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polaristranslations · 3 years

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Chapter 3 - The First Generation Maniwa Chouchou

This is a story from when this country was a warring country, when times were troubled times.

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No one, including Maniwa Chouchou himself, thought that the ninja would ever be elected as one of the Twelve Chiefs of the Maniwa Ninja Corps. It wasn't that he was incapable, nor was it that he didn't have a following—but there was one quality that Maniwa Chouchou decisively lacked as a shinobi.

And that quality was his physique.

He was—a huge, hulking man that everyone looked up to.

He was well over seven shaku tall, reaching almost eight shaku, with legs that were conspicuously long and arms that were much longer than the accepted norms.

Even from a distance of twenty jou away, Chouchou could easily be recognized, and even in a crowd of two thousand people, Chouchou could easily be recognized.

In a manner almost too weird to be true—

His body was large.

If he had been a samurai, he might have attained greatness.

In fact, there was not a single member of the Maniwa Ninja Corps that could match Chouchou in a simple comparison of strength—but ninja were not beings that simply compared their strength.

Rather, a ninja was someone who hid. Someone who lurked in the shadows.

Someone who concealed themselves.

On the battlefield, his huge body—it could be a weakness and could not become a weapon.

"Well, some things you just can't do anything about—I just have to resign myself to this fate. And it's not like I can hate this body that my parents gave me. Being sturdy is my only saving grace, so I'll carry out my tasks as an underling as best as I can,"

he would say.

As such, he was not so desperate about his circumstances—about his disadvantage.

Maniwa Chouchou was a pleasant person.

For that reason, there were quite a lot of people that lamented the fact that he lacked the qualifications to become one of the Twelve Chiefs from the start—and while the one who called herself the observer of the Maniwa Village, Maniwa Kyouken, wouldn't say she lamented it, she was also among those that felt it was unfortunate.

So when she was assigned an unusually active mission by the village's current head, Maniwa Houou, she decided to take Maniwa Chouchou along with her, even though she could have accomplished it on her own—and doing so may have been a manifestation of those feelings of her.

As a result.

That action of Kyouken's, which was almost a flight of fancy, would drastically change the fate of Maniwa Chouchou, but��

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At a late hour.

Two shadows were running through the craggy mountains—no, they were moving at such speed that their shadows couldn't even be seen.

In the first place, they weren't even running on the ground.

What they were running on—were the overgrown trees.

Without breaking a single branch or scattering a single leaf—as if they were one with nature, cutting through only the wind—the two of them ran.

Maniwa Kyouken and Maniwa Chouchou.

Maniwa Kyouken—a shinobi looked like a young girl with tattoos all over her body, but in reality, she was the observer of the Maniwa village, and, in a sense, she was a veteran authority with perhaps even more influence than the head, Maniwa Houou, himself.

Maniwa Chouchou—who'd been placed in unfortunate circumstances due to his overly long arms, overly long legs, overly long torso, and overly long body—that body that was much too big for him.

The two of them—were running in lockstep.

Of course, with the small Kyouken and the gigantic Chouchou, their paces were entirely different—to be precise, there was more than three times the difference between the two, and yet Kyouken made it seem as if that difference didn't exist—you could say it was, perhaps, a difference in experience.

They...

Were returning—from the task they'd just completed.

"...Tch! Ah, damn it, those guys sure are persistent—!"

In a manner which was unusual for her, Kyouken grumbled as she looked behind her.

Of course, that didn't mean she physically turned.

She simply—searched for presences to her rear.

"How far do they plan on following us, jeez."

"S-sorry, Kyouken-san, because of me—"

Chouchou began to speak in an embarrassed tone—of course, neither of them slowed their pace as they talked. If anything—they were speeding up even more.

"—Things became like this."

"Ha—"

Kyouken laughed. She—forced a laugh.

As if ashamed of herself for grumbling.

"—It's not your fault at all. We just happened to be unlucky this time—"

Their task.

At least for the task itself—they'd succeeded.

However, that was just a matter of course—when it was Kyouken herself that went out to do it, there was no way the task couldn't be successfully completed.

She possessed the ability to accomplish any task on her own. The term "being a match for a thousand" may as well have been made for her. It was almost as if she needed no training or practice—as if the longer she lived, the stronger she became. That was the kind of ninja that Maniwa Kyouken was.

Even now, it was not out of necessity that Kyouken was accompanying Chouchou, but out of concern for him, who would be ruminating on his own disadvantages even more as a result of the current election of the Twelve Chiefs—and Chouchou himself knew that very well.

Though he thought it was an unnecessary concern.

However, more than the concern himself, it was the fact that it was unnecessary—that made him happy.

He had nothing but gratitude towards Kyouken, who was going out of her way to meddle like this.

—However...

—Someone like me... is really...

The problem had arisen just after they had completed their mission—in a completely unrelated location, by chance, by sheer coincidence—Kyouken and Chouchou had been discovered by shinobi from their rival force, the Aioi Ninja Corps.

—No.

—It wasn't by chance—or by coincidence.

And it wasn't that they had been unlucky, either—and Chouchou knew that very well.

There was but one reason they'd been discovered—and it was Chouchou's gigantic body.

Kyouken's (current) small stature, perfect for reconnaissance, would have never been discovered—and even if she had been, it would have been nearly impossible to tell from appearances alone that she could possibly be a shinobi from the Maniwa Ninja Corps.

But it was different for Chouchou.

Chouchou had an unorthodox appearance that made others suspect who he was, just from a single glance—and if he was looked at with such suspicion, it wouldn't be long before his identity was revealed.

They didn't have the option to drive back the enemy.

Choosing that option would end up interfering with the mission they'd just completed—they needed to get as far away from the scene as possible, and they couldn't leave even a trace of combat. Even though they had always been enemies, now was not the time to be fighting with the Aioi Ninja Corps.

But, of course, the other side didn't know that.

If anything, the more they tried to avoid conflict, the more the Aioi Ninja Corps would try to press further.

Hence—their current situation.

"Ten people, huh? It's even more than before. They're multiplying like rats. Ahaha, maybe they're actually popping out some kids?—"

This time, in a manner that was more usual for her, she mixed in a joke—but even so, Kyouken's expression showed signs of impatience.

"If only I could kill all ten of them in an instant—but I guess that's impossible. Chouchou-chan. Maybe you can do it with your Maniwa kenpou?"

"With my kenpou?"

Chouchou responded.

"My kenpou isn't really designed for one-on-many situations—and even then, in this situation, I don't know if I can kill even one person."

"Ah, is that so."

Kyouken didn't seem too discouraged.

It was as if she were saying, there was no point in despairing even further in this situation—but in other words, it meant that they'd been cornered by that much.

"It doesn't seem like there are any kunoichi among the enemies, either—oh dear, oh dear. Don't tell me your Kyouken-nee-san is gonna be retired from her post here? What a surprise."

Laughing self-deprecatingly, Maniwa Kyouken ended up breaking one of the branches she stepped on.

Chouchou saw it happen.

The situation was bad—bad enough that Kyouken would break a branch.

—No—that wasn't it.

—Actually, it shouldn't have been that bad.

While the situation was pretty bad—it wasn't at its worst.

"—Well, even so, I still gotta keep you alive somehow, Chouchou-chan. Don't worry, if it comes to it then I'll be the one to hold them back. If the only thing you find is my corpse, I'm sure you can cover it up somehow—"

"Kyouken-san, please don't say that!"

Chouchou.

Resolved himself—and spoke.

Quietly, but affectionately.

"A shinobi as good as you, killing yourself to let me live—to let an underling like me live? That's not what a ninja should be doing."

"...Chouchou-chan."

"Why aren't you ordering me to die right here? Without me here, whether there were ten pursuers or a hundred of them, you would be able to annihilate them in an instant."

It wasn't a heartless choice.

If anything—it was the natural decision to make, considering the Maniwa village.

Without even needing to order Chouchou to die, and without even considering Chouchou's own will, it would've been just as fine for Kyouken to cut off his head with her own hands.

He didn't want to be underestimated.

Even if he didn't have the qualifications to be one of the Twelve Chiefs—even if he was only half as good as any ninja—he still had the resolve to die.

"...Don't tell me to kill a comrade of mine,"

she said.

Maniwa Kyouken—spoke in a sulking tone, for some reason.

It was the first time she had shown—or, at least, the first time Chouchou had seen—behavior befitting her young girl's body.

But it was just for an instant.

Maniwa Kyouken soon returned to her usual sarcastic expression as an observer of the Maniwa village and said, "But it's true, you make a fair point."

She continued.

"In that case, let's do this. Chouchou-chan—change of plans. We'll split off into two. I'll get the pursuers to follow me, and you take the looooong way round back to the village."

"Eh—but that doesn't give you any less of a burden. It just makes me safer. Even though there's no meaning to me surviving in this situation."

"There is a meaning. It'll make me feel good when fighting."

Kyouken replied clearly.

"I'm the village's observer. When it comes to the Maniwa village, nothing about it will feel like a burden to me—and it won't mean that you'd be completely safe, either. If I end up letting even one of our pursuers escape—then you're gonna have to be the one to fight them. In an instant—faster than anyone else."

Faster than anyone else.

Those words—lingered in Chouchou's mind, strangely enough.

But, in any case, there was no time to argue back—in the first place, Chouchou had no intention of going against Kyouken's words.

If he had an order, he'd have to obey it.

In fact, Chouchou was so happy about the change in strategy that prioritized his own safety—that he was almost brought to tears.

—Even though...

—Even though I thought my tears had dried up long ago.

Though he thought there was no shinobi in the Maniwa Ninja Corps that would shed tears other than "Tearful Kuizame".

He was surprised to find such humanity in himself—and meanwhile, without even needing to agree.

Maniwa Chouchou moved his gigantic body—and broke away from Maniwa Kyouken's movements with the speed of a strong gale.

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Maniwa kenpou.

In the Maniwa village, a settlement of shinobi, there were few people who mastered this martial art, which could even be considered a first-class school of traditional art. And Maniwa Chouchou worked as the assistant instructor of it.

No matter how much he trained his ninjutsu, he knew he would never be able to surpass the others. In that case, he aimed to improve his skills by making the most of his physique.

It was a good fit.

Now, he possessed the ability to be considered one of the best kenpou practitioners in Japan—you could even say that he was good enough to contend with a ninjutsu user.

It certainly wasn't suited for one-on-many situations.

However—if it were one-on-one, he'd probably be able to show off some of his ability.

He had no intention of losing to anyone one-on-one.

However, it was rare for a shinobi to face a situation in which they'd be fighting an enemy one-on-one—no, rather. It could even be called a disgrace for a shinobi to face a situation in which they'd fight an enemy one-on-one.

Cutting their way through many at a time.

Or perhaps, overwhelming many at a time.

That was the proper practice of a shinobi.

Furthermore—in the first place, a shinobi must have already made some kind of mistake if they find themselves in a situation where they must face an enemy.

A perfect shinobi—would never have their hostility exposed, never have their attacks noticed, and never even make their victims realize that they'd been killed.

That's how it was.

That's how it should be.

For example, the most eccentric of the Maniwa Ninja Corps—Maniwa Shirasagi, the most eccentric of the eccentric, with no one, not even Houou and Kyouken, understanding him at all—always stood on the front lines, concealing nothing and exposing everything while in combat, and yet the true nature of his ninpou was still unknown.

Although, as it was, that sort of personality wasn't the sort that would necessarily get chosen as a chief—

—If I'm able to return to the village safely.

—I'll need to think a little bit about my future.

No, not just a little. A lot.

He was going to think a lot.

About half an hour since he'd parted ways with Kyouken—it was those thoughts that ran through Maniwa Chouchou's head as he continued to run without so much as a pause to catch his breath.

If things had gone according to plan, then Kyouken should have already annihilated the Aioi Ninja Corps pursuers by now—at the very least, there was no one coming after Chouchou.

Of course, he couldn't slow down—but for now, perhaps he could feel a bit of ease.

But even so.

Maniwa Chouchou was not the sort of happy-go-lucky man that he could shake off his feelings of regret or remorse.

Surviving after being covered for by a respected leader of the village—that was shameful for a ninja.

Even though he had pledged to be an underling for life.

In the end—he couldn't do even that.

If he had been the subordinate of Kuizame, then it would not have been strange if he'd been killed on the spot for "disturbing the peace and order".

He wasn't just not suited to be a chief, but not suited to be a ninja at all. Well, that was something he knew as soon as he'd grown up with such a gigantic body—something he knew very well—something he knew very very well—and that's why.

The only thing he regretted now was that he did not kill himself when his height grew past six shaku—

"...Anyway, let's just think about getting back to the village. Even if I don't do anything myself, I'm sure Houou-sama will deal with me in some way, so all I can do is resign myself to that."

Right now, I don't even have the right to die.

Then, in that case—I'll carry out my work as an underling for the rest of my life.

As he thought such thoughts, Chouchou kept on running—and then.

And then, all of a sudden, his feet stopped.

"............?"

There was no way he'd stopped because he was tired.

If anything, he was a man with several times the physical strength of an ordinary shinobi. As evidence, despite running for so long, he was not the slightest bit out of breath.

But.

He stopped, because—he felt a strange presence.

"...Oh yeah. This area was an animal trail, wasn't it. Kyouken-san did say that bears might appear around here—"

He carefully looked over his surroundings—and it seemed that Chouchou decided that the presence he felt seemed to have come from an animal.

Of course, he wasn't going to let his guard down just because it was an animal—this deep in the mountains, animals were perhaps even more trouble than the pursuers, and something that he should exercise great caution against. But even so, he was relieved.

And, in the moment he felt relieved.

"............!"

He heard—a sound.

No.

There were probably no more than ten people, Maniwa Chouchou included, that could even recognize that as a sound.

On your own.

It would only be after you made that same sound from your own body thousands, millions, billions, trillions of times—that you'd be able to recognize that as a sound.

He didn't spend any time thinking.

Chouchou's legs, naturally, turned in the direction of the sound—it couldn't be far.

His heart pounding once again—Maniwa Chouchou descended from the treetops and ran in a straight line, without even hiding his footsteps, forgetting all his circumstances, hesitation, and burdens for just this moment.

And.

Just as he expected—it was there.

Just as he had envisioned it, it was there.

There, in a naturally open clearing in the middle of the mountain—the form of a man that was wholeheartedly yet recklessly yet single-mindedly making spear hand strikes.

The sound of a hand cutting through the air.

Quietly—resounded.

It resounded again and again.

"...Hm?"

With that.

The man noticed Chouchou.

He hadn't been hiding his presence—but even so, he had a huge body anyway, so no matter what he was in the midst of, there was no way he wouldn't be noticed when he approached.

The man looked at Chouchou, wearing shinobi attire cut off at the shoulders, and chains wrapped all over his body.

And he said.

"Haha. It's the first time I'm seeing someone bigger than me—you're incredible."

And laughed amiably.

This was the first time that Chouchou, born in a village of shinobi, was ever praised for his physique—and this was the fateful encounter between the Maniwa Ninja Corps genin, Maniwa Chouchou, and the founder of Kyotouryuu, Yasuri Kazune.

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The founder of Kyotouryuu, Yasuri Kazune.

But of course, at this moment in time, he was nobody at all—he was but a mere practitioner who had not earned any military honors or achievements.

A practitioner—and a martial artist.

He was in the middle of a mountain retreat.

However, despite this war-torn world, for him to be training alone in such a remote place, silently, without participating in the war—that alone made him a nonconformist of considerable strength in the eyes of Maniwa Chouchou.

It was as if he had no interest in the world at all.

As Kazune continued his actions, as if he only found value in training his own body—Chouchou forgot everything else and gazed at him.

Normally, he should not have been doing that.

Chouchou's top priority right now should have been to return to the Maniwa village—he didn't have the time to be making a detour, much less come to a stop entirely.

Even though Maniwa Kyouken put her life on the line to allow Chouchou to escape—what was he doing, to not respond to the spirit of those actions?

He could hear himself asking those questions.

And yet.

If he just walked away now after coming across this man—Chouchou felt like it would be an even bigger betrayal.

