I talked about it last year, but it's Christmas Eve and I'm going to talk about it again!
We know that Elizabeth and Darcy invite all the Gardiners to Pemberley for the Christmas following their marriage. I suspect Darcy would insist on paying to smooth out the various complications of getting from London to Pemberley with children, and thus the invitation would not impose extra expenses on the Gardiners. (Darcy might have to apply epistolary peer pressure to do this, but he's honestly pretty good at that.)
This may be the first time since Georgiana's early childhood that there were any young children in the family at Pemberley. If so, it hasn't really happened since Darcy and Georgiana's father was alive, so even with Austen's relative unsentimentality about children, it's still probably a big deal on their side.
But also, I occasionally entertain myself by imagining what it would be like for the children, especially the oldest, a girl of eight. The other children are six or younger, and I suspect they're not going to have clear memories of life before their cousins' marriages (especially the boys, but perhaps even the six-year-old girl). An eight-year-old, though?
Miss Gardiner, I think, would have a very clear sense of life at home vs holidays at her aunt Bennet's much bigger house at Longbourn. The Gardiners seem to be quite well-off, but I doubt they're extravagant in the way of Mrs Bennet or living at the edge of their income—there's a reason they continue to live within sight of Mr Gardiner's warehouses. So a middling kind of genteel estate like Longbourn would probably seem quite grand vs her house in Gracechurch Street.
And then she goes to Pemberley.
Note: I've occasionally seen it suggested that Pemberley is a more or less ordinary gentleman's estate that is just really pretty and has a bunch of land attached, which I think is manifestly false. Apart from the architectural and landscaping details which suggest otherwise on their own, Elizabeth does note that the interior is suitable to Darcy's wealth and markedly elegant, yet understated by contrast to the OTT splendor of Rosings; this is a mark of aesthetic taste, not humility.
So I think Pemberley's elegance is about what you would expect from the combination of what they would consider good taste (furnishings along finer lines than the heavier and more ornate furniture of the past, restraint in decoration and semi-naturalistic landscape, that sort of thing) and an income greater than the average lord's. It looks like what it is.
The point is that for this young girl who does not always (perhaps often) accompany her parents' travels, Longbourn is probably a lot. Pemberley is a lot more. She was probably warned that it was much grander than most (or all) of what she'd seen before, but even so, I think that she's just the right age to be really powerfully struck by a place like that, and a place like that being Elizabeth's home. That's the moment, I imagine, when she realizes that things are going to be different now.
Jumping even more into headcanon, I also imagine that later, when Miss Gardiner is going to come into society, the Darcys very much want to do whatever they can for her. Ten years after that Christmas at Pemberley, their own children (assuming they have them) would still be young. Miss Gardiner would be eighteen, though—just the right age to come out. And I kind of love the idea of the Darcys hosting a big winter coming-out ball for the daughter of their beloved relations in trade.
Of course, she'd have gone to Pemberley more than those two times. But I imagine that first, powerful impression in that first Christmas at Pemberley is very much with her as she dances at her first ball.
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It's kinda shocking to me how few people seem to know how prevalent the 'my great grandmother was cherokee' myth is and how it's almost never actually true, especially when it comes with things like 'never signed up' or 'fell off the trail' or 'courthouse burned down destorying the documentation' etc etc.
People just don't even seem to know the history like.. when the Trail happened. My great great great grandfather was 2 years old during Removal in 1838, so peoples 'my great grandmother hid in the mountains!' is so clearly wrong. And we have rolls. From before and after removal, rolls done by cherokee nation and others by the government, rolls that were not stored in one random flammable courthouse. It's not difficult to find the actual evidence of ancestry.
And just.. there are lots of ways those family stories get started. It was a practice during the confederacy to claim cherokee ancestry to show one's family had 'deep roots in the south' that they were there before the cherokee were removed. Many people pretended to be cherokee and applied for the Guion-Miller payout just to try to steal money meant for cherokees - 2/3rds of the applicants were denied for having 0 proof of actual cherokee ancestry. [We even see lawyers advertising signing up for the Miller roll just to try to get free money.] And the myth even started in some families in the cherokee land lotteries, where the land stolen from us was raffled off, including the house and everything that was left behind when the cherokees were removed. We have seen people whose families just take these things stolen from the cherokee family and adopt them into their own family story, saying that they were cherokee themselves.
If you had some family story about being cherokee and you wanna have proof one way or the other, check out this Facebook group run by expert cherokee genealogists that do research for free. Just please read the rules fully and respect the researchers. They run thousands of people's ancestries a year and their average is only around 0.7% of lines they run actually end up having true cherokee ancestry.
