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seyaryminamoto · 4 years

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In your opinion, what do you think is the predominant love language of Sokka and Azula? And how would they express it to each other? :)

I really don’t know much about this whole classification of love languages, if you want me to be honest xD a quick wikipedia search says it’s basically a way to break down and categorize different displays of love? And there’s five of them, apparently? I have to say frankly that, as I write them, Sokka and Azula basically do everything in that list of five languages:

Words of affirmation: one of my main must-haves in virtually any Sokkla setting, where Azula is either not redeemed or halfway there, is Sokka telling Azula she’s not a monster. As you may have noticed, that particular thing bugs Azula fans a lot, and we really wish someone would tell her she isn’t one :’D thus, one of Gladiator’s most emotional scenes in Part 1 is Azula’s mild breakdown in Ember Island where Sokka reasons with Azula’s belief of being a monster and tells her that she’s about as human as can be, and the darkness inside her isn’t anything that makes her fundamentally worse than anyone else. There’s so many scenes I could point to that feature words of affirmation they say to each other, or that they say to other people about each other *cough* look forward to chapter 187 *cough*, some of my favorites from Azula to Sokka was her reasoning for wanting to celebrate his birthday (” I've wanted to celebrate your birthday because I'm quite grateful that you were born”), as well as her later affirmation that she loves him for who he is: (”I can say, truthfully… that I love that you're a non-bender. I know it might seem strange, but… I wouldn't change anything about you"). This is without going into the ten thousand times they’ve said they love each other :’D virtually all their conversations in Part 2 end up featuring words of affirmation of one sort or another, from either of them, no matter how often they may tease each other. So... this one is pretty predominant, I suppose?

Quality time: and see, this one happens to be Gladiator Part 2 in a nutshell. Whenever they have any time to spare (well, when Azula does, in particular), their immediate idea is to spend that free time together, in whatever capacity is possible. Outside of free time, they also work together as sponsor and gladiator, so they have their training sessions, Sokka’s fights, the events in the League... Sokka also helps her out with anything she may need (for instance, he took up a job as swordmanship teacher for the Enforcers to give Azula a hand, which still means they get to spend a bit of time together, even if she’s really busy with her new undertakings), so in the end, they spend most their time together, and they’d spend even more of it if they could. They only separate whenever they have no official justification for spending time together, such as when Sokka was still recovering from the Jeong Jeong incident, and even then they were desperate to return to each other ASAP. So... yeah, I think it’s safe to say, Gladiator-wise, they dedicate all the time they can to each other. And, as far as I’m concerned, other stories and settings could even have them spending more time together than they do in Gladiator, since there’s no Ozai breathing down their necks and threatening to kill Sokka if he finds out he’s his daughter’s secret lover. Therefore... quality time is also guaranteed.

Giving gifts: This one might be the less obvious one with Sokka and Azula, because Azula’s initial generosity (in Gladiator) answered some very specific needs: she ensured he was well fed, clothed, trained, bought him a house, found a maid for him... basically, she gave him a thousand things, but it wasn’t because she was showing she loves him, it was because she knew such things would be necessary for Sokka to offer a decent performance as a gladiator. Now then, after their initial hurdles are out of the way and their relationship has progressed, Sokka gives Azula occasional gifts but constantly struggles to come up with something she’ll genuinely cherish. He made Xin Long’s armor, he brought her flowers, he tried to cook for her, he gave her a tiny hot-air balloon, and crafted a betrothal necklace for her... he also wrote poetry, and he’ll try his hand at another artistic venture with Azula very soon. But this stuff is pretty sparse, even if Azula appreciates it a lot whenever it happens. As for Azula, she will give Sokka some pretty nice gifts very soon, just as she continues to provide for all his needs. In recent times, the gifts she’s been willing to give Sokka have been mostly non-physical ones, such as the thumbs-up she gives his crowd in his stead, once they’re leaving the Royal Dome on the day he wins against the Mad Alchemist, or ordering her Barge back into Whaletail Island’s port so Sokka could meet Katara... it’s stuff that means a lot to him, more than any physical gifts might (this, paired with the fact that Azula had offered to bring him home whenever he wished to go, without forcing him to stick to their original deal). So, maybe the gift-giving isn’t quite the classic sense of it, but it still happens in its own way. In general, I think it’s difficult for Sokka to give gifts to a Princess who basically can have it all... so that’s why he generally tries the DIY route with gifts, and so far it has paid off wonderfully because she genuinely loves everything he crafts for her. I think in most settings it’d have to be this way, and depending on Azula’s situation, she can either give him anything he wishes for or maybe resort to small but heartfelt gifts and gestures that mean a lot to the two of them.