A betrayal against Kyouken? Or a betrayal against the Maniwa Ninja Corps?

Or, even before that, a betrayal against his own body?

It wasn't clear to him.

But he hesitated for just a moment.

And then Chouchou stopped thinking entirely—and just followed his heart.

And charged—right at Yasuri Kazune.

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There was no need for words.

There was no need to speak.

There was no need to listen.

The battle began naturally, as if they had made a promise to do so quite a long time ago.

Maniwa Chouchou headed towards Yasuri Kazune.

And Yasuri Kazune—received him with a delighted smile.

They didn't even know each other's names yet.

If anything, they didn't even know "what" the other party was. It was that sort of unidentified, indistinct situation.

Nevertheless.

They perceived each other as similar beings—as two of a kind.

And they faced off.

"Chei!"

Chouchou's first attack was faster.

Kazune had a considerably large body as well—but, as he'd said himself, it was a physique that was inferior when compared to Chouchou's. His stature was obviously smaller—but even when it came to the lengths of their arms, Chouchou's was overwhelmingly, ridiculously overwhelmingly, on the larger side.

And that long arm twisted like a whip.

Maniwa Chouchou's fist—headed for Kazune's face.

He covered a terrific amount of distance.

It was a fist of certain death that came flying in from so far—that would throw off one's sense of distance.

"Ha—"

Exhaling in such a way, Kazune repelled that fist upwards.

He didn't avoid it or receive it, but repel it.

That action—could be the proof of his absolute confidence in his own body. He was strongly convinced that, no matter the attack, it would not be able to come close to destroying his body, which had been forged like steel.

Chouchou—was pleased.

Strange as it may seem, he was incredibly pleased that his fist had been repelled.

Nothing made him happier to know that someone with such confidence was right in front of him.

To add to his joy, he tried to lunge from a distance with his other hand, this time as a spear hand—but Kazune would not allow it.

No, it was more than that.

He—went for the arm he'd just repelled.

He grabbed his wrist—and, in one go, used his weight to pull him down.

—A joint lock!

That came out of nowhere!

If his elbow was destroyed, then the battle would be decided then and there, and that wasn't what Chouchou wanted. As he was pulled down, Chouchou jumped—and, faster than Kazune could act, he rotated his body in midair, buying time for the joint lock to be applied.

If there had been anybody spectating, they surely would not have been able to hide their surprise at Chouchou's instantaneous movements—not one person could have expected that Chouchou would be able to move his gigantic body with such agility.

But to Chouchou, these were just normal movements.

A movement like this was just a way to buy time.

Not to mention—he'd only earned a second.

That was all it was.

However, even one second was enough.

For Maniwa Chouchou, one second was worth five thrusts.

And Kazune must have sensed something in his gut, because he immediately let go of Chouchou's arm—but instead of thoughtlessly trying to distance himself from Chouchou, he instead moved in even closer.

This wasn't close-quarters combat anymore.

It may as well be called contact combat.

In theory, his action was the correct one to make—because of Chouchou's long arms and long legs, and because his range was just too wide, it was more correct to draw in closer rather than move farther away. Although, the difficulty of the act of drawing in closer was unimaginably high—but Kazune performed it as if it were a perfectly natural procedure.

And then, at that distance.

At that short distance—marvelously, Kazune aimed for Chouchou's face and sent out a kick.

It was an attack that could only be allowed by a frightening degree of flexibility and explosive power.

There was no way to dodge it.

It was a kick from a completely unexpected direction.

In fact, never in Maniwa Chouchou's life—had an attack actually come for his head. So there being a slight delay in his reaction was something that was unavoidable.

However, even so, it wasn't like he couldn't do anything just because he reacted late.

If he couldn't dodge—then before they collided.

Before that attack collided.

Chouchou instantly folded his long arms and smashed his elbow into the kicking leg with an inside turn.

An elbow strike.

But it wasn't even something as skilled as that.

If anyone other than Chouchou had done it, it would have looked like a move made out of desperation.

With the elbow that he'd just barely freed from the joint lock, he'd intentionally use it in a move that could potentially break it? It was foolish even among foolish acts.

And he wasn't just repelling the attack, but rather boorishly aiming for their attacks to collide—recklessly using what was the hardest point on the human body was not in the slightest bit befitting of a shinobi, but a defensive move purely made from the perspective of a kenpou practitioner.

—No.

—I probably—can't call this a defensive move, either.

In the first place, there was no such thing as defense in Maniwa kenpou.

All they had was to be constantly attacking.

Attack before being attacked—that was the basic approach, and being ahead of the curve was the beauty of it.

As such, if you happened to be attacked first—then the basic approach was to attack whatever was attacking you.

That was the beauty of it.

—A shinobi, talking about beauty?

—If you ask me, it's kind of stupid.

The move resembling an elbow strike against the kick—was successful.

By deliberately shifting the moment of impact, he'd managed to minimize the damage to his elbow and arm, while the opponent—his shin had been injured.

In fact, Kazune had groaned,

"Oof... Kh!"

and pulled back his leg.

However, even noticing that fact was careless.

The leg that he'd pulled back didn't touch the ground—and instead came whirling back around towards Chouchou's body.

It was a feint to make one let their guard down—but it was probably true that his shin actually did hurt. But to use that injured body part immediately after for a follow-up attack—

A follow-up attack.

This time, the target was not the head but the torso.

He completely took it.

That force seemed like it was enough to pierce through his insides.

If anything, the impact was as if he'd been cut by a sword—and for a moment, Chouchou was enveloped in a vision of his torso having been cut to pieces.

"Gh—"

"Kyotouryuu—'Sarusuberi'!"

Kazune's voice.

Kyo-tou-ryuu?

Was that—the name of his school of martial arts?

Just as Chouchou came to that understanding—the move had already been sent out.

Of course, being distracted by the name of the school couldn't be an excuse—it was rather that the attack had once again come at Chouchou from an unexpected direction.

Chouchou's stance had drooped slightly after taking the attack to his torso, and the attack came for his jaw—as if this sequence of actions had been choreographed from the beginning, the heel of Kazune's palm flew up from below.

Despite being a movement that went against the pull of gravity, it still held overwhelming force.

The impact lifted his body off of the ground—but the force was as if he'd been slammed into the ground.

He barely had time to feel the pain.

In an instant, he fell unconscious.

But just before he fainted, Maniwa Chouchou had managed to perceive his own defeat—not a defeat as a shinobi, but a defeat as a kenpou practitioner.

Despite his conviction that he'd never lose in a one-on-one fight, the only pride he'd built up so far had been destroyed.

And yet.

Oddly enough—he didn't feel too bad about it.

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"Hey, you're awake. Here, drink this."

As soon as Chouchou woke up, the first thing thrust at him was some sake.

And not in a cup or a bowl—but an entire sake barrel.

Almost bursting into laughter at the tremendousness of it, Chouchou picked himself up off of the ground—and, accepting the barrel, he lifted it up and drank from it with loud gulps.

Sake to resuscitate him—no, that wasn't it.

If anything, it was sake to fortify him.

"It's good. How did you get your hands on something like this, deep in the mountains?"

"A fortune teller that I happen to know likes to drop in from time to time—well, he's a weird guy. I'm usually bad with sake, but this one's different."

"Uh-huh. A fortune teller."

"Yeah. I think he also said he was a swordsmith, but to me it's all the same. By the way, I'm Yasuri Kazune. Who are you?"

"I'm Maniwa Chouchou."

"Maniwa. Ah, a ninja."

"Unfortunately, I haven't heard the name Yasuri before—who do you work for?"

"I'm just the prodigal son of a family close to the Tetsubi family of the six feudal lords. It doesn't matter if you haven't heard of it. I'm just a good-for-nothing that can't even wield a sword properly."

"Me too—I'm not really someone you could describe as a ninja."

Chouchou smiled bitterly.

And so did Kazune.

The battle had only lasted a short amount of time—nothing but a few exchanges of blows.

However, as a result, the two men seemed to understand each other as if they had been talking for hours.

Sometimes, a single blow of the fist spoke more eloquently than a few billion words.

At the very least—that was how Yasuri Kazune was to Maniwa Chouchou.

"Hahaha."

Laughing, Kazune brought out another sake barrel—and began to drink from it with a tremendous sound.

"It's true that what you did just now wasn't ninjutsu—just normal martial arts. It's impressive that you've trained your body to such an extent within human limits. As someone who shares the same will as you, I have nothing but admiration—I thought I'd be the only one doing this kind of stuff nowadays. By the way, your movements seemed pretty unique. Is it your own style?"

"I guess you could say that. It's called Maniwa kenpou. It's a form with a lot of history, but it's a little too old—a little too rustic, a little too antique. It needs to be adjusted for the present times—but there's no other weirdo who'd go and do something so bothersome. Well, seeing as I'm just an underling that isn't assigned any particular task, at least I have a lot of time."

"History, huh? That's a word that that fortune teller might like—or wait, did he actually hate history? I forget. I just don't really know about that guy at all."

He set down the sake barrel.

"But really, I have to thank you," said Kazune. "Because of you, I managed to think of another special move. No, rather than a special move. Once you get into that area of things, you may as well call it a secret technique. With the fastest possible movements, attack before being attacked—the method of getting ahead of the ahead should be an invincible technique. With the meaning of an attack that you can't avoid even if you see it coming, I shall give it the name of 'Kyouka Suigetsu'.

With this, Kyotouryuu has come one step closer to completion—he said.

Kazune spoke happily.

Innocently, and earnestly—so there was a person that pursued his path like so. Chouchou felt a bit strange.

Aha, it was what Kazune had mentioned before.

He'd thought—that he was the only one doing such a thing.

"You sure are weird—speaking of nowadays, that goes for you too. A mountain retreat is pretty behind-the-times now, isn't it? While you were off doing something like this, the war's gone and ended. Did you know about that? Right now, this influence called the new shogun—"

"I know. A famous person from Shikoku, right? It's putting my family in a bit of a spot—I'll probably have to end up returning from the mountains in the near future. But now is not that time. My development of Kyotouryuu is still in progress."

"Kyotouryuu, huh."

It had a nice ring to it.

He didn't know why he felt that way, but it sounded like the name of a work of art.

"Anyway, the Maniwa Ninja Corps—who are they following now?"

"Dunno—we change who we work for all the time. There are even times when we act as both friend and foe, and I don't really get that stuff. It's possible we're even hostile to your family, the Tetsubi family."

"That would be interesting."

Saying that, it seemed Kazune truly did find it interesting, as he laughed heartily.

"If that's the case, then we may as well have had a war by proxy just now."

"Ho. Then it would be the Tetsubi family that came out victorious—haha. As long as it wasn't a battle between allies."

"Of course not."

And then Chouchou—stood up.

He stretched that gigantic body of his to the air—bending forwards, then backwards. Checking his condition.

"You're going?"

asked Kazune with a smile, not reluctant to see him go.

"Yeah. I was in the middle of a task."

"I see. I was also in the middle—of training."

"I should be the one to thank you. The truth is, this task will probably be my last."

"Your last?"

"Yeah. Not my first and last—but my last and final. Because, despite being a ninja, I'm not suited to being a ninja at all. This huge body gets in the way, and I can't carry out my work properly. Even today, I was just holding one of my comrades back—so I kept thinking that there was no reason for me to keep being a ninja."

"Haha, what's with that? How stupid."

Though Chouchou opened up with his concerns, Kazune just laughed it off.

In an extremely refreshing way, he laughed it off.

"The world is what you say it is, Maniwa ninja—and so, you shouldn't speak of what you can't do. Don't speak of yourself in the negative. Speak of yourself in the positive. All you need to do is master your kenpou, and then claim that that is your ninjutsu."

"......"

"I can't wield a sword—I don't even know how to hold the hilt. But no matter what, I'm not gonna go and say that out in the open—I'll keep that fact to myself for the rest of my life, as something that only I know about. Instead, I'll insist that these arms and these legs—that this entire body of mine is my sword. You can't do it? That's wrong. It's that you don't have to do it. What tiger is ashamed of not being able to breathe in the water? You should introduce yourself in an additive way, not a subtractive way. If you can't use a sword—your whole body can simply become the sword."

That—is my Kyotouryuu.

Yasuri Kazune—stuck out his chest and declared so.

"Well, I said all that all self-importantly, but I'm just repeating the words of that weird fortune teller—haha. Well, the negative thing about this is that it's from a bungling fortune teller, so you can't really rely on it, but apparently I'm a swordsman that will change history. Isn't that something? But if that's all, then it's kind of stupid. At that point, rather than changing history, I may as well be a swordsman that creates history."

"...Yeah. Then, I'll become a shinobi that can destroy history."

He didn't even need to say it—by that point.

By the point when he had exchanged blows with Kazune, Maniwa Chouchou had already stopped thinking of this task as his last—or, rather, this task would become his first as a ninja fistfighter.

After returning to the Maniwa village.

First, he'd bow his head to Kyouken and Houou.

However, he wouldn't say any words of apology.

Instead, he'd start talking big—he'd start speaking of pipe dreams that even Maniwa Kuizame would be ashamed to speak of.

"Maniwa Chouchou. Will the next time we meet be on the battlefield?"

"Who knows? However, if that time comes, then prepare yourself. My Maniwa kenpou is still in development. Don't think that today's victory will be all."

"If you're going to say that, then even Kyotouryuu is still incomplete. It will be completed in the near future, but as for when it is completed, when it is truly and utterly completed—when it is concluded, that may not be until much further in the future. Perhaps it may not even be possible in my generation."

"That will be true for Maniwa kenpou, too. I'll take this old, moldy school of martial arts—and improve it further and take it to future generations. To future generations, and perhaps to future eras."

And.

He didn't know if it would be a hundred years, or even two hundred years in the future.

"When the day comes that a user of Maniwa kenpou and a user of Kyotouryuu end up meeting again—I'm sure it will be an exhilarating one."

◇　　　◇

Afterwards, there were quite a few more twists and turns before Maniwa Chouchou would end up elected as one of the Twelve Chiefs—at the very least, it didn't go smoothly. However, at his own request, and with the fierce encouragement of Maniwa Kyouken, he became the first kenpou practitioner in the history of the Maniwa Ninja Corps to stand in the position of chief. Even after becoming one of the Twelve Chiefs, Chouchou continued to improve upon Maniwa kenpou and finally perfected it to a point where it went beyond ninjutsu and could be used in any situation, including in one-on-many battles. Even so, he continued to apply himself diligently, saying that it was only completed, but not concluded.

Whether it was bad luck or just fate, Maniwa Chouchou and Yasuri Kazune did not have a chance to meet again, not even in battle—so the rematch between Kyotouryuu and Maniwa kenpou would have to wait for perhaps another six generations.

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curious-minx · 3 years

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Denis Leary is making an animated vignette series based on Dogs Playing Poker and 10 Other Pieces of Kitsch Art That Should Be Turned Into TV

KITSCH auction house tremors and stampedes.

Dennis Leary basically discovered sex, drugs and rock n’ roll with his 2015 two season FX series Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll. Leary’s always been one of those guys that can’t be beaten down in spite of how dopey and cynical his edgy working class personal brand is. He’s got an entire deal set up with Fox, the flailing broadcasting company has placed all of their chips on a Denis with only one lousy “N” in his name. I can’t even with this fake Irish Bostonian droid. Relish in the delicate thought process of Leary and leftover former Daily Show producer, Jim Margolis, bringing up a Pinterest screen grab of the Dogs Playing Poker by Grand Master of Kitsch Cassius Marcellus Coolidge and money signs popping out of both of their heads. Here is a dramatic retelling of this thought process:

“Yo, get this Big D,” salivates the recently fired from Netflix Jim Margolis to Leary over a Zoom, “Fox got this Bento Box Animation Studio sitting around doing nothing but churning out animated interstitials for the Masked Singer, Paradise PD, The Prince, The Blues Brothers animated series, animated Harold And Kumar, Housebroken, The Great North, and ugh..um..Hoops..”

“I fuckin love Hoops, Jimmy! Why aren’t we pitching this on Netflix again?”

“Because Dogs Playing Poker is going to work so much better as pregame filler for live Sporting Events...on Fox.”

