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thewidowsghost · 3 years

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The Unknown Muggleborn - Chapter 2

3rd Person POV

By the age of nine, Jean and Tom Granger found that their adopted daughter (Y/n) was quite a peculiar child. It wasn't just the strange hourglass scar on her neck, but she was incredibly smart, picking things up that most kids in high school wouldn't understand.

By Year Five of school, (Y/n) (L/n)-Granger had aced all of her classes on top of taking Year Nine level classes - Geometry and AP Biology.

And by the age of ten, (Y/n) was fluent in Russian, French, and Spanish.

The eldest Grangers also learned that their adopted daughter was extremely athletic. (Y/n) had played football - what Americans called soccer - and was top of her class in her Karate and JiuJitzu classes.

(Y/n) was also an inventor. She could come up with solutions to problems that Jean Granger had told her that most adults couldn't solve. She had built her first circuit board at the age of five and her first engine at the age of eight.

The Grangers' had put a shed in their backyard where their adopted daughter was always tinkering with things she would buy or was gifted from neighbors.

It wasn't to say that Jean and Tom's other daughter wasn't smart, for Hermione Granger was very intelligent. But all three - including Hermione - knew that (Y/n) was on a whole different level of intelligence.

Hermione Jean Granger wakes on July 26th of 1991 to her sister standing over her, a wide smile on her face.

The two sisters - even considering that (Y/n) was adopted - looked nothing alike. Hermione had frizzy brown hair and chocolate brown eyes, whereas (Y/n) had sleek (H/C) hair and brilliant green eyes. There was a strange thing about (Y/n)'s appearance though, she had an hourglass shaped scar on the side of her neck. (Y/n) liked the scar, but it reminded her of black widows, which wasn't great because (Y/n) didn't like spiders.

Hermione sit up in her bed, pushing her covers off her.

After the two use the bathroom - (Y/n) taking a quick shower and leaving her hair damp - they make their way downstairs to find their parents already in the kitchen.

"Morning girls," Mrs. Granger greets her daughters as she places breakfast on the table.

"Morning Mum," (Y/n) and Hermione say in unison.

Both Mr. and Mrs. Granger were dressed for work - they were dentists at the local dentists' office a few miles away.

After the four finish breakfast, there is a knock on the door.

Looking slightly confused, Mr. Granger stands up from the table and walks towards the door.

He opens it to see a very stern looking woman with black hair and blue eyes.

"Good morning," Mr. Granger greets the woman.

"Good morning, sir," the black haired woman says. "Are your daughters home? I'm here about a scholarship, per say, for a new school."

(Y/n) and Hermione exchange excited looks.

"Yes, they are here," Mr. Granger answers the woman. "Would you like to come in?"

The woman nods and steps inside the neat house.

"Hermione! (Y/n)!" Tom Granger calls and the two girls rise from their chairs simultaneously and walk out into the living room.

(Y/n) waves shyly at the woman, surprising the other Grangers. (Y/n) was never shy.

A small smile spreads across the woman's face at the slight of (Y/n) and catches sight of the hourglass scar on her neck.

"Hermione and (Y/n), was it?" the woman asks and the two nod.

"I'm Professor McGonagall. I'm here about a school for gifted people like yourselves," the woman says.

(Y/n) and Hermione exchange gazes, like a clashing forest, brown on green.

"It might be hard to believe, but the two of you, you're witches," McGonagall says and (Y/n)'s gaze flashes a silver, almost too quickly for McGonagall to see, but the woman does.

This sends a flash of curiosity though McGonagall, but she holds out two letters.

(Y/n) and Hermione step forward and take the letters from the Professor.

Miss (Y/n) (L/n)-Granger 100 Crestent View Ln. The Third Largest Bedroom Hampstead, London

"That's so very incredibly specific," (Y/n) murmurs. Opening the letter, she quickly reads:

HOGWARTS SCHOOL of WITCHCRAFT and WIZARDRY

Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore (Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock,Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)

Dear Miss (Y/n) (L/n)-Granger, We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment. Term begins on September 1. We await your owl by no later than July 31.

Yours sincerely, Minerva McGonagall, Deputy Headmistress

(Y/n) looks suspiciously at the letter for a moment before looking up. "Are you sure?" (Y/n) asks. "I'm not anyone special. I can't be a witch."

At the comment about (Y/n) being no one special, the other three Grangers exchange looks that McGonagall presumed to mean that they though that the statement wasn't true.

"Has nothing ever happened when you were afraid or nervous?" McGonagall asks and a flash of realization flashes behind (Y/n)'s eyes. "If you two have to go to work," McGonagall turns to Jean and Tom, "I can take the girls to find their school things."

(Y/n) looks excitedly over at her mother and father, "Mum, Dad, can we?"

Jean looks at McGonagall and nods.

Hermione and (Y/n) grin at each other.

"Go get dressed and then you can go," McGonagall says, smiling softly at the girls' excitement.

(Y/n) and Hermione run up the stairs.

(Y/n) goes to her bedroom and opens her closet door. She pulls out a black AC DC t-shirt and a pair of jean shorts from her dresser.

Thinking for a moment, she grabs a zip up hoodie and throws it on, placing her wallet inside one of the pockets.

(Y/n) stops at her sister's room and a moment later, Hermione pops out, dressed in a pair of jeans and a short sleeved t-shirt.

"So, what do you think about this?" (Y/n) asks as the two make their way down the stairs.

"I think it's interesting, us being witches and all," Hermione answers as the two enter the living room where they find their mother asking McGonagall to keep her daughters safe.

McGonagall, (Y/n), and Hermione walk outside and McGonagall tells the two girls to take her hand.

They do, and they're suddenly somewhere else. (Y/n) and Hermione look up to see a sign, which reads, The Leaky Cauldron.

They walk inside.

It was a small, tiny, grubby-looking pub. A few old women were sitting in a corner, drinking tiny glasses of sherry. One of them was smoking a long pipe. A little man in a top hat was talking to the old bartender, who was quite bald and looked like a toothless walnut. All of a sudden, the low buzz of chatter stopped when two people walked in. One of them was a very tall man, he almost looked to big to be allowed. He had long black hair and a black beard. The other was a small boy with jet-black hair, bottle green eyes, and light skin. The bartender reached for a glass, saying, "The usual, Hagrid?"

"Can't, Tom, I'm on Hogwarts business," said the man who must have Hagrid, clapping his great hand on boy's shoulder and making his knees buckle.

"Good Lord," said the bartender, peering at the black haired boy, "is this — can this be — ?"

The Leaky Cauldron had suddenly gone completely still and silent. "Bless my soul," whispered the old bartender, "Harry Potter ... what an honor."

(Y/n) studies the boy for a moment, then he looks over at her, as though sensing her eyes on him.

The old bartender hurries out from behind the bar, rushes towards Harry and seizes his hand, tears in his eyes.

"Welcome back, Mr. Potter, welcome back." The boy didn't seem know what to say. Everyone was looking at him. The old woman with the pipe was puffing on it without realizing it had gone out. Hagrid was beaming.

Then there was a great scraping of chairs and the next moment, Harry was shaking hands with everyone in the Leaky Cauldron.

"Doris Crockford, Mr. Potter, can't believe I'm meeting you at last."

"So proud, Mr. Potter, I'm just so proud."

"Always wanted to shake your hand — I'm all of a flutter."

"Delighted, Mr. Potter, just can't tell you, Diggle's the name, Dedalus Diggle."

"I've seen you before!" said Harry, as Dedalus Diggle's top hat fell off in his excitement. "You bowed to me once in a shop."

"He remembers!" cried Dedalus Diggle.

(Y/n)'s POV

I look up at Professor McGonagall who looks at me with a question evident in her eyes, though I couldn't tell what it was.

McGonagall follows Harry and Hagrid out of the pub, Hermione and I following.

"Told yeh, didn't I? Told yeh you was famous. Even Professor Quirrell was tremblin' ter meet yeh — mind you, he's usually tremblin'." Hagrid was saying.

"Is he always that nervous?" Harry asks.

"Oh, yeah. Poor bloke. Brilliant mind. He was fine while he was studyin' outta books but then he took a year off ter get some firsthand experience. ... They say he met vampires in the Black Forest, and there was a nasty bit o' trouble with a hag — never been the same since. Scared of the students, scared of his own subject — now, where's me umbrella?" Hagrid responds. "Three up ... two across ..." he muttered. "Right, stand back, Harry." He taps the wall three times with the point of his umbrella.

The brick he had touched quivered — it wriggled — in the middle, a small hole appeared — it grew wider and wider — a second later they were facing an archway large enough even for Hagrid, an archway onto a cobbled street that twisted and turned out of sight. Hagrid and Harry proceed to walk through the archway.

McGonagall follows the two and Hermione and I follow close behind.

"The first stop for us is the wizarding bank, Gringotts," McGonagall says leading Hermione and I towards a large, grand, white building that looked over the rest of Diagon Alley.

The doors open and we walk in, the doors closing behind us. We walk over to what looks like a Santa Clause elf - pointy ears and relatively short.

"Good morning," McGonagall says, pulling out a golden key, "we need to visit Miss (L/n)'s vault."

"And does Miss (L/n) have her key?" the goblin asks.

McGonagall hands the goblin the key in her hand. "Very well," he says, handing the key back to McGonagall, who, in turn, hands it to me.

"I'll have someone take you down to the vault. Griphook!"

Griphook was yet another goblin. Hermione, Professor McGonagall, and I follow Griphook towards one of the doors leading off the hall.

Griphook holds the door open for us.

We walk into a narrow stone passageway lit with flaming torches. It slopes steeply downwards and there are little railway tracks on the floor. Griphook whistled and a small cart comes hurtling up the tracks towards us. We climb in and are then off.

When the cart finally stops, the four of us get out stopped in front vault 714.

"Key please," Griphook says and I hand him my key.

I was confused though, because Vault 714 had no keyhole.

Griphook simply examines the key closely, and then hands it back to me. I guessed that they key must just be confidential.

"Stand back," says Griphook importantly. He strokes the door gently with one of his long fingers and it simply melts away. "If anyone but a Gringotts goblin tried that, they'd be sucked through the door and trapped in there," says Griphook.

"How often do you check to see if anyone's inside?" Hermione asks curiously.

"About once every ten years," Griphook answers with a rather nasty grin.

3rd Person POV

Griphook steps aside and (Y/n) and Hermione's eyes go wide at the sheer amount of gold, silver, and bronze coins inside.

"This is mine?" (Y/n) asks Professor McGonagall, who smiles softly, holding out a drawstring bag.

"Your mother was very addiment on leaving most of her gold to you," McGonagall says and (Y/n) nods dumbly as she takes the bag.

Hermione helps (Y/n) scoop some of the coins into the bag. Though they had taken quite a bit of coins, it didn't even seem to make a dent in the large piles.

"The gold ones are Galleons," Professor McGonagall explains as (Y/n) studies a wooden box in front of the truckloads of gold coins. "There are seventeen silver Sickles to a galleon and twenty-nine Knuts to a Sickle."

(Y/n) nods absently as she opens the box, Hermione next to her.

Inside, she sees a stack of letters and a few pictures.

Hermione holds out her bag, and (Y/n) closes the box, placing it inside the bag.

(Y/n) smiles gratefully at her sister as Hermione pulls her backpack back onto her back.

One wild cart ride later, the three stand blinking in the sunlight outside Gringotts.

Hermione pulls out her letter, and (Y/n) reads over her sister's shoulder:

HOGWARTS SCHOOL of WITCHCRAFT and WIZARDRY

Uniform

First-year students will require:

1. Three sets of plain work robes (black) 2. One plain pointed hat (black) for day wear 3. One pair of protective gloves (dragon hide or similar) 4. One winter cloak (black, silver fastenings)Please note that all pupils' clothes should carry name tags

Course books:

All students should have a copy of each of the following:

The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1)by Miranda Goshawk A History of Magic by Bathilda Bagshot Magical Theory by Adalbert Waffling A Beginners' Guide to Transfiguration by Emeric Switch One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungiby Phyllida Spore Magical Drafts and Potions by Arsenius Jigger Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find them by Newt Scamander The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection by Quentin Trimble

Other Equipment:

1 wand

1 cauldron (pewter, standard size 2) I set glass or crystal phials 1 telescope 1 set brass scales

Students may also bring an owl OR a cat OR a toad

PARENTS ARE REMINDED THAT FIRST YEARS ARE NOT ALLOWED THEIR OWN BROOMSTICKS

"Where do we even start?" Hermione asks in amazement.

"If we get are cauldrons first, we can put our other supplies in it," (Y/n) thinks quickly.

Hermione nods and then both look up to Professor McGonagall, who smiles softly and leads the two to the Apothecary where they pick up two cauldrons and two supplies of basic potions ingredients for Hermione and (Y/n).

"Books now, 'Mione?" (Y/n) asks with a grin as they are about to pass a large bookshop.

Hermione shoots her sister a grin and the two girls walk into the bookshop, McGonagall waiting outside with their cauldrons and potions ingredients.

(Y/n)'s POV

Hermione grabs two of each of our course books while I look around at some of the other books. I grab: Hogwarts: A History, The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts, Modern Magical History, Great Wizarding Events of teh Twentieth Century, and a book that looked like it was for kids titled, The Tales of Beedle the Bard.

The next place we went was called Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions. Inside were two boys one was the Raven haired boy from the Leaky Cauldron; the other was a short boy with blond hair that was greased back; he had a mean attitude about him.

Harry's POV (A couple minutes before)

Might as well get yer uniform," said Hagrid, nodding toward Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions. "Listen, Harry, would yeh mind if I slipped off fer a pick-me-up in the Leaky Cauldron? I hate them Gringotts carts." He did still look a bit sick, so I entered Madam Malkin's shop.

Madam Malkin was a squat, smiling witch dressed all in mauve.

"Hogwarts, dear?" she said, when I started to speak. "Got the lot here – another young man being fitted up just now, in fact."

In the back of the shop, a boy with a pale, pointed face was standing on a footstool while a second witch pinned up his long black robes. Madam Malkin stood me a on stool slipped a long robe over my head, and began to pin it to the right length.

"Hello," said the boy, "Hogwarts, too?"

"Yeah," I said, not really liking him very much.

"My father's next door buying my books and mother's up the street looking at wands," said the boy. He had a bored, drawling voice. "Then I'm going to drag them off to took at racing brooms. I don't see why first years can't have their own. I think I'll bully father into getting me one and I'll smuggle it in somehow."

"Have you got your own broom?" the boy went on.

"No," I say.

"Play Quidditch at all?"

"Nope," I respond.

"I do – Father says it's a crime if I'm not picked to play for my house, and I must say, I agree. Know what house you'll be in yet?"

"No," I say. I really don't like this boy, I thought.

"Well, no one really knows until they get there, do they, but I know I'll be in Slytherin, all our family have been – imagine being in Hufflepuff, I think I'd leave, wouldn't you?"

"Mmm," I say, wishing I could say something a bit more interesting.

"I say, look at that man!" says the boy suddenly, nodding toward the front window. Hagrid was standing there, grinning at me and pointing at two large ice creams to show he couldn't come in.

"That's Hagrid," I tell him, pleased to know something the boy didn't. "He works at Hogwarts."

"Oh," says the boy, "I've heard of him. He's a sort of servant, isn't he?"

"He's the gamekeeper," I say. I was liking this boy less and less every second.

"Yes, exactly. I heard he's a sort of savage – lives in a hut on the school grounds and every now and then he gets drunk, tries to do magic, and ends up setting fire to his bed."

"I think he's brilliant," I say coldly.

"Do you?" says the boy, with a slight sneer. "Why is he with you? Where are your parents?"

"They're dead," I say shorty. He seemed not to want to talk to this boy any more than he needed to.

"Oh, sorry," says the other boy, not sounding sorry at all. "But they were our kind, weren't they?"

"They were a witch and wizard, if that's what you mean." I respond.

"I really don't think they should let the other sort in, do you? They're just not the same, they've never been brought up to know our ways."

A tinkling of a bell interrupts the boy. I look over to see two girls walk in.

"Some of them have never even heard of Hogwarts until they get the letter, imagine. I think they should keep it in the old wizarding families. What's your surname, anyway?"

But before I could answer, Madam Malkin says, "That's you done, my dear," and I, not sorry for an excuse to stop talking to the boy, hop down from the footstool.

"Well, I'll see you at Hogwarts, I suppose," says the drawling boy.

3rd Person POV

A few minutes later, (Y/n) and Hermione walk into the bright sunlit alley, their robes folded neatly in a bag.

(Y/n) smiles at Professor McGonagall and places her robes into the cauldron, then (Y/n) lifts up the heavy cauldron, Hermione doing the same with her own.

"What next?" Hermione asks Professor McGonagall.

"You two still need wands," answers McGonagall, pointing towards a store.

As we walk closer, I read the sign, Ollivanders: Makers of Fine Wands since 382 B.C.

