#preserving lives is one thing

[ace-and-ranty]

Speaking of, reason 173897985th why I love this book is how Naomi handles El’s shift from “Fuck you, got mine” to “I MUST SAVE THE ENTIRE SCHOOL OR I AM UNWORTHY OF LIFE”

It comes across so well, I think, because it is gradual, because it’s baked into her character so intimately, and because every time El shifts further forward into selflessness, she is so very pissed about it. Like. That’s real! She will be a good person! But she’ll be mad about it the whole fucking time!!

#The Scholomance #I love you so much Galadriel #The thing is. El's conflict is never 'I want to do the selfish thing / But my morals are stopping me' #It is always is 'I want to do the selfless thing / But my self-preservation won't let me' #she is so desperate to help and be good. from day one. so desperate. #it's kept in check by one thing and one thing only. and it's that she wants to live. #El's desire to live is the only thing barely keeping her in check #.and the second she finds people she loves #her love for them immediately trumps her self-preservation. #from there on?. #THE BREAKS ARE OFF.

[pennyserenade]

the x files really is so incredible in terms of fans and fandom. fans are so so so essential to the xfiles to the point that they’re literally embedded into the show—their usernames, sometimes their commonly held beliefs about the characters, sometimes jokes they made on forums. maybe it’s because i’ve never been really invested in tv series from the 90s or maybe it’s bc the x files really was that bitch back in the day, but i’ve never before witnessed a fandom so prevalent and everlasting. it’s so cool to witness

#misc. #this was inspired by the fact that i opened a fanfic that said #who is crazy enough to post the night before the movie opens #and i looked up to see the date #it was 1998!!!! the movie was THE movie #like idk maybe it’s the history nerd in me but the preservation of these fanfics #and these websites are EVERYTHING to me #like i hope one day when someone looks back at humanity they find things like this #it’s just a silly little show but people loved it so much and it changed so many lives

[uncanny-tranny]

There's something so insane to me about being able to create and recreate vintage or even ancient music, clothes, fabrics, building architecture, anything, really.

I watched this video about a lady who knit a WWII-era vest, and it was really unique, because the cable work would eat up yarn, when there were shortages of fibers. This pattern would have likely been used by people to send overseas to soldiers, and now it's being created in a time where this war has been over for generations. What were the people making this pattern thinking of? What about the people making the vest? Could they fathom a world where world wars didn't happen back to back? Could they imagine what peace felt like, or did it fade like a distant memory, a faint friend? All we have now are the remnants of their efforts, a "simple" vest that would warm the bodies of countless people the knitter would never have imagined were here on earth with them.

We're reaching across time to learn about other people - we're reaching our hands out just to grasp anything tangible. And when we've take hold of something, all we can do is say I love you I love you I love you

#positivity #art #i also come across this absolutely stunning woman who collects vintage pieces from the '50s and it's just. it's mind boggling #or how we've found ancient sheet music and have recreated its contents #do you ever think about how we're time travelers #do you ever think about what might be recreated of us in the future #this isn't about nostalgia baiting but about how we learn and process the ways that people in the past lived #you don't have to feel nostalgic for WWII to be intrigued by this (it would be very concerning if one WAS nostalgic for WWII) #i just. i die a little inside because i know i will never know everything... #...i will never know every lottle thing about people in the past especially... #...and i am never completely satisfied because only a very selective amount of things are preserved and remembered... #...i wonder then what 'forgotten' people thought and felt and how they lived... #...especially as individuals or as a small clan of family and friends. i want to know them intomately - as if i myself have become emeshed.. #...does this make sense. i don't just want to know about nobles and kings and the wealthy... #...i want to know what the lacemaker for a king felt making lace for the royals... #...i want to know what the rice field worker thought about when the fields were flooded and they swatted a bug away from their skin... #...i want to know what a mother of a small child thought when churning butter - her baby cooing and making a mess... #...and it sucks sometimes to know that we're time travelers but in a very narrow sense. but i still love what we have got... #...don't get me wrong i love it. but i still grieve that we have lost a lot of history - a lot of people... #...or maybe we have only lost them in the sense that we just haven't located and found them *yet* #anyway i've watched that video multiple times now and i just go absolutely animalistic thinking about it #all of this is complex and i have Plenty of thoughts about that. but at least to me this is what i've seen a lot - a lot of love #and isn't studying this - recreating it and analyzing it - isn't that a form of love? #am i... a nosy person..........