“Oh yeah. All of those rotten good for nothing grease monkey and lunch pail people will probably be giving each other Budweiser flavored Covid at the local saloon with these damn dog pictures hanging up. It’s like when old drunks would stay out late and watch the Flinstones at the bar, did you know that actual human male adults would sit in a town like Boston and waste away in a bar watching Flintsones. Can you believe that Johny?”

“My name is Jimmy, err Jim, but yeah Denis we’ll send you the scripts over. Any idea who we should cast?”

“Get me the hot blonde from Inspector Gadget 2, God dammit I miss Louie..are we sure we can’t get Louie back on air?”

“Afraid after Patton Oswalt dognapped his role from him in Secret Life of Pets, Louie CK has been banned from ever appearing as a talking dog again.”

“So bogus. Bobby Kelly will have to do.” Denis gets a text. “Dammit, Adam is getting all thirsty for this juicy delicious bone. Gotta throw a big bone to my dog Ferrera. Who else?”

“Ok. I’ll get one of those sad Daily Show losers. Um picking one at random, Roy Wood Jr. They’ll pretty much jump into anything, because John Oliver was in Love Guru they start thinking they can fail their way up.”

“I said no politics at the table! Paws off the table! This is going to be so fucking lit!”

////

Kitsch Art deserves so much more. George Lucas, retired American filmmaker, robber baron of childhoods and all around mensch has been heavily invested in the kitsch art of Norman Rockwell. There are a bounty of stories to tell. Too many of them are far too white and basic, but there are rich narratives to be found in his out of date even for his own time romanticism of The Old Masters. Hopelessly out of date could have been a failing of Rockwell, but his politics grew progressive as his career went on and fought against the system. Cassius Marcellus Coolidge is the man that operated the first bank in Antwerp, New York had the astronaut-like grace to wonder, “what if dogs played poker like people played poker?” A painting that dates back to 1894 used as means to sell cigars. What strikes me most about this painting is that they aren’t wearing clothes, but I bet when you try to imagine the painting you imagine these dogs fully decked out in some sort of work coat. There is a further anthropromized version of the ad called “His Station and Four Aces” that depicts a glimpse at a look at an entire canine furry society. His ideas of putting an animal in clothes remains to this day one of the most novel and surefire commercially friendly means of artistic expression. The original cynical man laughing all the way to the bank, his own bank that he founded to boot.

Seen above: An example of a Comic Foreground that also demonstrates the failings of having too few people in your party to properly partake in the comic foreground experience.

“Cash” Cassius wasn’t the first man to imagine a domestic pet in people clothes, but he’s probably one of the few to do so with such commercial finesse. The man also at one point filed the patent on the “Comic Foregrounds,” which is the technical name of one of those carnival boards with holes to stick your head in. In post Covid times how many more heads will be salivating and rushing towards those holes to pop their heads in to create a lasting memory, if only for a second. So when I start learning more about this remarkable weirdo Cassius Coolidge, a man according to his official website dogsplayingpoker.com’s Biography: “Trying to chase mischievous boys from an abandoned house, he fell from a window and hurt his knee, leaving him injured for the rest of his life.”

Flash forward back to 2021 and Denis Leary and his career a man with a wikipedia with fun entries about all the accusations of plagiarism and hate speech against autism I start to worry about the legacy of more Kitsch art falling into the hands of other greedy and desperate TV executives. That being said if you are a greedy TV executive who happens to be a maniac that likes reading rando’s tumblr pages do I have a list for you!

TOP TEN PIECES OF KITSCH ART THAT SHOULD BE TURNED INTO SOME KIND OF SOMETHING

“We Are Having a Heavenly Time” Columbian Bike Monkey and Parakeet by, once again, Cassius Coolidge

Coolidge’s anthropomorphic foresight strikes again! This time he effortlessly establishes a captivating duo that could be easily voiced by an endless combination of celebrity voice actors. PAUL RUDD as “Monkey” and ISSA RAE as “Parakeet” present “We Are Having a Heavenly Time” present a travel show. You could basically use whatever leftover footage you have lying around from the many Conan O’Brien segments and plug Monkey and Parakeet and their trusty bicycle anywhere for an irreverent glimpse into the foreign World around us.

2. “Clown and The Girl” by Haddon Sundblom

Now I know what you’re thinking, that title is miserable! I agree, but with a little reverse engineering you get The Girl and Clown, which could be a whole new addition to the Girl on a Train, Girl with a Dragon Tattoo, Girl with a Dangly Earpiece, the Girl-Verse! The girl appears to be quite fearless of this clown, which is good because we need someone to be brave for when the clown takes off his mask.

Sundblom is also the original artist for the Coke a cola Santa Claus and how is it that we have gone this many rotations around the sun without a single Coke a cola Santa Claus special is the real reason why Christmas will always be the saddest time of year.

3. “Clean Your Fornasetti” based around the artistic Plate collection of Pierro Fornasetti

Muk bangs, videos of people eating are a huge cyber traffic boom. People love watching people eat. Why not add the element of surprise by what kind of playful Fornasetti chanteuse is hiding underneath this plate full of gruel? Fornasetti is an artist with over 11,000 items created in his name and over 500 of them are based around a variety of expressions of a single woman. Clean Your Fornasetti is a deep and poetic rumination of the romance between the act of someone cleaning their plate and the reveal that the plate contained a visual feast all its own.

4. “Mickey’s Kinkade Playhouse” by the one and only Thomas Kinkade

The Kinkade Studios features over 63 “narrative panoramas” featuring Disney characters, but largely Mickey and Minnie, simply vibing. It’s time we stop pretending that small children like Mickey Mouse and market him for wistful older audiences that want to radiate in a nice long warm bath of color and sound. I am not sure I am even pitching an actual series but more of a Narrative Panoply. One thing that is missing from Disney Plus, and streaming services in general, is a severe lack of programming frills and flourishing. The iconic Adult Swim bumps are something completely lost to the dustbins of programming history left to remain in youtube compilations. Thomas Kinkade is a lot like Enya. Art critics treated him like a comedic punching bag for so long, but I doubt there’s an artist that grasps the kind of sterile enchantment people want after a long day of opioid benders. We’re all trapped inside doing puzzles why not do the bare minimum of slightly animating a pleasant scene of Mickey and Minnie roasting marshmallows or enjoying a breath of fresh Alpine air?

5. “Dust Lickers” by Odd Nerdrum

Quick! Get me Trash Humpers’ Harmony Korine on the Line Show him Shit Rock! The world of Odd Nerdrum is a harsh and primeval one that would make for an astonishing animated landscape. Odd Nerdrum himself feels like a worthy subject of some kind of documentary based around his imagery and insistence on making his art in the most arcane and old fashioned methods possible. Once again, maybe the visual world of Odd Nerdrum may not make for a full on narrative series, but once again would make for one hell of an animated segment.

6. “Homemade Pasta” by John Currin

A cozy Queer slice of life cooking drama based around the two charming fellows of John Currin’s Homemade Pasta scene. A series of vignettes based around the completely unfabulous and domestic version of bliss that was denied many people as a result of the AIDS crisis. You can’t tell me you don’t see those two nice guys getting cozy and making pasta together and you aren’t dying to see how they go about rolling out their own focaccia bread.

7. “The Velvet Elvis” by the Collective Conscious

David Lynch at one point in time was trying to crack into making his own Elvis biopic. I think it’s pretty safe to say that the age of a public wanting a David Lynch directed Elvis biopic has probably passed, but that does not stop Velvet art enthusiasts. TheVelvetStore.com is featuring a remarkable promo that could really bump up what a David Lynch Elvis movie could be like and the horror of having one’s soul trapped inside of a Velvet Elvis rendition painting seems like a pretty fertile place to begin a proper story about Elvis in America.

8. “Big Eye Bunch” by Margaret Keane

Yes, it was only a matter of time before Ms. Big Eyes herself, Queen of Kitsch, Margaret Keane would come up on a list like this. Tim Burton tried and sort of kind of captured what it so endearing about Keane’s work, but I think a fully animated dive into an orphanage full of sad Big Eye kids that time travel and meet other Big Eyed children version of historical figures is a Big Idea that could make a whole new generation keen on Keane.

9. “Banality” by Jeff Koons

An animated series based around the artistic sensibilities of Jeff Koons would be a tricky affair, but just the kind of gaudy whimsy that someone like Michel Gondrey could use to proper effect. A series based around someone trying to steal the fifteen million dollar Michael Jackson statue would also be appropriate.

10. “Groovenians reboot” by Kenny Scharf

Scharf is the only artist on this list that actually was a kitsch artist that caught the attention of early aughts adult swim. A tv show that only features the artistic sensibilities of Scharf but also a voice acting cast that consisted of Paul Reubens, Rupaul, Vincent Gallo, and Dennis Hopper. There’s also a theme song performed by the B-52s and musical direction by Devo’s Mark Mothersbaugh. One of the only known published reviews of the pilot describe the show as needing mind altering substances to enjoy and that it is essentially like “watching a cartoon reflected off of a funhouse mirror. This is basically a description of the modern tik tok addled twitchy type content that makes a killing on the Internet for millenial and zoomer types. Basically the whole aesthetic of a warped and broken looking cartoon is the exact sort of thing weirdos deep diving at youtube at four in the morning are looking for and seeing that this gets a failed pilot and Denis Leary’s Dog Poker vignettes get greenlit is exactly what’s wrong with the world.

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sternbilder · 4 years

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Camille Has Many KDrama Thoughts

As some of you have possibly noticed, I have recently fallen into a KDrama hole and I can’t get up, and I have just finished my 10th drama, which seems like less of an accomplishment than I thought now that I say it out loud, but anyway,

As a checkpoint/thinly veiled plug of some shows I love very much, here is a very long post with some of my thoughts on all the KDramas I’ve seen so far, as well as what’s next on my list, in case you too were interested in joining me in nonexistent fandom hell!

So firstly, all of the dramas I have watched to completion, in the order of how much I like them. First, my top five:

1. Sungkyunkwan Scandal (2010). My #1 favorite drama to date. I’ve probably watched it in full 4-5 times, and it’s still an absolute treat every time. Is it the best drama I’ve ever seen? Probably not. But it’s so fun and charming that it’s just gotta be at the top of my list.

The best way I can describe this drama is Ouran High School Host Club, except in Joseon era Korea, and instead of flirting with girls the main characters learn about Confucianism and solve mysteries and play sports (twice) and end up accidentally involved in a complicated political scandal. Also, that one text post about how Shang from Mulan is bi because he falls for Mulan while he thinks she’s a man...This drama has that, except actually canon. And while I won’t pretend this is show is a shining beacon of representation, there are multiple main characters who are explicitly not heterosexual and several others with very plausible queer readings, which earns it a very special place in my heart.

As for the actual premise of the show, it’s basically about a wonderfully determined and kind and clever but lower-class girl whose writing skills catch the eye of the most stubbornly strait-laced but idealistic aspiring politician-type on the planet. She ends up getting a one-way ticket to the most prestigious school in the country, except she has to pretend to be a man the entire time because women aren’t allowed to be educated at this time.

It’s a bit of a silly, cheesy show, and here are many wacky shenanigans, but the main cast is full of incredibly highly endearing and multifaceted characters, there is a lot of sexual confusion, the slowburn roommate romance has an incredible payoff, and it’s also full of deeply moving social commentary about class, privilege, and gender roles. This drama is a blast and I could go on and on about what I love about it, I absolutely adore it to pieces.

2. Six Flying Dragons (2015-2016). I debated between this and Tree With Deep Roots (next on my list, to which SFD is a prequel) as my #2 but I do think I want to place SFD higher just because it's the drama that I keep thinking about even after finishing it. of course, it has the dual advantages of 1) being released chronologically later (and having better production value, etc., because of this) and 2) being twice as long, but there’s just so much stuff to unpack with SFD that it makes me want to keep coming back to it.

The show is about the founding of the Joseon dynasty, and six individuals (half of whom are based on real historical figures and half fictional) whose lives are closely tied to the fall of the old regime and the revolution that brought in the new. It has an intricate, intensely political plotline based on the actual events that happened during this time, and though this may sound kind of boring if you’re like me and not super into history (admittedly, the pacing in the beginning is a tiny bit slow), it quickly picks up and becomes this dense web of character relations and political maneuvering. Though none of the major events should come as a surprise if you’ve seen TWDR or if you happen to already know the history it was based on, the show adds such a depth of humanity and emotion to every event and character that nothing ever feels boring or predictable. As a matter of fact, there are several events that were alluded to in TWDR that, when they actually happened in SFD, left me breathless--because although I 100% knew these were foregone conclusions that were coming up at some point, I still had a visceral moment of, “oh no, so that’s how that came to happen.”

But though I really enjoyed following the story of SFD and learning about the history behind it, the highlight of the show for me is definitely the great character arcs. I loved TWDR’s characters, too (especially Yi Do, So Yi, and obviously Moo Hyul), but with double the episode count SFD just has so much time for rich, dynamic character development, and I absolutely loved seeing how these characters grew and changed over time when their ideologies and fates collided in this turbulent and violent age: How young and ambitious Yi Bang Won eventually spiraled into a ruthless tyrant, how the naive and kind-hearted Moo Hyul struggled to retain his humanity in a bloody revolution that challenged his values and loyalties to the core, how the fiercely determined and idealistic Boon Yi grew into a pragmatic and capable leader who comes to realize what politics and power mean for her and her loved ones.

SFD was also everything I wanted as a prequel to TWDR--I loved seeing the contrasts between some of the TWDR characters and their younger selves in the SFD timeline: The hardened and ruthless Bang Won as a passionate and righteous adolescent, the cynical and resigned Bang Ji as a cowardly boy who grows into a traumatized and bitter young man, and my personal favorite character, the comically serious bodyguard Moo Hyul as the very model of the dopey, lovable himbo archetype. And though the ending was controversial among fans (particularly those who watched SFD first), I loved how it closed all the loops and tied it back to the events of TWDR, both providing that transition I wanted but also recontextualizing and adding new meaning to the original work. I think it's still a very good drama on its own, but this hand-off is what really sealed the deal for me personally, because it was not only super emotionally satisfying to watch how the stories connected, but it elevated TWDR to something even greater (suggesting that Yi Do and the events of TWDR was the culmination of everything the six dragons fought so long and hard for), which is exactly what I expect from a good prequel.

I’ve already talked so much about this drama but I also do need to mention that the soundtrack to SFD is A+, and the sword fights are sick as hell. There is also some romance, though it’s not really a focus--and all the pairings that do exist are extremely tragic, which is exactly up my alley. Overall, this is a hell of a historical drama, coming of age, villain origin story, and martial arts film in one, and I highly recommend it.

3. Tree With Deep Roots (2011). The sequel to SFD, though it aired first chronologically. Although this show isn’t one of those shows that I could rewatch once a year like SKKS or keep ruminating on like SFD, TWDR (much like Les Mis, or Fata Morgana) is thematically the kind of story that just makes my heart sing.

The story centers around the creation of Hangul, the Korean alphabet, by Yi Do (a.k.a., King Sejong the Great, who is the son and successor of Yi Bang Won, the main character of SFD) as well as two fictional childhood friends whose backstories and ambitions become central to the story of how and why this alphabet came to exist. Not only is the actual process of creating this alphabet absolutely fascinating from a linguistic and scientific POV, but the show dramatizes Yi Do’s motivations in a way that’s so incredibly touching and human--portraying the king as a soft-hearted and extremely charismatic yet fundamentally flawed and conflicted figure who tries so desperately to do right by his people.

The show explores both a number of personal themes like redemption, atonement, and vengeance, as well as broader societal themes such as the ethics of authority, the democratization of knowledge, and the power of language and literacy. Though the show never forgets to remind the audience of the bitter reality of actual history, it’s still a deeply idealistic show whose musings on social change and how to use privilege and power to make the world better are both elegant and poignant.