Acts of service: this one may even tie slightly with the previous one, but frankly, as far as acts of service are concerned, these two take it the extra mile. Sokka didn’t always fight as her gladiator out of his own convictions, he started off doing it because of their deal... but as time goes by, he genuinely cherishes his role in her life and he would fight anyone for Azula’s sake, if need be. It’s, of course, a mutual thing because Azula will protect Sokka against anything, even her own father, no matter the cost. Hence, their relationship dynamics and battle couple behavior can be interpreted as acts of service for each other. Sokka, like I said before, has tried to cook for Azula too, which is a more classic act of service, as far as I can tell, and she appreciates his efforts even if not his results just yet xD in future chapters Sokka goes out of his way (in two different instances) to get lychee wine for Azula because he knows that’s the only licquor she likes, and every time he does that her heart grows twenty sizes. He also cared for her while she was sick, and she often does the same when he’s wounded, such as how she cared for him in Jeong Jeong’s arc. Sokka also tries to help her have good relations with people such as Captain Zhen, by agreeing to teach swordsmanship to his son because he hoped that would help Azula. Everything Azula did in the current Whaletail Island arc counts as well as an act of service: she’s privileging Sokka’s needs and his bond with his family well above her own needs, to the point of preparing herself to face that he might choose to stay with Katara - and she’s determined to respect his decision, if he were to make it. So, I’d say this one ranks really high, perhaps more than everything else?

Physical touch: ... but this one’s obviously a big deal too considering how damn difficult it is for them to keep their hands off each other at any given moment xD from something as innocent as walking through the Capital’s tunnels holding hands, hence, fulfilling Sokka’s wish for them to “walk through the city while holding hands”, to their very frequent intimate encounters, once these two are together they’re as good as magnets, constantly seeking contact with each other. Sokka has always struck me as a highly affectionate person once he’s with someone he genuinely loves, and so he pours that affection on Azula constantly, to the point where, in the early days of their relationship, she could barely keep up with it all. Physical touch doesn’t come quite as easily to Azula as it does to him, as she has never been someone who receives a lot of physical affection, but her attraction to Sokka has made it so she craves for him physically and on every possible level she can... therefore, despite she’s been awkward when other people show her any physical affection (often pushes Ty Lee off when Ty Lee hugs her, or remains unresponsive, barely responds to Toph’s hugs and stood limp and awkwardly the first time she did it, nearly flipped out when Ozai reached for her hand in the temple that one time, and most recently was left drawing blanks when Zuko hugged her....), she’s at ease when it’s with Sokka, so much that she welcomes his touch and everything about physical contact with him, altogether.

In short... I seriously think they do it all? You could, perhaps, rank the languages depending on which one is more predominant, to a fault xD but there’s genuinely no love language they outright don’t do, at least in Gladiator (and honestly, I doubt they don’t use all love languages in my other stories). But I guess, if you really want me to rank them...

Acts of service

Physical touch - Words of affirmation

Quality time

Gift-giving

Sorry, I really think Physical touch and Words of affirmation are virtually tied together in the story, both things tend to happen at the same time, and I really can’t bring myself to rank either thing higher, so it’s a draw. Quality time falls to #3 because they can sacrifice being together sometimes, as much as they hate doing it, but they can survive while being apart (despite Sokka would likely argue with me and say he absolutely can’t, but you know, ignore him (?)). Gift-giving, while very heartfelt and cute when it happens, is sparse, like I said... so it can stay in the last place, despite it’s still part of what they do for each other.

Is this comprehensive enough? :’D I sure hope so...

(if anyone needs me to hide this under a read more, let me know... got longer than I thought it would, woops)

#anon #... ended up being a very gladiator-oriented answer so #gladiator #sokkla #love languages is such a strange new concept to me #it's not the first time I hear it #but frankly Sokkla do it all #if that's not how it's supposed to work well #I'm sorry the love between my OTP is as OP as it is (?)#but that's how it works (?)

