The best fics are the ones that recognize that although Luke Skywalker may APPEAR on the outside to be a normal friendly twink who happens to have cool powers, especially when contrasted with such ship partners as Boba or Din or even Han, he is arguably the scariest person alive in the galaxy around the prequel era. AND, crucially, he is also a fundamentally weird guy. This man was homeschooled on a rural farm his entire life and then apprenticed to a swamp gremlin who showed him how to tap into the cosmic power of the universe. He blew up the death star age 19, killing approx 2 million-ish Imperials. He is a vortex of Force power that can communicate with the ghosts of dead Jedi. He’s staring into the distance and mumbling to himself and doing Yoda aphorisms and casually pulling out the “yeah I could crush that guy into a paste with my mind (:” and nobody around him knows what to do with that. I think he is a character who has very little frame of reference for how a Jedi or a person in general is supposed to act and there is some thing about him that is by necessity really fucking weird and a little scary but he’s so nice that it can throw you off the scent a little bit. Thanks for coming to my TED talk
Pac: I'm not going to say anything to you guys [Chat], I'm not going to say anything to you. I'm not saying absolutely anything, I'm not going to comment. Man, you broke me here, you broke me in 3 parts! I'm not going to- no no no no no, I won't fall for your game, I won't fall for your game.*
Pac's chat allows viewers to make music requests, which led to this very well-timed moment today where Careless Whisper started playing as soon as Pac met back up with Fit.
* [Approximate translation. I'm not a native Portuguese speaker, so as always, please feel free to let me know if there's a better way to translate things!]
A regular came in a few evenings ago. A young mom with her daughter who often comes in the morning. She also often treats the baristas badly, but that’s a different story.
She came in at an unusual time with her daughter on her hip. The little girl looked sick to me - puffy eyes and a red nose and a tight, unhappy pinch to her mouth.
The mom ordered her sweets. Sensing something was wrong, I tried to stay upbeat and to engage the little girl but neither mom or daughter were interested. I turned to collect their order.
“See? Daddy made you sad but mommy makes it better, right?”
My mouth soured and my hands paused in making their drinks. The revulsion was physical, a hollowing in my stomach that sounded like a vacuum in my ears. A ghostly hand settled against the back of my neck and stole the heat from my veins.
Im an adult now. The justifications came to mind a microsecond behind the horror and tried to overwhelm it. Mom is tired, mom just wants little girl to feel better, daddy also made mommy sad. Sometimes the big lessons are learned on other days, sometimes it’s okay to make the day better with sweets, sometimes you don’t have the strength to fight the battles you’re supposed to fight—
I handed out the pastry.
She said again, “Daddy made you cry and mommy made it better.”
The little girl looked into her pastry bag and didn’t look up.
No, i wanted to say. No, mommy didnt make it better. Mommy is part of the problem, mommy is saying your feelings are only worth a cake pop and a juice, mommy is siding with daddy who made you cry so hard that you look like a child left in the cold.
“Would you like a sticker?” I asked. She did and she took one and I took too much comfort in the fragile return of her smile before leaving the cafe.
I should have said more. I’m sorry you’re sad. I see that you’re sad. It matters that you’re sad.
Did I become part of this terrible lesson by joining in? Here’s a pastry, here’s a sticker, see? Didn’t we make it all better?
I think a lot of discussions would be made better by recognizing that masculinity and femininity aren't inherently preferred, but adherence to cishet standards is, which is slightly different.
This is why a masculine trans man* or a feminine trans woman* often still face stigma - it isn't that they aren't gender conforming to the gender they are. It is that cishetero standards do not want trans people to exist at all, in any capacity.
Maddie: 🤨🤔 "mhmm, could be very much the point"..."wow"..."Eddie's friend??"..."I just think that maybe you're not sure of your own feelings, yet, and if there's something that you need to tell Eddie, you will. Just, in your own time."
Evan Buckley, your sister has your number and she is going to gloat SO hard when you finally get your shit together and lock Eddie down.