Romance definitely takes a backseat in TWDR, even more so than SFD, though this isn’t something I personally mind. There are, however, a lot of interesting politics surrounding the promulgation of the alphabet, including a string of high-profile assassinations--if SFD is historical/political-thriller-meets-action-film, then TWDR is historical/political-thriller-meets-murder-mystery, and it’s an incredibly tightly written and satisfying story whose pieces fall into place perfectly. Though not the sprawling epic that SFD is, TWDR is an emotional journey and an extremely well-written story with a TON of goodies if you’re as excited about linguistics as I am.

4. White Christmas (2011). My first non-sageuk on this list! White Christmas is, in a lot of ways, an odd drama. It’s an 8-episode special, and featured largely (at the time) new talent. it’s also neither a historical work nor romance-focused, but instead a short but intense psychological thriller/murder mystery.

The premise is this: Seven students at a super elite boarding school tucked away in the mountains receive mysterious black letters that compel them to remain on campus during the one vacation of the year. The letters describe various “sins” that the author accuses the students of committing, as well as the threat of a “curse” as well as an impending death. The students quickly find that they’re stranded alone at the school with a murderer in their midst, as they are forced to confront their shared histories and individual traumas to figure out 1) why they’ve been sent the letters, and 2) how to make it out alive. At the center of the survival game the characters find themselves in is a recurring question: “Are monsters born, or can they be made?”

If you’ve been following me for a while, it’s easy to see why I was drawn to this drama. In terms of setup and tone, it’s Zero Escape. In theme, it’s Naoki Urasawa’s Monster. It’s Lord of the Flies meets Dead Poets Society. or as one of my mutuals swyrs@ put it, Breakfast Club meets Agatha Christie. The story is flawlessly paced with not a scene wasted. There’s so much good foreshadowing and use of symbolic imagery, and though I’ve watched it at least 3-4 times, I always find interesting new details to analyze. The plot twists (though not so meta-breaking as ZE) are absolutely nuts, and aside from the somewhat questionable ending, the story is just really masterfully written.

Above all, though, WC is excellent for its character studies. Though I typically tend to stay away from shows that center around teenagers because I don’t find their struggles and experiences particularly relatable, WC does such an excellent job of picking apart every character psychologically, showing their traumas, their desires, their fears, and their insecurities. We see these kids at their most violent and cruel, but also their most vulnerable and honest. Their stories and motivations are so profoundly human that I found even the worst and most despicable characters painfully sympathetic at times, as cowardly and hypocritical and unhinged as they became.

Like I said, it’s only 8 episodes long with probably the best rewatch value on this list. My only complaints about it are its ending, as well as its relative lack of female characters, but otherwise I would absolutely recommend.

5. Signal (2016). Okay, this might be the recency bias talking because I just finished this series but I'm sure but I'm still reeling at the mind-screw of an ending and I feel like it deserves a place on this spot just for that.

Signal is a crime thriller based on a number of real-life incidents that happened in Korea in the last 30 or so years. In short, a young profiler from the year 2015, who has a grudge against the police after witnessing their incompetence and corruption twice as a child, happens to find a mysterious walkie-talkie that seems to be able to send and receive messages from the past. on the other end is an older detective from 2000 who tells him that he’s about to start receiving messages from his younger self, back in 1989. Through the seemingly sporadic radio communications, the two men work together to solve a series of cold cases, which begin to change the past and alter the timeline.

As they solve these cases, expose corruption within the police department, and correct past injustices, the two men (along with a third, female detective who has connections to both of them) also begin to unravel the mysteries of their pasts, as well as why and how they came to share this connection.

Like WC, the story and pacing of this drama were flawless, reminding me of an extended movie rather than a TV series. I was on the edge of my seat the entire time, and the 16-episode run went by in no time at all. I always love timeline shenanigans and explorations of causality and fate and the consequences of changing the past, and this show has oodles of that peppered with the heartbreakingly tragic human connections and stories that the main characters share. The main pairing has great chemistry and gave me exactly the pain I crave from a doomed timeline romance, and the cinematography and soundtrack were also beautiful, which also contributed to the polished, cinema-like feel.

My only complaint is that I wish that the ending felt more like an ending, such that the drama could stand on its own. I do realize this is because there’s a second season coming, but right now the show feels somewhat incomplete, ending on a huge, ambiguous cliffhanger/sequel hook and with several loose ends. I obviously can’t give a final verdict until the entire thing airs (and I typically don’t like multi-season shows, so I will wait for the next season to come out both reluctantly and begrudgingly), but even where the show leaves off I still did enjoy it immensely.

...And now, some brief thoughts on the other 5 shows I’ve watched, because I ran out of steam and have less to say about these:

6. Healer (2014-2015). It’s been a few years since I’ve seen this show, but I remember being really impressed by this drama at the time, especially the storyline. Unfortunately though I don’t remember too much about the drama itself, which is a shame. It’s a mystery/thriller, I think, and there is hacking and crimes involved? The main character is a very cute and sweet tabloid writer and she falls in love with a mysterious and cool action boy who helps her uncover the truth behind a tragic incident that relates to her past, or something. Judging from my liveblog it seems like this was an extremely emotional journey, and I enjoyed the main couple (who are both very attractive) a lot, and it was just overall a cathartic and feel-good experience. I feel like I should rewatch this drama at some point?

7. Rooftop Prince (2012). It’s also been forever since I watched this show but I remember thinking it was hilarious and delightful and I definitely cried a lot though I do not remember why (probably something something time travel, something something reincarnation/fated lovers??). I do remember that the premise is that a Joseon-era prince and several of his servants accidentally time travel into modern-day Seoul and end up meeting the main character who is the future reincarnation of his love (?) and he is hilariously anachronistic and also insufferably pretentious, which the MC absolutely does not cut him any slack for, and they have an extremely good dynamic.

8. Coffee Prince (2007). I watched this around the same time as Rooftop Prince and I remember really enjoying it! it’s basically just SKKS, but the modern cafe AU, and I mean that in the best way possible? It definitely shares a lot of the same tropes--crossdressing/tomboy female lead, sexually questioning male lead who falls in love with her despite being “straight,” very good chemistry and also extremely charming secondary characters.

9. Shut Up Flower Boy Band (2012). This show...Was just OK. I enjoyed it at the time, but I can’t say I found it particularly memorable. As I said, I don’t typically find stories about high school students particularly relatable, and the battle of the bands-type plot was interesting enough at the time but didn’t really leave a lasting impression. As expected, the music was pretty good. I kind of watched this mostly to hear Sung Joon sing tbh?

10. Rebel: Thief Who Stole the People (2017). I wanted to like this show. I really did. I wouldn’t say it was bad, but the beginning was painfully slow, and I only really enjoyed the last 10 episodes or so, when the vive la révolution arc finally started kicking off. The pacing was challenging--the pre-timeskip dragged on about twice as long as it needed to, and I just wasn’t really interested in the Amogae/Yiquari storyline very much. I also really, really disliked all the romances in the show, especially the main pairing, since I didn’t particularly love either the male or the female leads until pretty late in the show. Overall I think I would have enjoyed the show more if the first 2/3 of it was about half as long, and it either developed the romance better or cut it out altogether.

What I’m thinking of watching next:

1. Chuno (2010). Mostly because the soundtrack to this show is so goddamn good, but also because I’m craving more historical dramas with good sword fights after SFD. I was kind of hoping Rebel would fill that need but I was a little disappointed tbh?

2. Warrior Baek Dong Soo (2011). Same reasons as above, honestly. also has a very good soundtrack, and Ji Chang Wook, who is a known nice face-haver, doing many very cool sword fights.

3. Mr. Sunshine (2018). Late Joseon era is something I’ve never really seen before in media so I’m pretty intrigued? Also Byun Yo Han was one of my favorites from SFD and I definitely want to see him in more things.

4. Rookie Historian Goo Hae Ryung (2019). A coworker recommended this to me and the trailer looks delightful. first of all it’s a sageuk with the gorgeous and talented Shin Se Kyoung in it playing a smart and plucky female lead, which have historically been extremely good to me, but also it gives me massive SKKS vibes, so how could I not.

5. My Country: The New Age (2019). This caught my attention because it’s based on the same historical events as SFD, so it features some of the same characters. I am very very interested in Jang Hyuk’s take on Yi Bang Won, even if he is less of a main character here compared to SFD, and he’s already an adult so he’ll already be well on his way to bastardhood. I also hear it’s very heartbreaking, which is instant eyes emoji for me?

6. Chicago Typewriter (2017). It’s about freedom fighters from the colonization era, which I’m very intrigued by after The Handmaiden and Pachinko, plus a reincarnation romance. I am very predictable in my choice of tropes. Also, Yoo Ah In is in it.

7. Arthdal Chronicles (2019-). Ok, it’s a gorgeous-looking historical fantasy set in Korea written by the same writers as TWDR and SFD, plus it has not just one but TWO Song Joong Ki characters, one of which is a pure, doe-eyed soft boy and the other an evil long-haired fae prince looking asshole who I hear is a complete and utter Unhinged Bastard Supreme. Nothing has ever been more Camille Bait than this, but unfortunately this show hasn’t finished airing, which does pain me deeply. speaking of,

8. Kingdom (2019-). It’s a fantasy sageuk with zombies, is about the extent I know about this show. The fact that it also hasn’t finished airing turns me off a bit but it looks absolutely gorgeous and I also just found out it was written by the same writer as Signal, so,,,,,,,,,

9. Gunman in Joseon (2014). I honestly don’t expect too much from this drama but I just enjoy its premise a lot? From what I understand it’s just Percy from Critical Role, but make it Joseon era.......Like, they just straight up took a Shadow the Hedgehog, “let’s make a sageuk, but guns,” approach, and I kind of unironically love that. Also the soundtrack kicks ass, which like...you can really see where my priorities lie here, huh,

10. Misaeng (2014). I don’t remember at this point why this is on my list but I found it in the Keep note I have of all the media I want to watch?? I have no idea what this show is about, except that it takes place in an office. Apparently Byun Yo Han is also in this one? I’m sorry this is the only non-sageuk or sageuk-adjacent show in this list, I know what I’m about, and it’s fancy old-timey costumes and cool braids.

#/#//#///#////#/////#cam thoughts #KDrama #this is the most self-indulgent thing i've written in a while but it felt good to shout my many thoughts into this void of a blog #also i typed most of this out a few days ago since which i already started watching misaeng #so far it is very good but also the exact opposite of what i was expecting..whatever that is??#long post /#Television

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miximax-hell · 5 years

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As always, it’s been a hot minute. But, uh, hey! I hope you’ve all been fine!

Can you believe that this is actually my 20th reference sheet? That’s crazy. I am hecking slow, but I honestly thought I’d have stopped doing this (way) before I reached the double digits. But, hey, I’m still kicking!

And, to honour such a number, it was about time to add another Raimon baby to this blog, so I’ve gone for one of my very favourites. Shishido is very dear to my heart for a variety of reasons (that I will make sure to explain thoroughly when the time for it comes) and I’ve had this miximax in mind for a very long time. In fact, I’ve been ruminating on it since @raynef-art (btw, today’s Raynef’s birthday, so go and wish her a happy birthday if you can!!) and I talked about Shishido on Skype years ago. When was that, even? 2016? 2017, perhaps? In any case, it sure has been extremely long. But, thankfully, all of that ruminating led to one of my favourite pairs in this whole project! Katrielle Layton is a fantastic fit for Shishido, and I will do my very best to explain why this is the case in this post.

So, for more on ShishiKat, please check under the cut!

As always, I like to use this first paragraph to talk a bit about random stuff, so feel free to skip it if you want. Long story short, I’ve spent the last few months (since mid-May or so) job hunting like a beast. Big ol’ companies from all around the world, like Rockstar, Revolution, The Creative Assembly/Sega or Build A Rocket Boy have shown interest in me, but it’s led nowhere so far, which is extremely frustrating. Heck, there’s a company who contacted me first and they still didn’t give me the job in the end. >:| But I did an interview last Thursday and I should get an answer soon, so let’s hope that goes well...! It’s an awesome job, close to where I live (so I wouldn’t have to move), the company is super successful and two friends are already working there. It’d be incredible to join them and keep progressing in my career. And, well, money doesn’t hurt at all either. Gotta get into the wheel of capitalism. Anyway, job matters aside, I’ve recently finished some games that have become personal favourites of mine, like Valkyria Chronicles and Hatoful Boyfriend: Holiday Star (even if the first one was arguably better), but the one that undoubtedly takes the crown is Marvel’s Spider-Man, which shaped up to be a game as brilliant as Insomniac’s previous titles, if not even more so, and has become one of my favourite games of all time. Sadly, Spider-Man isn’t originally a videogame character, so I won’t be including him in this project (as much as that pains me). So we’ll have to take other routes if we want to have a Marvel miximax here... I’m on it, but suggestions are still accepted.

So, Shishido! Who doesn’t love Shishido? He’s just so lovely. Look at him! Look at him right now! How can someone without visible eyes be so PRECIOUS? Don’t you just want to channel the annoying aunt within you and pinch his cheeks and nose? Well, we still can’t do that, but we can try and do him justice by giving him a truly awesome miximax. (The quality of the art that accompanies said miximax may vary in quality, but that’s not Shishido’s nor Katrielle’s fault--it’s entirely mine for not being better.)

So, friends who have been here for a while and have a good memory may be thinking, “Hold on a minute, you! The Professor Layton franchise has already been represented within this blog--you miximaxed Fudou with Hershel Layton himself!” And you’d be right. You might even be thinking I’m betraying my own rules by using two characters from the same franchise. Well, that isn’t the case, as PL is a Level-5 franchise and I may (and tend to) use up to two characters from each franchise made by L5. It’s all here. But, even with all of that, there’s still a question that remains and that I figure many people might have in their heads: if Fudou is already miximaxed with Hershel, isn’t Shishido basically a copy? Does Katrielle really add anything to the table?

I’m glad you asked. Well, I’m glad I asked, because that’s what led to all of this. ww And, thankfully, yes. Yes, she does. But before answering that question, we have a much more important question to ask:

Who is Shishido Sakichi?

Hino, that lovely piece of work, is actually really fricking good (when he actually tries) at something I’m unable to name, hence why I will refer to it as “scattered storytelling.” It’s similar to environmental storytelling in the sense that we’re never directly told many things, but we can still figure them out thanks to the looks of a character, the scenarios we see, audio queues, etc. Video games offer many resources to build up rich environmental storytelling, but what Hino (and probably many others--it’s not like he invented the wheel!) does is give us hints scattered across different pieces of media to try and figure out what some of his undeveloped characters are all about. And let’s be real: original Raimon is a lovely collection of undeveloped characters. So let’s check out a few things about Shishido and see where they take us.

Shishido was one of the first members of Raimon, being one of the 7 players the team had before they were forced to look for more people to have a match against Teikoku. He was, however, replaced by Kidou when he joined the team, and he stayed as a benchwarmer until he got injured by Gemini Storm. Then, as he joined the Dark Emperors, if you talk to him in the game before the match, he mentions how he’s been pushing himself past his limit for a long time, only to keep feeling like he’s mediocre. Finally, during the match between Raimon’s older and newer members, he is shown facing Kidou and getting past him despite how afraid he was of engaging directly with such a big rival.

On top of that, his in-game descriptions go like this: “He is becoming the team’s key-man by developing his own pace,” (IE1) “His laid-back personality can make him the butt of his team-mates' jokes“ (IE2) and “The Aliea crystal has given him an invincible self-belief“ (IE2 DE). Let’s admit that it’s not a lot to go by, but maybe we can get something out of all of this.

As usual, I explain this better in the heat of the moment while talking to someone who’s ready to listen, so Raynef or my girlfriend probably got the better version of what I’ll be trying to explain now. However, those conversations are so old that I'm having trouble retrieving them, so... welp. ww Let me try anyway.

Judging by what we know about Shishido, we can try to figure out what his character development has been like. We get his first in-game description as soon as we can see him in our in-game menu; that is, before the first Teikoku match even takes place. At this point, aka at the very beginning of the game, Shishido is a player that is “becoming the team’s key-man.” Slowly, perhaps, but he is on his way. However, this process is halted abruptly when Kidou joins the team, as he replaces him as a regular first-team player. Now, a valid question would be, “why did Kidou replace Shishido and not any other midfielder?”