The three of walk inside. A tinkling bell ring somewhere in the depths of the shop as they step inside, and an old man walks to the desk from teh deep recesses of the shop.

"Hello, good afternoon," the man says. "I am Mr. Ollivander. You two are here for wands I presume?" he asks and Hermione and (Y/n) nod.

"(Y/n) (L/n)," Mr. Ollivander says, "I was wondering if I was going to be seeing you soon." he pauses, looking carefully into (Y/n)'s eyes. "Your mother's eyes." At the statement, (Y/n)'s eyes seem to light up with curiosity. "It seems that only yesterday she was in here herself, buying her first wand. Twelve inches, ash wood with a unicorn hair core. Good for stubborn and courageous witches and wizards."

Even at this small amount of information, (Y/n) had perked up. Hermione glances over at her adopted sister and feels a rush of pity for her. She can't imagine not knowing who her parents were.

It wasn't that (Y/n) didn't remember, because she did have very vivid nighmares about a car slamming on the brakes, a flash of green light, then red, then everything would go dark. It always ended the same way however, with Mrs. Granger carrying a two year old (Y/n), who was clutching her black and white stuffed cat, back to her home.

(Y/n) wrenches herself out of her thoughts as Ollivander approaches her. He had come so close that he and (Y/n) were almost nose to nose.

"And that's where . . ."

Mr. Ollivander touches the hourglass shaped car on the side of (Y/n)'s neck with a long white finger.

"I'm sorry to say that I sold the wand that did it," he says softly and (Y/n) looks back up into the wand maker's misty silver eyes. "Thirteen-and-a-half inches. Yew. Powerful wand, very powerful, and in the wrong hands . . . well, if I'd known what that wand was going out into the world to do . . ."

He stops, and (Y/n) continues to watch the wand maker, her green eyes flashing silver for the second time that day.

Ollivander, as though sensing (Y/n)'s desire to know more, moves onto Hermione, and she quickly revives her "Vine wood, Dragon heart-string, 10 1/4 inches, unyielding" wand.

(Y/n)'s POV

Again, the same process commences with me, but I end up trying more wands then Hermione. Finally, I get my wand, and strangely my, "Alder wood with a Phoenix Feather core, 12 1/4 inches. Alder is an unyielding wood, yet I have discovered that its ideal owner is not stubborn or obstinate, but often helpful, considerate and most likeable. Whereas most wand woods seek similarity in the characters of those they will best serve, alder is unusual in that it seems to desire a nature that is, if not precisely opposite to its own, then certainly of a markedly different type. When an alder wand is happily placed, it becomes a magnificent, loyal helpmate. Alder is also excellent for protection against outside forces, and, when combined with phoenix feather, is a suitable match for a wizard who will "make their mark on this world.'" Mr. Ollivander says, and I look up at him in shock. Hermione hadn't gotten such a lengthy explanation of her wand.

Mr. Ollivander fixes me with his pale stare.

"I remember every wand I've ever sold, Miss (L/n). Every single wand. It so happens that that phoenix whose tail feather is in your wand, gave two other feathers - just two. It is curious indeed that you should be destined for this wand when its brother - why, one of it's brothers gave you that scar."

I swallow thickly.

"Your other wand's brother, however, I sold just a mere thirty minutes ago," Ollivander continues, "to a young Harry Potter. Curious how these things happen. The wand chooses the wizard, remember . . . I think that we must expect great things from you, Miss (L/n) . . . After all, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named did great things - terrible yes, but great."

Hermione and I return home a few hours later with Professor McGonagall, me clutching a woven basket that housed my new black and white cat Marvel inside.

3rd Person POV

Before they enter the house McGonagall stops (Y/n) before she can enter.

(Y/n) turns to looks quizzically at the professor.

"Good luck," the Professor says simply, then holds out to train tickets. "These are you and your sister's ticket's for Hogwarts." (Y/n) nods, taking the tickets. "I'll see you on September 1st," McGonagall says. Then the Professor turns around and walks away.

Word Count: 4,100 words

So yeah, here's Chapter 2.

I wonder if any of you know who (Y/n)'s dad is yet. I tried dropping some hints at the very beginning.

So yeah

I'll see y'all soon!

Love y'all!

Kaitlynn 😍❤️

#hermione granger #harry potter #ron weasley #fred weasley #george weasley #harry potter various x reader #fem reader

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itslostfocus · 3 years

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Journey to Fluency - Steps I follow

Objective

The idea is to arrive to an advanced level in July 26th 2022.

To calculate this I searched how many hours it is needed to reach the fluency in Korean. Internet says that it is around 2500 hours seeing the kind of language it is (type 5 if I remember well). After some more research I realized that in general, I would spend like 3 hours every day in contact with Korean in an indirect or passive way, so I decided to extend that to 4 hours and mix both, active/direct and passive/indirect learning.

I do these 4 hours during the day not to overwhelm myself, also cause I have other stuff to do lol

Daily routine

1) 20 new words

I copy them from a list on an excel file to have them in a table form with the meaning and examples.

Then I make flashcards with their meanings and a picture (I'm a visual learner). I use quizlet but use any flashcards system you want. The important is to make them and review them right away and any time you want. In my case I play basically all the modes quizlet has.

After that, you will see which words are the hardest for your mind to stick with. Then write then down with an example from a dictionary to give it a context and make the correlation between the word and the meaning easier. I use the method explained by Lindie Botes here and has worked so well! Aka red for Korean, blue for English and black for the examples (I write these examples on the excel).

2) Grammar point

I study 1 grammar point per year. Until now I'm reviewing what I have already learned cause grammar is the hardest thing for me to remember and I always tried to hurry things up to "learn more" and all I did was read but not actually learn. Don't make the same mistake! Allow yourself to take your time to learn well

To study better I have made a flashcards deck when I write the name of the grammatical structure and what it's used for. Also I have made like a table where I write examples, the usage, the sequence, how it changes if the previous word ends in a vowel or consonant etc.

3) Hanja (한자)

After like a week or so into the routine I realized that my brain works better learning words individually and then making sentences and phrases from them, instead of learning full sentences. So to use that, I decided to add hanja as a way to help me to learn vocabulary better since in that way I can connect and relate words based on their origin. It's pretty cool and til now it hasn't been something too complicated for me, it just requires practice.

I do 3 hanja characters per day using the lessons from How To Study Korean here and take notes (there are books, apps, videos based but I find this way better for me). Then make flashcards and review them, and I write them down on an excel file as it is a table so I can have a record of everything and an easier way to review.

I personally recommend to start with hanja once you are used to read hangul and have a good base of basic vocabulary so it won't be confusing. But well you decide according to your situation.

(Plus if you want to learn Japanese, as I do, it will be super useful cause it's the same -except for some points- than kanji so. And well of course really helpful if you want to learn Chinese since these are chinese characters)

4) Listen / Read / Watch

This is basically all the passive/indirect way of learning. Add playing games if you want lol.

I don't take notes of anything I see in here cause I don't want to set the mindset of "oh I need to be aware of all words to later search on naver and make flashcards". These are things I do to make my ears and brain get used to the sound of the language and be able to understand people when they speak, and also to have fun. Disconnect your learning thoughts and just enjoy what's happening, sooner or later you will see how you understand stuff just by listening and seeing.

Here I...

Listen to songs and read the lyrics.

Watch videos on youtube, variety shows, etc with korean subtitles, or without subtitles if it's something that I have already watched before.

Read webtoons or social media posts or anything you find that has Korean written.

5) Learning focused apps

The goal of the app, in my opinion, is to practice making sentences and get used to the different structures without reading them from a book or a lesson format. Also if it has a streak format it works to establish a routine.

I used lingodeer before and now I'm using duolingo. There are many more, so choose your fav ^^

I don't take notes here either for the same reason explained before.

6) Daily posts on social media

This is a way to not only keep a record of the journey, but also to interact with other learners and native speakers and to force yourself to continue the routine since you have to leave a record of it.

So don't stress yourself about making pretty notes, what matters is for to learn and proudly show how well you are doing 💜

(Optional) 10 daily phrases / sentences

When I started the journey I had this instead of the hanja, but how I explained on that point my brain simply doesn't learn from phrases, it needs to know the meaning of each word (or most of them) before forming or understanding sentences. If I don't know all the words but some of them I can already understand by context, but I need to know words. If the sentence only has words I don't know, my brain simply ignores it, even if I can read what it means.

I decided to change it cause it became really hard after some days and it was starting to make the whole routine stressing just for that.

I will see if I do it again in a future, but for now it's not something I consider lol.

The most important things

Remember to rest well, eat well, sleep well. Learning is easier like this. If you want to take a break or take naps, do it. Your brain needs energy to work, more to learn, so take care of it.

Copy this routine or make your own adding or taking things out. Do what works the best for you and spend the time you want and can on it. If you can do it for hours, great for you, if you can do it for 5 mins, great for you, all is progress. The important is to establish a routine that is easy to follow.

Enjoy every day of the journey!

Sooooooo that's all! I hope this can be helpful to anyone, for Korean or for any other language.

Happy learning 여러분! ^^

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scotianostra · 3 years

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On July 10th 1559 King Henry II of France died from an injury received during a jousting tournament.

On 30th June 1559, the king was jousting against a French nobleman called Gabriel de Lorges, Count of Montgomery. Gabriel was born in Ducey, France, the son of Jacques, Duke of Montgomery, a Scottish nobleman with a sound career supporting the kings of France, Gabriel grew up in the same vein and he became the captain of The Garde Écossaise (The Scots Guard) an elite Scottish military unit founded in 1418 to be personal bodyguards to the French monarchy.

Even though King Henry was properly armoured for the tournament, when Montgomery’s lance hit him on the helmet, a long splinter from the shattered lance slipped through the slits of the king’s visor and pierced the king’s eye. Reportedly, the sliver of wood was driven in so deeply it actually penetrated his brain. Montgomery hurried to kneel before the king and asked to have his head and hand cut off in punishment, but Henry magnanimously told him that it was not his fault and he had carried himself bravely and well.

The royal doctors removed the splinter from the king’s eye and others that had pierced his head and throat and bled the patient who relapsed into unconsciousness. It was hoped that the loss of the eye was the worst that would happen, but even though the royal surgeon fought to save the king, on July 9th the last rites were administered and the king died early in the afternoon of the following day. He was 40 years old.

Although Henry forgave him on his deathbed, could not cope with his “crime” and resigned his commission, throwing himself into a life of religious study, this soon converted him to the Protestant party and he took up arms against the Catholic authorities of France in a movement called The Huguenots, I’m totally out of my depth here so wont go into the history of this and will just concentrate on our erstwhile “Scot” who became a more than able commander of the Protestant faction, to the point that in an infamous event in Paris in 1572, The St. Bartholomew’s Day massacre in which during a truce, Catholics began assassinating the Huguenot’s hierarchy, lasting several weeks, the massacre expanded outward to other urban centres and the countryside. Modern estimates for the number of dead across France vary widely, from 5,000 to 30,000. Though Montgomery was a specific target for assassination that day, he somehow managed to escape. He gave the Catholics fits for the two years left him, enough that the crown tried to buy him off. (Like most Protestants, he was distrustfully defiant after the horrors of St. Bartholomew’s Day.)

While mounting an insurrection in Normandy, he was finally captured, and was dispatched to Paris, tortured, put on trial and sentenced to death.

On 26th June 1574, as he was about to be beheaded, Montgomery was informed that a royal edict had proclaimed that his property would be confiscated and his children deprived of their titles. In true martyrdom style Gabriel is said to have shouted “tell my children, if they are not able to reclaim their position, I curse them from the grave!”

And then they cut off his head.

If you want to know the complete story there is a great account to be found on the link here http://www.normandythenandnow.com/the-heroic-end-of-gabriel-comte-de-montgomery-in-domfront/

#scottish #franco-scot #scots guard #france #history #jousting

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seiin-translations · 3 years

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2.43 S1 Chapter 1.7 - Young Yunichika

7. (COOL BUT WORST) PLAYMAKER

Translation Notes

1. The term used here, 球威, means “pitcher’s stuff”, which basically refers to how effective a pitch is at being the pitch it’s supposed to be

2. Refers to the popular myth/saying/action that writing the character for “person” on your hand and then pretending swallowing it will relieve stress

3. Some neat wordplay here. アタッカー並み means on par with an attacker, but 並みのアタッカー means average attacker

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He felt like he could see Haijima’s smug face painted on the raised set. It was after the opponent blocker fell for the decoy in front of the net and jumped. Kuroba jumped in from behind the decoy with a back-row attack. From the point of view of the opponent blocker, a new shadow suddenly shot out from above the decoy’s head. This was the combination they were best at, called a pipe attack, and it should have been already analyzed by the opponent, but it felt great to be given a face of astonishment that said, “How did you appear there!?” every time. This is the moment when I’m the coolest one on the court.

Haijima’s sets were completely different than his senpai setter’s sets from last year. Kuroba still couldn’t explain it in theory, but even though his senpai’s sets were a big arch that “went up and fell down,” Haijima’s sets “didn’t fall down.” The ball was thrown “straight” to the place where it could only be reached by stepping in the fastest, jumping the highest and swinging his arms at the highest point. If he didn’t stop it, it would just whoosh past him. In practice, he constantly missed the timing and missing the ball, which ended into arguments. While he became reckless everyday, desperate to stop the ball next time for sure—a strange phenomenon occurred today.

As long as he jumped and swung his arms with all strength, the ball would be there. The sets fitted into his hands so cleanly, like they were sticking to his hands, that there was not even a millimeter of deviation. All he had to do was to add power and hit it out with a nice feeling. He cut through the gaps in the opponents’ defense, who were unable to take a step, and landed after seizing the ball with his eyes until it pierced the court. “Yes!” he pumped his arm into the air, still on his knees.

“Yuni!”

“You were so cool!”

While his gathered teammates messed up his hair, he searched for Haijima. He caught a glimpse of Haijima, who was always on the outside of circles like these. Haijima smiled thinly and nodded.

The rotation moved once, and Kuroba came up to the front row right after he did a back-row attack in the back row. When Haijima went down from the front row to serve in exchange, they exchanged a low high-five as they passed each other.

July 26th. The first round of the boys’ volleyball division for the Prefectural Middle School Summer Games, taking place on the two courts of A and B in the Suzumu City Municipal Gymnasium. In the first game on Court A, Monshiro Middle already took the first set. For the second set, the other side came close in the middle of the game because of a disordered receive, but they didn’t allow them to form a comeback and extended a wide lead again to close out the set. It was a three-set match, so if they took this set, they would have a straight-set win.

Haijima moved back considerably in the service zone, almost to the wall, and got into the serve position. He put the ball in his left hand and extended his arm straight out in front of him. His narrow eyes were narrowed even more sharply and he stared at the other side of the net with a fixed gaze. For a moment, the stands that were cheering loudly fell deathly silent. Everyone held their breaths at the clear, intimidating something Haijima was clad in.

Taking just one second to lightly adjust his breathing, he tossed the ball up high without any perceivable jump and hit a powerful jump serve from a beautiful, textbook-like form. The gym became filled with cheers that bordered on roars once again.

But it was a bit too long. It’s out—Kuroba could see it in his eyes, but there was no time for the receiver to avoid it. The ball bounced up all the way to the ceiling with such tremendous power (1) that the receiver nearly fell over.

Ah——.

His body moved naturally before he could think about it, and he jumped. Above the net, he caught hold of the ball that returned directly and knocked it down to the opponent’s court.

⋆﹥━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━﹤⋆

Since sixteen schools participated in the first round, the passages behind the gym were crowded with players in jerseys of all sorts of colors, teachers, and management staff.

“Somehow while I was in a daze…”

“We won!”

“With a team of only eight people!”

“Yuni, you reacted well to that direct one.”

“Well, I guess. For some reason, I feel like I can see the ball really well today. Also, when I see the opponent’s faces, I somehow know what they’re gonna do.”

“What the hell’s that, that sounds cool. I’m falling for you!”

“We should have talked to the girls from class more. All I could hear was the moms’ voices.”

“Agh, I was switching the moms’ voices with the girls’ voices in my head, but you just dragged me back to reality!”

Having finished their match in good time, everyone was still in good spirits, and there was a constant stream of excited chatter. It seemed that the match that started at the same time in Court B was carried over to the third set, so muffled cheers and the sound of the ball bouncing could be heard. When he wondered why this extremely stupid conversation never ended, he realized that it was because Haijima wasn’t there to chop through the mood. He was supposed to be with them when they left the court, but…

Their advisor, who had said he was going to drop by the management headquarters, came back just then.

“Sensei, do you know where Haijima is?”

“He went back inside. The second match in Court A is about to start soon. He said that he’s going to go watch it since it’ll decide who we face in the second round.”

“Eh…He didn’t have to go alone.”

If it’s for our next opponent, then shouldn’t we all go scouting them out, not just Haijima? A tinge of dissatisfaction sprouted in his heart as he thought that he should have at least called out to them.