[mercutiotakethewheel]

rereading fablehaven is actually so sad rn bc like fuck im not eleven anymore wtf? i keep reading expecting to relate to kendra and seth like i used to but i just dont? like i can still feel the beating heart of love i have for this story underneath but its like different now. like this fun story is deeply sad to me now like what???

these kids joined the magical world and in doing so had to sever every connection they have to the outside world from before. they only have friends their age for like a ch of book 2, and after that they basically have no peer group. how awful is that for a couple of kids?

and they dont get to be kids anymore. seth’s mischief gathers consequences until he seems to lose it in the latter half of dragonwatch. kendra gains self confidence in some ways but then also becomes more and more burdened with responsibilities she didnt ask for and shouldnt have at the ripe age of 13-16.

like i dont even know

i might be projecting here and its def not this deep but i desperately need these bitches to re-enter the public school system and make some fucking friends their own age. please. magical or non-magical.

#fablehaven #and like it even seems to eat at the relationship they have to their parents #who more and more become distanced from the lives and emotions and actual going ons of their children #like fuck the whole umnite book 4 parents are worried their kids are in a cult #and they dont know whats going on with them anymore thing isnt funny anymore #kendra sorenson #seth sorenson #i even think maybe this is some of whats going on in dragonwatch #where kendra and seth are seeing this escalating mistreatment of the dragons by the supposed good guys #and dont seem to think twice about it either #i wonder if theyve just become so isolated with this set of adults #around this set of adults who have this ideology about preserves as unquestioned forces of good #that maybe its harder for them to put it in a context they no longer have #idk #im just spitballing here

[bitegore]

So seriously: if you have a serious recoil/disgust factor at uncommonly eaten parts of an animal being in any kind of food context (eg: whole fish being served at a table) and you want to work on minimizing that reaction, I really really recommend eating "normal" versions of those unusual foods, like for example deli-sliced tongue. I know I'm talking out of my ass here, but things like liver and haggis (organ meat), tongue (tongue), and probably a whole lot of others I've never had can be pretty easily made into forms that taste real good and don't look much like a weird lump of flesh you can recognize, and being able to get from "that's weird and gross but I want to get it" to "that's weird but it tastes really good and I want to get it" will probably make building up momentum easier when you move on to less "common" pastures.

Good luck, by the way. I believe in you.

#red rambles #i'm doing this with bugs for the record im not like JUST talking out my ass. I have a full on phobia of dead bugs #I can and have eaten live bugs! I've eaten and really enjoyed cricket-flour chips! I'm working my way up to "whole preserved scorpion in #chocolate'' type desserts but I haven't gotten there yet #so I know for a fact that there's a kind of person who has this sort of instinctive repulsion and also really really REALLY wants to get #over it. and also i didn't even realize this was a thing because i grew up with whitefish and tongue and so on #anyway im not sure if people like. KNOW that you can get like... liver *spread* or prepared tongue or brain or w/e #being able to go 'oh that is actually delicious' is a big thing or at least it is for me! it's very motivating! #you're the only one who is going to really 'push' you on these things- god knows my immediate family and friends mostly wants me to #STOP trying to eat bugs LMFAO (this is due to my behaviors but also like my dad told me I was not to keep cricket snacks in the house) #(so it's a bit of both but mostly because i cannot be trusted not to just eat a random ant because they are delicious these days) #but like at least in my experience the second you step out of the 'culturally normative' fold people stop being like 'yay stop being picky! #and start going 'no stop go back to being picky' so it's really really important to find your own motivators and not rely on other people

[forcedhesitation]

exhalted vampeeric maaastah

#bg3 #thoughts about media #bg3 spoilers #(in tags- not the post) #astarion’s...performance. early act 3 lives in my mind rent free #it’s delightfully dramatic. but it also tells you a LOT about him. #that’s one thing I truly and honestly REALLY love about astarion’s character. #he’s charismatic in his own way- his dramatics are silly and charming. #and to some- they may be distracting. which is somewhat the point. #I say somewhat because I don’t think ALL of his drama is meant to be a distraction/performance. #he’s genuinely Like That. #but in this case it at least partially is. #to cover up his fear. because it’s very clear the driving force behind everything astarion does is fear and self-preservation. #he’s more honest with you here. he tells you outright that what cazador did was wrong because he did it to astarion himself. #not because cazador’s actions are objectively wrong no matter who the victim is. and that all the other spawn suffered too. #not that astarion knows about the 7k living spawn in cazador’s basement though. just his own siblings. #which he views as necessary sacrifice for his own freedom. #which again. says sooo much about him. #I won’t say he only cares about himself at this point anymore though. it’s clear he DOES truthfully love tav. #and he does care about the other companions too. his reactions to their individual predicaments suggest as much. #and he does care for yenna- even if complains that there’s no room in the camp for any more ‘mangy strays’ #*cough cough* pot and kettle. anyways. he does approve of you helping her and is upset if she is kidnapped by orin. #but all that. the way he speaks of his siblings. the way he speaks of yenna. the way he still thinks he needs cazador’s power... #he thinks so little of himself. even if he acts like the world revolves around him and his suffering. #deep down- he still believes everything cazador’s literally beat and cut into him. #which makes the moment where he tells cazador that he’s so much more than what cazador did to him- so much more satisfying and rewarding.