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d-exavier · 7 years

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Dear Carlos,

I can hardly say how grateful I am to be walking alongside you in this season, just three years after we first met. It’s never felt like I’ve known you my whole life; but it has always been clear to me that we were meant to meet in the moment we did. Our individual proclivities for abysses along with our four sockets holding eyes weary of disaster have ebbed in the way of outrage and flowed in the direction of relief in this primordial sea of art making we’ve committed to. No matter how much our thoughts and inclinations convene or diverge—you coming from an imaginary concerned with exile, me coming from an imaginary concerned with home—at least one of our questions has remained constant and shared: How are we (as in proximate bodies) supposed to live (as in more than exist) after all (as in history, as in consequence, as in time)?

How you’ve chosen to (re)visit this question in The Utterances is at once deeply challenging and strangely sensible, calling for a reorientation of the corporeal, language, and time. In a year as technologically advanced as this 2017, you’d think we’d be able to, with the assistance of all our books, words, and toys, find ways to imagine beyond instances of personal catastrophe. After all, the scale of catastrophe is always collective; that’s literally how big it is, encompassing completely. Catastrophe is so total. And yet, our feelings, our ideas, our problems, our solutions concerning any catastrophic event are always so private, individual, small. What an awful reminder of how human we are.

I think of our running joke: I scream, “I don’t even like theater!” You laugh. But then I’m reminded of your question. It seems there is no art form better suited to utter a response to such an inquiry begging an actual “us” to forge ahead in the opposite direction of injury. How terrifying (and opportune) that the first step of this possibility is to give up the self. I, for one, look forward to exactly this—the giving up of my I, the dismantling of my my—with every collaboration I enter. If any of us are going to truly face and move beyond catastrophe, beyond the tyranny of total destruction, it only makes sense we get our unions right. But it requires a certain kind of rehearsal.

What you are considering takes practice: a poetry of embodiment so athletic and precise in awareness a person might be able to tell, like the difference between strands of hair on an arm, when they are being and when they are representing. I wish people, myself included, paid so much more attention to this. When are you person (unarticled, collectively unexceptional): a creature with a body that can cease, in need of a few things that can keep that body from ceasing for a time? When are you the person (a singular impression): an individuated being decidedly human because of things like power and will and the ability to tell (often ignore) time? What rights and responsibilities do we have to oscillate between these poles?

Carlos, I don’t even know. I have no idea. What I am sure of is that there is something deeply wrong with almost every single thing that purports a walkable path for our current set of global conundrums, among the most egregious of these bamboozling maps being the very art we make. I roll my eyes, the ones long weary in their sockets, watching people leave the comfort and shelter of their own homes in daily attempts to convince themselves that they are uncomfortably exiled in service of some kind of art when they are mostly dissatisfied with the entrails of catastrophe they’ve been fed, not recognizing they should be ever grateful they have not been served the belly of the beast.

I think of remnants, the leftovers we’re made to consume daily. Our stomachs are full of ghosts. It leaves little room for the Spirit.

I know giving up the self makes room for more Spirit.

Children, if they get to be that, are full of Spirit.

As I am the Magician says: “The child is easy to trick, but he is no fool.”

Fools are people who grow in years under the mistaken impression that they can keep the whole Spirit of the child. This is a tendency toward possession, a refusal to give up self.

I keep wishing people would grow up: more, faster, actually. I keep praying people would just give themselves up.

I keep wondering if the most important difference between fantasy and imagination is the personal sacrifice it takes to step out of your own mind, the fantastical realm, and into something more collectively, totally unknown: Chaos, the imaginative real.

I am not convinced people actually know what Chaos is.

The current definition of “chaos” might just be: systems of deliberate disorder manufactured by very human hands over time, fantasies on a countdown. I fear this because I recognize it in the worlds artists make: perpetuating economies of power, possession, and hierarchal transaction; inventing small and temporal countries that mimic the violence of colonization; trapping people in personal fantasies while touting enthusiastic convictions about these small and giant feats of imagination; hoping that repeated failures in any or all of these tasks might prove none of these horrors are actually true.

It’s sick.

More and more I find troubling correlations between the projects of nation building and art making. The obsession seems to be focused on the wrong query. I don’t think the question is how do we (I) make a(nother) world. What kinds of gods do we think we are? I think the challenge is how might we (all) really live in this one. After everything that’s been done, after history, into the future: What is the collective move forward? Beyond life, beyond death, beyond even love: How are you present? How do you care?