“Didn’t Haijima want to give you guys a break because he was worried? You’re fine now, but if you get too excited, you won’t enough energy for the second round.”

Haijima worried about them? It was a phenomenon that seemed like it wouldn’t happen even if the heavens and earth were turned upside-down. It was exactly a phenomenon. It was equal to a natural disaster that only happened once every few hundred million years or so.

But, it was true that playing two games in one day was unfamiliar terrain for them. Although everyone seemed to be in good condition right now, it was hard to predict how tired they would be in the second game.

“But, you know, I knew Haijima had volleyball experience, but I didn’t expect him to be that good. Even when I stopped by the headquarters earlier, teachers from other schools kept coming up to me and asking who that player was.”

“Hey, what about me? They didn’t ask about me?”

“Hmm? They didn’t.”

“Tch. My efforts always get overshadowed by Haijima.”

When he pouted and grumbled that, he was soothed with “You’ve got this from now on.”

“Keep this up for the second round. Don’t get too worked up about it and just have fun with everyone.”

He thought he was in good form and stood out quite a bit, but he guessed that Haijima’s skill was so outstanding that his own level wasn’t enough to leave an impression. He couldn’t believe that he was getting noticed by the volleyball team advisors from other schools, who was probably much more discerning than their own advisor.

“We’re gonna win”—Haijima was extremely confident, but at the same time, he was a realist. He never gave lenient assessments to himself or others, and he wasn’t the type of guy who would say soft and easy effort goals like “It would be nice if we could win.” He said that back then because he had a serious expectation that was possible.

He had a feeling now that it really might not be a dream if Haijima was there.

If they won four times, they won the championship. They had already cleared one match. Three more to go.

We can…reach it…?

I want to win, he thought. I want to win next time too. And after that. And then if we win after that—. When he heard it in June, he felt a lot of bewilderment, but now for the first time, he definitely wanted to win. His heart began to beat fast.

***

Right when they entered the venue since the time for the second round’s official practice was approaching, cheers similar to an angry roar rose up, and the entire team leaned back in the same direction despite themselves.

A horizontal banner—which wasn’t there in the first round—with the words “Monshiro Middle School Boys’ Volleyball Team” written with excessively good handwriting was hanging from the second-row bleachers. And next to that, there was a square flag with “Spread your wings! Kuroba UNIVERSE!”

His face turned hot.

“Wow. Yuni’s cheering squad is amazing.”

“It’s like we’re at Koshien.”

His teammates were more taken aback and put off rather than being jealous. Their parents formed a small cheering squad for the first round, but it was just a modest thing where they cheered for their children on the spot, with no bells and whistles or anything else. The huge cheering party that newly appeared completely swallowed that up, sounding their megaphones loudly and as for his relatives, they were shouting in voices that couldn’t be called refined.

“…That’s Grandpa’s writing.”

On a pure-white cloth, the words “Monshiro Middle School Boys’ Volleyball Team” were written in bold, stirring letters like a rampaging dragon in all black ink. Come to think of it, when he went out this morning, his mother was in a hurry making phone calls to here and there. It would have been better if his family had just come here modestly instead of taking the time to organize something like that and be late for the first round.

The other one, “Spread your wings! Kuroba UNIVERSE!”, had a black background and decorated with sparkly gold tinsel, and it was a lot more lowbrow than his grandfather’s single brush stroke. Right above where that deathly embarrassing flag—which he thought of as more like harassment—was hanging, he saw Itoko shouting into a huge megaphone. …If she had the time to prepare that, she could have come for the first round. You should have seen that really nice back-row attack in the first round.

Yorimichi…didn’t seem to have come. He couldn’t spot him as far as he could see. He was sure he would have heard that there was a game today through Itoko.

“Oh, Haijima, your grandma came. I wonder if my mom also invited her.”

He tugged on Haijima’s uniform and whispered that into his ear. “Huh…” Haijima didn’t look all that happy as he looked up at the stands, straining his eyes as a wrinkle formed between his brows.

“Can’t see her.”

“Right there. She’s above ‘team.’”

“Even with contacts, my eyes aren’t as good as yours. It’s fine.”

He immediately gave up and returned his eyes to the court.

“Concentrate, Kuroba.”

He said in a low tone. He can see Haijima’s consciousness narrowing and condensing. As though saying that the world he needed only existed inside that nine-by-eighteen-meter court, he raised his awareness by shutting out outside gazes and cheers. He could feel that the power of his concentration that made his skin tingle just by being next to him.

“Y-Yeah. Got it.”

Kuroba responded vigorously with all his might, but even if he took his eyes off the stands, he couldn’t get rid of the feeling of being surrounded his relatives’ faces, faces, faces from 360 degrees.

The rotation started with Haijima on the right back as the server and Kuroba “diagonal” to him on the left front. The rotation was made so that Haijima, who was strong at serving, got to serve as much as possible, and either one of the tall Kuroba and Haijima was always in the front row. There were six people, so there were three pairs of players connected by diagonal lines, and one’s partner was called one’s “diagonal.” The diagonal relationship was always maintained even when the rotation moved. However, when he became absentminded, he sometimes lost track of his current position, which was quite confusing.

Back-row players weren’t allowed to jump up to block, and they could only spike by doing a back-row attack from behind the attack line (the line three meters from the net).

As though saying that victory went to the one who made the first move, Haijima smashed in a jump serve with all his might from the very beginning. A jump serve was hit with a lot of force, and consequently had a high risk of error. In practice games, Haijima used a low-risk jump float serve, but right when he wondered what he was going to do in the official match today, he was actively using a jump serve.

Regrettably, it went behind the end line and was out, giving their opponent their first point, but the air in the opposing court was frozen for a moment.

“Don’t worry about it!”

His teammates called out to him, but Haijima didn’t seem to care about the mistake in the first place and unashamedly responded lightly with one hand, staring over the net with a brazen expression as though that was his substitute for a greeting. Even though it didn’t result in a point, he had successfully planted the seed of fear in them that made them think, “What would happen if that had gone in?”—Their amount of experience was different by one or two orders of magnitude. And more than anything, the fearsomeness of Haijima was that he had such nerves of steel.

Haijima was making the game in a literal sense. As a setter, he didn’t just set up his teammates’ offensive, but also controlled the mood in the opponent’s court. He of course knew that the difference between their amounts of experience couldn’t be filled in overnight, but he felt strangely impatient.

He felt like it took an awfully long time for his own first serve order to come around. He impatiently waited for the rotation to move, and when he went down into the service zone and was about to receive the ball,

“…ba! Kuroba!”

Haijima’s voice burst into his ear, and he jumped. He was so out of it that he didn’t hear him, as though there was a membrane around his head. He looked and saw Haijima pointing to the right position of the front row with an unusually anxious look on his face.

The color drained out of his face. The rotation was wrong. He was in the front row for one more time. Nagato, who was in the original service order, was standing confused in a halfway place.

“S-sorry.”

“No, it’s my fault too. I thought I got it wrong when Yuni moved back…”

He talked to Nagato and hurried back to his defensive position. Haijima was about to go to him to say something, but the whistle prompting Nagato to serve sounded. The cheering squad was noisy in the stands, probably because they didn’t understand why the server was suddenly changed.

Something’s wrong…I can hear the voices from the stands well, but the voices on the court are distant. He almost felt like he was standing in the bleachers right now, not on the court.

He felt the rotation was moving quickly, contrary to earlier. His sense of time wasn’t stable. The wrong service order came around this time, and he ran to the serve zone and received the ball. He stood facing the net and took a deep breath to try to calm down, but couldn’t breathe in deeply.

Haijima’s first jump serve suddenly replayed in his mind. Kuroba also practiced the jump serve. He was getting able to hit the ball squarely more and more, and practice could be exhilarating sometimes. It would no doubt feel good to carry out that kind of thing successfully in a game. He would be able to show the cheering squad his good points, but of course his accuracy was not yet usable, so he made sure to do a jump float serve as usual…

Huh? Which foot do I usually step forward with? What’s the timing for the toss? What’s ‘usual’?

His usual way of doing things had completely slipped out of his mind.

Beep—.

The whistle sounded.

He didn’t immediately understand what the signal meant. Something was wrong. His own court was in a panic. After the referee showed the opposing team’s score, he made an “8” sign with his fingers.

An eight second violation!?

The spectators were buzzing once again about the point loss that was difficult to understand to the layman’s eye. If you didn’t serve within eight seconds after the whistle sounded, your opponent scored. It wasn’t like he didn’t hear the first whistle. And yet, he himself had absolutely no idea why he made such a basic mistake.

Haijima made a hand gesture towards the bench, and the advisor, who received it, hurriedly requested a timeout.

⋆﹥━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━﹤⋆

“You’re nervous, aren’t you.”

Haijima poked him above his heart with his fist. He didn’t seem angry, but he was definitely fed up. A series of careless mistakes that had nothing to do with the play itself.

“Do you have stage fright or something?”

“Ugh… I’ve never really been in a situation where I’ve gotten stage fright, so I don’t know.”

Was he nervous? He was aware that he was overly concerned with unnecessary things. During the first round, he was able to see the court so well and concentrate on his own task. He knew what he should do without thinking about it and his body moved. It was as if he was being made use of by being incorporated as a part of the organic matter that was the game Haijima finished weaving. He wasn’t displeased with that at all; rather, he felt euphoric. And yet, after they entered the second round, that feeling suddenly stopped, his field of vision abruptly narrowed, and only the voices in his mind increased.

Haijima sighed at him.

“Write down ‘people’ and swallow it.” (2)

“Can’t, can’t you give better advice?”

“I’ve never been nervous. I could tell you all about play, though.”

He felt like he was being shown the disparity between them again. “Can’t be helped, Yuni. If that many of my relatives came, I’d get nervous too. Don’t worry about mistakes.” Though everyone else encouraged him, the sigh Haijima alone had given him weighed heavily on him.

The thirty second timeout went by in the blink of an eye. In the end, he noisily dashed back to the court without putting his feelings in order.

Anyways, there was nothing to do but to recover from here. Right when he moved back to the rear, he immediately got a gesture for a pipe attack from Haijima. It was a fast back-row attack from the middle using the center’s A-quick as a decoy, which was the source of their points in the first round. The shocked face of the opposing blocker who was drawn in by the decoy and jumped at it when he jumped in from over the center’s head was so satisfying—.

“!?”

This time he kept blocking. The do-or-die expression of the opposing blocker appeared from the other side of the net that was like a towering wall, blocking the course. How—!? The ball crashed straight onto the block and was knocked down onto his own side. While falling on his behind from the excess momentum, words such as “What?” came out of his mouth.

As he let his mind wander for a moment and stared at the opposing court, where there were fervent roars, from beneath the net, his teammate was held out in front of him. After he borrowed that hand and stood up, he reflexively drew back his hand when he saw that it was Haijima.

“Sorry.”

An apology slipped out of his mouth. For what? Getting blocked? Drawing back his hand?

“It’s fine. There was no helping that. They’ve already guessed that you’re the only one who could hit it properly. We should have marked them thoroughly.”

Haijima seemed to have accepted the former’s apology. His eyes never left the opponent’s court, where they were exchanging high-fives and celebrating, and spoke quickly. If the only decent hitter was Kuroba, and he was marked for it…then what were they going to do?

Haijima gave him a sharp side glance. He looked fed up again.

“I told you not to let it show on your face… Shake off the guy blocking you as much as possible. However, don’t think you’re not being marked, stay calm and watch the block. I told you about straight and cross. They’re not at a level where you can’t get rid of them.”

Well, from Haijima’s level, middle school volleyball in a rural prefecture like this would seem like a piece of cake. The prefectural finals in a place like this was probably the same size as a subdivision preliminary in Tokyo. It was no consolation for him, as it only deepened his inferiority complex.

⋆﹥━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━﹤⋆

Haijima scattered his sets to other attackers, but Kuroba always had a block on him whether he hit or not. The opponent seemed to think that as long as Kuroba was suppressed, the rest of the team couldn’t hit too hard, so they could respond with receives. Unfortunately, it was an effective strategy.

Although the team was able to score some modest points with Haijima’s skillful direction, they still were unable to score consecutively due to the lack of a decisive blow. The seesaw game where stress accumulated continued. No, in terms of overall team morale, the flow was completely on the other side. There were more and more situations where the receives were so disordered that even Haijima had trouble covering them, and when he couldn’t get the set, the rest of the team couldn’t do anything.

Far from regaining his composure, Kuroba was experiencing the sensation of gears steadily becoming less and less aligned. Even though his mind was panicking, his body wouldn’t work together with it. It was like his head and body were doing on their own thing on this side and the other side of the court. While his spike success rate had decreased, moreover, at the beginning there were many times where he would slam the ball into a block and get shut-out, and it became noticeable that he was making the mistake of getting it caught in the net himself, let alone hitting the ball into the blocking.

“Just stop looking at the blocks. It’s better not to. Don’t think about avoiding them, just hit it where it’s easy to hit.”

Haijima pulled on his uniform and whispered that, but he was only extra confused by the change in instructions. Didn’t he say “Watch their blocks” earlier?

Did my jump power go down? Aren’t my legs getting tired? The instant he realized that this is what it was to play two games in a day, his body suddenly became heavy. Are my knees okay? Don’t I feel more burdened than usual? He suddenly started to worry about the growing pains that should have been unrelated to this. What if that thing that hurts so much I couldn’t sleep at night hits me during the match? What do I do? What do I do? What do I do——?

Haijima was saying something from his diagonal position to him. But he couldn’t hear his voice. He could probably hear him physically, but his heart was blocking his ears. Listening to Haijima’s just reasonings now was of no use whatsoever.

Do you, who's completely disconnected from nervousness or agitation, have the words that I want, the words that will help me? I don’t think so.

He didn’t remember at what point—Haijima turned away with a look of resignation on his face. Ah, if Haijima has given up, then this was already a complete loss, he thought.

For some reason, only a small click of his tongue and the word “useless” reached his ears without being cut off.

***

“Get in line, Yuni.”

It was only when Nagato called out to him that he realized that the game was over. A smattering of applause came down from the stands. When he absentmindedly looked at the score board that was still standing on the court, he saw that the set count was 2-0, and the winner—Monshiro Middle School.

…Wait, what? Did something…happen…? I have almost no memory of touching the ball…

Even when he looked over the faces of his teammates standing in a line along the end line, he didn’t actually feel like they had won at all. Were these really the faces of a winning team? The atmosphere was not as merry as it had been when they won the first round, and everyone looked somewhat apathetic and subdued. And maybe it was just his imagination, but the applause from the stands seemed like it was just done out of politeness.

When he was about to line up next to Haijima, who was standing there with his expression erased, he recalled it along with the flashbacks of some scenes—it was all Haijima's doing.

Haijima’s play changed after that tongue click and badmouthing.

The jump serve was of course incredible, but Haijima’s original domain was at the net. At the net, the control of the ball was not passed over to anyone—neither opponents nor even his own teammates. Rather than entrusting the set to the attacker, the cases where he hit the ball by himself by performing dumps increased dramatically. A dump was a surprise attack where the setter pretended to set the ball and returned it to the opponent’s court with their left hand, but the power of the dump released from the left hand of the ambidextrous Haijima was not confined to the level of a surprise attack. He smashed it into the opposing court with the same power as an attacker spiking with all of their strength. It should have temporarily made the opponents agitated and close the score gap considerably.

However, it was from there that Haijima showed his demon-like true power. When the opponent marked his dumps and started to block it, he switched from hitting hard to deliberately hitting the ball lightly at the head of the block where they jumped with power in preparation for a strong hit to make it drop to his own side. He pulled off the feat of getting down low to pick up the rebound that gently dropped down without a moment’s delay and swinging it to a nearby teammate with an underhand pass and the instructions “Give it to me!” This time, he used his right hand to smash the ball that was set to him by his panicking teammate into the opponent’s side.

The venue was stunned by the powerful spike that was on par with an attacker’s, or even stronger than an average attacker’s (3), and even the referee’s whistle was a beat late.

How was he able to do that…? It was technical, but more than that, what kind of nerves did he had that enabled him to play in a way that overturned the foundation of team sports like that in front of people?

To be honest, Haijima, you’re…disgusting.

When he heard “Thank you,” he hurriedly matched them in a small voice and bowed. For an instant, he felt as if the shadow of Haijima standing next to him broke out of its human shell and swelled up into a warped shape, and a shiver ran down his spine.

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#2.43: Seiin Koukou Danshi Volley-bu #2.43 translation #2.43 book 1

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rukia-writes · 3 years

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Yes, God? Hurry up to July 26th so I can see the Vinland Saga announcement already.

#like just go on an announce it #then July 26th release the trailer #Vinland saga

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inactive-dangan-fandom-calendar · 4 years

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July Masterpost

Hey everybody, thanks for waiting!

Gift Exchanges: @komahinasecretexchange is taking signup’s until July 5th so hurry over and sign up if you’re interested!

Zines: @oumota-zine now has an interest check! A mastermind AU themed zine has an interest check! You can get the link via their carrd, along with an FAQ and links to their twitter and instagram.