[arweenie64]

utena car this shiori car that WHAT ABOUT WAKABA CAR HUH???! WHAT ABOUT THE WAKABA JEEP SHE IS VERY SPECIAL TO ME

#revolutionary girl utena #there is definitely significant analysis to be done as to why these three specifically are the ones who turn into cars #I'm thinking it has to do with the fact that each of these characters struggle with preserving autonomy over the narrative of their lives #and one of the huuuge things cars (or i guess technically car keys) represent in the film is autonomy #imo at least #i should actually write my thoughts out on this formally some day hmmmm

[the-busy-ghost]

Petty rant this morning- I can understand that somtimes even the nicest noises can be a nuisance, even painful, and believe me I have become cranky about all sorts of innocuous noises at the wrong time.

That being said, I have heard a surprising number of people complain about bellringers practising, when they moved into a house next to a mediaeval English church

#Oh I'm sorry we'll just move this twelfth-century bell tower somewhere that doesn't irritate you #Can it sometimes be a rather awful cacophony? Yes but they only get better if they practise #And even the worst noise of bells (from the distance of neighbouring houses not the tower) is better than car engines and drunk arguments #And bellringing is such a magnificent piece of craft and tradition; it's worth preserving even above and beyond any religious role #Though to be fair all the bellringers I've met seem to hold bellringing as their chief religion and are indifferent at best to the church #So it's not even that much of a reminder of Christianity imo #Thouhg I suppose people could disagree #Anyway church bells were one of the best things about living in the south of England #Even when they were rattling away very untidily #I miss them so much being back in Scotland where we only have a handful of towers at best #and certainly don't have the longstanding tradition of ringing in small churches #I have to get my kicks from the Tolbooth clock and let me tell you it just isn't the same as hearing an English bell tower ringing up #Let alone actually ringing the changes #It's one of the few genuinely wholesome English traditions and you want to whine about the sound of BELLS #Not because it's a sensory issue or anything just because you don't like your lie-in being interrupted #But you'd expect your neighbours to put up with your noisy barbecues #Actually never even mind disruptive events like that- in my opinion the noise of your silly car idling in the driveway is worse than bells #You trying to fit your massive SUV down the tiny streets of a small English village #Is always worse than plain hunt

[akkivee]

wait one of thw radios is gone??? which ons 😭😭😭😭😭 are it lost forever?!

i hope someone out there recorded the other ones to save them in case that happen again....

yeah, for whatever reason kr killed the original spotify hypnosis radios, hypnosis wave was their second round 😭😭😭

ik the og run is floating around on bilibili and there are people who did record them when they announced its end, myself included, so they aren’t gone forever!!! and i’m sure the wave radios have been recorded by others as well in the event they nuke those as well 🤗

#vee got an ask #my recordings aren’t good lol but they get the job done for me personally lol #it’s not a thing i can imagine happening at this very moment but one of my old fandoms i revisit every so often #has a dedicated effort to preserving its entire ost on its wiki and its incredible bc those tracks are like 15 years old at least lol #i wish hypmic could do the same with all its ‘lost media’ but hypmic is too new still lol #i haven’t looked for them in a minute but i’m still devastated that abema just deleted everyone’s 8th live after talks without warning 😞

[theres-whump-in-that-nebula]

Did anyone else used to lie on their bed or the ground and stare directly into a lightbulb and/or a ceiling fan when they were a kid?