It would make no sense to get rid of Someoka or Kurimatsu to let Kidou in the pitch, as he’s not a forward nor a defender. But, among all the midfielders in the team, why Shishido? Why not Handa, Shourin or even Max (who is technically a forward, but has been playing as a midfielder, so it’d make a lot more sense to bench him)? The most obvious answer would be that everyone else has abilities that Kidou can’t properly replace/mimic/make up for; or, in other words, that Kidou is like an upgraded version of Shishido more than he is an upgraded version of any of the other characters. And what is Kidou, exactly? A brilliant midfielder with incredible control over the ball and a great strategist overall. It’s this last part that we’re most interested in: he’s a strategist. A game-maker, that is. What one could easily call a vital part of a team or, even, in more poetic words, a key-man. What Shishido used to be, or was going to become, before Kidou showed up to steal his spotlight. Not to mention the incredible pain one must feel upon being replaced like that... (This was best explained by @mimiflieder on her fic, Change of pace--it’s about Handa and Ichinose, but the same thing applies. I totally recommend checking it out!)

This theory is further supported (in sad ways) by his in-game description in IE2. His personality remains the same (laid-back and doing his at his own pace), but he has gone from being a key-man WIP to the butt of his teammates’ jokes. Sure, the jokes are blamed on this laid-back personality, but something doesn’t quite add up. Check out his quote while he’s a Dark Emperor: he’s been pushing himself too hard to achieve nothing. Is that really what you’d call ‘laid-back’?

In the best case scenario, everyone sees him as being laid-back and chill to the point of being funny: he’s not making a fuss about being replaced in front of his teammates. However, he’s been trying as hard as possible in secret to become the best he can possibly be... only to still be eclipsed by Kidou and the other talented members of the team in every sense.

In the worst case scenario, his attempts to improve are very much obvious to his team, and the lack of results or the gap between the two key-men not becoming any smaller is what makes him the butt of jokes (but I hate this scenario because Raimon babies are all sweet and supportive boys who’d never do this. I DON’T CARE IF TEENAGERS ARE CRUEL AND STUPID BY NATURE. RAIMON BABIES ARE BETTER THAN ACTUAL TEENAGERS, OKAY, AND THEY’D NEVER DO THIS. THEY ARE PRECIOUS LITTLE ANGELS.)

In either case, he was destined to be--heck, he might have already been in non-spoken parts of the game--Raimon’s game-maker, but when Kidou came around with his superior skills, Shishido became, simply put, obsolete. That made his self-esteem sink and eventually threw him in the arms of Aliea in a desperate attempt to finally be better and stand up to Kidou. That’s why his in-game description as a DE talks about his boosted self-esteem, much like Handa’s talks about how that jack-of-all trades is using the meteorite to become master of all.

And, of course, this makes that scene during that final match ALL the more relevant: not only does it signify the triumph of hard work and resolution over sheer talent, fleeting as it might be, but it’s also the end of a long, long journey of self-deprecation, self-improvement, guts and sheer fear. Shishido was literally SHAKING when he saw Kidou running towards him, but he pulled himself together and won. He was no longer the inferior one, the replaceable one, the laughing stock. Little and unexplained as it may be, it’s a truly emotional finale to his personal and unspoken journey.

(Another and more positive way to look at it is that Shishido is meant to become Raimon’s game-maker and key-man AFTER KIDOU LEAVES, so all this time by his side has been a massive training camp of two years to learn his ways and then add his own twist to everything he’s learnt. This leaves some issues hanging, but it will at least let me sleep tonight.)

What we have here is a pretty solid theory pointing at Shishido having what it takes to become a game-maker. But, hey, that’s just a theory! A GAME THEORY! ...And what this means is that there’s evidence supporting it, but we have no way to confirm it unless one of you guys can go and casually interrogateview Hino (and if you do, that’d kind of come in handy, actually). However, the pieces fall together a bit too well to be just a coincidence, right? At least, I think so. And even if they don’t, we don’t have much more to go by, so... it’ll have to do.

Anyway, we’ve (somewhat) answered the question about who Shishido is. It is, therefore, about time to answer the main question this post laid on the table: is Katrielle a good aura to use when her father is already part of this project? And, even if she is, why would Katrielle be the best match for Shishido? Let’s start by explaining what makes Katrielle non-redundant despite bearing her father’s surname and being very similar conceptually.

In essence, Katrielle and Hershel fulfill very similar roles: a smart person who likes puzzles and is hired to solve mysteries no one else can solve. But anyone who knows anything about these characters will know that, really, they are absolutely nothing alike.

Hershel is the perfect gentleman: well-behaved, modest, calm and cold-headed regardless of the situation, polite to a fault, boasts perfect manners, and he manages to get along with even the most unfriendly people in the world thanks to his infinite patience, unwavering kindness and the smile he has on his face whenever he greets someone. Not to mention that his investigation process is long-winded and meticulous, and keeps telling Luke to not make quick assumptions when he jumps into conclusions ahead of time.

Meanwhile, Katrielle is pretty much the polar opposite: proud (heck, the first episode of the anime has her saying her skills are better than her father’s!), funny, dramatic to a fault, jumps to crazy conclusions so fast that everyone around her is always surprised by it and doubts she even put any thought into them, has a quick temper sometimes, she works as a detective just for funsies (and glory, to some extent, as she’s constantly struggling to be taken seriously by people who’d rather talk to her dad), she’s easily swayed by yummy food, instinct and imagination move her much more than hard evidence... This alone is enough to make the personalities of ShishiKat and FudoLay totally different, but, of course, this train doesn’t run on personalities, but on powers and skills. So let’s discuss not what Kat offers, but what Shishido needs.

We’ve established that Shishido was a game-maker in progress. Now, let’s keep in mind that this project includes all of the main characters from IE, IEGO, IECS and IEGalaxy, and they could all potentially be sharing a side of the field with Shishido, so let’s see whom he is competing against.

Of course, we have Kidou, the genius game-maker, the absolute commander of the pitch and, well, a living legend trained by another living legend: Kageyama. He has a miximax too, but you guys have not seen it yet. In due time.

We have Fudou, whose natural intelligence is (arguably) on par with Kidou’s and has received some training by Kageyama as well, even if he didn’t reach the same level of legend nor acted as a game-maker nearly as much as Kidou did. Fudou is, however, enhanced by Hershel Layton, whose influence upon mixitransing helps Fudou stop being such a little shit. That allows him to focus enough on the game and on his teammates to surpass Kidou as a serious and cold-headed strategist who is able to treat every situation as a puzzle and find the precise moves needed to solve it. Not to mention that, of course, Layton boosts Fudou’s intelligence as well.

Shindou has his miximax, which turns him into a "gamemaker of truth who can appraise people and the general situation, while combining both stillness and motion." Pretty self-explanatory.

Taiyou and Hakuryuu, upon mixitransing, become "midfielders of unparalleled accuracy, who can see into the future and attack the enemy's weak spots with their analytical reasoning." These two aren't technically game-makers in Chrono Storm, but Zhuge Liang was a frigging strategist and these two are given analytical reasoning through their miximax. Not to mention they were probably game-makers when they were part of their original teams.

The way the canon tried to keep Shindou and Taiyou/Hakuryuu from overlapping was by casually disregarding Zhuge Liang’s strategist side and focusing on her Keshin and ability to see the future/what no one else can see, so we can scratch Taiyou and Hakuryuu, as they won’t easily be taking the role of game-makers anymore. We can also discard Kidou, as FudoLay completely outclasses him for the time being. (Look at me, I sound like I’m writing an article on Electrode for Smogon--) So, ShishiKat’s only real challengers are FudoLay and, uh... does Shindou’s miximax have any kind of fandom name? I heard people refering to Kirino’s miximax as Kirino d’Arc, but that’s about it. Anyway, to keep it simple, I’ll call it ShinOda until someone brings up something better.

So, yeah, ShishiKat is competing against ShinOda and FudoLay. ShinOda focuses on a complete control over when to move and when not to move, arguably to preserve his teammates’ and his own stamina and maximise what everyone can do with their natural reserves of energy. FudoLay, on the other hand, uses analytical thinking to find the most efficient moves in any given situation. As I mentioned, he treats every situation as a puzzle, and, as Layton would say, “every puzzle has an answer.” One specific and perfect answer that FudoLay excels at finding, using the minimum number of steps necessary and turning the solution into pure art. He is, however, still Fudou, so he’d probably push his teammates to the limit in rough ways in order to achieve that perfection he is aiming for. And it’s still Layton, so we can expect some long-winded thought processes that take long to pay off--but when they finally do, HOO BOY.

It's good being analytical and smart, but perhaps, just perhaps, Shishido could use a little something to make him different and stick out among his peers. Something that is a bit more... proactive. Unpredictable. Slightly impulsive. But still as witty as one can ever be. He needs to combine the brains with the brawn, and blend it all together with much-needed cheerfulness, since all the game-makers we’re dealing with here are cold or outright pricks.

Shishido needs to improvise to the point of making things up for no reason and eventually making them work in almost miraculous ways. Focus less on what’s in front of his eyes and more on what other possibilities could be there. Act more on instinct than on careful observation. Give commands that are a lot more roundabout that those of Shindou, Kidou or Fudou, but end up paying off in ways that not even he could always predict. Jump into the problem head-first and solve it in-situ instead of looking at it from afar and pondering for long periods of time. And, of course, among all of that, he needs an enormous self-confidence to pull it all off, as his premises may seem utterly ridiculous and he must believe in them whole-heartedly to convince everyone else.

Katrielle Layton checks every single one of these boxes. It’s Katrielle, and Katrielle alone, who can turn Shishido not just into a replacement for the times when Kidou and Fudou aren’t around, but into a true force of nature that can assist the team at all times. It makes Shishido useful and non-redundant--which is, of course, much more than the anime did for him. Let alone the manga, where Shishido didn’t even appear. (I mean, the manga gave us Tamano bby, but still--)

And the best part is that they don’t step on each other. ShinOda is fantastic (and I won’t comment on my own ideas), but no one is objectively better at being a game-maker than the rest. Different situations will call for different approaches, so their relevance will shift as the rivals change or as the rivals adapt to one style or the other. Or, heck, they can simply all work together to keep their rivals guessing and come up with even greater strategies that combine everyone’s fortes.

Also, I’m watching Katrielle’s anime with my girlfriend and that is what made me consider her for this project in the first place, so props to her! (But sorry for butchering the design, dear ww)

#Shishido Sakichi #settei #miximax #mixi max #Inazuma Eleven #original Raimon #info #reasons behind the miximax #inazuma eleven go #inazuma eleven ares no tenbin #inazuma eleven ares

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homiegeesus · 5 years

Text

The Year of Magical Thinking, Ch.1

Summary: Francis Sinclair believed Arthur Morgan had not finished living. In a second chance at life, Arthur discovers what it means to love himself.

At the edge of a precipice and nowhere to run, Arthur concedes defeat. In an extraordinary turn of events, he is sent through the ether to another time where his path crosses with a group not too unlike his own family. After discovering the fate of those he loved before, he races to find a way back. But what if he realizes that there is something worth staying for in this new world? Can two people separated by nearly a hundred and twenty years of living find their happily ever after?

________________________________________________________

So…Super nervous posting this. It’s the first time in a few years that I’ve written anything (the first fandom-centered work I’ve written since like 2005 lmao; Gilmore Girls anybody?) and it shows. But, alas, I’ve been incredibly inspired by RDR2’s story and the way other authors on Tumblr & AO3 have expanded on it. Shit guys, dunno if anybody is even going to read this, but I’ll push it out of the nest and into the world regardless. This may be the stupidest idea ever, but whatever, I’ll let y’all decide. A warning: This is not beta'd, but I reread it like 50 times. Still, I apologize for my terrible grammar. And, yes, I have shamelessly lifted the title from Joan Didion’s fantastic book. It just fit. So. Well. I’m terribly uncreative, so please forgive me Joan. Also, my only knowledge of 1920s-speak comes from F. Scott Fitzgerald, Clara Bow movies and Googling. I don’t know if anybody ever really said ‘old sport’, but what the hell. On another note, there will be a few things taken from the GTA universe, but it's minimal (San Andreas/Liberty City do not exist). I'll be explaining through a secondary character how states in RDR became the modern states that we know. And finally, constructive criticism welcomed and appreciated!! Anyway, here's Wonderwall...

AO3 Link

Warning: This is me working through my “stuff” vicariously through Arthur Morgan and co.

The Year of Magical Thinking

Chapter 1 - Prologue (or A Dream of Arthur Morgan)

Roanoke Valley - 1899 Peace settled over Arthur Morgan like a warm embrace; the rattle in his lungs that had invaded his every waking moment these past few months now a distant feeling. With each labored rise and fall of his chest, drowning in his own blood, he spared but one final thought.

It’s over. It’s finally over and death would soon come for him.

This wasn’t how Arthur had envisioned his death. No, he had always thought he would die with a bullet in his chest and cordite in his lungs. Not at the behest of disease and treachery. Such a shame that wisdom should only come to him on his deathbed. If only…

That’s what it came down to, that’s what it always comes down to. If only, if only, if only, his mind repeated nonstop. Regrets, Arthur had plenty of them. For months, he had been sinking so far in regrets, he could scarcely breathe. What could he have done differently that would have given a better outcome? How had he not seen Dutch’s descent into mania? Arthur supposed that maybe he had seen but chose to ignore, because when had Dutch ever led them astray.

Micah. Arthur had so many regrets about that goddamn snake. Micah had attached to Dutch like a leech and sucked every drop of the very lifeblood of the gang. He had played on all of Dutch’s insecurities and weaknesses. Arthur’s eyes were finally open, for all the good it did him now. But that rat was only one of the last in a long line of regrets he would have in his life. Arthur’s craving for penance started long before Micah came along.

Maybe Arthur himself was the leech, a disease – an infection. Death and pestilence followed him around like an acrid smell. It was something that seeped into his skin, clawed its way inside like a cancer until it reached his soul, the very center of him. Not happy with just him, it carried through the air and infected everything he had ever cared for or loved. His mother, Hosea, Mary, Eliza and –

Isaac. Arthur still had trouble even saying his name, so wrapped up in guilt as he was. During the rare times he found himself alone, thoughts of the little towheaded boy would invade his mind. Being rightly familiar with cowardice, he would press the tips of his fingers to his skull until they felt like ten dull knives, as if to physically rid himself of the painful memories. Of course, this rarely worked and he was resigned to suffer through the punishment he subconsciously forced upon himself. And now, as he laid on the jagged gravel of this cliff, he finally welcomed the comforting mental images of his son.

Feeling the weight of a life lived recklessly lift slowly from his mind, Arthur turned his head towards the setting sun, his final thought being: I gave it all I had.

___________________________________________________________

Francis Sinclair had one rule:

Don’t mess with the timeline.

It had seemed so easy in its simplicity. In the beginning, that is, until it wasn’t. He hadn’t counted on Arthur Morgan. For a bad man, he sure did a lot of good. Probably more than he realized. When Francis had asked the outlaw to find the futuristic rock carvings, he hadn’t expected Mr. Morgan to deliver. Especially not in a matter of months. Chronos himself probably would have found the task trying.

So, in 1932, when Francis had read about the fate of the Van der Linde Gang in a new hit novel by J. R. Miller, he learned that the coppers had closed in on his ole friend, and well, that just wouldn’t do. He understood that he wouldn’t be able to find Mr. Morgan in the time needed to prevent the most unfortunate aspects of his fate, but he could prevent the ultimate one. What he didn’t expect was to find the man with one arm in a Chicago Overcoat.

Francis pulled the horse-drawn buckboard to a stop in a clearing next to the crag and hopped down. The air was calm and filled with the late evening chatter of the local fauna. He jogged the incline of the rock until a recumbent figure came into his field of view. It wasn’t until he was a few feet away that he noticed the extent of the man’s injuries. His blue shirt stained brown, gone was the desperado’s worn black leather hat, in its place a matte of blood and dirt in his previously honeyed blonde hair. His once handsome face gaunt, his ashen skin a mess of bruises and cuts. One eye was swollen shut, blood trickling down the corner of his mouth. Was he even breathing? Francis was running out of time.