Week Events: - @perfect-ishimondo-boys is running Ishimaru x Mondo Week from July 6th to the 12th! - @kaemakiweek2020 begins on July 8th, and is a week devoted to Kaede x Maki! - @kirumakiweek hosts Kirumi x Maki week which goes from July 20-26 ! - @mahiyokoweek (Mahiru x Hiyoko) begins on July 26th, and runs into August! - @saiouma-events is running a Shuuichi x Kokichi Week, which starts July 30th, and also runs into August!

Birthdays: July 1st: Ryouma Hoshi July 5th: Hagakure Hiroko July 7th: Maizono Sayaka July 15th: Owari Akane July 25th: Hagakure Yasuhiro July 31st: Shinguji Korekiyo With so much going on this month, I’d like to give you guys two reminders! 1: Events are for fun and there's bound to be overlap! Let’s not get attack each other because of that, and instead be excited for the opportunity to create more content for the things we love! 2: Remember to take time for yourself and not overwhelm yourself by trying to do too much at once! Take breaks and remember to have fun!

Thank you all so much, have a great month!! (^u^)/!!

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duggardata · 4 years

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Apparently, Jinger Suffered A Miscarriage in November

Everything Duggar Data Knows About It, So Far.

ICYMI—Jinger is pregnant, due in November 2020! She announced via People yesterday. Sad news came alongside happy, though... People also shared that Jinger experienced a miscarriage prior to her current pregnancy.

Pregnancy loss now factors into the Predictor, so Duggar Data is trying to figure out as much information as possible about when the miscarriage occurred, and at how far along. This Post summarizes what I’ve been able to piece together.

Since some may not want to read on... After the jump.

Fair Warning—This Post is absurdly long. There’s a TL;DR at the end, if you’re in a hurry!

When Did Jinger Miscarry?

Per Jinger and Jeremy, it happened in November 2019. (Initially, People simply said it happened “last fall,” which ostensibly includes September to November. Then, the Vuolos posted on Instagram about the loss, revealing it had occurred in November, specifically.) Jinger further shared that it happened on a Tuesday; she said she and Jeremy shared the news with family on “Monday evening,” but miscarried “the next morning.” [Jeremy’s IG Post, Jinger’s IG Post. Permalinks provided in the text above.]

So, a Tuesday in November 2019... We’ve already narrowed it down a lot. The possibilities include only these dates—

Tuesday, November 5, 2019

Tuesday, November 12, 2019

Tuesday, November 19, 2019

Tuesday, November 26, 2019

Since yesterday, we’ve also been provided two additional data sources, both of which provide further insight into the timing of the miscarriage—

The Counting On Trailer. TLC announced the new season alongside Jinger + Jeremy’s pregnancy announcement, and dropped the first trailer. At 0:30–0:46, the trailer features Jinger + Jeremy announcing a pregnancy to Jinger’s family... The Duggars are gathered at the Big House for “their family fun night,” which is held weekly on Mondays. The night’s activity was gingerbread house–building. Skyping in from California, Jinger + Jeremy build a gingerbread version of their family, complete a clearly–pregnant ginger Jinger.

Some have assumed that the ‘Jingerbread’ Announcement was for the Vuolos’ current pregnancy, but it’s clear to me that it wasn’t. The timing doesn’t make sense. Jinger is due with Vuolo #2* in November 2020, and she wouldn’t have learned she was pregnant until ~March 2020. Given gingerbread’s association with fall and the holidays, Duggar Data really doubts that the Duggars decided to do a gingerbread–themed family night in March or April. Additionally, social distancing due to COVID–19 was well underway by March / April 2020, yet the clip shows a large gathering of not–same–household Duggars. Notably, Jessa + Ben appear in the clip, and they’ve stated that they’re staying away from the Big House during this time. Taken together, all of this all suggests that the clip wasn’t recorded in March or April 2020—and thus, can’t be an announcement of Jinger’s current pregnancy. This must be Jinger + Jeremy announcing their pregnancy that ended in miscarriage in November.

Immediately, I hoped that I could figure out the timing based on which Duggar Ladies were visibly pregnant or which Duggar Babies appeared. Babygeddon was in full force, after all! Sadly, this didn’t narrow things down much... Joe + Kendra were present with Addison (b. 11–2–19), but that doesn’t rule anything out; the earliest Monday in November 2019 was November 4th. (I’d admit it’s slightly unlikely that Kendra made it to Family Night two day after giving birth, but I don’t think it’s impossible... They live on the Compound.) Neither Anna nor Lauren, nor Maryella or Bella, is seen. Josiah appears, but it that doesn’t tell us much, since Lauren wasn’t in labor on a Monday. (Bella was born on a Friday after ~2 Days of labor.)

Undeterred, I scoured Duggar Instagrams to see if I could figure out what they did and who attended each Family Night in November 2019. I also looked for any photos in which a Duggar is wearing the same outfit that’s seen in the clip of the ‘Jingerbread’ Announcement...

Based on this sleuthing, I think we can rule out November 4, 2019. Per Anna, that Family Night was spent stuffing gift boxes for Operation Christmas Child. Her Post shows dozens of bright red boxes all over the Big House. No boxes are seen in the ‘Jingerbread’ Announcement clip, but they probably would’ve been if they were there. (The gingerbread house building activity appeared to take up the entire living room.) Plus, I think it’s unlikely that they’d do two big activities in one night.

I wasn’t able to figure out the activities at the other Family Nights that month.

I checked Instagram to see if any Duggar visible in the clip was, e.g., out–of–town, and thus wouldn’t have been present at a particular Family Night. This search didn’t produce any evidence sufficient to rule anything out.

As for the outfit search, it also didn’t produce many leads... Only one. Jessa posted a photo on Instagram on Monday, November 25, 2019, in which she’s possibly wearing the same long–sleeve emerald shirt that she’s seen in in the clip. So, that points slightly towards November 25, 2019 as the date Jinger + Jeremy announced, and November 26, 2019 as the Date of Loss.

The Vuolos’ Instagram Live. On May 28, 2020 at 4:00 PM, Jinger + Jeremy did an Instagram Live discussing the pregnancy and earlier miscarriage. The Live gave us various information, but one fact is of particular relevance, here: Per the Vuolos, Jeremy’s Sister (Valerie) visited them very shortly after Jinger miscarried. Apparently, her trip was pre–planned, and it just worked out that she was there during a time when they happened to really need help.

Turns out, Valerie Vuolo has a public Instagram—and lucky for us, she posted about the trip in question. On November 30, 2019, she put up three Posts w/ photos of her, Felicity, and Jeremy, each one tagged Los Angeles, California. Even more telling, the first Post included #Thanksgiving, which pretty much confirms that Valerie was visiting for the holiday, which was November 28th in 2019. Bolstering this further, Valerie actually posted the photos on November 30th, and Jinger commented: “We miss you already!” So... Clearly, Valerie is no longer in Los Angeles, at that point.

Based on all of this, I’ve got a very strong suspicion that Jinger miscarried Tuesday, November 26, 2019—i.e., the Tuesday before Thanksgiving—which means she announced the pregnancy to the Duggars on November 25, 2019. This is mostly based on the apparent timing of Valerie’s trip, but also happens to line up with Jessa’s November 25 IG Post, in which she’s possibly wearing the same shirt she wore for the ‘Jingerbread’ Announcement. Also, Tuesday, November 26, 2019 happens to be a day where neither Vuolo posted on IG... Could be a coincidence, though; they didn’t post on Tuesday, November 12th, either.

Duggar Data plans to use November 26, 2019 as Jinger’s Loss Date, for now. It’s considered “Not Confirmed.” I think we can rule out November 4th as the announcement date—so if the Loss Date isn’t the 26th, it must be the 12th or 19th.

Was This Her First Miscarriage?

During the Instagram Live on May 28, 2020, Jinger + Jeremy said “thank you” to their followers for all the support they’d received after announcing Jinger’s miscarriage. Then, they said something about how miscarriage is something that many couples go through, and Jeremy said: “We’ve now gone through that.” Duggar Data took this to mean that Jinger’s recent miscarriage wasn’t something they’d gone through before, which obviously means that this must have been Jinger’s first—and, so far, only—miscarriage.

IMO, it is reasonable to conclude that this was Jinger’s first miscarriage.

How Far Along Was She, At The Time?

So far, there’s no definitive data on this; however, it’s clear that it was early on. On Instagram Live, the Vuolos—Jinger, IIRC—referred to the baby they lost as one “that the Lord blessed us with for such a short time.” Additionally, there isn’t any reason to assume that Jinger + Jeremy waited until, e.g., the Second Trimester to announce to her family. (And we know the loss happened the day after she announced to them.) With Pregnancy #1, Jinger + Jer announced to their families in November 2017, when Jinger was <6 Weeks Along. (Felicity’s Due Date was July 20, 2018.) [Shout–out to @undercoverduggarblog, as well as @pickledchickenetti, for your valiant efforts in piecing together the real–life timeline of Counting On.)

Absent contrary evidence, Duggar Data will assume a miscarriage occurred at Exactly 6 Weeks. Statistically, 90% of miscarriages occur by Week 6, and the lack of concrete loss dates for several miscarriages forced me to create a rule to ensure uniformity in considering pregnancy loss data.

Impact On The Data

I’ll discuss this in an upcoming Post! Stay tuned.

TL;DR—

Loss Date A Tuesday in November 2019... Probably November 26th. Duggar Data’s spreadsheet says November 26, 2019, but doesn’t label that as “Confirmed.” That’s what I’m using, for now.

Due Date Unknown. Consistent with a uniform rule, Duggar Data will assume the loss occurred at Week 6, Day 0... The Estimated Due Date associated with November 26, 2019 is July 21, 2020. That’s what I will use, for now.

1st Loss? Seems like it was, yes.

#pregnancy loss #miscarriage #jinger and jeremy

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blackkudos · 4 years

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Diana Ross

Diana Ross (born March 26, 1944) is an American singer, actress, and record producer. Born and raised in Detroit, Michigan, Ross rose to fame as the lead singer of the vocal group The Supremes, who during the 1960s became Motown's most successful act, and are the best-charting female group in US history, as well as one of the world's best-selling girl groups of all time. The group released a record-setting twelve number one hit singles on the US Billboard Hot 100, including "Where Did Our Love Go", "Baby Love", "Come See About Me", "Stop! In the Name of Love", "You Can't Hurry Love", "You Keep Me Hangin' On", "Love Child", and "Someday We'll Be Together".

Following her departure from the Supremes in 1970, Ross released her eponymous debut solo album that same year, featuring the No. 1 Pop hit "Ain't No Mountain High Enough". She later released the album Touch Me in the Morning in 1973; its title track was her second solo No. 1 hit. She continued a successful solo career through the 1970s, which included hit albums like Mahogany and Diana Ross and their No. 1 hit singles, "Theme from Mahogany" and "Love Hangover", respectively. Her 1980 album Diana produced another No. 1 single, "Upside Down", as well as the international hit "I'm Coming Out". Her final single with Motown during her initial run with the company achieved her sixth and final US number one Pop hit, the duet "Endless Love" featuring Lionel Richie, whose solo career was launched with its success.

Ross has also ventured into acting, with a Golden Globe Award-winning and Academy Award–nominated performance in the film Lady Sings the Blues (1972); she recorded its soundtrack, which became a number one hit. She also starred in two other feature films, Mahogany (1975) and The Wiz (1978), later acting in the television films Out of Darkness (1994), for which she also was nominated for a Golden Globe Award, and Double Platinum (1999).

She is the only female artist to have number one singles as a solo artist; as the other half of a duet (Lionel Richie); as a member of a trio; and as an ensemble member (We are the World-USA for Africa). In 1976, Ross was named the "Female Entertainer of the Century" by Billboard magazine. In 1993, the Guinness Book of World Records declared her the most successful female music artist in history, due to her success in the United States and United Kingdom for having more hits than any female artist in the charts, with a career total of 70 hit singles with her work with the Supremes and as a solo artist. She had a top 10 UK hit in every one of the last five decades, and sang lead on a top 75 hit single at least once every year from 1964 to 1996 in the UK, a period of 33 consecutive years and a record for any performer.

In 1988, Ross was inducted to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Supremes, alongside Mary Wilson and Florence Ballard. She was the recipient of the Kennedy Center Honors in 2007, the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2012, and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2016. Ross is also one of the few recording artists to have two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame—one as a solo artist and the other as a member of the Supremes. In Billboard magazine's Greatest of All Time Hot 100 Artists chart, she ranked 16th as the lead singer of the Supremes and 26th as a solo artist. Diana Ross ranks among the Top 5 artists of the rock era (1955 to date) on the Billboard Hot 100 when combining her solo and Supremes' hits.

Early life

Diana Ross was born in Detroit, Michigan on March 26, 1944. She was the second-eldest child of Ernestine (née Moten; January 27, 1916 – October 9, 1984) and Fred Ross, Sr. (July 4, 1920 – November 21, 2007). Ross's elder sister is American physician Barbara Ross-Lee.

According to Ross, her mother actually named her "Diane", but, a clerical error resulted in her name being recorded as "Diana" on her birth certificate. She was listed as "Diane" during the first Supremes records, and she introduced herself as "Diane" until early in the group's heyday. Her friends and family still call her "Diane".

Ross's grandfather John E. Ross, a native of Gloucester County, Virginia, was born to Washington Ross and Virginia Baytop. Virginia Baytop's mother Francis "Frankey" Baytop was a former slave who had become a midwife after the Civil War.

Ross and her family originally lived on Belmont Road in the North End section of Detroit, near Highland Park, Michigan, where her neighbor was Smokey Robinson. When Ross was seven, her mother contracted tuberculosis, causing her to become seriously ill. Ross's father moved with his children to live with relatives in Bessemer, Alabama. After her mother recovered, her family moved back to Detroit.

On her 14th birthday in 1958, her family relocated to the working-class Brewster-Douglass Housing Projects settling at St. Antoine Street. Attending Cass Technical High School, a four-year college and preparatory magnet school, in downtown Detroit, Ross began taking classes including clothing design, millinery, pattern making, and tailoring, as she had aspired to become a fashion designer. She also took modeling and cosmetology classes at the school and participated in three or four other extracurricular activities while being there.

Ross also worked at Hudson's Department Store where it has been claimed in biographies, she was the first black employee "allowed outside the kitchen". For extra income, she provided hairdressing services for her neighbors. Ross graduated from Cass Tech in January 1962.

Career

The Supremes: 1959–1970

At fifteen, Ross joined the Primettes, a sister group of a male vocal group called the Primes, after being brought to the attention of music manager Milton Jenkins by Primes member Paul Williams. Along with Ross, the other members included Florence Ballard, the first group member hired by Jenkins, Mary Wilson, and Betty McGlown. Following a talent competition win in Windsor, Ontario, in 1960, the Primettes were invited to audition for Motown records.

Later, following local success via live performances at sock hops, etc., Ross approached former neighbor (and rumored childhood former boyfriend), William "Smokey" Robinson, who insisted that the group audition for him first. Robinson agreed to bring the Primettes to Motown, in exchange for letting him and the Miracles hire the Primettes' guitarist, Marv Tarplin, for an upcoming tour. Tarplin played in Robinson's band(s) for the next 30-plus years.

In her autobiography, "Secrets of a Sparrow", Ross wrote that she felt that deal was "a fair trade". The Primettes later auditioned for Motown Records, before various Motown executives. In Berry Gordy's autobiography, To Be Loved, Gordy recalled he was heading to a business meeting when he heard Ross singing "There Goes My Baby" and Ross's voice "stopped me in my tracks". He approached the group and asked them to perform it again but, learning of their ages, Gordy advised them to come back after graduating from high school.

Undeterred, the group went to Motown's Hitsville U.S.A. headquarters regularly, offering to provide extra help for Motown's recordings, often including hand claps and background vocals. That year, the group recorded two tracks for Lu Pine Records, with Ross singing lead on one of the tracks. During the group's early years, Ross served as hair stylist, make-up artist, seamstress, and costume designer. In late 1960, having replaced McGlown with Barbara Martin, the Primettes were allowed to record their own songs at Hitsville's studio, many written by "Smokey" Robinson, who, by then, was vice president of Motown ("Your Heart Belongs to Me" and "A Breathtaking Guy"). Gordy, too, composed songs for the trio, including "Buttered Popcorn" (featuring Ballard on lead) and "Let Me Go the Right Way". While these songs were regional hits, they were not nationwide successes.

In January 1961, Gordy agreed to sign the group on the condition they change their name. Eventually, Janie Bradford approached Florence Ballard, the only group member at the studio at the time, to pick out a new name for the group. Ballard chose "Supremes", reportedly, because it was the only name on the list that did not end with "ette". Upon hearing the new name, the other members weren't impressed, with Ross telling Ballard she feared the group would be mistaken for a male vocal group (a male vocal group was, indeed, named the Supremes). Gordy signed the group under their name on January 15, 1961.