#For some reason if I’m burned-out I can hold my eyes open for unnaturally long periods of time (a minute straight or longer) and stare #Which is extremely out of character because I usually blink at least every ten seconds and “flutter” them when thinking of words to say #I only found out I did that after recording myself for a public speaking class… I had to make a conscious effort not to blink so much #because it was atrociously distracting… But even concentrating on it I still blinked too much #It’s a rhythmic sort of blinking. #My parents accused me of blinking in Morse code to “brainwash” them into apostasy when they found out I was protesting their cult #I shit you not. That’s how fast and rhythmic it is; and that’s how crazy they are. Cults: Not even once. #Yeah kind of hurtful because they accused me of having extreme control over the one thing I have literally no control over #1.) My eyes hurt because the lighting in the living room they decided to detain me in to be yelled at for four hours sucked ass #2.) I can’t think of what to say to people if I don’t blink; whether I’m lying or not #(I mean I absolutely was lying about certain things because I believe in self-preservation in the face of religious extremism #but that’s not the point)

[lincnok]

not gonna lie, the eclipse was a masterpiece.

like, yeah, khao give us flirty teenage badboy, but, heck, man. first really nailed the exact feeling of being closeted.

#akk x ayan #the eclipse #like the EXACT feeling #especially in a position where you don't know how people feel about being queer #but your automatic response is obviously worst case scenario #and your life has become almost entirely self preservation #because you live in a constant spiral of i will disappoint everybody with this #and i can't lose the one thing that they won't be disappointed in #even if it hurts #and i will make this one thing my entire personality because then they won't notice my real personality #and by extention they won't notice my queerness #aaaand im describing my high school experience #no wonder i loved this show

[madigoround]

How many times do you think those dead people cryochambers have malfunctioned or the power has gone out and the generators never kicked on or something where the company just doesn’t acknowledge it because their clientele are all dead anyways

Alternatively; give me a horror story inside a cryogenics facility why are there so many horror stories about cemeteries and not about cryogenic centers that also hold dead bodies that very much feel they have unfinished business because they wanted to be brought back to life before they even died, give me cryogenic ghosts that appear to the employees as desperate tortured versions of themselves because there is no moving on for them as their bodies are suspended forever and the pain of complete isolation in death and a torture they chose and paid a hefty sum for is a fate worse than the irrelevance they originally feared from death

#can you tell I’ve been thinking about this #there was a magnus archives episode that got this stuck in my head lol #I’ve also really been thinking about how cemeteries as a concept are incredibly creepy yes but in practice they see a lot of love #the grounds are usually well cared for and there’s visitors all the time if you were a ghost and tied to a graveyard for some reason I think #that I would derive comfort from seeing people’s loved ones visit them even in death that they are so devoted to their love to that person #that they take time out of what life they have left and even bring them flowers or trinkets things they’ll never actually get to use just as #a gesture whereas imagine paying thousands or hundreds of thousands of dollars to be preserved in a tank for the possibility of having your #consciousness live on only to then come back as a ghost and be completely isolated in conplete darkness in what amounts to a soup can #which would drive you mad first the isolation or the darkness? #cryogenics #horror #ghost stories

[giratina-plushie]

what this is teaching me is that im funnier and more correct and i should make more posts

#i dont original post anymore cause i used to liveblog my college lessons on here and like..... look im all for internet preservation but if #its from 2020 and i find it again im deleting that shit sorry #but yeah doing that for like a year and a half and then experiencing the clarity of march-may 2021 made me go Jesus Christ #I Do Not Want To Live Like This #and proceeded to just not make original posts that weren't 'art' or 'silly image i made' #also all the posts of mine that have got a lot of notes in a short amount of time in the past couple years have been shit i thought of #between the hours of 12 and 4am #good lord a tag rant havent done one of these in a while #i feel the need to be presentable on here when i make original posts because of the above and also people follow me on here? #but i'm trying to adopt the whole You're In My House; Bitch thing

[nocturnebby]

so me and @squirrelfromspace (idk how to mention a user I'm still bery new to tumblr) discussed this arc for empires joel (which I'm not gonna bother explaining) villian!joel go brr lonely mf

drew this in like 20 minutes so quality is a bit off the rocker, and my cameras not going any clearer either soz lmao

