#I gave leo two peircings | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

hvndcvffed · 5 years

Text

s u r v e y : g r i z z v i s s e r .

he slides it into the submission box late, because he kept lending people his only pen. whoops.

basic information

FULL NAME: gareth paul visser PRONUNCIATION: GAH-reth VISS-er MEANING: gentle. REASONING: his parents named their son after the most important trait they wanted to nurture in him: kindness. his middle name is paul after his paternal grandfather. NICKNAME(S): gareth paul ( only his mother, when she’s angry ), grizz, grizzy, grizzly bear / grizzy bear ( parents ), kiddo ( his dad ) visser, bear ( blue ), jizz ( unwarranted, miles ), babe ( tess, retired ) PREFERRED NAME(S): grizz. don’t call him gareth, please. he’ll just... smile uncomfortably and act like it doesn’t bother him, but it really does. BIRTH DATE: july 26, 2000. 3:23am. during a rainstorm. AGE: 18. ZODIAC: leo. GENDER: cismale. PRONOUNS: he/him. ROMANTIC ORIENTATION: demiromantic ( sexual attraction stems from emotional connection. ) SEXUAL ORIENTATION: homosexual ( closeted ) NATIONALITY: american. ETHNICITY: american very far back. dutch and polish ancestry.

background

BIRTH PLACE: west ham, connecticut. HOMETOWN: west ham, connecticut. SOCIAL CLASS: upper. FATHER: keith visser. one of the lead police detectives on west ham’s police force. 48. jewish. avid outdoorsman, and can often be found hiking, kayaking, or rock climbing on the weekends. has a habit of cleaning off lisa & grizz’s plates, if they leave behind some peas or mashed potatoes. snacks on leftovers for breakfast, but can make a mean frittata. the secret’s all in making sure you’ve got a super hot pan. cautious, mindful. grizz gets a lot of his serene disposition from his father. unaware of his son’s sexuality; still thinks he’ll wind up marrying tess, or maybe hannah, or even cassandra. gets a kick out of becca when she comes around the house, because she’s so little. calls her shortstack, but only when pancakes are around to make the pun stick. MOTHER: lisa “lees” visser. 46. editor-in-chief for the west ham chronicle. freelance landscaper / gardener on the weekends, for fulfillment more than the money. religious, catholic born-and-raised, but she now attends the unitarian church in town. the switch happened once she married keith and they reasoned they wanted their child to have a composite world-view, one they could interpret and internalize free from categorical restraint. very in touch with her emotions; likes facilitating family discussions. made the executive decision to pull grizz out of dance classes after one year of lessons, because her 4-year-old son donned a sparkly feather boa and she didn’t like what she saw. primarily motivated by maternal and protective instinct. wants what’s best for her son: safety. supported grizz’s relationship with tess through and through. mentions her from time to time, because she’s still unclear as to why they called it off. she wants grizz to be happy. tess made him happy. SIBLING(S): none. his parents never told him, but they lost a child in infancy about 2 years before they had him, and suffered a miscarriage when they tried for another child when he was 5. his parents don’t talk about it, and they see their lives as very full with just grizz. they considered adopting when he was around 8, but ultimately decided against it. one child fills their hearts plenty. they’ve practically adopted all his friends ( especially blue, becca, hannah, and tess ) as part of the family anyway. BIRTH ORDER: only child. PET(S): grew up with a tabby cat, doobie, who lived to be 14. as a kid, he always dreamed about having a pet kimodo dragon. gets a real kick out of chinchillas, but the visser family’s rarely home: they’re always out and about, going on hikes, exploring connecticut and the northeast. they travel often. so it wouldn’t be fair, having to leave any pet at home alone. OTHER IMPORTANT RELATIVES: his uncle james lives on the edge of town and works under peyton pellegrino’s dad in the fire department, so the families are close. they get together each year for christmas eve. his younger cousins live down by the sea in mystic, kipp ( age 4 ) & rebekah ( age 7 ). they facetime often, and the family makes annual trips to mystic seaport. they pile onto grizz’s back and have a blast running around the docks. PREVIOUS RELATIONSHIPS: tess de luca ( freshman year - end of junior year ). ARRESTS?: none. but he does make frequent trips to the station to drop food off for his dad and his buds. PRISON TIME?: not unless you count the one time his dad played an april fools’ joke on him and placed him in a jail cell for 10 minutes for, “ bringing the wrong flavor cookies. the biggest crime of ‘em all, kiddo. ”

