frogwithapen

[frogwithapen]

[frogwithapen]

me: if I become the evil overlord I will never harm my minions

[5 years later]

highly throwable imp: hoohoohee

me: hmm

[frogwithapen]

unsung benefit i think a lot of ppl are sleeping on with using the public library is that i think its a great replacement for the dopamine hit some ppl get from online shopping. it kind of fills that niche of reserving something that you then get to anticipate the arrival of and enjoy when it arrives, but without like, the waste and the money.

[frogwithapen]

Bro, I have nothing against braces, I'm not a bigot! I just have some concerns. I just want the damn doctors to leave the kids alone. It's not right to mess with children's bodies! They don't really want to have their crocked teeth fixed, they are probably just autistic or depressed! They should live with their fucked up crooked teeth untill they are 21 and then they can decide if they reaaaally want to get braces. But they still should go to a therapist first to see if they actually have crooked teeth dysphoria or if they are just depressed. Also I don't think people should be allowed to wear braces in public were kids can see them. But I'm not bracephobic, I just have some concerns.

[frogwithapen]

When I was a kid, maybe 14 or so (which is, you know, 20+ years ago), I belonged to a Yahoo! mailing list for an anime called Gundam Wing. It was mostly populated by other teens, of varying ages, as it was started by a teen and her friends. Eventually it migrated, when Yahoo! groups started as forums, and even branched off into non-GW related stuff in a second forum.

One of the things I remember the most clearly is the oldest person in the group. Her name was Steelsong. She was a 40-something Dom with a sub whose name we knew even though we knew nothing else. She ran her own fanfic archive because the web was still handmade HTML and navigated in webrings and I’m pretty sure Google didn’t exist or was only barely, barely launched and not well known. She was kind and patient and we loved her. She treated everyone on the group with the respect given any adult, even though most of the rest of the world was still treating us like we were children. Not teenagers even, but children. She never once condescended to any of us, never made our youth a barrier to her respect, never treated us like we were incapable of being full people or like we were less than her because we were young.

I remember that she hosted our fanfiction, as absolutely terrible as it was (and I still have some of it, I am WELL aware of how cringingly terrible it is, just absolute nonsense garbage), right there alongside of other fic that was soul-achingly beautiful. Not a separate section for her friends or for kids, just right there like we were good enough to feature alongside other authors. I never once received crit from her that I didn’t ask for, only support. Only love. I am still writing today partly because Steel was so kind about our fic, fanfic and original.

I remember that when I started doing clay sculpture, she commissioned a tiny pair of dragons from me, to support me doing artwork. She sent a check my mom cashed for me, and my mom helped me mail it when it was finished. It broke in transit, and Steel assured me that she mended it and that it was still beautiful. It was a small gold dragon curled up with a small silver dragon.

I remember that her patience knew no bounds. I remember that she was there for us, regardless of reason. When we wanted to know silly things like what to do with a single AA battery, she answered. When we had serious questions about sex, she answered.  When we had questions about writing, she taught us. When one of our group members, a young gay teen in Australia, ended up in the hospital and then stopped making posts, and we all knew what had happened, she let us talk to her about it because we couldn’t go to our own parents, even though we had just lost a friend.

She was not a replacement to my parents, but she was an extra parent, in some ways. A friend, certainly, but someone that had been through more life than we had and was willing to pass on knowledge if we asked for it. Someone older that we trusted with things that were too uncomfortable to go to our parents or teachers or whatever about, because we already knew she wasn’t going to judge us or something, and that we would get an honest answer.

I don’t know why I’m remembering this so hard tonight, and I’m not sure if there’s a point to sharing this, except that I know she’s gone now. She was ill the last time we spoke, and her site went down a long time ago, and I miss her. She was a huge influence on my life, then and now. She was hope, for me, that life as an adult didn’t have to be boring, it wouldn’t have to mean giving up the things I loved and Becoming Only Responsible With No Fun. Her presence meant I had hope I could still write and play with friends even when I wasn’t ‘a kid’ anymore. And she’s gone, and I miss her, and I wanted to share her from the perspective of youth, and the perspective over twenty years later has provided me.