“You’ve a lot more living yet, old sport,” the red-head crouched down and placed two fingers against the outlaw’s throat finding a slow, but steady pulse. “Yes, a lot more.”

Mr. Morgan groaned.

“Come on, we gotta find a way to get ya on your gams, ya follow?” Francis grabbed the man’s arm and tried to pull him into a sitting position. Morgan was having none of that.

“Let me– let me die, damn you,” he wheezed on an exhale.

“No, no you poor little bunny. Can’t do that. Now up you go,” Francis pulled once more, this time succeeding.

In a broken voice, Arthur pleaded, “Goddamnit, jus’ let me alone. ‘M so damn tired.” When he finally raised his head and opened his good eye, a look of recognition passed over his face. “You– “

“Yes, me. Now, let’s scoot. You don’t have much time, Mr. Morgan.” Francis placed the man’s arm over his own shoulders, Arthur allowing himself to be hauled into standing.

Arthur weakly protested, “’M dyin’, Mr. Sinclair. I’m a dead man. Ain’t no use in helpin’ a dead man.”

Francis just laughed and replied with the strain of half-carrying a grown man in his voice, “No, Mr. Morgan. As I said before, you’ve a lot more living left to do. Now, conserve your strength.”

Likely out of exhaustion, the outlaw did not say another word. They barely made it to the buckboard before Arthur collapsed. Just before Morgan would have fallen to his knees, Francis used the momentum to haul the man into the back of the wagon. As Francis grabbed each of the larger man’s legs to swing into the bed, Arthur’s breath rasped in his throat, “Why you doin’ this?”

Francis regarded him for a moment before saying, “Because you helped me get outta a pretty big pickle.” He paused, then smiled, “And because you’re terribly important to a lot of people, baby.” And with that, Francis climbed back up to the seat and flicked the reigns.

___________________________________________________________

Well, shit.

Arthur’s plan to die in peace had been upended by a curious red-haired fellow in a blue sweater. With no energy to ruminate further, he resolved to die in the bed of this damn wagon. As the cart trudged backed to the main road, Arthur’s worn body felt every mound and stone the wheels rolled over. Finally, on a relatively smooth surface, he allowed himself to observe his surroundings. Tall pines and hemlock blurred into each other passing in his periphery as he stared at the spattering of stars visible through dark clouds. The sun had officially set in the last thirty minutes and all that remained a reddish orange hue near the horizon. Above him though, what a sight indeed. Bright stars twinkled along the Milky Way, like God himself spread them with a paintbrush across the sky.

Why had he taken all this for granted? So many nights spent under these same stars, but Arthur never really paid them any mind except for navigation. How many years before the artificial lights of the cities overpowered their natural beauty? Unable to ponder any longer and continue the fight to stay conscious, Arthur resigned to close his eyes and place complete trust in the relative stranger.

What felt like moments later, or hours Arthur was unsure, cold droplets of water forced his good eye open once again. A murmur of thunder rolled in the distance. Mr. Sinclair finally turned around, his voice deafened by the creaking of the wagon and heavy breathing of the horses.

“We are just a minute away. I think we’ll make it before the worst of the storm hits.”

But like an omen fitting of this night, Sinclair was wrong. What began as random drops here and there crescendoed into a torrential downpour. The red-haired fellow should have known that hitching his wagon to the outlaw would herald an abundance of bad luck. Unable to shield himself and too tired to care, Arthur welcomed the deluge as if it would wash him away.

Mr. Sinclair halted the horses and hopped down from the buckboard once more. He appeared in Arthur’s line of sight as he unlatched the tailgate, setting down a lantern and grabbing the larger man’s arms in another tug-of-war to get him sitting. Water poured down his face and converged at his chin.

“We just have to ankle about ten feet to the opening,” Sinclair hollered over the rain. “You ready?”

At this point, Arthur would have conjured up his most intimidating mien but there was no energy for that. “No,” he answered defeated.

Unperturbed, the younger man smiled, “That’s the spirit.”

Grabbing Arthur’s arms, Mr. Sinclair placed one across his shoulders. When he hauled the outlaw into standing position, Arthur’s world tilted. Feeling unable to breathe and so lightheaded, he launched into a series of hacking coughs. Blood splattered against his hand and mixed with the rain, diluting until it turned into a river of pink down his arm. He looked to Sinclair. Wet hair plastered to his forehead; the cold of the rain made the strange man’s curious birthmark stand out all the more against pale skin.

“When you gonna see that I’m already dead?” His weakened voice barely heard above the storm.

The redhead looked at him, “Please, just trust me.”

They began their short journey to wherever it was they were going, walking only yards but feeling like miles. By the time they reached what appeared to be a cave entrance, Arthur’s knees buckled and his vision went black. He would have felt hitting the ground, if he’d been conscious. Coming to seconds later, he became aware of his arms being tugged above his head. Mr. Sinclair was apparently dragging him. Deep down, Arthur briefly admired the man’s grit. However, the sentiment was soon replaced by annoyance and near-agony as the sensation of what felt like an elephant settled atop his chest. In and out of consciousness, Arthur realized they had stopped when Sinclair crossed the threshold to grab the lantern at the mouth of the cave. The red-haired man set the lantern between the outlaw and the cave wall and then perched above his head, grabbing both of his arms by the wrists. Arthur could see the younger man’s mouth moving but could not discern the words, only comprehending ‘listen’ and ‘your hands’.

Sinclair then placed Arthur’s large hands against the cool stone wall. Even in his delirious state, he recognized the carvings he had previously found for the peculiar fellow. He could feel the vibrations of the man’s voice behind him in what felt like a chant, but he still could not determine the words. To Arthur’s astonishment, the outlines in the rock began glowing a mute bluish color. What began as a slight tingling in his fingertips turn into full body experience. Reality dissolved into nothingness and became a pure void. And then –

Everything.

Every single moment in his hard life experienced again but in hundred times the speed. This must be it, Arthur thought. God must be forcing him to relive every chapter of his rotten existence before He banished him to the fiery pits of Hell. Familiar faces began to permeate his view. Arthur tried in vain to reach out at the image of his mother. Beatrice Morgan may have been alive for only a small portion of his life, but he would carry her memory with him forever in the form of a flower at his bedside. Unpleasant memories began to flash as Lyle Morgan pervaded his vision. The son of a bitch had been a vile presence in his young days, a man who Arthur would live in fear of until the moment they finally hanged him. Arrested for larceny, his death hadn’t come soon enough.

And then Hosea appeared, someone Arthur had thought of as more of a father than even Dutch. The man had been convinced by the raven-haired outlaw to take a chance on a scared gangly boy who had just tried to rob their room. Starved and desperate for family, Arthur had latched onto the men soaking up anything they would teach him. And teach him they had.

More memories raced by, and Arthur caught sight of a beautiful brown-haired girl. Mary Gillis, the visage of her still enough to stir his pulse, laughed and blushed like a young woman in love. Even in the inevitability of their parting, Arthur had still carried the hope that they’d one day reunite and ride off into the sunset together. If not for Guarma and the mess that had come from the robbery in St. Denis, that may have been his future. Not the hellfire that awaited his damned soul.

And then, Eliza. A young girl of nineteen, Arthur had found comfort in her embrace in the wake of heartbreak. Intent on forgetting Mary, he foolishly took advantage of a girl’s infatuation and followed her to a room above the saloon where she worked. What had come from the union was a beautiful gift but more a curse. Isaac had his mother’s hair and his father’s eyes. A happy baby from what Eliza had told him. Until a group of transients killed them both over ten dollars. Arthur had just whipped up a tidy sum from some cattle rustling and had set his compass to visit his secret family, fully intent on giving Eliza all of the hard-earned money. What greeted him would harden his heart and set him on a path of wickedness. All he had to see were the two graves to understand what had happened.

Like a moving picture, the entirety of his life played before him. If this was what the devil had in mind for his punishment, it would be a hellish eternity. Forced to relive every mistake and misstep he’d ever made; it was what he deserved. But as the memories neared their end, he began to feel a weightlessness. Every atrocity and sin that had weighed heavy on his shoulders suddenly lifted. Again, everything went black.

But then –

Stars. Billions of them. Clearer than any night sky he’d ever seen. Galaxies and distant worlds powdered his vision like puffs of freshly picked cotton. No longer held under the burden of sickness, he took a deep and easy breath. He hadn’t felt this well in months – no, years. Was this heaven? Could God forgive a lifetime of misdeeds? Arthur may have never been a good man, but he did try to be better – in the end. But, no. He was irredeemable. This was a final punishment. A peek at the peace and serenity that redemption would have gifted, before God cast him from the light.

The answer was seemingly given when an unnatural force dragged him back through the ether. Again, hundreds of images flashed in his sight, but this time the memories didn’t belong to him. Too fast to discern individual frames, he could only pick out one reoccurring subject. A woman with dark blonde hair and a bright smile that formed two apple cheeks. Strangely familiar, his memory told him he didn’t know her, but his subconscious shouted in recognition. Then she was gone and with her the remainder of his vision.

Everything turned to black once more.

#Red dead redemption #Arthur Morgan x oc #rdr2 #arthur morgan #rdr2 fanfic #the year of magical thinking #arthur x oc #red dead redemption 2

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iknownothingihearnothing · 6 years

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BoJack Horseman: 5.2 The Dog Days Are Over

Kay, we ended episode 5.1 with the Goldfish Ladies doin’ their thang in BoJack’s pool. Aside: if their water ballet team isn’t called the Goldfish Ladies, I’ma be disappoint.

Fish Fridays have gotta be like The Purge for these ladies.

We also left off, at the tail end of the episode, with Diane and Mr. Peanutbutter. He was dropping her off at her new, um, let’s just call it “not a mansion in the Hollywoo Hills” after a trip and giving her a set of signed divorce papers.

“Take *that*, our marriage!” she joked awkwardly before leaving.

So, Diane and Mr. Peanutbutter are friendly but awks around each other. As tends to happen when exes who’ve seen each other nekkid many, many times try to stay friends with each other.

The episode starts with Diane crying in her car, mascara running down her face. She is wearing an outfit that is very unDianeish and she has cut her hair short. AKA the post-breakup haircut all girls know and eventually come to regret.

As poor Diane is cryin’ her eyes out over her canine ex-husband, uh, this happens:

This couple must be transplants from the underwater land BoJack went to for the premiere of Secretariat in season 3.

Still crying, Diane heads to the airport and asks to be taken as far away from Los Ageless as possible. She demands this of the airport attendant, who is an emu.

After the title sequence, Diane lands in Vietnam, and as she is walking through Hanoi, dodging people and reptiles alike (look, conspiracy theorists! lizard people!), Stefani calls, salivating for fresh content. Diane, if you remember, is a contributer at the website Girl Croosh, which I guess is a site for, like, everything.

She promises to write something up from there, the article of which becomes the Top 10 Reasons Why You Should Travel To Vietnam

I, personally, do not have ancestral roots with Vietnam...as far as I know. I took one of those Ancestry DNA tests a few weeks ago and am waiting on the results. As far as I know I could be 15 percent Tongan, which would be awesome.

I should visit Germany. Or Austria. Or Russia. Those I know I have roots to. Really close roots. Munich-y roots. My dad’s side of the family were from a valley near the Caucasus Mountains. I am literally Caucasian.

Sometimes, I don’t know whether to interested in the rich history or saddened and embarrassed at how white that is.

In VO, Diane explains that her family wasn’t much help in explaining to her where they came from when she was growing up, or their family history. We are shown a flashback of pre-teen Diane inquiring to her dad about just this, but he is busy with baseball. Likely a Red Sox game. Or a Red Fox game.

Furthermore, many of the stores and billboards bear her last name.

I know. Many people in Vietnam share surnames. One of my friend’s last name is Nguyen.

Everybody she passes, Diane continues, look like her (except the flamingo in the nón lá hat).But then a woman bumps into her and speaks Vietnamese to her and she has no idea what she’s saying.

At the gorgeous (cartoon) hotel, Diane checks in just as a gang of American filmmakers bust in; they are filming a movie in the hotel. It stars Laura Linney as a recently divorced woman who comes to Vietnam to find herself.

So much for escaping the LA life.

Diane puts on the dress she bought and the rice paddy hat but she still feels like a tourist.

Speaking of tourist--

Cut to Diane in her usual clothes plus the rice paddy hat appearing to take a selfie in front of the Thien Mu Pagoda.Then everything zooms out.

Pretending to be somewhere more awesome than where you actually are to make other people jealous of you on social media? The hell you say, that never happens!

Diane eats her chicken in the park when Mr. Peanutbutter calls, and, in his usual Mr. Peanutbutter way, inquires as to why she left his party early. He was gonna ask earlier but he was distracted by Todd getting his tongue stuck to the ice sculpture. Todd’s tongue swelled up, and Mr. Peanutbutter had to interfere between him and a mob boss when Todd started talking to him all muffled, the mob boss thinking he was making fun of his deaf sister.

Ya, don’t blame the mob boss.

She makes up an excuse about having a plane to catch to Vietnam while Mr. Peanutbutter literally catches his newspaper in his mouth like a good boy and he promises to pick her up like a good boy/ex-hubby. He is also glad that he is not paying for her phone bills anymore because that international call is gonna be bazongers

Wah wah wahhhhhh as joke falls flat.

In flashback, a still longhaired Diane and Mr. Peanutbutter, recently separated, are celebrating how friendly their separation is by having a divorce dinner. Their waitress turns out to be an excitable young pug by the name of Pickles and I need to call my next dog that. Not fit for a pug, tho. Maybe a dachshund.

She and Mr. Peanutbutter seem to hit it off right away, much to Diane’s annoyance. They both like water! And food scraps! And are full of boundless energy! Amazing! Diane just wants to know if he’s signed the divorce papers yet. Then suggests a housewarming party to curb his loneliness.

Back in the Bojackverse present, a family of American tourists dressed in American flag shirts and polos mistake Diane for a Vietnamese citizen and talk to her like she’s an idiot.

Yup yup yup. Reminds me of the tourist from California who carved her initials into the Roman Colosseum and then took a selfie.

I can go a few streets over and meet new people, Diane!

This is a bad reason to travel to Vietnam, Diane!

The internet exists, Diane!

At the hotel bar, Diane meets one of the only other Americans staying there, a dude working on Laura Linney’s movie about the recently divorced woman going to Vietnam to find herself. He appears to be a bald eagle, but we do not know that he is indeed bald because he is wearing a hat.

He is likely bald, tho.

I mean, unless people start fake tanning and fist-pumping there. Then I’d feel right at home.

In flashback, Diane hangs a painting of the gorgeous Te Huc Bridge at the Hoàn Kiếm Lake in her crappy new apartment just as BoJack stops by. While helping her move, he, in true blunt BoJack fashion, informs her that this place is a shithole and invites her to stay at his place for a bit. She likes the shithole though. It may be a shithole, but it is her shithole.

At Girl Croosh HQ, Stefani is signing a contract outside of their be-tented building. It seems that the “cockroaches at IT tried to unionize” so Stefani called an exterminator--ahem, “negotiator”. The exterminators, natch, are flies. She also requires that listicle from Diane of 5 Empowering Roles For Women Over 40 Who Would’ve Been Better Played By Jennifer Lawrence.

Somehow, I predict that role opposite that (now 58) year old actor Maggie Gyllenhaal didn’t get because she was told she was “too old” to play his love interest at the shocking age of 37 will go to JLaw. She’s, like, 28 now! That’s almost thirty!

Still in flashback, Diane’s trying to get work done in her shithole when a pipe leaks and a stray cat meows and someone burps. She shows up at BoJack’s door intoning “I’m a sad, sad girl with a dirty apartment” as was the phrase agreed upon she needed to utter if she ever needed a space.

Diane finishes her article there and has a glass of wine with BoJack before going back to her shithole. But it turns into...

Keep saying it, Diane. Maybe if you utter it enough times, it’ll actually come true! like the Darling kids shouting “I can fly!”