A year later, Barbara Martin left the group, reducing the quartet to a trio. In late 1963, the group had their first hit with "When the Lovelight Starts Shining Through His Eyes", peaking at number 23 on the Billboard Hot 100 pop chart. At the end of the year, Gordy assigned Ross as the group's lead singer, even though Ballard was usually the lead vocalist.

The group scored their first number-one hit with "Where Did Our Love Go", paving the way for unprecedented success: between August 1964 and May 1967, Ross, Wilson, and Ballard sang on ten number-one hit singles, all of which also made the UK top 40. The group had also become a hit with audiences both domestically and abroad, going on to become Motown's most successful vocal act throughout the sixties. Following significant issues with her comportment, weight, and alcoholism, Florence Ballard was fired from the Supremes by Gordy in July 1967, hiring Cindy Birdsong from Patti LaBelle and the Blue-Bells as Ballard's replacement.

Gordy renamed the group Diana Ross & the Supremes, making it easier to charge a larger performance fee for a solo star and a backing group, as it did for other renamed Motown groups. Gordy initially considered Ross leaving the Supremes for a solo career in 1966 but changed his mind because the group's success was still too significant for Ross to pursue solo obligations. Ross remained with the Supremes until early 1970.

The group appeared as a trio of singing nuns in a 1968 episode of the popular NBC TV series Tarzan. Between their early 1968 single "Forever Came Today" and their final single with Ross, "Someday We'll Be Together", Ross would be the only Supremes member to be featured on many of their recordings, often accompanied by session singers the Andantes or, as in the case of "Someday, We'll Be Together", Julia and Maxine Waters and Johnny Bristol. Still, Wilson and Birdsong continued to sing on recordings.

Gordy, drove Ross diligently throughout this period and Ross, due to anxiety arising from Gordy's demands of her, began suffering from anorexia nervosa, according to her autobiography, Secrets of a Sparrow. During a 1967 performance in Boston, Massachusetts, Ross collapsed onstage, and had to be hospitalized for exhaustion.

In 1968, Ross began to perform as a solo artist on television specials, including the Supremes' own specials such as TCB and G.I.T. on Broadway, The Dinah Shore Show, and a Bob Hope special, among others. In mid-1969, Gordy decided that Ross would depart the group by the end of that year, and Ross began recording her initial solo work that July. One of the first plans for Ross to establish her own solo career was to publicly introduce a new Motown recording act.

Though she herself did not claim their discovery, Motown's publicity department credited Ross with having discovered the Jackson 5. Ross would introduce the group during several public events, including The Hollywood Palace. In November, Ross confirmed a split from the Supremes in Billboard. Ross' presumed first solo recording, "Someday We'll Be Together", was eventually released as a Supremes recording and became the group's final number-one hit on the Hot 100. It was also the final number-one Billboard Hot 100 single of the 1960s. Ross made her final appearance with the Supremes at the Frontier Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada on January 14, 1970.

Solo career,Touch Me in the Morning, Duets album, Lady Sings the Blues soundtrack and diana: 1970–1981

In May 1970, Ross released her eponymous solo debut, which included her signature songs, "Reach Out and Touch (Somebody's Hand)" and "Ain't No Mountain High Enough", the latter becoming Ross' first number-one solo single. Follow-up albums, Everything Is Everything and Surrender came out shortly afterwards. In 1971, the ballad "I'm Still Waiting" became her first number-one single in the UK. Later in 1971, Ross starred in her first solo television special, Diana!, which included the Jackson 5.

In 1972, the soundtrack to her film debut, Lady Sings the Blues, reached number one on the Billboard 200, selling two million units. In 1973, Ross had her second number-one hit with the ballad "Touch Me in the Morning". Later in the year, Motown issued Diana & Marvin, a duet album with fellow Motown artist Marvin Gaye. The album became an international hit. Touring throughout 1973, Ross became the first entertainer in Japan's history to receive an invitation to the Imperial Palace for a private audience with the Empress Nagako, wife of Emperor Hirohito.

In April 1974, Ross became the first African-American woman to co-host the 46th Academy Awards, with John Huston, Burt Reynolds, and David Niven.

After the release of a modestly successful LP, Last Time I Saw Him, Ross had a third number-one hit with "Theme from Mahogany (Do You Know Where You're Going To)", from her second feature film, Mahogany. A year later, in 1976, Ross released her fourth solo number-one hit, "Love Hangover", a sensual, dramatic mid-tempo song that bursts into an uptempo disco tune. Later that year, Ross launched her "An Evening with Diana Ross" tour. The tour's success led to a two-week stint at Broadway's Palace Theatre and a 90-minute, Emmy-nominated television special of the same name, featuring special make-up effects by Stan Winston, for a scene in which Ross portrayed legendary cabaret artist Josephine Baker and blues singers Bessie Smith and Ethel Waters, and a Special Tony Award.

The albums Baby It's Me and Ross sold modestly. In 1979, Ross released The Boss, continuing her popularity with dance audiences, as the title song became a number-one dance single. On July 16, 1979, Ross guest-hosted an episode of Johnny Carson's The Tonight Show, featuring Lynda Carter, George Carlin, and Muhammad Ali as guests. Later that year, Ross hosted the HBO special, Standing Room Only, filmed at Caesar's Palace's Circus Maximus Theater in Las Vegas, Nevada, during her "Tour '79" concert tour. This concert special is noted for its opening, during which Ross literally makes her entrance through a movie screen. In November of that year, Ross performed The Boss album's title track as a featured artist during the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, in New York City.

In 1980, Ross released her most successful album to date, Diana. Composed by Chic's Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards, the album included the hits "I'm Coming Out" and "Upside Down", the latter becoming her fifth chart-topping single. Prior to leaving Motown, Ross recorded the duet ballad "Endless Love", with Lionel Richie. The song would become her sixth and final single to reach number one on the Billboard Hot 100.

Ross began negotiations to leave Motown at the end of 1980. After over 20 years with the label, Ross received US$250,000 as severance. RCA Records offered Ross a $20 million, seven-year recording contract, which gave her complete production control of her albums. Allegedly, before signing onto the label, Ross asked Berry Gordy if he could match RCA's offer. Gordy stated that doing so was "impossible". Ross then signed with RCA on May 20, 1981. At the time, Ross's was music history's most expensive recording deal.

Film career: 1972–1999

In 1971, Diana Ross began working on her first film, Lady Sings the Blues, which was a loosely based biography on singer Billie Holiday. Despite some criticism of her for taking the role, once the film opened in October 1972, Ross won critical acclaim for her performance in the film. Jazz critic Leonard Feather, a friend of Holiday's, praised Ross for "expertly capturing the essence of Lady Day". Ross's role in the film won her Golden Globe Award and Academy Award nominations for Best Actress. The soundtrack to Lady Sings the Blues became just as successful, reaching No. 1 on the Billboard 200 staying there for two weeks.

Ross's second film, Mahogany, was released in 1975. The film reunited her with Billy Dee Williams, her co-star in Lady Sings the Blues and featured costumes designed by Ross herself. The story of an aspiring fashion designer who becomes a runway model and the toast of the industry, Mahogany was a troubled production from its inception. The film's original director, Tony Richardson, was fired during production, and Berry Gordy assumed the director's chair himself.

In addition, Gordy and Ross clashed during filming, with Ross leaving the production before shooting was completed, forcing Gordy to use secretary Edna Anderson as a body double for Ross. While a box-office success, the film was not well received by the critics: Time magazine's review of the film chastised Gordy for "squandering one of America's most natural resources: Diana Ross."

In 1977, Motown acquired the film rights to the Broadway play The Wiz, an African-American reinterpretation of L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. The film initially was to include the stage actors who had performed on the play, but, producer Rob Cohen could not garner the interest of any major Hollywood film studios. It was not until Ross convinced Cohen to cast her, (instead of Stephanie Mills, who portrayed Dorothy on Broadway) as Dorothy that Universal Pictures agreed to finance the production. This casting decision led to a change in the film's script, in which Dorothy went from a schoolgirl to a schoolteacher. The role of the Scarecrow, also performed by someone else onstage, was eventually given to Ross's former Motown labelmate, Michael Jackson.

The film adaptation of The Wiz had been a $24 million production, but upon its October 1978 release, it earned only $21,049,053 at the box office. Though pre-release television broadcast rights had been sold to CBS for over $10 million, the film produced a net loss of $10.4 million for Motown and Universal. At the time, it was the most expensive film musical ever made. The film's failure ended Ross's short career on the big screen and contributed to the Hollywood studios' reluctance to produce the all-black film projects which had become popular during the blaxploitation era of the early to mid-1970s for several years. The Wiz was Ross's final film for Motown.

Ross had success with movie-themed songs. The soundtrack for Lady Sings the Blues peaked at number one on Billboard's Pop chart, selling over 300,000 copies in its first eight days of release. While her version of Holiday's "Good Morning Heartache" only performed modestly well in early 1973, her recording of "Theme from Mahogany (Do You Know Where You're Going To)" gave Ross her third number-one hit, in late 1975.

Three years later, Ross and Michael Jackson had a modest dance hit with their recording of "Ease on Down the Road". Their second duet, actually as part of the ensemble of The Wiz, "Brand New Day", found some success overseas. Ross scored a Top 10 hit in late 1980 with the theme song to the 1980 film It's My Turn. The following year, she collaborated with former Commodores singer-songwriter Lionel Richie on the theme song for the film Endless Love. The Academy Award-nominated title single became her final hit on Motown Records and the number-two record of the year.

Several years later, in 1988, Ross recorded the theme song to The Land Before Time. "If We Hold on Together" became an international hit, reaching number one in Japan.

In 1993, Ross returned to acting with a dramatic role in the television film, Out of Darkness. Ross won acclaim for her role in the TV movie and earned her third Golden Globe nomination, although she did not win. In 1999, she and Brandy Norwood co-starred in the television movie, Double Platinum, which was aired prior to the release of Ross's album, Every Day Is a New Day.

Continued solo career and development: 1981–1999

In October 1981, Ross released her first RCA album, Why Do Fools Fall in Love. The album sold over a million copies and featured hit singles such as her remake of the classic hit of the same name and "Mirror Mirror". Shortly thereafter, Ross established her production company, named Anaid Productions ("Diana" spelled backwards), and also began investing in real estate and touring extensively in the United States and abroad.

Before the release of Why Do Fools Fall in Love, Ross hosted her first TV special in four years, Diana. Directed by Steve Binder, the concert portions of the special were filmed at Inglewood, California's 17,500-seat The Forum indoor stadium and featured performances by Michael Jackson, Muhammad Ali, Dallas actor Larry Hagman, music impresario Quincy Jones and members of The Joffrey Ballet.

In early 1982, Ross sang the "Star-Spangled Banner" at Super Bowl XVI and appeared on the dance show Soul Train. The program devoted a full episode to her and Ross performed several songs from the Why Do Fools Fall in Love album.

On May 6, 1982, Ross was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

In 1982, she followed up the success of Why Do Fools Fall in Love with Silk Electric, which featured the Michael Jackson-written and -produced "Muscles", resulting in another top-ten success for Ross. The album eventually went gold on the strength of that song. In 1983, Ross ventured further out of her earlier soul-based sound for a more pop rock-oriented sound following the release of the Ross album. Though the album featured the top 40 hit single, "Pieces of Ice", the Ross album did not generate any more hits or achieve gold status.

On July 21, 1983, Ross performed a free concert on Central Park's Great Lawn, aired live worldwide by Showtime. Proceeds of the concert would be donated to build a playground in the singer's name. Midway through the beginning of the show, a torrential downpour began. Ross tried to continue performing, but, the severe weather required that the show be stopped after 45 minutes. Ross urged the large crowd to exit the venue safely, promising to perform the next day.

The second concert held the very next day was without rain. The funds for the playground were to be derived from sales of various memorabilia. However, they were destroyed by the storm. When the mainstream media discovered the exorbitant costs of the two concerts, Ross faced criticism from New York City's then-mayor Ed Koch and the city's Parks Department commissioner and poor publicity. During a subsequent mayoral press conference, Ross handed Koch a check for US$250,000 for the project. The Diana Ross Playground was built three years later.

In 1984, Ross released Swept Away. The album featured All of You, a duet with friend Julio Iglesias. The single was featured on both Ross' album and Iglesias' 1100 Bel Air Place, his first English-language album. It became an international hit, as did the Lionel Richie-penned ballad "Missing You", composed as a tribute to Marvin Gaye, who had died earlier that year. Swept Away garnered gold record sales status.

Her 1985 album, Eaten Alive, found major success overseas. "Chain Reaction" reached number one on the UK charts as well as in Australia and Ireland and the title track also performed well. Both songs had strong music videos that propelled the tracks to success. The Eaten Alive video was patterned after the 1960s horror film, The Island of Dr. Moreau while the "Chain Reaction" music video saluted the 1960s American Bandstand-style music shows. "Experience", the third international single's video reignited the "Eaten Alive" romantic storyline with Diana and actor Joseph Gian. The track, Eaten Alive, a collaboration with Barry Gibb and Michael Jackson, became a top 20 hit internationally.

The Barry Gibb-produced album garnered an international number one in "Chain Reaction" and a Top 20 selling album. It is believed Michael Finbarr Murphy, a distant cousin of Alan Murphy, guitarist for singer Kate Bush, Level 42 and others, played the guitar parts on "Chain Reaction". Michael was the producer for Unknown Quantity, the backing vocalists featured on the "Chain Reaction" track, are also featured as Ross' backing singers in the track's video. There were four members of Unknown Quantity, however, only 3 were needed for the video.

Earlier in 1985, Ross appeared as part of USA for Africa's '"We Are the World"' charity single, which sold over 20 million copies worldwide. Ross's 1987 follow-up to Eaten Alive, Red Hot Rhythm & Blues (No. 39 Billboard Top R&B Albums chart; No. 12 Sweden), found less success than the prior album. The accompanying acclaimed television special was nominated for three Emmy Awards, winning two (Outstanding Costume Design for a Variety or Music Program - Ray Aghayan and Ret Turner; Outstanding Lighting Direction (Electronic) for a Miniseries or a Special - Greg Brunton).

On January 27, 1986, Ross hosted the 13th annual American Music Awards. Ross returned the next year to host the 14th annual telecast.

In 1988, Ross chose to not renew her RCA contract, and had been in talks with her former mentor Berry Gordy to return to Motown. When she learned of Gordy's plans to sell Motown, Ross tried advising him against the decision though he sold it to MCA Records in 1988. Following the sale of the company, Ross was asked to return to the Motown label with the condition that she have shares in the company as a part-owner. Ross accepted the offer.

Ross' next album, 1989's Workin' Overtime was not a commercial success, despite the title track reaching the top three of the Billboard's Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart. The album peaked at number 34 on the Billboard Hot R&B Albums chart, and achieved top 25 placings in Japan and the UK, attaining a silver certification in the latter country. Subsequent releases, such as The Force Behind the Power (1991), Take Me Higher (1995), and Every Day Is a New Day (1999) produced similar results. Ross's albums achieved more international than domestic success.

In 1991, Ross became one of the few American artists to have headlined the annual Royal Variety Performance, performing a selection of her UK hits before Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh at the Victoria Palace Theatre, London.

"The Force Behind the Power" sparked an international comeback of sorts when the album went double platinum in the UK. led by the No. 2 UK hit single "When You Tell Me That You Love Me". The single's duet version with Irish group, Westlife, also hit No. 2 in the UK in 2005. The album performed well across Europe and into Japan as "The Force Behind the Power" achieved Gold record status in the nation. The album produced an astounding 9 singles across international territories, including another Top 10 hit, "One Shining Moment".

In 1994, One Woman: The Ultimate Collection, a career retrospective compilation, became a number one hit in the UK, selling quadruple platinum, and selling well across Europe and in the English-speaking world. The retrospective was EMI's alternative to Motown's box set Forever Diana: Musical Memoirs.

Ross performed during the Opening Ceremony of the 1994 FIFA World Cup held in Chicago, where she infamously missed a penalty kick that was part of her act, and during the pre-match entertainment of the 1995 Rugby League World Cup final at Wembley Stadium.

On January 28, 1996, Ross performed the halftime show at Super Bowl XXX. Earlier that month, Ross' Tokyo concert, "Diana Ross: Live In Japan" filmed live at the city's Nippon Bodukan Stadium, was released.

In May, 1996, Ross received the World Music Awards' Lifelong Contribution to the Music Industry Award.

On November 29, 1996, EMI released the compilation album, Voice of Love, featuring the singles "In the Ones You Love", "You Are Not Alone" and "I Hear (The Voice of Love)".

On February 8, 1997, EMI released the Japanese edition of Ross' album, A Gift of Love, featuring the single, "Promise Me You'll Try".

In May, 1997, Ross performed with operatic tenors Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras again at the Superconcert of the Century concert, held in Taipei, Taiwan.