occupation & income

SOURCE OF INCOME: he works as a summer camp counselor at an adventure camp during school intersession, leading hikes & nature trips. during the school year, he’s too tied up with football to hold a job. he’s grateful that his parents are willing to help him out for major expenses, but he’s definitely the saving type, so most things he can cover on his own. he helps his neighbors out with taking care of pets & gardens as needed, so that’s a way to earn some fast cash. even though he always insists he can’t take their money. CONTENT WITH THEIR JOB (OR LACK THERE OF)?: yes! granted, working with phone-addicted kids in the wilderness can be difficult, but he’s thankful to get the breather from west ham. PAST JOB(S): he used to deliver papers on his bike, when he was younger, since his mom had the connection. SPENDING HABITS: frugal. more likely to spend on experience than material. MOST VALUABLE POSSESSION: his dad’s collection of original-release vinyls by the beatles.

skills & abilities

TALENTS: writing, but he won’t admit it. football. wood-whittling. gardening. whistling. navigation. knot-tying. making sumptuous drip coffee. SHORTCOMINGS: sells himself short, a lot. his sexuality. can be impatient at times, when other people are slower to pick things up. will often take over getting something done ( i.e. a group project ) if he feels people aren’t doing it the most effective way. LANGUAGE(S) SPOKEN: english, french. a tad of latin. he wants to learn more hebrew, especially since he’s from a blended household, but that shit’s difficult and he never had time to enroll in hebrew school full-time as a kid. DRIVE?: yes. he has his own car, for ease of getting to/from games, etc. but prefers to ride his bike around town. JUMP-STAR A CAR?: yes. CHANGE A FLAT TIRE?: yes. his dad taught him how when they had to call aaa on their way home from hiking the adirondacks, a trip they gave him for his twelfth birthday. RIDE A BICYCLE?: yes. he goes everywhere on that thing. need a ride? hop on. SWIM?: yes. the visser household has a very nice in-ground pool, heated. PLAY AN INSTRUMENT?: not really. grizz appreciates music and loves listening to it, but never really learned how to make it himself. unless you count a year or two of required band in elementary school, during which he ( very badly ) played the clarinet. PLAY CHESS?: yeah. he played a lot with his maternal grandfather growing up. big glasses of chocolate milk, classic rock, and chess. BRAID HAIR?: yes. it’s all very simple, once you learn how to tie all the scouting knots. TIE A TIE?: so many. thank you, boy scouts of america. PICK A LOCK?: he’s read up on it, but never actually done it. the closest he’s gotten is cutting his own padlock off his camping locker during his 7th grade boy scouting trip to maryland, when he conveniently forgot the combination.