Diane mumbles drunkenly how weird it is that they are both single at the same time. BoJack knows why he thinks it’s weird, but why does she? It is just weird, they can totally make out and it’d be okay. But that is gross because he’s BoJack and he’s gross and she’s getting a divorce and allowed to be mean. Then, just as BoJack is ruminating on the last time Diane stayed in the guest room, when he went to New Mexico *andtotallydidnothookupwithateenager* she passes out on the couch in a drunken stupor.

In all my years of seeing therapists, not once has any of them advised me to fly to the capital of Vietnam.

Diane’s therapist also gossips about the non celebrities she sees. Including Demi who had a first husband named Bruce and a second named Ashton. And a client named Angelina J., who does not think of herself as an actress anymore.

An actress, a director, a humanitarian, a savior of all mankind, all in a painfully obvious attempt to keep the spotlight on her.

Yeah, I am not much of a Jolie fan.

Diane meets American Bald Eagle working on the Laura Linney movie at the bar and helps him order a drink. He thinks she’s a Vietnamese citizen. They walk through Hanoi’s market area, he tells her about his life in America, thinking she cannot understand a word he is saying, and she kisses him.

I have no bloody idea how you tongue a dude with a beak. There must be some particular angling involved.

American Bald Eagle takes her to Ha Long Bay...the set. It’s actually a backdrop for the Laura Linney movie. American Bald Eagle is the executive grip on the crew. He is Very Important. Or so he claims. But then, as they are perplexedly kissing again, a klieg light falls beside them and Diane curses. In English.

The jig is up!

Diane tries to defend her actions but American Bald Eagle ain’t havin’ it. She’s the bad guy here!

Diane is NOT having it, y’all.

Oooh, mic drop!

Number 9 reason to go to Vietnam:

She worries that this is similar to reason #5, which is Get Out Of Your Natural Habitat, but it’s whatever. Diane is getting divorced, she is owed a whatever.

In flashback, Diane has just chopped off her hair and she is wearing a kick jumpsuit looking all fly ready for her ex’s party but when BoJack arrives and compliments her she flies off the handle a bit, accusing him of trying to take advantage of her when she is vulnerable. He sighs and leaves, telling her that Mr. Peanutbutter will love her new hair.

At the party, Todd is wearing what he always is and eyes the ice swan greedily. Yes, he will lick it tonight. Oh, yes he will.

Oh, Todd. You are a delight.

Diane wanders into the library that used to be hers (her Belle-room) and bumps into Mr. Peanutbutter dressed in a tuxedo shirt and what look to be electric blue plastic pants. Carrying a dog bowl full of nachos.

Mr. Peanutbutter mumbles that she looks good. The new haircut really brings out her...neck. It is all really awkward and uncomfortable and Mr. Peanutbutter quickly finds an excuse to greet someone else.

PC hugs Diane and cries that she saw the whole thing; she will be her rock as long as it does not interfere with being Mr. Peanutbutter’s rock because they are both her friends and it also cannot interfere with her work, which is keeping her very bizzay.

There are a lot of heartbreakingly awkward moments in this episode. I kinda sympathize with PC, though. It’s always a fragile position to be in, being a friend of both parties in a divorce. There’s a fine line you have to tread.

In the present, Diane gets on a plane in Hanoi and calls BoJack to apologize for how shook she’s been post-divorce. She really just needs a friend right now. Get that, BoJack? A friend.

No more yanky your wanky, BoJack.

Or maybe do.

On the plane, none other than Laura Linney sits down beside Diane.

After she gets over her initial star struck reaction, Diane asks her how her movie ends. Does Laura find herself in Vietnam? Well, yes. Literally. She finds her clone sleeping with her ex. And they team up to take down the government.

Someone call Alex Jones!

But those, Diane says in VO, are not the real reasons to go to Vietnam. The real reason is because you see your ex-husband kissing someone else at a party.

Mr. Peanutbutter picks Diane up from the airport, we are shown the uncomfortable exchange from the first episode in his car, and just as she is about to leave with the signed divorce papers, Mr. PB admits that he is seeing someone. Who is not her.

Flashback to the party. PC is still rambling on about being supportive while talking on her phone about work related stuffs when Diane spots her ex and Pickles through a window. She kisses him, and, at first, Diane waves it off as just Mr. PB being drunk. Then, the golden retriever and the pug kiss more thoroughly, and poor Diane is crushed.

There. You can fully see the shock and heartache in her eyes, rendered perfectly through simple animation. Another reason why I heart this show so much.

Because even though she left him, even though she knows she made the right choice, it still frigging HURTS. Like shards of glass pricking her heart.

The heart is an unreasonable muscle.

Diane spends the next few frames drifting through her days. At her shithole apartment. At BoJack’s. On the plane. Even in Vietnam. In VO, she tells us she had hoped the vacation would give her some perspective, but it doesn’t. When she returns, she feels worse than ever.

And that is okay. It’s okay to ache. It’s okay to be confused. When your heart is crushed, nothing makes sense.

So, back in the present, Diane takes a deep breath, smiles a little, and says--

Wow, that was a great episode! I mean, they are all great, but this one was particularly awesome. Took FOREVER to cap, tho. I loved the artistry of the animated Vietnam, how beautiful Ha Long Bay and the Pagoda looked even rendered in animation. The attention to detail is exquisite.

The emotions were so real. When our hearts ache, whether it be after a horrible break up or a divorce or any kind of tragedy in our lives, we tend to be erratic like Diane was in this episode. We lash out at our friends. We try to doll ourselves up when we know we’re going to see ex boyfriends or girlfriends. We feel as if we’ve been stabbed when we glimpse them moving on when we cannot. Sometimes, we take unplanned trips. Or some of us spend a lot in lieu. I could not take such a trip as Diane took after the worst breakup of my life because I was in the middle of a semester...so I spent money at the local mall. Everything I earned. My paycheck was GONE as soon as I got it. I think I spent over a grand in one month alone.

We find ways to cope. And eventually, we start on the road to becoming okay again.

#Bojack Horseman #Bojack #bojack season 5 #recap

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quarterpint · 7 years

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[Event!] On coffee cups and cults

“Now. Give me your hand...”

“You don’t need her hand."

Hasa grabbed it anyway. “It’s part of my aesthetic. You can keep your stupid twenty questions, I—” she gave a flourish with her free one “— will be conducting the noble art of palmistry.”

Goten had been halfway to the kitchen to leave them to it, though at that had spun on his heels, scooped up a chair along the aisle and planted himself at the head of the table, clinging to the backrest.

“Ohh I gotta see this.”

She bristled. “Didn’t you have some prep to do?”

“Yep.” He made no move to leave. Pan snorted. The café would open a little late this morning, then.

"Fine." Hasa settled herself, brushing her curls away from her face in a faux attempt at gravitas. "Let me see your life line..." Pan flattened her palm for her. She was older by a good six or seven years, but Hasa's excitement and determination at learning really brought out the child in her. She reminded Pan of her wide-eyed mature students, always the most hard working in the class. Her face soured. Something wasn't quite right. “Boss, shh.”

“I’m barely breathing...”

“No!” She wheeled on him, “your energy! It’s mixed up with Pan’s. Shush it.”

He rolled his eyes in response, yet did as asked.

There was a jagged collapse in the world then, that tapestry of hearth fire and playful sparking stars he carried with him folding into itself until extinguished. The dawn light in the café had dulled along with it, warming spices of mulled wine vacating the air to leave just the freshly baked pastries and coffee beans. His ki had vanished. For the briefest of moments his body was a gaping void then with a slow, calming exhalation he allowed the ambient ki in the room to pass through him. Completely invisible. In ki-sense, anyway. For Pan, her ki-sense with her as long as she could remember, the sudden change was unnerving. It was as if he were a ghost, or headless. She’d never get used to it.

The world of ki would be startlingly new to Hasa, ki-signatures a secret to uncover and concentrate on rather than an important part of someone’s voice or face. For her his ki-suppression would have reduced her confusion. To Pan just the opposite, Goten had made himself positively freaky-looking.

/Disgust, amused/ she shot to him through feeling. He wouldn’t be able to answer her telepathically with his ki at zero but he grinned in response, topping off the effect.

Hasa acknowledged the change in her favour with a nod, turning her attention to Pan and the patter she was developing.

"Now, see the shape of the heart line here? It's telling me you're a fan of bitter flavours--"

As soon at Goten had relented to teach Hasa ki-sense Pan had been her regular guinea pig. Or one of them at least; she suspected the entire household had been enlisted and routinely poisoned by Goten's lead barista. The exercise was wonderfully nostalgic so Pan didn’t mind - bringing back the entire summer her uncle had spent home from college feeding her ever-improving cake and sweets until he’d nailed the pattern; the link between ki-signatures and taste. Everyone thought it a madcap curios, a mere party trick to ultimately impress dates. No one expected him to take a risk and try to make money from it. But he did, and over fifteen years later he was still raking it in, baffling the odd industry expert who stumbled across Paozu Place to boot.

If Pan was going to be gifted drinks and sweets again whilst he finally passed on The Knowledge, she’d weather a few duds. Heck, she could even help in some respects. “If you’re pretending to read my palm, why are you staring at my stomach?”

Hasa started. “Oh! Oh crap. I keep doing that. It’s just easier," she smiled ruefully. "Your ki's louder looking there."

“I guess it would be. How about—” Pan brought her hand up and in a little “—this?" It was now between her centre and Hasa's face, the misdirected gaze less obvious. "At least, until you get used to it."

Hasa's eyes focussed and unfocussed between palm and ki. "Genius! Thank you!" Her fingers idly traced the creases in Pan's palm now. "I was going to talk more about the main lines, they can be the big flavours or bases? Add some twists with the smaller ones. Maybe even make up a line or t--" She dropped all palmistry pretence, knocking Pan's hand out the way to narrow her eyes, following something from Pan's own centre to chest. "Oh! Got it!" She was behind the bar in moments, a whirlwind of activity, grabbing a mug and throwing down a tub of powder.

"What did you pick up? The flow?"

"Yes! You're stressed!" She sounded far more excited at her inference than would be polite, "that's what the humming on the green is. I can play on that!"

Pan laughed at her description. It was nowhere near sensical, but no one could do any better. She knew exactly the kind of restless flitting Hasa was referring to. "Work's been crazy lately. Gramps has been building the barricades this week and I'm having to pick up his slack."

Goten drummed on the table. "Speaking of, have you been reading the cult auditions?"

He meant the Pan Fighting Network forums. With her father's book serialisation it had exploded as the only possible hub for discussion on the net. The martial arts students of course loved it, but were impatient to learn more. So impatient in fact many were teaching each other. She was proud of their progress, though it was tinged with a growing, sickening horror that she had absolutely no control.

"Only the posts that get attention, those are stressful enough to read." Pan's suspicion piqued. "I hope you're not messing with them all again..."

"What? No no! Don't look at me like that, Gotenks has been a good boy, too." He leant forward, affecting a serious tone. "We've being reading some of the blogs--"

"The bowling ball video was scary," Hasa called over, mid-measurement "imagine how strong he'd get?"

Goten waved a dismissal. "Nah, he lifted it what - two inches for a second? You could do that if you blew hard enough." He grabbed a handful of sugar cubes from the pot on the table, dropping a couple back until he was satisfied. "Now, Can Man, that's a blog I've been following." Pan clocked immediately at the nickname. So, she wasn't just being paranoid. Goten glanced over, her rumination obvious. "You know who I'm talking about."

"Mm."

"Can Man?"

"'West City'... something something." Goten explained for Hasa, "Might be Can Cat for all I can work out, they're not planning to prove it with a video."

He tossed the cubes in the air, unhitching the lock on his genki in the process and it snapped back to the room, happy to be free. His aura densened around the sugar, slowing their fall to a stop, pushing and holding them in place with the shrink-wrapped bubbles. All invisible to non-ki-users. Pan warmed a little as the familiar glow in the room returned, the free ripples of his genki mixing and blending with her and Hasa's own. It was the comforting sense of safety she always enjoyed with her uncle. A whisper of change in his ki, and all but one of the cubes began to spin around the other.

"Hasa, how good are you at juggling?"

She double-took at the midair routine. "Can't. Too much to keep track of."

"Well, they say they're juggling cans with their ki."

She turned back to raiding the shelf, shrugging. "I saw a video of someone floating two baseballs."

"Can Man says they're up to too many to count. Repeatedly. Every day." Another silent whisper and the sugar rotated the other way. "Lifting heavy things is cool and all but it's just brute force. Keeping track of ki all over the place? Now if they’re telling the truth that's a neat trick, newbie or not."

He was thinking along the same lines as Pan. "I've had students who never get passed splitting their ki in two. To have this ability without tuition..."

They both attended to the dancing cubes for a moment, Hasa finally at the coffee machine. Pan homed in on his tiny, efficient nudges in intent keep the cubes in formation. He'd arranged them in a pattern to give the exercise a rhythm and Goten was so practiced he could probably leave this running and read a book three timezones away. Even so, it wasn't simple.

"Are you going to speak to them?"

Pan had been wondering that herself. As a default admin she'd be able to see their name and address at the click of a button and her finger had hovered a few times, but... "No. Not yet, anyway. It might be flukey early ability. I wouldn't want to get their hopes up." She caught herself, "or mine, I suppose."

Demonstration over, Goten's hand twitched to push all but one of the sugar cubes towards him. He let them fall into his mouth and crunched without resistance.

"When then," he slurred through the syrup.

That was a good question. "I'm not sure. Maybe next chapter if they're still going."

"Don't leave it too late, Squirt." It was a warning out of concern, she knew. He still saw her as that little girl, deer in headlights before taking her first class. She'd pushed against his coddling back then, worse than her father's, but was almost grateful for it nowadays.

"I know."

"Done!" With a final tink of spoon on china Hasa floated over with her latest masterpiece, passing it gently to Pan with both hands.

The warm contents smelt safe. Pan blew on it and took a tentative sip, slowly letting it roll over her tongue and swallowed when her tastebuds approved. She was pleasantly surprised. "It's great!" A full mouthful let her work out the depth of flavour. A darker roast to not key up her stress with as much caffeine she knew, a bitter chocolate, the mint stronger than the drinks Goten would make her based off her ki signature, but all there. "Thank you."

Hasa beamed. "Missing anything do you think?"

Pan racked her brain. There was something. "Umm--"

The last sugar cube flicked passed her nose into her coffee with a plink. Goten winked.

"Needed a can of something."

#gs

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personalcoachingcenter · 5 years

Text

Causes of Depression at Different Life Stages

New Post has been published on https://personalcoachingcenter.com/causes-of-depression-at-different-life-stages/

Causes of Depression at Different Life Stages

“I beg your pardon I never promised you a rose garden Along with the sunshine There’s gotta be a little rain sometime”

—from ‘Rose Garden’ by Joe South

“When life takes you for a ride, hang on tight!”

—Charles Schulz, author of ‘Peanuts’

Challenges are an inevitable part of life, from the first breath we take right through to the last.

All lives follow twists and turns, dark paths as well as lighter ones.

But some common life stages pose greater risks to mental health than others, and we all go through them – at least, if we’re lucky! Often it is at times when we face change, such as illness, divorce, or even retirement, that we suddenly find it harder to meet our needs – and those are the times we are most at risk of becoming depressed.

So here I want to share with you some of the common life events that increase the risk of depression, and why that might happen, so that you can use this to help prepare clients (and yourself and your loved ones) for tough times. It’s so important, because depression is all around us. It’s a ‘disease of civilization’ and a curse of modern living.

We live in depressing times

When pressures and demands prevent people from meeting important needs in their life, they naturally feel stressed. And, in turn, when people reach a point of feeling helpless to meet those needs, they can start to feel trapped. Mulling over unmet needs can stress the brain and eventually produce what we call clinical depression.

Depression is a growing problem in modern life. Its prevalence now is ten times greater than 70 years ago. A rise that apparently accounts for increased diagnosis and people being more ready to admit they are depressed. So there does seem to be a huge actual increase in incidence.

Depression is striking young people more and more(1), but no age group is immune: depression is rising in all age groups, as are suicide rates (2). And we can’t simply pass the disorder off as a ‘chemical imbalance’ – our genetics just don’t evolve that fast.