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fnaf oc time
im not a true william fan unless i make a fnaf oc and make it all about him
william made her because he was jealous of the attention freddys was getting (henry owns freddys instead) so he was like: fine!! i’ll make an animatronic that is BETTER and FLUFFIER and CUTER than his stupid robots!! so he made her
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Even when she's fending off hunger pangs, Helena's got a weak spot for the sexy brash alternative girls (bonus points if they're named Lilith).
Previous / Next
Chapter 4: The Art of Dark Meditation
Helena, thinking: You are not hungry. You are not hungry. You are not h-
[stomach grumbles loudly]
I guess it's back to the drawing board.
-
Julia: Whoa. Where ya off to looking like that?
Helena: Ugh, do I look ridiculous? Is my makeup awful?
Julia: No, you actually kinda look like a million bucks. No more migraine?
Helena: It's under control for now.
Julia: Wait! You didn't answer my question.
Helena: Maybe because it's none of your business. Keep out of trouble, kiddo, and don't stay up past your bedtime.
Julia: But-
Helena: Don't make me call a babysitter.
-
Darling: Helena! You managed to track me down. Guess I owe you that free drink now, huh?
Helena: Oh, I really don't need-
Lilith (Pleasant): One more round, Dar?
Darling: Another round of EAPAs coming up! I'll make you the cocktail of your dreams once I'm finished here, H.
Helena: [stealing discreet glances] No worries. I can wait.
[indistinct conversation]
Darling: Helena, you've barely even touched it! Are my mixology skills that hopeless? I've been practicing!
Helena: Sorry. It's great. I'm just a little... distracted.
Darling: [chuckles] Yeah, that's obvious.
Helena: Who is she? I thought I knew everyone in this place.
Darling: She's new in town, I think. Looks like a tough nut to crack but seems nice enough. Good tipper at least. God, what is her name? I think it's...
Lilith: [faintly overheard] Well, I should pack it in or I'll hate myself in the morning.
Helena: Thanks for the drink, but I've got to go.
Darling: What's with you and the hasty exits these days? [sighs resignedly] Well, good luck chasing down your new lady.
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@floydsteeth thank you c: Also i should prob tag @mllorei and @m-mmiy since they asked and i didn’t answer question so heres some general Info about the fun stuff___
- Born in Rhodolite, closer to the southeast, In a town almost entirely made up of farmers
- Circumstances lead to her just leaving home super young, hitching a ride with some vintners who’d only been passing though town and were headed to a farmers market.
- Ended up staying with said vintners, they put her to work tho.
- When they had to go she wanted to stay in the capital because there weren’t any big libraries a walking distance from where they were going. Found out she did NOT like being alone.
- ‘hitchhiked’ away. Ended up on a random boat. Was really bad with harpoons. Can’t swim. Still can’t.
- when she asked them to teach her to swim they said ‘No. Just don’t fall in’ so she didn’t fall in.
- Ended up migrated to Tanzanite by her late teens early twenties. Since she is extremely receptive to any and all attention praise community she naturally gravitated toward the people who dedicated their time to follow Azel around. He likes that she can strip fruit really fast.
(small note; - She does genuinely believe in Azel though, she can’t think of a reason believe a god wouldn’t want to be incarnated.)
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— ☆
I described her as like a dog or a parrot as opposed to being cool because she isn’t cool.
I’ve drawn her on my blog in the past but she’s always with Keith so she’s always got a stupid silly blank blissed out blank happy face so random info__
- For routes i always have a first Phase where her names Dimitri and then she gets called Demelza be because I’ve done that since forever, Demelzas her real name though.
- I consider her to be an Egotist, not at the expense of anybody and in such a small scale that its probably not all that different in practice then Altruism. But its still there. Because my oc’s need to suffer under the weight of their minds a little
- She fidgets with her gloves, Pinches the skin underneath, Pulls them up against her wrists, Rolls her fingers into the fabric of them.
- Extremely sentimental, still hums Oh my Darlin’ Clementine like the Ladies would while they were working whenever she’s focused. Still likes to watch people cook. Still a little comforted by the sound of crickets from a distance. Very regimental
- Good with first aid. Knows which plants are antibacterial/anti inflammatory + works as a great bandage. Had to adapt to different materials in Tanzanite.
- Good at Playing things off, her caretakers never knew much about her because she’s good at avoiding the truth. As for lying shes got too many tells.
- Overall more of a River then a Lake. Faster moving, ebbs and flows. Extremely aware of the emotions she’s having.
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- Demelza (last name was Aster but im considering changing it just because that goes WAY back to when I was using her as a MYSTIC MESSENGER oc so)
also heres a better edit of her face. I’d changed some parts because it made sense geometrically but did it make sense within my heart 🤔 ? no- it did not.
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