On May 6, 1997, Ross inducted The Jackson 5 into The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

On February 19, 1998, Ross hosted the Motown 40 telecast on ABC.

In 1999, Ross was named the most successful female singer in the history of the United Kingdom charts, based upon a tally of her career hits. Madonna would soon succeed Ross as the most successful female artist in the UK. Later that year, Ross presented at the 1999 MTV Video Music Awards in September of the year and shocked the audience by touching rapper Lil' Kim's exposed breast, pasty-covered nipple, amazed at the young rapper's brashness.

Supremes reunions, Return to Love and 2002 solo tour

Ross reunited with Mary Wilson first in 1976 to attend the funeral service of Florence Ballard, who had died in February of that year. In March 1983, Ross agreed to reunite with Wilson and Cindy Birdsong for the television special "Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever". The Supremes did not rehearse their performance for that evening, due to time constraints. A scheduled medley of hits was cancelled.

Instead of following producer Suzanne dePasse's instructions to recreate their choreography from their final Ed Sullivan Show appearance, Wilson (according to her autobiography) planned with Birdsong to take a step forward every time Ross did the same, then began to sing lead on the group's final number-one hit song, "Someday We'll Be Together", on which Wilson did not perform.

Later, Wilson introduced Berry Gordy from the stage (unaware that the program's script called for Ross to introduce Gordy), at which point Ross subtly pushed down Wilson's hand-held microphone, stating, "It's been taken care of." Ross then re-introduced Gordy. These moments were excised from the final edit of the taped special, but still made their way into the news media; People magazine reported that "Ross [did] some elbowing to get Wilson out of the spotlight."

In 1999, Ross and mega-tour promoter SFX (which later became LiveNation) began negotiations regarding a Diana Ross tour which would include a Supremes segment. During negotiations with Ross, the promoters considered the creation of a Supremes tour, instead. Ross agreed. As the tour's co-producer, Ross invited all living former Supremes to participate. Neither Jean Terrell nor late 1970s member Susaye Greene chose to participate. 70s Supremes Lynda Laurence and Scherrie Payne were then touring as Former Ladies of the Supremes.

Ross contacted Mary Wilson and Cindy Birdsong, who then began negotiations with SFX. Negotiations with Wilson and Birdsong (who allowed Wilson to negotiate on her behalf) failed when Wilson refused SFX's and Ross' offer of $4 Million for 30 performances. Following the passage of SFX's final deadline for Wilson to accept their offer. Payne and Laurence, already negotiating with SFX, signed on to perform with Ross on the tour.

Laurence and Payne would later say that they got along well with Ross. The newly formed group performed together on The Today Show and The Oprah Winfrey Show, as well as VH1's Divas 2000: A tribute To Diana Ross. The Return to Love tour launched in June 2000, to a capacity audience in Philadelphia. The tour's final performance was at New York City's Madison Square Garden. The tour was cancelled by SFX shortly thereafter, due to mediocre ticket sales, despite glowing reviews from media as varied as Billboard magazine, The Detroit Free Press, the Los Angeles Times and The Village Voice newspapers.

On December 5, 2000, Ross received a Heroes Award from the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences (NARAS). The Heroes Award is the highest distinction bestowed by the New York Chapter.

Diana Ross' first public post-RTL appearance was at a fundraiser for former President Bill Clinton. In January 2001, "Love & Life: The Very Best of Diana Ross" was released in the United Kingdom, becoming Ross' 17th gold album in that country. In June, Ross presented costume designer Bob Mackie with the Lifetime Achievement Award at the American Fashion Awards.

Two days before the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Ross performed "God Bless America" at the U.S. Open tennis championships before the tournament's women's final, between Venus and Serena Williams. Immediately following the attacks, Ross performed the song again at Shea Stadium, before the Mets first game, after driving cross-country to be with her children(In the wake of the attacks, flying in the U.S. was temporarily restricted.). Ross teamed with legendary singers Patti LaBelle, Eartha Kitt among others for a Nile Rodgers-produced recording of Sister Sledge's classic disco hit, "We Are Family", recorded to benefit the families of 9/11 victims.

In May 2002, Ross and all five of her children appeared on Barbara Walters' Mother's Day television special. Shortly thereafter, Ross admitted herself into the 30-day substance abuse program at the Promises Institute in Malibu, California, after friends and family began to notice a burgeoning alcohol problem. Ross left the program three weeks later, and began to fulfill previously scheduled concert dates, beginning with a performance before a 60,000-strong crowd at London's Hyde Park, for Prince Charles' Prince's Trust charity.

U.S. ticket sales for the new tour were brisk, from coast to coast. Venues such as Long Island, New York's Westbury Music Fair and California's Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts and Humphrey's Concerts by the Bay attempted to add extra shows, due to public demand. Sold-out performances in Boston and Ontario, Canada, followed. In August, shortly after the tour began, however, Ross re-entered the Promises Institute's substance abuse rehabilitation program. That December, during her stay at Arizona's Canyon ranch Health Resort, Ross was pulled over by Tucson police for driving the wrong way on a one-way street. She failed a breathalizer test and was arrested for a DUI. Ross was later sentenced to 48 hours in jail, which she served near her home in Greenwich, Connecticut.

In January 2003, Ross was honored as Humanitarian of the Year by Nile Rodgers' We Are Family Foundation. Shortly thereafter, Ross was feted as an honored guest at the National Association of Black-Owned Broadcasters Awards. Later that year, Ross was the guest performer at that year's Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute's annual gala, in an ensemble custom-designed by designer Tom Ford, followed by an appearance as the surprise celebrity model for American couturier Dennis Basso's runway show.

In February, 2003, The Supremes were honored by The Rhythm & Blues Foundation honored The Supremes with its Pioneer Award.

Later career: 2004–present

In May 2004, Ross and daughter Tracee Ellis Ross appeared on the cover of Essence Magazine, in celebration of its 50th anniversary. On December 8, 2004, Ross was the featured performer for Stevie Wonder's Billboard Awards' Billboard Century Award tribute.

On January 14, 2005, Ross performed at the Tsunami Aid: A Concert of Hope TV concert to help raise money for Indonesian tsunami victims. On January 20, 2005, Ross launched her M.A.C. Icon makeup collection, as part of the beauty corporation's Icon Series. In 2005, Ross participated in Rod Stewart's Thanks for the Memory: The Great American Songbook, Volume IV recording a duet version of the Gershwin standard, "I've Got a Crush on You". The song was released as promotion for the album and later reached number 19 on the Billboard Hot Adult Contemporary chart, marking her first Billboard chart entry since 2000. Ross was featured in another hit duet, this time with Westlife, on a cover of Ross's 1991 hit "When You Tell Me You Love Me", repeating the original recording's chart success, garnering a number 2 UK Singles Chart hit (number 1 in Ireland).

Also in 2005, Ross was featured as an honored guest at Oprah Winfrey's Legends Ball Weekend, a three-day celebration honoring 25 African-American women in art, entertainment and civil rights. On May 22, 2006, a year after the celebration, a one-hour program about the weekend aired on ABC, including celebrity interviews and behind-the-scenes moments. On March 22, 2006, Ross' televised Central Park concerts, entitled "For One & for All", are named TV Land Awards' Viewer's Choice for Television's Greatest Music Moment.

In June 2006, Universal released Ross's shelved 1972 Blue album. It peaked at number two on Billboard's jazz albums chart. Later in 2006, Ross released her first studio album in seven years with I Love You. It would be released on EMI/Manhattan Records in the United States in January 2007. EMI Inside later reported the album had sold more than 622,000 copies worldwide. "I Love You" peaked at No. 32 on Billboard's Hot 200 albums chart and No. 16 on Billboard's Top R&B Albums chart. Ross later ventured on a world tour to promote I Love You. In 2007, Ross was honored with the BET Awards' Lifetime Achievement Award and, later, as one of the honorees at the Kennedy Center Honors.

On August 28, 2008, Ross performed at the opening of the US Open tennis tournament, as part of a tribute to Billie Jean King. Ross headlined the 2008 Nobel Peace Prize Concert in Oslo, Norway.

In October 2009, Ross was the featured performer at the annual "Symphonica in Rosso" concert series, held at the GelreDome Stadium in Arnhem, Netherlands.

In 2010, Ross embarked on her first headlining tour in three years titled the More Today Than Yesterday: The Greatest Hits Tour. Dedicated to the memory of her late friend Michael Jackson, the concert tour garnered positive reviews, nationwide.

In 2011, Diana Ross was inducted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame.

In February 2012, Ross received her first Grammy Award, for Lifetime Achievement, and announced the nominees for the Album of the Year. In May, a DVD of her Central Park concert performances, For One & For All, was released and featured commentary from Steve Binder, who directed the special. A month later, on December 9, she performed as the marquee and headlining performer at the White House-hosted Christmas in Washington concert, where she performed before President Barack Obama. The event was later broadcast as an annual special on TNT. In 2013, Ross completed a tour in South America and a tour in the United States. On July 3, 2014, Ross was awarded the Ella Fitzgerald Award for "her extraordinary contribution to contemporary jazz vocals", at the Festival International de Jazz de Montréal. On November 20, 2014, Ross presented the Dick Clark Award for Excellence to Taylor Swift at the American Music Awards.

In 2015, Ross appeared in the video for the song "How to Live Alone" performed by her son Evan Ross. On April 1, 2015, Ross began the first of nine performances as a part of her mini-residency, The Essential Diana Ross: Some Memories Never Fade at The Venetian in Las Vegas, Nevada. On November 27, 2015, Motown Records/Universal released the album Diana Ross Sings Songs from The Wiz, recorded in 1978. The album features Ross' versions of songs from the film version of the musical The Wiz, in which she starred along with Michael Jackson, Nipsey Russell, Ted Ross, Richard Pryor and Lena Horn.

In February 2016, Ross resumed her In the Name of Love Tour, which began in 2013. On November 22, 2016, Ross was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Obama.

In December 2016, Billboard magazine named her the 50th most successful dance artist of all time.

On June 30, 2017, Ross headlined the Essence Festival in New Orleans, Louisiana, with her daughter Rhonda Ross-Kendrick performing as the opening act. On November 19, 2017, Ross received the American Music Awards Lifetime Achievement Award. Ross performed several of her hits, ending with "Ain't No Mountain High Enough", during which she brought all of her grandchildren onstage. Her eldest grandson, eight-year-old Raif-Henok Emmanuel Kendrick, son of Rhonda Ross-Kendrick and husband, Rodney, performed an impromptu dance behind Ross, which gained attention. Ross was then joined onstage by all of her children, their spouses, first ex-husband Robert Ellis, Smokey Robinson (who brought Ross to Motown) and Motown founder, Berry Gordy.

In December 2017, Ross appeared on the Home Shopping Network to promote her first fragrance, Diamond Diana. The fragrance sold out within hours. Ross made several hour-long appearances on the network, and also released a tie-in CD retrospective collection of her music entitled Diamond Diana. Diamond Diana peaked at number six on the Billboard R&B Albums chart and number five on its Top Album Sales chart. The CD's first single release, "Ain't No Mountain High Enough 2017", remixed by Eric Kupper, reached number one on the Billboard Dance Club Songs chart.

On February 8, 2018, Ross began a new mini-residency at The Wynn Las Vegas Hotel & Casino. On August 4, 2018, Ross scored another No. 1 hit on Billboard's Top Dance Chart with "I'm Coming Out/Upside Down 2018" She performed a song from a to-be-released compilation Christmas album at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade on November 22, 2018.

In December 2018, Diana Ross consolidated her status as a dance diva by ranking #3 in the Billboard Dance Club Songs Artists year-end chart.

On February 10, 2019, the Recording Academy honored Ross at the 61st Annual Grammy Awards. Ross performed "The Best Years of My Life" and "Reach Out and Touch (Somebody's Hand)". In 2019 her song "The Boss" was remixed by Eric Kupper as "The Boss 2019", and reached number one on Billboard's Top Dance Chart on April 13.

On October 10, 2019, it was announced that Diana Ross would play the Sunday legends slot on the Pyramid Stage at the Glastonbury Festival for the festival's 50th anniversary.

Personal life

Relationships and family

Ross has been married twice and has five children.

In 1965, Ross became romantically involved with Motown CEO Berry Gordy. The relationship lasted several years, resulting in the birth of Ross's eldest child, Rhonda Suzanne Silberstein, in August 1971. Two months into her pregnancy with Rhonda, in January 1971, Ross married music executive Robert Ellis Silberstein, who raised Rhonda as his own daughter, despite knowing her true paternity. Ross told Rhonda that Gordy was her biological father when Rhonda was 13 years old. Beforehand, Rhonda referred to Gordy as "Uncle B.B."

Ross has two daughters with Silberstein, Tracee Joy and Chudney Lane Silberstein, born in 1972 and 1975, respectively. Ross and Silberstein divorced in 1977, and Ross moved to New York City in the early 1980s, after living in Los Angeles since Motown relocated to the area in the early 1970s.

Ross dated Gene Simmons, bass guitarist and singer for the band Kiss, from 1980 to 1983. They began dating after Cher, who had remained friends with Simmons following their break-up, suggested he ask Ross to help him choose her Christmas present. Simmons, in his autobiography, contends that he was not dating Cher when he met Ross. Ross ended her relationship with Simmons when he gave Ross the erroneous impression that he had resumed his relationship with Cher. Simmons' story differed in 2015 when he revealed that he fell in love with Ross while dating Cher, which ended Ross and Cher's friendship.

Ross met her second husband, Norwegian shipping magnate Arne Næss Jr., in 1985, and married him the following year. She became stepmother to his three elder children; Katinka, Christoffer, and folk singer Leona Naess. They have two sons together: Ross Arne (born in 1987) and Evan Olav (born in 1988). Ross and Næss divorced in 2000, after press reports revealed that Naess had fathered a child with another woman in Norway. Ross considers Næss the love of her life. Næss fell to his death in a South African mountain climbing accident in 2004. Ross remains close with her three ex-stepchildren.

Ross has six grandchildren: grandson Raif-Henok (born in 2009 to her daughter Rhonda); grandsons Leif (born on June 5, 2016) and Idingo (born 2017), born to her son Ross Næss; granddaughters Callaway Lane (born in 2012) and Everlee (born October 2019) born to Ross's daughter Chudney; and granddaughter Jagger Snow (born in 2015 to Ross's son Evan).

Religious views

Diana Ross considers herself a Baptist. She used to sing in a church, where she gained her initial musical experience. Her mother Ernestine's father, Reverend William Moten, served as a pastor in the Bessemer Baptist Church in Bessemer, Alabama. The Ross children spent considerable time with their maternal grandparents during their mother's bouts with tuberculosis.

2002 arrest

Diana Ross was arrested for DUI on December 30, 2002, in Tucson, Arizona, while undergoing substance abuse treatment at a local rehabilitation facility. She later served a two-day sentence near her Connecticut estate.

Legacy

Ross has influenced many artists including Michael Jackson, Beyoncé, Madonna, Jade Thirlwall, Questlove, Ledisi and the Ting Tings.

Various works have been inspired by Ross's career and life. The character of Deena Jones in Dreamgirls was inspired by Ross.

Several of Ross's songs have been covered and sampled. "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" has been featured in the film Chicken Little. The song has also been covered live and on albums by Jennifer Lopez, Amy Winehouse. Janet Jackson sampled "Love Hangover" on her 1997 song "My Need" (featured on the album The Velvet Rope), having already sampled "Love Child" and "Someday We'll Be Together" by Ross & the Supremes on her 1993 tracks "You Want This" and "If" (both released as singles from the janet. album). "Love Hangover" was also sampled in Monica's 1998 number 1 "The First Night" as well as being sampled by Will Smith, Master P (who also sampled "Missing You"), Heavy D and Bone Thugs N Harmony, "It's Your Move" was sampled in 2011 by Vektroid for her song "Lisa Frank 420 / Modern Computing", which appeared in her ninth album Floral Shoppe under her one-time alias Macintosh Plus.

Motown: The Musical is a Broadway musical that launched on April 14, 2013. It is the story of Berry Gordy's creation of Motown Records and his romance with Diana Ross.

As a member of the Supremes, her songs "Stop! In the Name of Love" and "You Can't Hurry Love" are among the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988, received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1994, and entered into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 1998. In 2004, Rolling Stone placed the group at number 96 on their list of the "100 Greatest Artists of All Time".

As lead singer of the Supremes and as a solo artist, Ross has earned 18 number-one singles (12 as lead singer of the Supremes and 6 as a solo artist). While Mariah Carey is the only solo female artist to have 18 number-one U.S. singles, Ms. Ross is the only female artist to have number one singles as a solo artist; as the other half of a duet (Lionel Richie); as a member of a trio (the Supremes); and, as an ensemble member (We are the World-USA for Africa). Ross was featured on the Notorious B.I.G.'s 1997 number-one hit, "Mo Money Mo Problems" as her voice from her 1980 hit, "I'm Coming Out", was sampled for the song.