Human beings suffer in context. They suffer in the context of their current situation, but also in the context of their emotional history and learning, and their innate character traits.

Relationships probably have as much to tell us as other life contexts about why some people depress and others don’t.

What’s more, attitudes, feelings and ways of responding to life can all be learned from other people, so the more depressed people there are, the easier it is for depression to spread through communities.

Please (don’t) pass it on

Some people learn depressive attitudes from others. Living with a depressed person is, unsurprisingly, a risk factor for becoming depressed (3). Again, this is strong evidence that there is more than just genetics at play here.

Many psychologists, including Michael Yapko and Martin Seligman, consider depression to be partly a learned phenomenon, and also a ‘socially infectious’ one. Seligman found that children learn depressive biases, expectations and world views from their primary caregiver. He also found that if children were taught new ways of responding to their day-to-day realities, depression could be avoided. Nicholas Christakis and others have shown that depression can spread in social networks up to three degrees of separation, an effect that appears to be more pronounced in women.

Clearly, there are multiple different causes of depression – not just one simple blanket explanation. But it’s not just who you know, or even what happens to you, that determines whether you will become depressed or not.

No one chooses depression

Some people react to the idea that depression isn’t primarily a biological disease with a knee-jerk response like “Are you saying it’s people’s own fault that they become depressed?” As if it’s nothing to do with a person’s emotional history and learning! They interpret the idea to mean that depression is somehow a choice a person makes, or a reflection of personal weakness.

But of course, the truth is far more subtle than that. A small proportion of people do perhaps have a genetic predisposition to reacting to life’s events with greater stress and, of course, no one wants to be depressed. Strong, intelligent, good people become depressed. And sometimes life can be overwhelming for anyone. But it’s important to consider the following:

Depression isn’t solely an event-driven phenomenon

People can and do have all kinds of terrible things happen to them without depressing, while other people seem to become depressed even when outwardly their lives seem to be perfectly fine. So it’s not just about what happens to a person so much as what they inwardly do with what happens to them – how they respond and whether they are prone to negative rumination.

Depression is not just about what happens to a person so much as what they inwardly do with what happens to themTweet

Negative rumination or mulling can happen even during periods of stability and calm. While outwardly life may be calm, inwardly anxiety may be churning. Conversely, a person’s life may be outwardly harsh, but inwardly they may be calm and hopeful.

Resilience can be learned and developed. If someone has been traumatized or spent years listening to someone else interpret life depressingly, then it is not their fault. If life becomes incredibly overwhelming, that is not their fault either.

But there do seem to be times in a person’s life, often times of transition, when it becomes harder to meet their emotional needs. This leaves them vulnerable, and potentially more prone to depression. But it’s feelings of helplessness and hopelessness about ever meeting those needs again that allow depression to really set in.

If someone has learned depressive attitudes, had traumatic emotional conditioning or not been exposed to enough reasonable challenge in childhood, these periods in life may pose a greater risk.

Here I want to give you some ideas as to what stages of life generally tend to be risky for people’s emotional health and balance. Understanding this is more important than ever against the backdrop of the ever-increasing spectrum of depression in our modern world.

More children are depressed than ever before. Yes, this may have something to do with overdiagnosis and eagerness to pathologize natural sadness. But it is true that more children seem to be genuinely disturbed. So what are the risky times in childhood?

Childhood changes

Potentially difficult experiences for a child include:

Going to a new school, particularly before they establish new friendships

Moving away from familiarity

Being bullied

Death of a family member or pet

Loss of a parent through divorce, especially if that parent becomes estranged

Arguing or abusive parents

Too much time spent in a virtual world online, so that the real world can start to feel unnegotiable, and relationship skills may not have developed

Illness of a parent, friend or self.

None of these events inevitably produce depression of course, but they are risky times. I should point out here that there is actually evidence to suggest that some adversity as a child, as long as the child doesn’t feel entirely helpless, can actually strengthen mental resilience.

It’s important to support the child, help them meet their primal emotional needs in any way we can (perhaps outside of school), and help them relax, have fun, find what they enjoy to do and help them explain events to themselves in ways that are not depressing.

And it goes without saying that children need love and support. But of course, that doesn’t just apply to children.

FREE Reframing Book! Just subscribe to my therapy techniques newsletter below.

Download my book on reframing, “New Ways of Seeing”, when you subscribe for free email updates

Click to subscribe free now

Teenage transitions

The idea of the ‘teenager’ is relatively new, and it may be that many young adults have never quite become comfortable with that ‘in-between’ identity – not quite being an adult, but not being a child either.

Anxieties around forming more adult relationships, sexual awakening, pressures of conforming or finding an identity through seemingly not conforming, concerns about what path to take in life, pressures over drugs and sex, and hormonal and other physical changes can all lead to increased rumination, stress and anxiety.

Conflict with parents can also lead to inner struggles and fears.

Teenagers may feel particularly vulnerable due to:

Changing schools

Developing ‘hopeless’ crushes

Relationship issues, including breakups

Leaving school or college

Going away to university and suddenly facing pressure to actively meet emotional needs, such as form new friendships

Separation or divorce of parents

Bereavement.

Addictive behaviours such as drug or alcohol consumption, smoking, or self-harm such as cutting may start during teenage years and may persist as a misguided coping mechanism if not superseded by healthier ways to meet needs.

Treating teenagers as young adults, helping them develop responsibilities and deal with the complexities of life, and actively teaching them emotional skills by re-evaluating explanatory styles, understanding their and other people’s primal emotional needs, and even helping them examine their expectations from life, can all be really powerful ways of supporting teenagers through difficulty.

But of course, teenagers don’t stay teenagers forever.

Adulthood anxieties

Pressures for young adults include:

Starting a new job (or not)

Settling into a relationship (or not)

Moving away from the family home (or not).

These issues can all pose problems for the young adult. It’s really important to realize that not experiencing hoped-for transitions can be just as much of a problem for young adults as the transitions themselves. Romantic and career successes may prove harder to achieve than they had hoped or anticipated.

New responsibilities can also be trying for some young adults. One young guy I saw told me he felt terrified at the prospect of paying bills. Another woman in her twenties told me she was starting to despair that ‘time was running out’ because she had always imagined that ‘Prince Charming’ would have swept her off her feet by now.

A young person may go through several relationships as they try to find out who they are and who they are compatible with, so relationship issues may present difficulties.

Career choice and advancement and the acquisition of material wealth and ‘success’ – whatever that means! – may also be a major focus during young adulthood as we start off in pursuit of the ‘American Dream’. Mind you, as hard as we may try to plan the perfect future, sometimes life has other plans.

Parenting panic

The impact – no, let’s be honest – shock of having a newborn baby is often beyond anything we could have imagined or anticipated.

Don’t get me wrong, new parenthood is, or can be, wonderful. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t come with its fair share of stress. Challenges for new parents include:

The sudden realization of serious responsibility. Many people develop fears they didn’t have before, such as of flying, because now they have to be around for their baby

Perfectionistic demands on themselves or even their baby, which clash painfully with reality. They may blame themselves for feeling angry or resentful, sometimes needing reassurance that they are only human

The physical and emotional stress of a difficult birth, which can lead to PTSD and can in turn precipitate depression in some people

Difficulty meeting their needs for rest, adult social connection and financial security, especially for single parents

Worries or preoccupations with the baby’s health

Strain on relationships brought on by stress and lack of sleep

Inability to strike the right work/life balance and overworking if parents are working as well as parenting.

I realise this all sounds a little bleak! Of course, many parents are thrilled by the arrival of a newborn, and indeed, raising a child can bring incredible joy… but that’s not what this article is about. The reality is, many parents do find this stage very challenging.

But it can be just as challenging when the expected transition to parenthood doesn’t happen. Many people have dreamed of having children for many years, and finding out that this may not be possible can trigger people to ruminate and become overwhelmed, sometimes to the point of feeling that life is not worthwhile.

But time moves on, and new challenges emerge.

Middle-age milestones

Challenges for people in their forties and fifties include:

Awareness of dreams not fulfilled

Job insecurity or stress, or work becoming more intermittent

Concerns about children or aging parents

Family or relationship breakdown or job loss, potentially making people feel as if they have to ‘start all over again’ as a single or unemployed forty- or fifty-something. That feeling can be terrifying and overwhelming

Realizing that their time is finite – the so-called ‘mid-life crisis’ can make people want to cling to a sense of youth or adventure

Health issues and poor physical health, especially if a person hasn’t prioritized looking after themselves or has struggled with long-term stress.

Forty has been called the ‘old age of youth’ and fifty the ‘youth of old age’. Not that old age is necessarily a bad thing! In fact, some people report being happier than ever in their senior years. But old age is certainly not without its own trials and tribulations.

Old age and retirement

Work shouldn’t meet all of a person’s needs, but it may well meet some important ones. When a person retires from work they might suddenly find some of those needs remain unmet. Specific challenges for retirees and the elderly may include:

Unfulfilled needs for status, meaning, and purpose

Loss of the sense of belonging to a community

Lack of self-esteem and self-advancement, as they are no longer able to feel competent in their role or stretch themselves by updating their skills

Increased frailty, illness, and waning physical and sometimes mental health, both personal and of their partner and friends

Loneliness from friends dying or moving away

Feelings of isolation and marginalization due to negative attitudes towards the elderly

Worry about ‘becoming a burden’ as uncertainty over their health and care develops

Conflict with a partner from suddenly spending much more time with them than ever before.

Going from a context that easily meets many emotional needs to one that doesn’t can cause a person to ruminate, stress and, unless they find ways to meet those needs outside of the work context, become depressed. Less human contact can be a major problem and keeping connections going may be as vital for health as regular exercise.

It’s not what we experience, it’s how we experience it

So some issues are pretty perennial such as relationship concerns, health worries (although typically they increase with age) and money worries. Trauma can occur at any stage of the life cycle, of course, and there’s no predicting when the stresses of life will suddenly mount up to the point of feeling overwhelming.

We all go through tough times, but it’s not just what we go through that determines our ability to cope, but how we deal with the stress – how we still manage to meet our needs as best we can, retain hope, and feel empowered. Once we understand the typical stresses of the life cycle, we can prepare ourselves and others to best manage them. And a big part of this lies in having good support from others.

So what can we learn in general? Well, first and foremost, relationships matter. Having warm, good and wide-ranging friendships and relationships helps us all mentally, physically and even financially.

The one and only constant in life is change. The body morphs, circumstances alter, no new second is the same as the last. Resilience means flowing with the changes, not fighting them. Adaptability is perhaps the greatest human asset. And of course, everything passes, including hardships.

Let me leave you with some words from ex-slave and self-created man George Washington Carver:

“How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant of the weak and strong. Because someday in your life you will have been all of these.”

Our How to Lift Depression Fast course enables you to treat depression quickly, making a lasting difference in your clients’ lives without the use of harmful drugs. Read more about the course here.

FREE Reframing Book! Just subscribe to my therapy techniques newsletter below.

Download my book on reframing, “New Ways of Seeing”, when you subscribe for free email updates

Click to subscribe free now

Notes:

Read more Depression therapy techniques »

Search for more therapy techniques:

Go To Source

#coaching #coaching business #coaching group #coaching life #coaching life style #coaching on line #coaching performance #Coaching Tips #Coaching from around the web

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personalcoachingcenter · 5 years

Text

Causes of Depression at Different Life Stages

New Post has been published on http://personalcoachingcenter.com/causes-of-depression-at-different-life-stages/

Causes of Depression at Different Life Stages

“I beg your pardon I never promised you a rose garden Along with the sunshine There’s gotta be a little rain sometime”

—from ‘Rose Garden’ by Joe South

“When life takes you for a ride, hang on tight!”

—Charles Schulz, author of ‘Peanuts’

Challenges are an inevitable part of life, from the first breath we take right through to the last.

All lives follow twists and turns, dark paths as well as lighter ones.

We live in depressing times

Human beings suffer in context. They suffer in the context of their current situation, but also in the context of their emotional history and learning, and their innate character traits.

Relationships probably have as much to tell us as other life contexts about why some people depress and others don’t.

Please (don’t) pass it on

No one chooses depression

Depression isn’t solely an event-driven phenomenon

Depression is not just about what happens to a person so much as what they inwardly do with what happens to themTweet

If someone has learned depressive attitudes, had traumatic emotional conditioning or not been exposed to enough reasonable challenge in childhood, these periods in life may pose a greater risk.

Childhood changes

Potentially difficult experiences for a child include:

Going to a new school, particularly before they establish new friendships

Moving away from familiarity

Being bullied

Death of a family member or pet

Loss of a parent through divorce, especially if that parent becomes estranged

Arguing or abusive parents

Too much time spent in a virtual world online, so that the real world can start to feel unnegotiable, and relationship skills may not have developed

Illness of a parent, friend or self.

And it goes without saying that children need love and support. But of course, that doesn’t just apply to children.

FREE Reframing Book! Just subscribe to my therapy techniques newsletter below.

Download my book on reframing, “New Ways of Seeing”, when you subscribe for free email updates

Click to subscribe free now

Teenage transitions

Conflict with parents can also lead to inner struggles and fears.

Teenagers may feel particularly vulnerable due to:

Changing schools

Developing ‘hopeless’ crushes

Relationship issues, including breakups

Leaving school or college

Going away to university and suddenly facing pressure to actively meet emotional needs, such as form new friendships

Separation or divorce of parents

Bereavement.

But of course, teenagers don’t stay teenagers forever.

Adulthood anxieties

Pressures for young adults include:

Starting a new job (or not)

Settling into a relationship (or not)

Moving away from the family home (or not).

A young person may go through several relationships as they try to find out who they are and who they are compatible with, so relationship issues may present difficulties.

Parenting panic

The impact – no, let’s be honest – shock of having a newborn baby is often beyond anything we could have imagined or anticipated.

Don’t get me wrong, new parenthood is, or can be, wonderful. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t come with its fair share of stress. Challenges for new parents include:

The sudden realization of serious responsibility. Many people develop fears they didn’t have before, such as of flying, because now they have to be around for their baby

The physical and emotional stress of a difficult birth, which can lead to PTSD and can in turn precipitate depression in some people

Difficulty meeting their needs for rest, adult social connection and financial security, especially for single parents

Worries or preoccupations with the baby’s health

Strain on relationships brought on by stress and lack of sleep

Inability to strike the right work/life balance and overworking if parents are working as well as parenting.

But time moves on, and new challenges emerge.

Middle-age milestones

Challenges for people in their forties and fifties include:

Awareness of dreams not fulfilled

Job insecurity or stress, or work becoming more intermittent

Concerns about children or aging parents

Realizing that their time is finite – the so-called ‘mid-life crisis’ can make people want to cling to a sense of youth or adventure

Health issues and poor physical health, especially if a person hasn’t prioritized looking after themselves or has struggled with long-term stress.

Old age and retirement

Unfulfilled needs for status, meaning, and purpose

Loss of the sense of belonging to a community

Lack of self-esteem and self-advancement, as they are no longer able to feel competent in their role or stretch themselves by updating their skills

Increased frailty, illness, and waning physical and sometimes mental health, both personal and of their partner and friends

Loneliness from friends dying or moving away

Feelings of isolation and marginalization due to negative attitudes towards the elderly

Worry about ‘becoming a burden’ as uncertainty over their health and care develops

Conflict with a partner from suddenly spending much more time with them than ever before.

It’s not what we experience, it’s how we experience it

Let me leave you with some words from ex-slave and self-created man George Washington Carver:

Our How to Lift Depression Fast course enables you to treat depression quickly, making a lasting difference in your clients’ lives without the use of harmful drugs. Read more about the course here.

FREE Reframing Book! Just subscribe to my therapy techniques newsletter below.

Download my book on reframing, “New Ways of Seeing”, when you subscribe for free email updates

Click to subscribe free now

Notes:

Read more Depression therapy techniques »

Search for more therapy techniques:

Go To Source

#coaching #coaching business #coaching group #coaching life #coaching life style #coaching on line #coaching performance #Coaching Tips #Coaching from around the web

0 notes