physical appearance & characteristics

FACE CLAIM: jack mulhern. EYE COLOR: hazel, a murky blend of gold and forest green. depending on the lighting, they look different: in bright sunlight, they look like a faded jade green. sometimes, when the room’s darker, they look more gold. reference. HAIR COLOR: deep, russet brown. HAIR TYPE/STYLE: jaw-length, straight with some wave to it. typically worn down, tucked behind one ear, or up in a tiny little man-bun. reference one. reference two. reference three. GLASSES/CONTACTS?: he’s blessed with 20/20 vision! but he’ll still try on your glasses, if it’ll make you laugh. there’s a photo of him on the visser fridge wearing his mom’s readers and holding a tray of fresh-baked cookies. he looks like a friendly neighborhood grandma. DOMINANT HAND: left-handed. but he’s worked for years to become ambidextrous for most tasks. he can’t brush his teeth with his right hand, though. it feels funny. HEIGHT: 6′2. WEIGHT: 158 lbs. BUILD: broad-shouldered. lean waist. chiseled core, strong legs. he’s got an athlete’s build for sure – he’s perhaps not as heavy as other guys on that football field, but it takes some serious force to knock him down. tall. but he kind of hunches, just slightly, to not take up so much space. EXERCISE HABITS: varsity football team. lots of morning and night runs. crunches, push-ups, pull-ups: he’s got one of those bars in his doorway. weight-lifting with the team. yoga, sometimes. SKIN TONE: light, but he spends a lot of time outdoors. no freckles. TATTOOS: none. but would love to get a walden quote, or a simple pine tree. someday. PEIRCINGS: none. but maybe once he gets to college he’ll get his ear pierced. MARKS/SCARS: some miscellaneous scars on his hands from whittling incidents growing up. a faint line across his arm from stitches, when he broke it in the peewee football league in fifth grade. he has a barely-there scar just to the right of his left ear, along his hairline, from a camping incident. NOTABLE FEATURES: his hair. his eyes. people have drunkenly said he’s got kissable lips. USUAL EXPRESSION: inquisitive, collected. he’s always thinking. CLOTHING STYLE: letterman jacket. jeans. tall socks, boots. pants tucked into socks, because why the hell not? flannels, hoodies, utility jackets layered over plain white tees. pendant necklaces, leather bracelets. occasionally he’ll wear a statement button-downs that looks like your grandmother’s upholstery, but somehow it’ll work really well. varsity t-shirts. hats of all varieties. if he could, he’d showcase some edgier styles. but he’s paranoid. he’s got a stanford hoodie buried in his closet. and a yale one, too. JEWELRY: leather bracelets. a silver ring strung on a chain, engraved with “ for sylvie, with love ”. he found it on a hike, and… figured he’d be sylvie for a day, or something like that. ALLERGIES: sulfur-based antibiotics. bullshit. idiocy. BODY TEMPERATURE: runs hotter than most. probably the first to offer you his jacket or sweater, if you look cold. DIET: grizz’s mom loves to cook, so they’re always trying some new paleo trend. some of it’s awful. but he’ll try to eat it and if he can’t, he’ll sneak a granola bar later. he’s bad at pretending disgusting shit tastes good. his nose will wriggle up involuntarily and he’ll sniffle. if the school’s serving smiley face fries, he’ll have those. he really likes green apples and those little clementines. cajun fries are some of the best things ever invented. PHYSICAL AILMENTS: nope. he’s quite able-bodied and he’ll use it as a way to take the burden off of his parents. grizz knows how to do most things around the house: fix a faucet, replace bulbs, work on pipes, etc. because his parents are getting older and he doesn’t want them to hurt themselves doing something he’d barely even break a sweat at. he’s always volunteering to help out his neighbors with heavy packages, retrieving their mail, tending their gardens, etc. it’s no hassle. so why not?

psychology

MORAL ALIGNMENT: neutral good. he’s all for what’s morally right. sometimes laws and rules leave that out. TEMPERAMENT: melancholic. ( analytical, wise, peaceful. ) ELEMENT: water. MENTAL CONDITIONS/DISORDERS: mild insomnia, sometimes. but he’ll usually just throw on some music and yield to it. guzzle a few redbulls the next day to keep alert for practice. SOCIABILITY: grizz is never the type to turn anyone away, but he does have a fear of compromising his one secret: so... if someone shows signs of seeing through him? he might distance himself a bit. but he’s often compared to glue that binds. he has a real capacity for leadership ( though he’ll never see himself that way ), and tends to be the driving force in maintaining healthy friendships and friend groups. he looks out for his friends. EMOTIONAL STABILITY: very stable. which is why when things go awry and he can’t rationalize his feelings, he gets... scared. vulnerable. PHOBIA(S): irrelevancy. being outed. loss. ADDICTION(S): good literature. DRUG USE: marijuana, but that’s it. ALCOHOL USE: what you’d expect from a popular jock. though he hesitates to think of himself as just a jock, because there’s so much more to his life than just football. PRONE TO VIOLENCE?: no. grizz doesn’t believe in using violence to manipulate or express emotion. but he will punch someone if there’s no other way.

