The whole discourse about the privacy/secrecy/support thing has been sitting with me for a few days (I mean other than it always does to a certain degree) thanks to all the excellent discussion happening and I know I'm not saying anything that hasn't been said a million times before, but I think what we're seeing and what we're going to learn (e.g. from TTPD) is that it wasn't just the support issue, but how it was shown/handled.
We've all gone out of our way to show that introversion =/= lack of support. Someone can be shy, reserved, etc. and still show up for their partner, whether in public or at home. To chalk any of the differences up to the clash between introversion and extroversion is unfair to folks who count themselves among either tbh.
@thisisctrying said something the other day that hit the nail on the head about how if that support had been offered in private, there very well may not have been a Joever to begin with, or at least not at this point in time. (Sorry for loosely paraphrasing, and for namedropping you! Long time listener, first time poster.)
If this were a case where the "shy" partner said, "I am really uncomfortable with the spotlight personally and do not want to court it, but I will support you in your ambitions and offer you whatever you need to make them happen and make the glare bearable," I suspect that would have gone a long way to making Taylor feel seen and comfortable in pursuing her goals in the way that she now has. Again, that might have been more akin to the balance that seemed to have been struck around 2019 from what we can see, but even speaking in a general sense, there are lots of couples out there, celebrity or not, that have similar approaches where there are highly driven people and busy careers involved.
(A famous example being Dolly Parton's marriage. Tbh I know next to nothing about her and Carl, but she's always heralded as an example in this regard, because her husband is famously uncomfortable with the spotlight and hasn't accompanied her to public events in decades, but she's said that she never minded that because that was always work to her, and what was important was that he supported her in pursuing all her career goals and basically ensured she had a place to call home to return to at the end of the day.)
We're kind of in a brave new world with her current relationship because it felt like, at least at the start, we were maybe watching her figure out her boundaries in real time as to what she was comfortable with or not and adjust accordingly. Like so many have said, I fully believe the extreme privacy thing was initially driven by herself and her experiences in 2016, and she needed that quiet time to recover from all of the things and figure out how to exist in the world again.
Stating the obvious, it seemed like eventually privacy was equated with secrecy, turning the relationship and the celebrity into the elephant in the room and something to never be spoken of to the outside world. People are free to choose whatever works best for themselves and their relationships, and for some the separate public lives might work, but the “kept me like a secret but I kept you like an oath” theme is all over her work and it’s clear that it’s a sore spot for her, because she’s been made to feel shame just for the life she leads so many times in the past.
What I’m trying to say is that it’s pretty obvious something Not Great was happening behind the scenes, which didn’t just amount to “she wanted to be a public celebrity and he wanted to be a private hermit.” (Also, in case anyone forgot, this is a person who also chose a public-facing career who also has to engage in press for it, but I digress.) As her career reached new heights post-folklore, if she had the support at home to do all the things without judgment and with encouragement, and in turn offer the same support to her partner, she may have very well lived just fine with that, not unlike Dolly Parton’s case.
By reading between the lines in all the press since, as well as comments on tour and general ~vibes~ with TTPD teasers, it seems like one of the issues was that that was likely not the case. There was all the stuff that we saw — the reticence to acknowledge each other in the media (particularly on one side), the lack of public support even at events at which they were both in attendance for their respective jobs, the great lengths they went to not to be photographed together at events they attended yet no problem taking pictures with other friends and coworkers, the jobs that separated them, the withdrawing from the public even for work accomplishments, etc. Which could all be manageable if a couple chooses to do so together and are not inherently a sign of trouble in themselves.
But what we’re seeing now I think is a reflection of the things we weren’t seeing then, and it seems to indicate some very deep hurt. (I know, call me Captain Obvious.) And like so many have been saying, it feels likely that that part of that hurt is rooted in that very lack of private support where a person would expect it from their partner. Obviously as a Taylor fan blog I’m going to be more inclined to understand her side of a story, but tbh, it’s also because… this is sooooooo common, and something I’ve experienced in my friend group. (@taylortruther is right when she says most breakups are the same one way or another lol.)
One partner is resentful of the other’s success, or resentful that the other’s priorities begin to evolve as new experiences unlock new goals, or feels the other’s ambitions are not worthy of pursuit, and coupled with perhaps their own struggles in the same domain, it’s easy to see where that can chip away at the other partner’s morale and faith in the relationship. I know I’m just speculating here, but I also don’t think it’s totally unfounded. (Again, because a) I’m picking up what she’s putting down and b) it happens to sooooooo many women even among us dull normals.)
With all the pointed mentions about how much Taylor feels supported in her current relationship and how she in turn loves to offer the same show of support to not only her partner but other loved ones, how she’s stepped out more in the last year to a whole host of events, how she’s mentioned feeling like she locked herself away for years and she’s just proud of her partner and happy she can show up for him even if the chaos around it is unsettling, it paints a picture of what perhaps was happening before last year.