And I think of her, when people go off about older folks being in fandom with younger folks. I’m an older folks now, or at least middle aged folks because there are certainly folks older than me still, but I wasn’t always. I’ve been here since i was a younger folks, and I know how much Steel’s presence and support meant to me, how much she helped not just me but everyone on that group. And I think of the people saying older folks don’t belong in fandom, and that they shouldn’t interact with younger folks at all, and I just think… I can’t agree. I needed that kind of solid presence in my life back then and even at the age I am now, I need the folks older than me to stay. I want them here.

So I guess, like, if you’re here and you’re 40 or 50 or 60 or 70 or 80 or whatever, I want you here in fandom with me, still. Your presence here is a comfort. It is hope. It is a reminder that life will continue to be fun, even as I get older, myself. And if you’re younger and you have this sort of elder in your groups, I hope that they are like Steel. I hope they are kind and patient and supportive, and that knowing them gives you hope for your own future. I hope in twenty years you look back and remember them fondly.

[frogwithapen]

people always say autistic people think in black and white, but then they *teach* us in black and white. good girl, bad girl. good (normal) behavior, bad (abnormal) behavior. you have to be consistent with these kids

my therapist gave me a feelings chart and when I circled more than one told me to choose one feeling. in social skills group, they were always asking questions like, “is talking about airplanes expected or unexpected behavior?” and “it depends” was not the right answer- talking about airplanes is unexpected, inappropriate, abnormal, bad behavior (at least when you are one of Those Kids. when you like things too much you aren’t allowed to like things anymore)

here is your behavior chart, you either get a sticker or you don’t. here is your anger scale, you aren’t allowed to say you don’t know. we need an answer that fits into a graph because we are graphing your anger. here is a social story where everything is so simplified it resembles real life about as much as stick figures resemble people. here are your right and wrong answers and you play, move, think wrong

special educators are some of the most rigid people I’ve met. you have to follow the program. it has to fit on this chart. you have to be consistent with these kids

[frogwithapen]

Realistically, a household the size of Wayne Manor needs more than just a butler, and while Bruce might imagine he can keep his proclivities secret from his own domestic staff, Alfred certainly harbours no such illusions. I've gotta wonder what the orientation lecture he's worked out looks like. Like, of course they're going to be extensively vetted before they ever set foot on the premises, but at some point during the onboarding process the subject of the Batcave has gotta come up – I just wanna know how Alfred broaches that.

[frogwithapen]

trying to get the courage of posting again ò_ó here's some stuff

[frogwithapen]

this was funnier in my head

[frogwithapen]

here's a fun parchment fact for you re: reusing a surface: sheepskin was often used for legal documents because it's hard to scrape out a word and rewrite without it being obviously damaged, unlike good quality calfskin where it can be undetectable that something has been altered

[frogwithapen]

in my head the star wars equivalent of tswift is some human woman named tay’lor spiff or something and her stans are losing their minds over theories that she’s secretly a jedi singing about the horrors of war, even though she’s from a neutral system that hasn’t seen so much as a moral panic in 50 years

[frogwithapen]

this rave sucks they don't even have platypus controlling me

[frogwithapen]

I am fucking dying

[frogwithapen]

As with the horse poll, please regard these options as sliders. The extent to which each one deviates from 1/6th of the total will determine the amount that canine aspect deviates from the "average."

I will draw the dog we make. :)

[frogwithapen]

[frogwithapen]

Reblog for a larger sample size, if possible.

#it was a hard toss up between giant winter coat and ominous cloak #ended up choosing the winter coat #but only because i already can and do wear the cloak

[frogwithapen]

Today I realized its kind of a shame that @mysteryfleshpit is a national park and not another kind of protected land because you can sing "Mystery Flesh Pit National Forest" to the same tune as "Doofenschmirtz Evil Incorporated!"