mannerisms

QUIRKS: rarely settles his gaze on anything for more than a few seconds, except for other peoples’ eyes. eye contact is probably one of grizz’s biggest conversational strengths. probably why he makes such a good liar, when he needs to. he’ll finish a pint of ice cream and just sit there for over an hour sucking on the spoon, lost in thought. licks his lips when he’s nervous. plays with his hair a lot. you know he’s anxious when he keeps tucking his hair behind his right ear. chuckles to himself, even when things are the pure opposite of funny. laughs quietly so the skies have to lean in to hear it. dog-ears pages of books; stencils in his thoughts. his bookshelf is a catalogue of interiority: so if he lets you borrow any of his well-loved copies ( becca, cassandra, tess ), you know you’ve got his trust. burns marshmallows, but it always seems like he’s waiting for the perfect brown before he lets the thing catch fire. sneaks peanut m&m’s into the house because his mom’s on another big health kick; he munches on them in the basement theater with his dad, mischief aplenty. stole HOBBIES: jotting notes in book margins. he dabbles in poetry but feels like his shit is too beat-generation to be that cool. wandering through the woods and attempting to generate his own maps, then checking them for accuracy. lighting matches in the cold, mid-evening air just to watch them burn. watching minimalist apartment tour videos. whispering poetry out loud to himself with his eyes closed, to feel the words shape his lips. HABITS: standing in front of the mirror and trying to let the word gay escape his lips without panic setting in. asking others how they are instead of answering when it’s asked of him. when he goes to bed later than his parents, he’ll peek in their doorway to make sure they’ve gotten into bed safe. setting up the french press before he leaves for his morning runs, so coffee’s ready for his parents when they wake up. bringing donuts to the station, just to make his dad’s coworkers laugh. getting drunk and tossing finger guns around like free candies. NERVOUS TICKS: pursing his lips. biting the inside of his cheek. rocking back and forth on his heels. avoiding eye contact. growing quieter than usual. choppy focus. leaving text messages unanswered for days on end. DRIVES/MOTIVATIONS: make it to graduation and get out of west ham. live this lie a little longer. protect his friends. nurture his family. make sure his dad eats: he tends to forget, when he’s on duty. look after his teammates. keep everyone else grounded. FEARS: time. losing his family: too many people in this town have experienced that kind of loss for him to indulge in the illusion that he doesn’t run that risk. cassandra’s health might decline. when he comes out in college, people from home might hear. people might hate him. blue’s not really okay, and there’s nothing he can do about it. becca’s having a hard time, and he doesn’t know how to fix it. does he really think sam eliot could ever like him back? what if he made a mistake, breaking it off with tess? what if he doesn’t know himself as well as he used to? he’ll experience firsthand death someday. he’ll lose people, too. he’s so used to picking up everyone else’s pieces. how’s he supposed to do that if he’s the one bleeding? what if he can’t help people as much as they need him to? will his parents hate him for lying about yale? will they hate him for giving up on football to pursue literature & philosophy? fear. that one’s ironic. POSITIVE TRAITS: charismatic, introspective, pacific, quick-witted. NEGATIVE TRAITS: self-contained, reckless ( with himself ), careless ( with himself ). SENSE OF HUMOR: dry, witty. facetious, but never ill-intended. lots of eye rolls and light laughs. DO THEY CURSE OFTEN?: ask his parents, they’ll say no. but hell yeah. CATCHPHRASE(S): uno. dos. tres. & a bonus: “ what the fuck ? ” & “ i’m surrounded by idiots. ”