To feel like you’re all alone in carrying the weight of the relationship (or burden of it), of twisting yourself into knots to accommodate the other person’s boundaries (or insecurities) but not feeling reciprocity for your own has to be so painful. (The idea that it may have been even darker and to have a partner not only be unreceptive to your own needs but even perhaps resentful/dismissive/belittling of them is even more painful to think of. I guess we’ll find out when TTPD comes out if that was the case, too.)
At a certain point, that lack of acknowledgement will force your hand to be able to reclaim yourself. And it feels like the further removed Taylor in particular is from it, the more she moves from being sad about the life she felt she gave up by leaving, to angry at the life she felt she was giving up by staying. Especially being in a relationship now where it seems like everything comes much easier, where she can be open about the person she’s with and show up for them, all the stuff that seemed as challenging as climbing Mount Everest in her past is nothing more than a molehill at best in her current life.
TL;DR: I don’t think it’s privacy that inherently spells doom for a celebrity relationship like this; it’s the mutual support and respect that does. If Taylor had felt that in the later years of her previous relationship, I think we could be seeing a different, though not necessarily unfulfilled, person right now in 2024, who’d be happy on tour but whose personal life would look a little different. But it seems like by losing that support she lost parts of herself, and we’ve seen her reclaim that in spades in the last year, and perhaps to degrees she didn’t even realize she could from before all the Bad Stuff started happening in her young adulthood.
I know this was extremely long-winded and unnecessary, especially about total strangers we only know through scraps fed through the media, but I just always bristle at this idea that issues like these boil down to “personality differences,” as though one person wants to live in a city and the other on a remote island, or some shit like that. The whole support (and gender tbh) issue is one that’s just very close to my heart because again, I have seen it play out with so many of my friends in long term relationships and marriages and I just think people in relationships (and women in particular in some circles) deserve better than to feel like they’re being, well, tolerated.
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The human au is very interesting! Would you do another one? Maybe they get attacked by the deviants and Thena is a bit too late to protect Gil and he gets hurt badly while he saves a kid?
The last thing he remembered was that little girl, standing in the middle of the chaos, looking up at the wall. But whatever they were fighting out there was big.
Gil was forbidden from leaving the gates when they were under attack, even to help get people inside. Partially by Ajak's order and strongly enforced by Thena, it was simply too dangerous for him to be out there.
He was as good as human, now.
He had run over to the girl, protecting her with his own body as a section of wall crumbled from the outside in. Human or not, he was still bigger than she was, and he could still protect humans, even if he was one.
"What happened?"
"You saved a young child," Ajak smiled down at him. She must have healed him, because the pain in his body was screaming.
"Some of the wall fell around and," Sersi grimaced, "on you."
"Don't worry, pal, the kid's fine," Kingo reassured.
Gil's eyes moved around them all. He could even see Druig and Ikaris on the outskirts of their little group. He groaned, "Thena?"
Looks were traded. Ajak looked behind her and nodded her head before looking down at him again. "You should rest, Gilgamesh."
The rest of the Eternals took their leave, leaving the Warrior Eternal to take their place to be the one and only in his vision. He looked up at her, trying to read the expression - or lack thereof - on her face.
"Are you in pain?"
Yes, he was in agony. He blinked at her, "not bad."
Still, she just stared at him, "you lie."
He watched as she moved around Phastos' examination table. He grunted as he tried to sit himself up, "that makes two of us."
"Gil," she put her hand to his chest.
He huffed, flopping back down again. He would have smacked his head on the table if not for her hand cradling the back of it. "Please?"
Thena kept her hand pressed on his chest, but did eventually move one to his back to help him up. "You must move gently. You were gravely injured, Gilgamesh."
He winced as his body took on its own weight again. "I don't remember."
"Perhaps because the gravity of your injury is blocking your memory."
He looked up at her. That eerily still expression was gone but it was replaced with an even worse on. "You're mad at me?"
"Do not trivialise this, Gilgamesh," she scowled at him. He did have to consider himself lucky. If he were anyone else he would be getting a lot more hell than just this. "You were nearer death than I have ever seen you."
He attempted a smile, "I saved that kid, right?"
Thena looked away. She had no argument to that, nor would she shame him for it, no matter her feelings on the issue. Her approach changed direction, "you were told to stay within the walls."
"I was, technically," he pointed out, not that it was helping his case.
She glared at him, "Gilgamesh."
"Hey, I'm the one injured here," he countered, but that just worsened things again. Her fists clenched and she leaned on the edge of the table. He frowned, "Thena?"
"I cannot be in two places at once," she conceded, and it sounded like she deeply and truly resented having to admit such a reality. She finally looked at him, eyes screaming what she could not. "There is only so much I can do to protect you."