Billboard magazine named Ross the "female entertainer of the century" in 1976. In 1993, she earned a Guinness World Record, due to her success in the United States and United Kingdom for having more hits than any other female artist in the charts with a career total of 70 hit singles. Ross is also one of the few recording artists to have two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame—one as a solo artist and the other as a member of the Supremes. After her 1983 concert in Central Park, Diana Ross Playground was named in her honor with a groundbreaking opening ceremony in 1986.

Ross was given credit for the discovery of the Jackson 5. Her "discovery" was simply part of Motown's marketing and promotions plan for the Jackson 5. Consequently, their debut album was titled Diana Ross Presents the Jackson 5. It was actually Motown producer Bobby Taylor who discovered the Jacksons. Even so, Ross embraced the role and became a good friend of Michael Jackson, serving as a mother figure to him.

In 2006, Diana was one of 25 African-American women saluted at Oprah Winfrey's Legends Ball, a three-day celebration, honoring their contributions to art, entertainment, and civil rights.

Diana Ross was named one of the Five Mighty Pop Divas of the Sixties along with Dusty Springfield, Aretha Franklin, Martha Reeves, and Dionne Warwick.

Awards and nominations

On November 16, 2016, Ross was announced as one of the 21 recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor.

Discography

Studio albums

Diana Ross (1970)

Everything Is Everything (1970)

Surrender (1971)

Touch Me in the Morning (1973)

Diana & Marvin (with Marvin Gaye) (1973)

Last Time I Saw Him (1973)

Diana Ross (1976)

Baby It's Me (1977)

Ross (1978)

The Boss (1979)

Diana (1980)

Why Do Fools Fall in Love (1981)

Silk Electric (1982)

Ross (1983)

Swept Away (1984)

Eaten Alive (1985)

Red Hot Rhythm & Blues (1987)

Workin' Overtime (1989)

The Force Behind the Power (1991)

A Very Special Season (1994)

Take Me Higher (1995)

Every Day Is a New Day (1999)

Blue (2006)

I Love You (2006)

Soundtrack albums

Diana! (1971)

Lady Sings the Blues (1972)

Mahogany (1975)

The Wiz (1978)

Endless Love: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (1981)

Live albums

Live at Caesars Palace (1974)

An Evening with Diana Ross (1977)

Greatest Hits Live (1989)

Stolen Moments: The Lady Sings... Jazz and Blues (1993)

Christmas in Vienna (with Plácido Domingo and José Carreras) (1993)

Filmography

Lady Sings the Blues (1972)

Mahogany (1975)

The Wiz (1978)

Out of Darkness * (1994)

Double Platinum * (1999)

(* = made directly for television)

Television

T.A.M.I. Show (with the Supremes) (1964)

Tarzan (with the Supremes) (1968)

TCB (with the Supremes) (1968)

The Dinah Shore Special: Like Hep (with Dinah Shore and Lucille Ball) (1969)

G.I.T. on Broadway (with the Supremes and the Temptations) (1969)

Diana! (1971)

The Jackson 5ive (1971)

Make Room for Granddaddy (1971)

Here I Am: An Evening with Diana Ross (1977)

The Muppet Show (1977)

Standing Room Only (HBO) (1980)

Diana! (TV Special) (1981)

Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever (1983)

Diana Ross: Live in Central Park/For One and For All (Showtime) (1983)

Diana Ross: Red Hot Rhythm and Blues (1987)

Diana Ross: Workin' Overtime HBO: World Stage (1989)

Diana Ross Live! The Lady Sings... Jazz & Blues: Stolen Moments (1992)

Christmas in Vienna (1992)

BET Walk of Fame (1993)

Always is Forever: 30th Anniversary (1993)

1994 FIFA World Cup (1994)

Super Bowl XXX (1996)

Super Concert of the Century (1997)

An Audience with Diana Ross (1999)

VH1 Divas 2000: A Tribute to Diana Ross (2000)

The Making and Meaning of We Are Family (documentary) (2002)

Tsunami Aid (2005)

BET Awards 2007 (2007)

Kennedy Center Honors (2007)

Nobel Peace Prize Concert (2008)

The Oprah Winfrey Show: Farewell and Salute (2011)

Christmas in Washington (2012)

The Voice (2014)

HSN (2017)

Ashlee+Evan (2018)

Stage

An Evening with Diana Ross (1976)

Tours

Headlining

Co-headlining tours

Superconcert of the Century (with Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras) (1997)

Return to Love Tour (with former members of the Supremes) (2000)

#03/26

6 notes · View notes

heads-in-the-clouds-spacecadet · 4 years

Text

When asked to write a daily diary for anxiety management.

Here are a few days example....

Sunday 24th

Mood/anxiety = numb.

Additional meds =8mg of diazipam.

My whole body aches yet it shouldn't. My stomach is growling yet i feel physically sick.

Things i ask myself....

Q.1 Will i leave my safe space, weighted blanket & mountain of pillows?

A.1 NO.

Q.2 Will i manage my yoga routine

A.2 NO

Reasons....Why

I feel exhausted even though ive not been outside since Thursday. I just want the aching to subside the pain to leave. My jaw is clenched closed making eating an ordeal. I know this needs to be done.

The dread of what passive aggressive message/s ill receive today either in person or written either way im struggling to motivate myself to move.

The Internet has been blocked for nearly a wk now. But i just let it slide as the saying goes choose your arguements "wifi is not the hill i want to die on" quote from TBBT. I hear Luke (my brother) is now in his bedroom and his door is closed. He has been banging around the house sending passive aggressive messages (sms) since 4am. My belongings that i left downstairs were thrown into my room. I'm nervous to leave my room till i know he is asleep.

Flashback/negative thoughts....

1. How can my baby brother be an emotional manipulator.

2. Last time i had to justify my everymove i was in Portugal in a very bad relationship.

*****Ways im looking to excuse his behaviour. Find the cause to my sudden crash of low mood aka depression with a nice battle of anxiety.

---Logically i know its not the same.

---Emotionally it hurts the same.

The way he looks at me with disgust, resentment & impatience is the trigger. I realise this. How someone you love can make you feel this way.

Solution: i decide to find a solution to the sudden conflict of money and i know there is a receipt in the car. I go to the normal place the keys are kept and theyre no where to be found. I look in all the obvious logical places they could be and realise theyre hidden by my loving brother. His Reasons, 1-to stop me buying shit (his words). 2. He has decided its his house, his car so therefore his rules. (Its all my mums btw)

As im downstairs i notice the kitchen is a mess. Pots all over from a feast Luke cooked up the night before. Or should i say 2am.

So i feel defeated. Ive basically been cleaning non stop everytime i use a room as per gov guidelines and he just doesnt seem to comprehend the severity of the situation.

I decide i need to eat. So i opt for Shreddies with Oat Milk (Luke has a serious milk allergy to the milk proteins in cows milk so im not fussed about milk and am happy to use alternatives) topped with vanilla soya yogurt, bannana, a few cranberries, 3 strawberries, sultanas and crushed Almonds. My logical brain is telling me eat well as we are not leaving the bedroom again unless desperate.

I send a few messages to the family whats app (Luke refuses to be a part of this) and receive encouraging and support in return. Everyone is struggling in their own way so i appreciate having a small outlet between us all.

After food i sleep finally.

Trying now to Ready myself for round 2 which i know is coming.

My mum calls i dont want to answer but i do. I explain the situation. She knows, she has dealt with his angry behaviour since he was 11yrs old. She stated she is coming to visit Tuesday as per new gov guidelines and we will meet in the park. She then asks me to pass the phone to Luke which i pointblank refuse. Im not ready for round 2 yet. Especially since he has his own phone he is just not answering making everyone worry about him but he just resents it. Its safe to say im proud i refused to do something. Gold star award ⭐

Monday 25th

Mood/Anxiety - still no change from yesterday but i decide i have to force myself to move. Wash, clean and pack the additional things my mum has requested.

Additional meds - i decided against taking anything today as i need to be clear headed for my appointment Tues and obvs my mums visit.

I check the weather see its a nice day decide washing is task 1. I set a bath running (multi tasking saving time from all the free time) and head downstairs to pop the washing machine on. Before i left my room i checked my phone for messages i have one from my mum telling me she has had words with Luke and that he needs to basically deal with the resentment in a more positive way.

This explains all the banging and loud music yesterday early eve. He decided to actually clean.

Anyhow I head downstairs. Kitchen is clean, messages all wiped from the black board.

I decide i must try and communicate with Luke as we cant take the conflict with us to the park it isnt fair to our mum.

I can hear him moving so send a sms message asking if he wants anything in the oven. No response. ***He did finally get out of bed at 3pm so a peaceful day so far.

I decide food is required. I opt for protein soya burgers x2 with Spinach, tomatos, avacado, sultanas, almond pieces and some crumpets. I sit in the garden to eat.

All washing is out and drying but im to anxiety ridden and unmotivated to enjoy the sunshine.

I head back to my room to sort bits for my mum and throw away my origami collection. It was over taking my room and again causing conflict.

Lukes awake!!!. I decide to say hello. So far so good. He decides to make himself lunch and throws a fit because i ate a £0.45 avocado. I walk away as i know he is just venting and i need to not start the circle of negative thoughts or interactions. This is rewarded with resentment. Luke suddenly decides to do his own washing and cut the grass. Which means my washing is in his way. Before he even starts i am pulling in whats dry mainly because i want to go back to bed and need my bedsheets but also because he wont care if my washing turns green or is damaged. To my delight my sheets are dry but my pjs etc need another 30mins so i leave them whilst i go and make my bed.

Im bellowed at about washing as Luke needs the line. So i head down stairs to reteive the rest of my belongings.

Self soothing thoughts...

Im walking on eggshells trying not to provoke the beast and i need to keep going. Focus on my achievements. I left my room. I cleaned myself, my clothing and my pillow fort which has been my safe zone for the past 4days.

Deep down thought i am disappointed as i know isolation and distancing is not a long turn solution as the yrs pass im becoming more and more isolated and lonely.

Im downstairs again and i ask Luke if he wants anything popping in the oven as i was having toast. He requested 2 burgers and chips but on seperate trays as he was hungry. Easy to do popped into the oven. 40mins later chips are cooked he is plating up and all he says is "why have you cooked so many chips, clearly we now live in a household of wastefulness".

This was the turning point for me id had enough for 1day and just told him to give it a rest and went to my room.

Im dozing with Big Bang on in the backround and Luke is banging on my door. Mums on the phone. Confirming arrangements for tomorrow. I say a few oks with the occasional nod.

I start packing the bits n bobs my mum has asked for and carry then downstairs so theyre ready for the car tomorrow am.

Its PJs and bed time. Luke has other ideas. He is awake and up and about at 4.30am. Having a bath at 5am, doing weights after his bath at 6am then leaves in the car at 7am. He is back around 8am banging has a shower then decides to leave again in the car. He is meant to be house-bound until July 1st. This in itself causes me anxiety as i cant handle watching another member of my family die in front of my eyes.

Thoughts...

Yes this is VERY dramatic. STOP IT BRAIN!

Take precautions all will be ok.

Tuesday 26th

Mood/Anxiety = No change

Additional meds = 4mg diazipam but late afternoon as i couldnt stop shaking and fidgeting.

My mum is coming to visit. Im trying not to think about the fact Luke is out of the house.

We are having a picnic social distancing style.

We head to the coop as Luke has decided even after knowing our mum all his life never be on time, we have to be early. I buy Costa coffee, fresh bread, hummus, bananas, diet coke and some biscuits the nature valley ones theyre really good. Luke doesnt go into the shop I think at least he is listening to some rules. He rolls his eyes as i spray the shopping with dettol spray and use the alcohol hand sanitizer for my hands and door handle etc. I just tell him its how it needs to be done.

We find a perfect parking spot under a bunch of trees. I notice that all the trees are trimmed in a very even shelf across the bottom. It looked like it was designed perfectly for people to walk straight onto the park from the car park without having to fight with tree branches or go around. But in actual fact its the deer. They eat the lower leaves this made me smile and relax for a moment. WIN.

My mum is late so im nervous that she is

1. Stuck somewhere (over reaction)

2. Lost (over reaction)

3. Just running late (normal reaction)

Im a tad fidgety as im aware i have an appointment in 2hrs. Hurry up MOTHER...

I ponder about work and whether or not ill still have a job to return too. Had an email this am stating theyre cutting 200jobs from the team i work in. So not sure if thats a good thing or not. But its also increasing my anxiety as ive read the email and now have a burning desire to do the research to see what my probability of keeping my job will be. Before my brain can go on a major tangent my mum arrives.

Shes brought Oscar (her poodle) he is so excited to see me. And the big hairy fluff ball gave me the biggest snuggles. He has a major Covid hairdoo. My mum doesnt hug me which hurts but i know she cant.

Picnic time. We sit in the middle.of a field away from everyone. Social distancing 10/10. My mum has made me my favourite cakes, rock buns. (Apparently these are a northern thing) but im feeling the love. Its fairly chilled only 1 disagreement with Luke over blinkin avocados.

Im clock checking and aware of impending appointment, im a little (understated) nervous because ive not had positive relationships with therapists or doctors in the past.

#mental health #lost #hurting #help #self reflection #finelinebetweenloveandhate #still breathing #GAD #recovery #survivor

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stroni-bomb · 5 years

Text

Son of Satan, Prince of Hell

Warnings: mentions of blood, death and a lot of angst

Being the Prince of Hell and Son of Satan meant Yuta had to be untrue to himself since the day he was born. He watched others fall around him, wanting to save them, forced to stand by and laugh. When he realised what he was bound to inherit he couldn't take the pain any longer- leaving his home and Father behind for good.

Demon!Yuta - Backstory ~Stroni~

26th October 1995 - The Prince is Born

Fallen angels blew their trumpets. Hell hounds howled and other demons cheered. Slaves, although unwillingly, celebrated their future leader. Yuta, the Son of Satan.

His mother, bless her soul, was instantly killed as soon as she gave birth. Her crying child ripped from her arms, a spear instantly stabbing into her skull. She was successful, test subject number 203, in finally bearing the Son of Satan, the Prince of Hell.

Others before hadn't been so lucky, the baby too strong and killing her and themselves in the process. A few had managed to survive to this stage, only to give birth to a beautiful baby girl. Pathetic is all their father would say as he personally took the baby from the subject and thrown her into a fire pit. The subject was killed soon after.

Yuta wasn't aware what his life had become, what exactly was expected from him or the pressure he'd receive. At this point he didn't care, he was just a little baby demon blissfully unaware of the monster which was his father.

26th October 2000 - The Prince's 5th birthday

Yuta laid patiently in bed not having gotten any sleep since the excitement brewing in his stomach was far too much. He was still innocent at this point... far too innocent.

He was waiting for his maids to come in, the ones who usually took care of him. On past birthdays they'd come with bags full of presents, the concept of presents were fairly new to Hell, a slave from the living world gave them the idea. Yuta had no idea that he was a slave, nor that every morning he gets tortured just like the other millions of slaves that live here.

No one came. It was approaching midday but Yuta wouldn't know that, he was definitely aware that they were arriving much later than usual though. Cautiously, he jumped out of bed and tip toed to the door, ever so quietly opening it just a crack. He couldn't see anyone but he heard a booming voice down the hall.

He was only five....you couldn't blame him for wanting to explore.

Quietly following the voice of what he thought was the King (he had no idea if was his father) he noticed there were smaller voices too, voices that he knew belonged to his carers. Running now he found the room they were in and took a peek inside, the poor boy had no idea what he was going to end up finding.

"I told you to stop with such childish things," the King boomed, slapping the eldest carer across the face with such an impact that a bruise was already forming.

"We're sorry your highness but the look on his face when he gets these gifts is too precious," the woman dropped to her knees and bowed her head to show her sincerity.

"Sir if you saw his face you'd-" the King grabbed the younger carer, secretly Yuta's favourite, by the throat and squeezed. He didn't let go, not until her body laid limp, no sign of life left in her. The King let go and her body fell, where his hand was previously gripped were now just blisters and burns.

"Anyone else want to tell me what to do with my own son?" He roared at the women who were crouched by the youngest's limp body.

"N-no sir."

Terrified of being caught, Yuta sobbed silently as he ran back to his room, the sight of his favourite carer being murdered in mere seconds staining his pure memories. A little piece of his heart turned black and a thin protective shell started to form around the young boy.

1st January 2011 - Initiating Ceremony

At 15 he was deemed a full fledged demon, something humans would call an adult. His heart had become completely blackened and his thoughts were tainted. Witnessing death after death, his loved ones and friends being ripped from him one by one, all of it was a sick joke from his Father to toughen him into a strong leader. Yuta was unaware of this though too, unaware how every time his best friend would suddenly cough up blood and die in his arms was actually his father's doing, blissfully unaware that his mother was killed on his Father's orders.

Today he was called to his Father's quarters, he wasn't told why but only to come in his best attire and be prepared. Again, no one told him what to be prepared for, only to expect the unexpected.