(in this specific drawing I've like made pearl goddess of afterlife cause according to oli and sausages lore she is one)

explanation in tags

#I sent everyone to the afterlife #smallishbeans fanart #smallishbeans #empires joel #empires season 2 #I'll explain the thing here #basically the old gods were Joel's friends and family #they're dead now and at much risk of being forgotten by the mortals #Joel's desperately trying to preserve their legacy #but he has memory loss n shit #he keeps mundane memorabilia from his old god friends #which some people have the nerve to steal #he has two options #either to swallow his pride and ask for them back or to let it go and risk them being forgotten #Joel being joel he goes for the third option #goes bloodthirsty and like somehow manages to get rid of entirety of server I forgot the like how he did it #he's all alone again in an empty shell of a world #he's used to it by now though; his companions all withering before him (not usually cause of him) in every one of his lives #basically yeah that's the general gist #the pearl dialog is just my dumb way of saying :I sent them to the afterlife" jfhf dk how to explain so sorry #a lot of this wonderful hc is contributed to by squirrel from space #they're very cool and it was fun discussing this with them #joel smallishbeans the pathetic diety who I desperately want to see go feral batshit

[sleepyone2three]

A piece of dialog I plan to use at some point in Little Knowledge, Lotsa Heart, but just had to share. Because it's honestly a mood with the stress those idiots put the poor reader through.

"Attraction has nothing to do with the matter; sexual or otherwise," you huffed, indignant at the very suggestion in and of itself. "I'd yell at and embarrass every single one of my numbskull crewmates if meant keeping them from getting needlessly killed."

#when villains keep mistaking you for other crew members so because you you start yelling at them for needlessly endangering themselves #smh being asexual in sexulized world really do be like that sometimes #they just care a lot okay #and these idiots have no sense of self preservation #it gets stressful ya know? #so yo do what you can and embarass the living hell out of them #and eventually they learn to not just laugh and try to wave off what they see as empty threats #parenting tips for the nervous wreck who's just trying to keep his mugiwara alive #things get so much better when chopper joins lmao #he at least helps to enforce the guys resting for a little bit aft battles #its never ending when you decide to adopt a group of pirates 🙄 #one piece fanfiction #one piece reader insert #trans reader #asexual reader #but there may be some fluffy romamce stuff sprinkled throughout #Little Knowledge Lotsa Heart #one piece x reader

[townofcrosshollow]

Idk man if you're constantly talking about your crushing loneliness and feelings of being ostracised and left out when you ostensibly have a bunch of friends around you then maybe the feelings of loneliness aren't the problem there

#i would always feel really empty and distant and 'act out' after our hangouts #and i always framed it as like 'i get the high when i'm around people and then i crash afterwards' #and didn't really consider that maybe sitting in a vc for 4 hours feeling left out while other people have fun is just soul sucking #it was always framed as my behaviour that was the problem. 'you did this and you did that.' so i just kinda internalized that #if i felt like shit it must be my fault. everybody knows i'm the one who causes problems so i'm just causing more problems #if i say that something made me uncomfortable and the response is 'i wont make accomodations and how dare you even ask' it must be my fault #idk. we filled out consent forms in the game i'm really not excited to play and i was reminded that nobody ever asked my consebt #and when i tried to advocate for myself and voice that i wasn't consenting it was treated like i was causing problems by trying to say that #and i saw that as a reasonable reaction at the time cause i had been so deeply convinced that i was broken and horrible #that if i was trying to revoke my consent or even just negotiate it then i was ruining everything for everybody else #that if i was uncomfortable with what was going on i needed to just shut up and live with it #i wish i had realized that and dropped out months ago. maybe that could have preserved some semblance of my relationships with those people #far too late for that now. i'm trying to accept that #and all that effort was wasted anyway #i tried to say once that i was putting in a massive amount of effort and i felt like nobody was recognizing that fact #and i still kind of feel that way #i put hours of mental energy into trying to be enough for people who kept demanding more from me and kept giving me less in return #did that do me any good or did it just cause me 3 months of grief and an empty bank account from therapy? #the problem is that i still wish things had turned out better even though i know i had no control over that #if i had kept advocating for myself it just would have been over far faster. i guess that might have spared me a bit of money #if i tried to talk about the problems it would have just been dismissed with some quick quippy therapy phrase amounting to 'not my fault' #we're already living in the universe where i put all my effort into changing in the ways i was told to change and look how well that went #idk. the attitude was never 'let's fix the problems.' it was always 'you need to fix it.' and then when i did it was #'now there's a new problem. fix that one too. and this one. and that one.' #and to do all that work for somebody and then be told they thought you never even cared about them. man it just stings #idk. it's in the past now. but i can't build new relationships. i'm trying and it's impossible #i try meeting new people and they all suck. i try strengthening relationships with old people and they all get too busy or leave. #the only reason i post these things on tumblr is cause i don't have anybody else to talk to about it #the only person i could talk to has their own shit going on. there really just isn't anybody else #personal