Gil sighed, although his broken and then healed ribs protested. "You're protecting me day in and day out, already."
"Does that displease you?"
"I'm not saying that," he cut in quickly. He held out his hand, and was relieved when it seemed that this at least remained the same for them. He brought it to his lips. "How do we make this work?"
Thena bent herself to kiss his lips this time, gentle in a way that made them both want to cry.
"I can't go on like I'm made of glass," he stated aloud that which everyone had been avoiding saying. "And you know it."
"And what would you have me do?" she whispered, locking their fingers together. "Allow you to walk into harm's way when you are mortal?--something you would never allow to happen to me if I were in your place?"
She used that argument often. And she was right; if she had mysteriously turned human overnight he would nary let her out of his sight, let alone onto the battlefield.
And keeping her from fighting would hurt something inside of her, no matter how safe he kept her.
Thena touched her forehead to his, "I know you want to help."
"I can't do nothing, Thena."
"Of course not," she accepted, deeply saddened by his happy declaration. "But I will not watch you die, either."
Gil ran his hand over her cheek. It felt the same, even if he had no Cosmic Energy under his skin. He could still feel hers, though, as if rising to just under her skin, calling out to him. "I promise you won't."
Normally she would scold him for making a promise over which he held so little control. Now, all she did was lean into his touch. "I was too late, today. If that happens again-"
"It won't." Now he was just lying to her. But he tipped her lips to his again. "Hey."
She indulged him, looking into his eyes with her green ones.
"Y'know," he murmured, "this doesn't have an end in sight. Are you really ready to face...what if I never-"
Thena placed her finger upon his lips, then her own lips. She smiled, "am I prepared to have a human for a partner, you mean?"
He blushed.
She inhaled against his cheek. This was the most she had touched him in weeks. "If it's you."
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MULTIMUSE QUESTIONAIRE
Tagging: @infernalight, @infernal-feminae, @heartsofhell, @questionablemuses, @because-i-simp, @frostworkxfiction, @deepspacevivarium, @hotelbitches, @voxiiferous
RULES: Answer the questions with the Muses that would best fit the answers. Bonus if you give details why. If tagged, copy and paste into a new post – DO NOT REBLOG!
1) Rank your softest Muse and your toughest Muse. (Personality-wise)
My softest muse is definitely Vick. He's a 0 on the toughness scale, he's a big teddy bear and he will choose kindness over anything else at any point.
My toughest muse is probably Barbie. Girl is tough as nails and will not be stopped if she puts her mind to something. She doesn't take pain as a reason to stop and will go harder when it hurts.
2) Which Muse would blow through $1000 quickly?
Valentino, hands down. He spends $1,000 every day easily on things he doesn't even need. He loves to buy expensive things and will do so at all hours. He especially loves spending Vox's money. $1,000 is a drop in the bucket for him and he doesn't even notice spending it.
3) Do any of them have nicknames? Is there a meaning behind them?
Quite a few of them do!
Valentino answers to Bunny from his lovers, it's a subspace trigger word for him. I assigned him Bunny because he's Cute And Horny, aka a rabbit, and a bunny sub is fairly common.
4) Are any of them up-to-speed on the latest trends? Anyone more old school?
Velvette, Vox, and Valentino are obsessed with always being on top of the next new thing.
Alastor hates new things and will fight them as much as he can.
5) Who has the best relationship with their siblings?
Valentino had a fairly good relationship with his siblings when he was alive. He had seven of them, plus three live-in cousins that were like his siblings.
6) Karaoke night! Who is likely to grab the mic first and bust out a tune?
Beelzebub, Ozzie, Valentino, and Ostello! They all love to sing and party, and they're all pretty good at it. Ostello was a pop-jazz singer when he was alive and before he died in Hell, too!
7) Who is least likely to enter a beauty pageant/model?
Gretchen. She doesn't think that she's very pretty, and would just feel embarrassed even going to watch.
Travis. He is constantly told he's very ugly, and he doesn't have a very high opinion of his looks.
8) If your Muses visited a haunted house where actors scare you, who would panic and who would be unfazed?
Chazz, Gretchen, Charlie, Anya, Magpie, Summer, Travis, and Vick would be the easiest to scare!
Valore, Dimas, Cash, Glitz, Stu, Paimon, Alastor, Darío, Niffty, and Vox would be the hardest to phase.
9) Are any of your Muses particular about taking certain modes of transportation?
Vox prefers to be driven around and doesn't like driving himself.
Valentino only likes to drive occasionally and prefers pretty sports cars when he does.
Anya and Darío are motorcycle people.
Emily enjoys bicycles!
10) Share a little-known fact about any Muse.
Adam is actually a very good father and he loves kids and babies. He is very tender with children even if he can be harder on them once they have grown into adults.
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