His had never seen his father without his demon form, such a form that only the King, known as Satan, was able to change into. It was probably a pride thing, Yuta concluded, something that made his father think he was intimidating to others. His son just saw him as a coward.

Politely he bowed,"You called, father?"

Satan smiled broadly, lifting himself out of his throne and casually walking down the steps towards his son.

"Yes my dear boy," he stopped a few metres in front of Yuta, an almost menacing smile etched on his features. The very look of him made Yuta uncomfortable. "Today is the day you officially become Prince my son. Do you know the requirements for such a title?"

Yuta nodded his head with a hesitant gulp. Dzina, a bloodhound and Yuta's only best friend, told him what he must do in order to please his father. He would have to kill one of the slaves, something Yuta sworn that he'd never do.

A click of a door behind his father caught his attention, the unsuspecting slave came in and placed the King's meal on a table. His father gave him a pointed look, a cue for Yuta to commit the murder. He could have easily said no, but if he had then he'd be a "failed experiment", his blood would stain palace walls and anyone he knew would have the same fate. Plus... He really wanted his demon powers.

He lunged at the slave, taking her throat so easily in his hands, his grip instantly tight. He tried to look cocky, to have a smirk written on his lips and forced a laugh out of his throat, his eyes though were pained with sorrow as he kept squeezing the young girls neck.

He was only fifteen.

18th May 2013 - Escape while you can my Prince

"Yuta you should go," Dzina continued to plead, her eyes tearing up. She had found a way out of this hell, literally, and was trying to convince Yuta to be the one that leaves.

“I’m the Prince Dzina,” he shook his head at his best friend, “father would kill us both if he found out.”

She pouted using her abilities as a Hellhound to do her best puppy dog eyes, “Yuta I don’t want to be around and watch my best friend turn into the same monster as his father I-”

“Enough Dzina!” He screamed, his eyes going a dark shade of purple, fists clenched by his side. “I’m not going! I need to protect Hell and everyone in it, if I run away that won’t solve anything.”

She slumped in defeat, beady red eyes glaring into his purple ones, “at this rate it’ll be you they need protecting from Prince, Son of Satan.” She bowed, something she would never usually do, and shifted into her Hound form leaving Yuta alone dumbfounded.

It was his turn to feel defeated. Should he had gone?

3rd July 2013 - Where do I go?

It was the last straw. Yuta couldn’t do this anymore.

As he let go of the limp body of a young slave a lone tear rolled down his cold cheek. He crouched down to examine the body in front of him. He looked no older than twenty, who knows what he did in his past life to end up in Hell but Yuta was sure it wasn’t enough to earn complete death- to never have the chance to reform, to never live any kind of life again. The Prince was sick of being able to make these decisions, being able to kill whoever he wanted to just because he felt like it, this wasn’t who he was deep down. This is who his Father wanted him to be.

Not anymore.

“Yuta...” The Prince quickly stood up, wiping the tears from his cheek before turning to see his former best friend standing there.

“I want to go Dzina,” he whispered. “Take me away. Far away.”

Dzina gave the troubled prince a heartfelt smile, “I’ll sort it out straight away Yuta.”

He tried to smile, he really did, instead it turned out to be a faint quiver of his lips. “But where do I go?”

Dzina gently shook her head, “there’ll be someone on the other side waiting for you my Prince, my Yuta.”

6th July 2013 - D Day

If someone had told Yuta beforehand that angels really did exist then he would have refused to escaping in the first place. Every story he was told as a child seemed to be a lie, Hell wasn’t for the good and not every angel had become a fallen one. All his suspicions of his life being built on one big lie were confirmed to be true as an angel who looked no older than him stood in front of him at the gates to his kingdom.

“Yuta this is Taeyong, he has a kingdom on the Land Of The Living. You’ll be safe there, we struck a deal with heaven that only you will be permitted to leave Hell and accompany Taeyong,” Dzina informed the very lost demon, he still hadn’t picked up his jaw as he gawked at the angel, his natural sworn enemy.

“I won’t have to kill anyone on Earth right...” was all that he managed to say and Taeyong simply shook his head and held out his hand.

“Come,” he said softly as he gestured for Yuta to take his hand. “It won’t take long for your father to realise I’m here.”

It was Yuta who shook his head now. “If I touch you for more than five seconds you’ll die.”

“Angels are immune to a demon’s touch. Please hurry all of us will be killed if we’re caught,” Taeyong sounded desperate so Yuta just shrugged and complied, not completely assured that the angel would be okay.

“Dzina...thank you. Be okay, please? For me,” the bloodhound simply nodded, she didn’t want to break in front of her best friend, crying would only make him stay.

“Bye Dzina I lov-” the demon’s words were cut off. A bright flash of light left him disorientated and the familiar heat of his homeland was replaced with a cool breeze which caused the hair on his skin to raise.

Once his vision was cleared he was met with a big building, one much like his father’s, which was surrounded with blankets of greenery. Looking up he saw blue and white, colours which were much different to the red and purple he was so used to seeing. There was no fire in sight. No screams to be heard. No smoke to be smelt. It was beautiful, it was safe to say Yuta was purely in awe.

“This is N City. There’s only me, you and a Siren called Taeil here right now. I can show you your room if you’d like?” Taeyong pointed to the door of the home but Yuta stayed immersed in the nature surrounding him.

“I- I’d like to take a walk,” he didn’t wait for a reply but instead went forward towards the forest which bordered the homes and plains of grass. His thoughts were dazed and unclear but the pain in his heart could be easily identified. He was hurt, by his past but also the decision to leave Dzina behind. Maybe this would become his biggest regret but he just hopes that she’s okay.

He does love her after all.

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bee-kathony · 6 years

Text

The Holiday | New Year

Thank you so much for reading this AU! I have enjoyed writing it so much and I hope you enjoy this last chapter of ‘The Holiday’, Merry Christmas in July! Thanks @jules-fraser for my cute moodboard <3

Chapter 7: New Year

CLAIRE BEAUCHAMP

Two days. I left in two days. For whatever reason, I had booked my flight home for December 26th, probably thinking it would be cheaper. But now, standing in the doorway, letting Jamie inside, possibly for the last time — I never wanted to leave.

We were silent as I lead the way up to the bedroom, our hands brushing and playing a game of who could touch the other the softest. My heart pounded with every button Jamie’s fingers undid, his skin warm on my cold flesh. As Jamie held me to him, naked beside the bed, I knew my heart would break in two days when it came time to leave.

He laid me gently back on the bed, his eyes never leaving mine as he climbed on top of me and placed himself between my thighs.

“I dinna want ye to leave,” his hands said as they caressed the skin on my sides. “I don’t want to go,” my mouth replied as I pressed it to the side of his neck, unshaven and warm. “Please stay,” his body said as he spread my legs and slid home. “Don’t stop,” my body responded to his, back arching from the bed in a hurried embrace that only left me begging for more.

Jamie held me, hands exploring the sporadic freckles dotted on my too pale arms, “Long distance relationships can work ye know.”

Sighing, I moved my hand to cup his cheek, “Let’s say we make this work, Jamie. We commit to flying back and forth. You come to Boston and I come to Inverness.” He nodded in a cheerful agreement. “What happens when we hit a wall in six months? The tension builds because we don’t know what to do.” His hand slides up my arm to my shoulder and then settles on the side of my face, his thumb pressing gently on my bottom lip as I speak. “You can’t constantly be away from your girls… and I can’t constantly be leaving my patients.”

He stopped me from speaking further with a kiss and pulled me tighter to him, “We could make it work, Sassenach. If we really wanted to.”

“Or maybe,” Jamie let out a deep sigh I didn’t know he’d been holding when I said or, “we should realise that what we’ve had these past two weeks has been perfect and maybe the fact that I leave in two days makes this far more exciting than it really is.”

Jamie shifted us in bed, sitting up and taking both my hands in his, “I have another wee scenario for ye. I’m in love wi’ ye.” He smiled, his blue eyes crinkling, “I am in love wi’ ye, Claire Beauchamp. I just know I love ye. I — I never thought I’d feel this way again, come to a woman’s bed and feel such joy. I realise I come with a package deal,” he blushed, “three for the price of one.” I squeezed his hands, “I finally know what I want and that is ye.”

My words were stuck in my throat but I managed to whisper, “I wasn’t expecting an ‘I love you’.”

Jamie smiled, loosening his grip on my hands, “I do remember that you said ye wouldna fall in love wi’ me.”

That night we made love again, tender and slow, hands and eyes memorising every detail that we dared not forget. If this was truly the last time we would be together, we would make sure our bodies conveyed what our hearts longed to do.

__________________________

JENNY FRASER

The party honouring Joe was in two hours and Ian just messaged me that he would be by in an hour to pick me and Joe up. As soon as I put my phone down, it started to buzz on the counter. I picked it up, expecting it to be another message from Ian but it wasn’t. It was a FaceTime call from Oliver.

Christ.

Instead of declining, I found myself swiping to accept the call and paused, waiting for his face to fill the screen.

“Fraser!” He said, smiling when the connection came through, “’Tis so good to see yer face.”

“Why are ye callin’ me Oliver?” I wasna in a mood to beat around the bush, let’s get straight to the point.

“Can I no’ just call ye to say hello?”

“No. Ye can’t, Oliver. Ye lost the right to do that we ye got engaged and ye didna tell me about it beforehand.”

“Oh come on, Fraser —“

“Stop callin’ me ‘Fraser’, it’s Jenny to ye. Nothin’ more.” I replied shortly, “Oliver…” I stared at his face on the small screen and for once I found I felt nothing. Nothing save regret over wasted years pining after someone who would never love me back. “I’m ending this — whatever this,” I waved my hand in the air, “is. I wasted so many years on ye and ye treated me like dirt.”

Oliver opened his mouth to speak but I spoke first, “Ye are selfish and ye dinna do anythin’ that isna for yer own gain. I hope ye and yer new bride are verra happy together. Dinna ever talk to me again.” Before he could reply, I hit the red end call button and slid my phone across the counter.

“Christ, that bastard.” I should’ve had that conversation years ago but now that it was done, I felt lighter, more free than I had in years.

_____________________

I walked into the hospital holding Ian’s hand, my other arm wrapped in Joe’s. It wasn’t long before Joe took the stage to accept an award for all his years he dedicated to the hospital. Winking at him and giving him a thumbs up, he took a deep breath and pulled out the paper with his speech I had helped write.

“This place,” he looked around the room, filled with colleagues and friends, “has been my home for more than thirty years. Everyday I come to work, I’m filled with love for each and every one of you that has been with me on this journey. As a doctor, our job is to save lives, heal people… well this place saved me.” He began to sniffle, his eyes growing shiny with unshed tears and I couldn’t hold back my own tears.

“I’ll miss coming to work here everyday but don’t think that just because I’m retiring it means that I won’t stop by from time to time,” he laughed, “I could go on and on but I guess what I wanna say is thank you, for giving me this award of a lifetime achievement and for throwing me this fabulous party. Now… let’s get back to the cake!”

Everyone clapped as Joe exited the stage and he came back over to sit at our table, “That was wonderful Joe, ye did such a good job.”

He smiled and squeezed my hand firmly, “I was so nervous Jenny but I made it through didn’t I?”

“Aye, ye did.”

The rest of the night was filled with drinks, cake and people coming round to congratulate Joe. I never once felt out of place, only having met Joe nearly two weeks ago. With Ian on my other side, I felt so at home.

As the night dwindled down and we stood to grab our coats and head home after a long night, Ian touched my elbow, pulling me to the side.

“What are ye doin’ for new years, Jenny?” He asked, hope in his voice.

“I’m goin’ home… I leave for Scotland in a couple of days.” I slid my hand down to grip his in mine.

He sighed, looking defeated, “Ye know,” his eyes suddenly twinkled, “I havena been back to Scotland for Hogmanay in many years.”

“Och, have ye no’? Well then ye must come and spend it wi’ me — if ye want to of course.”

Ian slid both his hands up to cup my cheeks and pulled my face to his, placing a kiss on my lips. God, how I had wanted to do that from the first moment I laid eyes on him.

Lingering on his mouth, he whispered, “I would love to, Jenny. I would verra much like to spend just about every holiday wi’ ye but I’ll do with Hogmanay for now.” He laughed, leading us out to the car where Joe was waiting with a smug look on his face.

_____________________

CLAIRE BEAUCHAMP

I stood in the living room of Jenny’s house that I had grown to love, with it’s mismatched mugs in the cupboard and I would even miss Bouton, the furry companion that kept me warm when Jamie hadn’t been there to warm the bed.

“Ye have everythin’? Yer passport, yer bags?” Jamie asked, his eyes red and puffy from a previous cry session he had as soon as he walked in the door this morning. We had decided not to spend Christmas together, I didn’t want to intrude on his time with his girls.

Opening my purse, I confirmed that I did have my passport and my bags were sitting by the door, ready to go when the car came to pick me up and take me away.

“Yes. I have everything…” I tried to smile, “everything but you that is.” Wrapping his arms around my waist once again, Jamie pulled me to him and held me, breathing in my scent and cherishing the feel of my body pressed to his. I could have stayed like this forever but a loud ‘honk’ came from outside which meant it was time to go.

“Better go.” I press my lips tightly together and walk towards the door. We’re silent as Jamie helps load my oversized bag into the boot of the car.

“I love ye, Sassenach. Two weeks ago, when I showed up here… I never expected ye.” He twisted a stray curl around his pointer finger.

“I never expected someone quite like you either, Jamie Fraser.” Before more tears, on his side, came falling down his face, I kissed him quickly and with a hurried embrace I slid into the backseat of the car. Waving goodbye, I watched him stand at the front gate until the car turned around the corner.

It’s true. I hadn’t been expecting Jamie, I came here to get away from a failed relationship, to be on my own. But instead I had met him, the most wonderful man that absolutely turned my world upside down.

With the distance growing further and further between us, my chest began to feel tight and my throat closed. There was a wetness against my cheeks, something I hadn’t felt since my parents death. I was crying.

“Jamie,” I choked out.

“Sorry miss?” The driver said from the front seat.

Tears began to fall more quickly and I realised then what I had to do.

“Turn around!” I begged the driver, “Please, turn around.”

“Did ye forget somethin’?”

“Yes. Yes, I did.” The driver managed to turn around and started driving back to Jenny’s house. I hoped Jamie hadn’t already left.

“You can take my bag out, please!” I told the driver as I shut the door and ran up the path to the front door of Jenny’s house. Without knocking, I ran inside, searching for him but he was nowhere to be seen.

“Jamie?”

Then I heard the sound of someone crying coming from upstairs and then Jamie appeared at the top of the stairs, “Sassenach, what — what are ye doin’ back? Did ye forget somethin’ already?”

He walked down the stairs, wiping tears off his face and then as he came closer he noticed the wetness on my own cheeks, “Claire… you cried?” He smiled, unusual when you think about the fact that he was happy I had been crying.

“I did, Jamie. Because I realised something.” My hands wrapped around his neck, “I realised that I love you. And I never want to leave you.”

“Och, Sassenach, yer goin’ to make me cry again,” he sniffled and kissed my cheeks, “So that means yer stayin’?”

I nodded, my thumb wiping away a tear as it fell, “Yes, at least for Hogmanay and then I need to go back to Boston and figure some things out but then I was thinking I would come back here… to Inverness?” I said it as a question, it had only been two weeks after all.

“Yes, I would like that verra much, Sassenach!” Jamie smiled and wrapped his arms around my waist, lifting my feet off the ground and spinning me in fast circles around the room.

______________________

CLAIRE BEAUCHAMP & JENNY FRASER

Jenny arrived home with Ian the day before Hogmanay. She was surprised but not shocked to see that Claire was still there and was so happy to finally meet the woman who she had swapped homes with.

“It’s so lovely to finally meet you in person, Jenny,” Claire embraced her.

“’Tis indeed. Never thought we would but I see ye had a good reason to stick around,” she winked and looked behind Claire at her brother, Jamie, sitting just by the fire at Lallybroch.

“And you brought back your own Scot I see?” Claire smirked, turning to look over at the man Jenny had brought home, Ian as he talked with Jamie.

“Aye, seems this holiday was verra kind to both of us. I guess I should start callin’ ye sister!” Jenny laughed and Claire simply blushed.

Bree and Faith ran down the stairs, dressed in the best clothes and jumped onto Jenny, squealing and smiling. Clearly they loved their aunt very much.

Claire sat next to Jamie, his arm coming to slide around her shoulder and she leaned her head against him, “Happy Hogmanay, Sassenach.” He kissed her, smiling against her lips as he realised that he would be kissing those lips for the rest of his life.

Jenny joined Ian by the fire, their hands intertwining in an instant.

Claire and Jenny would forever be grateful for that holiday season, it brought them both love and a place and person, to call home.

#the holiday au #jamie fraser #bree fraser #faith fraser #claire fraser #claire beauchamp #jenny fraser murray #ian murray #outlander fanfic #mclairefras #christmas #feels #new year #joe abernathy #they finally all meet

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