole twenties and thirties. Our heroes have no idea who they’re meant to be – society’s pillars or outcasts? Women’s protectors or equals? Tough, emotionless beings or sensitive creatives?

As always men are hogging the limelight. As the media avidly reports on their descent into a regressive state – those weekends playing Grand Theft Auto in their teenage bedrooms post-uni and attempts to replicate semi-violent YouPorn clips with poor unsuspecting girls - women are going through their own identity crisis. Now I'm not giving bait to the mindless ‘feminism killed it for women’ brigade. This isn't about girls having too much choice and freedom that we don't know what to do with it and would rather just give up our jobs and freedoms and return to a blissful state of domesticity and passivity. This actually has very little to do with women’s rights, it's all about age, education and economy.

If you were a girl born any time between the mid eighties to early nineties - basically if you have some memory of making formative identity developments to the soundtrack of B*Witched or ever wore Von Dutch - you grew up being heralded as the mature ones. As a sex, girls ruled the school. We were told our mental ages were years above boys by beaming teachers who cast weary glances at the confused, acne-ridden idiots alongside us. We beat them in our GCSEs, we took 'their' university places. When Tim or Mark or whoever dumped us, our parents, friends or teachers told us he's just an immature loser – he’ll grow out of it, you’re too old/sensible/wise for him. But then, sometime post college or uni, as the recession hit, came the drastic realisation that there’s not much use having the sense and maturity of a boy 5-10 years older than you if your generation is jobless (733,000 young people aged 16 to 24 were unemployed in June to August 2014 and in 2012 1 in 10 graduates couldn’t get a job six months out of study). What's the use of kicking the ass of some sexist public school boy convinced of women's innate inferiority in your university finals (sorry Jack), if you're going to end up sleeping back at your parent’s house under those faded Powerpuff Girls bed sheets and picking back up the same part-time cash-in-hand job you had aged 15? Our generation has been forced into a time warp, cruelly prevented from ever growing up like some sad passive female Peter Pan in American Apparel disco pants. So what did we do in response? In a slightly less thuggish way than the boys, and in most cases with less substance abuse, we returned to a childlike state. Confused by our position, we reveled in our lack of responsibilities – even though we’d actually quite liked to have bought a house or, you know, have been offered a salary - and embraced eternal infancy.

It’s a sad cycle. We're told our body clocks are ticking and are constantly saddled with a strange Bridget Jones-esque 'sad single girl' tag by an older generation, confused by the fact we've been unable to pluck a husband from the tropes of bewildered boys struggling through the same crisis of societal and employment rejection. So we resort to silliness. Sure our eggs may be dying but have you seen our hilarious Mean Girls quotes on Instagram? Your hair looks sexy pushed back! It doesn't matter that we're unemployed as we're dressed like our responsibility-less 13-year-old self anyway! How ironic is this crop top? Emojis are our baby talk. Aren’t we cute! Our poster girls are either #TBT heroines like Cher Horowitz or TOWIE sirens like Amy Childs, on one hand so 18+ with her man-made breasts and lips, on the other so infantile with her baby voice, wide-eyes and moronic chit chat (she once asked if a matador was a type of penguin. Adorable!!) The ‘basic bitch’ isn't the only manifestation of this crisis but she's one of them. What's intriguing about her isn't her vapidity (Urban Dictionary defines her as a ‘white suburban girl who…takes pictures of everything, and when the miracle occurs that she leaves the house she will take snapchats of the endeavour to make sure the world knows. These journeys will include trips to Starbucks, Chipotle or other appropriately 'basic' locations.’) but her infantile props - the cupcakes, the florals, the ‘Keep Calm and Go Shopping’ cushions, the My Little Pony iPhone case, the glittery princess stickers decorating her iPad. Basically she's a sign that 'your average' twenty-something girl is stuck in time, obsessing over the music and fashion of her youth and the repressive domesticity - hello Cath Kidston - of her ancestors. If there was ever a sign our generation is reveling in childishness it’s Zoella: a 24-year-old woman – and, according to more sources than I’d care to read, this generation’s ‘role model’ - who makes YouTube videos of herself squealing like a hysterical toddler over a Boots bronzer. Bleak.

For women, is grasping at our infancy some desperate attempt to slow time down? A weird Disney-fetishising 'we never had it so good mentality', that leaves us dreaming of the infinite freedom but also infinite hope of our youth. The sheer number of girls who have selected The Little Mermaid as their social media avatar or are 'ironically' sporting Hello Kitty accessories seems to suggest so. Young women have no idea who our role models are. We want to be strong but can't be the 'power career women' Vogue makes a trend of each season because no one wants to hire us. That's never been more patently clear than on the runways. Those 'adult' icons - the strong women of Celine or the vixen of Tom Ford – entice us but don’t relate to us. Who is this ‘high flying gallerist or writer’ who shops Phoebe Philo? Not us. We can tell the Tom Ford look is regressive - who wants to look like the sad 19-year-old bride of a oligarch, dressed in clothes picked out by him - but we don't have much else that’s better and relevant to turn to. So we laugh off the crisis and use silliness as a crutch. For many it’s got nothing to do with personal style – sure, some women consciously and intelligently own this ‘Girly’ look, but most only dabble in accessories. That's where Moschino by Jeremy Scott comes in - peddling pink Barbie plastic phone cases that look like toys you played with as a child to twenty-somethings the world over. Why the success? It speaks to a generation that has nothing to say for itself other than LOL. One that is so displaced and confused about our position in society - rejected on one hand, criticised and obsessed-over on the other - that a Barbie or McDonald’s logo says more about us than anything else. It’s a sorrowful, smile-through-the-tears mentality where we're in control as long as we’re ROFLing. We feel safe around these childish remnants of our youth, they smack of a time before we’d realised we’d probably never get on the property ladder and would likely meet our life partner on Tinder with an action as haphazard and unromantic as a swipe left or right.

What's the alternative? Marry while at university? You'd almost certainly have to in order to wed at the same age as your parents’ generation. Pop out a couple of kids while juggling an internship with a Saturday job and living in a warehouse with six other people? Obviously not. But there is another way. Acceptance. Yes, we’ve been dealt a bad hand but it’s a very real and inescapable one. Fetishising the silly, cartoon and unreal – we all know a Barbie body wouldn’t be able to stand if it belonged to a real woman - may be a distraction but it’s not honest. Fashion’s meant to be about dreaming not numbing – about fantasy not ignoring your realities because they’ve got too tough and things were nicer when you were cared for like a child. Grow up – you can’t hide behind a Barbie hand mirror forever.

I do feel like this essay from the ‘Girly’ project over on SHOWStudio really grasps the concept of why adults want to dress younger - why 18-25+ women are looking to go back in time with their choices of accessories, hairstyles and selfie poses. I like the point of ‘relatability’, this idea of already having been that girl once so she’s no stranger. The Tom Ford ‘Vixen’ does not exist - she’s fantastical. Girls are trying to hold on to reality but it’s long gone and now only a memory or fantasy.

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