favorites

ACTIVITY: reading. writing. gardening. football. ANIMAL: fish. they’re so graceful and they don’t bother anybody. BEVERAGE: half-oreo half-chocolate milkshake. extra whipped cream. two cherries. please. BOOK: le petit prince by antoine de saint-exupéry. it was the last book his grandmother ever read to him, on his fifth christmas eve. he can recite the first and last lines by heart, in english and french. CELEBRITY: young johnny depp. emma watson. COLOR: a nice, deep forest green. he also likes burnt reds and browns. DESIGNER: i mean... he knows his way around adobe creative cloud? FOOD: cajun curly fries. ugh. FLOWER: there’s something really beautiful about forget-me-nots. his grandmother used to pick a few of them with him in her backyard. she was big on those kinds of things. and all those silly sayings like: tickle tickle on the knee. if you laugh, you don’t love me! grizz always faught so hard not to laugh. his toddler self would puff out his cheeks and hold his breath until the twenty-second window was up. GEM: any kind of geode. HOLIDAY: halloween. boo. MODE OF TRANSPORTATION: biking! MOVIE: mr. nobody. eternal sunshine of the spotless mind. the first time little grizz saw alice in wonderland, he wouldn’t shut up about it for two weeks MUSICAL ARTIST: the divine comedy, radiohead, pink floyd, the beatles, the rolling stones, the kooks. the avett brothers. belle & sebastian. he envies bowie, prince, and mercury for like... living their truths. QUOTE/SAYING: “ if you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need. ” SCENERY: mountain ranges. the view from the top of difficult climbs. snow-dusted treetops. SCENT: the connecticut homesick candle. it smells like cinnamon and nutmeg and vanilla and fireside bliss. and pine trees. yum. SPORT: football. SPORTS TEAM: “ centurions on me! centurions on three! ” TELEVISION SHOW: he grew up watching wallace and gromit. he’s still got a soft spot for it. he also really likes travel channel specials. WEATHER: gentle rain. VACATION DESTINATION: he doesn’t know this, but his parents were planning a month-long backpacking trip through new zealand as his grad gift.

attitudes

GREATEST DREAM: live his truth, fearlessly. get to yale and just... be himself. whatever that means. GREATEST FEAR: people in west ham will find him out. he’s not ready. MOST AT EASE WHEN: he’s with tess. the visser family has relaxed nights in, or firepits in their backyard. when he’s neck-deep in a good book. reading dickinson. listening to the beatles. on the field, where none of his demons can touch him. LEAST AT EASE WHEN: people ask difficult questions, questions he doesn’t have the answer to. you’re gay, aren’t you? BIGGEST ACHIEVEMENT: his boy scout eagle scout award. he constructed and taught faculty how to maintain a sustainable farm-to-table garden at each of west ham’s three elementary schools. BIGGEST REGRET: not getting to know his grandmother more before she passed. not... telling blue the truth. telling himself the truth. breaking up with tess. he had to free her. but it still stings. MOST EMBARRASSING MOMENT: he cried at endgame in theaters. jason hasn’t lived it down for weeks. BIGGEST SECRET: he’s gay. he thinks he’s gay. he’s... he’s not as self-assured as people think. not as strong. he committed to yale without telling a single soul, except cassandra. his parents still think he’ll be going to uconn or southern for hockey. TOP PRIORITIES: looking after his loved ones. making sure everyone’s okay. securing the centurions’ top season record. helping blue, somehow. how can he ease tess’s pain? get to graduation. get to graduation. leave west ham behind.

#ᴛʀʏɪɴɢ ᴛᴏ ᴀᴄᴄᴇᴘᴛ ᴛʜᴇ ᴍᴀɴ ɪ ᴀᴍ ! ɪꜱᴍꜱ.#newhamhq: task

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