With all my love and gratitude for your care, Diane

Dear Diane,

Before anything else, a deep and abiding, THANK YOU. I find it impossible to imagine having gone through this program without you. So, I’ll dispense with that non-occurrence. A confession: Diane, I do not understand time. Sometimes it feels like Time is carrying me, at others, that I’m riding Time, like a current down whichever river I’m closest to at the time. And then sometimes, Time drops me off. It’s at these moments; I can see more clearly what’s around me. I’ve had more of those moments these past three years. That’s no small thing, and it has been a privilege to be in your company for this leg of the journey: contemplating shape, geography, land, home, exile, wakes, breaks, prophecy, utterances, and good blood.

It took me forever to learn to tie my shoes; and when I was young, it was often said of me, and quite like this: “That boy ain’t got a lick of common sense.” It wasn’t just that I was untethered; I was a bona fide space cadet. And we don’t need to debate whether I still am sometimes. It was the sky, and the night sky ,in particular, that captivated me, the stars, and the stars’ integrity; I was obsessed. In the face of that mystery, tying shoelaces, the right-in-front-of-your-faceness of it, was rendered a ridiculous prospect. I couldn’t do it. I resisted; and the result being, I tripped all over the goddamned place. That's where we find ourselves, in this world of ours. Trippin.’

I know now that it takes confrontation with death, to approach the common. Death, being that which is held by all. Common, as in that which brings us into a greater fellowship of consideration. If this is true, neither of us is lacking; and not just us. So many Others are not lacking in this confrontation with actual death, and so ultimately, find it impossible and futile to be in the habit of abstracting death. I'm attempting to think this abstraction of death with a western obsession for nostalgia, and now, a burn-it-at-all-cost kind of that nostalgia, which cannot ever be fulfilled: well, at least, the nostalgia can’t. We can burn, and this nostalgia is ultimately an exercise in fantasy. We live right now. We live right now. That eternal and childish daydreaming which fixes the gaze on a kind of time that collapses in on itself, this nostalgia pulls everything which it encounters into itself, turning all it encounters into bone, fodder, ash, global ghosts. We are not!

Prophecy, as dramaturgy, may be an intervention, or rather a way of being, before this way we’ve trod along embedded itself as normative and sufficient. At once atmospheric, and capacious, inchoate, prophecy invites us to open ourselves to all time. It is evident to me when encountering, Good Blood, and its stratagems, that what I am experiencing is a deployment of the reparative, the prophetic. It is attention inside of Time, the linear made eternal. In this way, Good Blood is epic. There is a cartography of Spirit at work; that prayerful attention that requires a lover to get up off their damn knees, and to stand up, open, and rise before the work at hand. Chelsea Beyond Her Years depends upon this opening. All of us do.

Diane, this labor of regard is a hallmark of your work and the liberatory ethic at its core. Liberation will not be managed. The ways of being, your work insists upon is different than just collisions with systems of reform, it's after revolution. This must be rehearsed in our rooms even before we build them; and how do we build the literal rooms, this one being one of those, but really all our inhabitations, so that these inhabiting spaces bring us, truly bring us into consideration of our condition. We don't have to do this alone; and of course, we can’t. If, at times we get frustrated with theater, and really all art, it’s precisely where we’ve not encountered a proper consideration, which is sometimes just really being with someone, or something, together, even an idea, or a question, a death even. What about the weather?

(Insert tornado, hurricane joke here, can I take a rain check?)

Home is the force, beyond any other that totalizes and marks us. It is our great and proper reaction. Home is wherever I am. Well, it is, and it isn't. Home is an attachment to land. So am I homeless when I am landless? Home is where my Ancestors’ Spirits are. Can Spirits swim? I mean, really, can they swim and, if so, how far; also, do they get tired? I’m really asking. In Good Blood, Chelsea Beyond Her Years senses this paradox and inquires. I can’t tell if she’s satisfied with the answer she receives. I don’t know if we are.

The 40,000 ghosts, or the incalculable deaths, as they are so often referred, in media and history, haunt Good Blood, haunt us. I’m talking about incalculable loss, here. It is it true, the calculus of it is impossible task, and at the same time, I know, that we better do our math, and by do our math, I mean calculate, and by calculate, I mean remember, and where memory and the archive fail us, we must imagine, which means that our work is never finished.

The result and inverse of nostalgia is apocalypse. It is often presented as alien and not actual, as that which is far away. I want to argue for its presence with us now. One need only pay attention. When we can’t see this, this is marker of a willful evacuation of memory.

Can we get an intervention?

Can we?

I have to believe that we are all older than we know.

Like Time, Good Blood carries us, rides us, drops us all inside of itself, like Time.

With Love,

Carlos

#letters #Good Blood #The Utterances #catastrophe #apocalypse #new plays

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