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hickmanhaslund10 · 9 months

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15 Soothing Adorning Ideas That Will Help You Loosen Up And Unwind At Home

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edens-serigala · 2 years

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what if casita is a reincarnation of abuelo pedro?

there are a couple ways to explain this:

first, if the miracle was pedro's desire to protect his family extending beyond his self-sacrifice, then it would explain how the miracle found alma and the madrigals. and with how ambiguous the film makes the miracle and its origin, it could be reminiscent of how we discuss and view death and what comes after.

secondly, casita is shown to be sentient; holding conversations with family members, fulfilling requests when asked and not asked, helping the madrigals make antonio's gift ceremony as smooth as possible, etc.

not to mention the fact that when abuela alma speaks to her husband after mirabel talks about the cracks in the wall and the candle's flame nearly going out, she says;

(29:42 - 30:25) "ay pedro. i need you... open my eyes. if the answer is here, help me find it. help me protect our family... help me save our miracle."

and after abuela alma and mirabel reconcile, alma follows it up with this;

(01:20:40 - 1:22:51) "i asked my pedro for help. mirabel. he sent me you."

bruno's prophecy showcased mirabel being the destruction of casita, and ultimately, she created a new, stronger foundation. and even as the house is falling apart, it brings furniture together to protect mirabel. symbolically, it's identical to when abuelo pedro sacrifised his life for the sake of his wife and children, as after the dust clears, the magic is gone and the house is in ruins - it has thematically died.

casita was crucial to mirabel's journey to ultimately protect her family. from taking away her door and rendering her without a gift, to cracking when mirabel is alone during antonio's celebration and setting her journey in motion, to aiding her in her journey to learn about bruno's vision, to helping her get to the candle when the house begins to fall apart, to protecting her as it does so, to being the literal symbol of the family's stronger foundations and signalling that mirabel has succeeded.

the first thing we ever hear 15 year old mirabel say is "morning, abuelo." aside from abuela alma, mirabel is the most connected to him (from what we see). but she's also the most connected to casita, second only to abuela, as seen by home much she speaks to and acknowledges the house as a sentient being.

abuelo pedro died, protecting his family. and who of the family, now, is the most protective of the family? mirabel.

this also applies to theories that involve mirabel being the next candle-holder - which i completely agree with, by the way. as her connection to her family, the house and their history is what ultimately concluded mirabel's character arc within the film. her love and empathy towards them all, abuela included, allowing them to reconnect. what, with love being the shown thing that makes or breaks their home and foundation apart.

but.

i have an alternate idea which is, admittedly, rather fanfiction-y, but i think it fits just as well, and with a lot of the same points. it just offers a different intro into how the madrigals got to where they are.

in which, abuelo pedro was born with magic, himself.

(please correct me if i'm wrong, here)

though the idea of wives taking their husbands' names isn't as traditional as it is in western worlds, it is still a commonly used option. disney's primary audience is likely those living in the states, where wives taking their husbands' names is a much more traditional practise.

but through agustin and félix, we know that spouses to the madrigal family do not receive magic gifts. and if abuelo pedro had powers which leaked into the candle as a last-ditch effort to comfort his wife in her time of need, then the world reshaping to protect her just as he died to do, could be explained.

his power could be reshaping material, or literally building anything he chooses - mountains, landscapes, houses, etc. which then begins the madrigals' family legacy.

and although this is a disney film, not a pixar film (in which memory is what creates, maintains and powers life). it is when the family starts to lose sight of what abuelo pedro died to protect - his family and the love they share - that the miracle and the house begins to break, and die.

abuela broke the miracle, and when she asked pedro for help, he sent mirabel.

and mirabel ends up completing the reconstructed casita with it's final missing piece.

#edens-serigala #encanto #encanto spoilers #encanto theory #abuela alma madrigal #abuelo pedro madrigal #mirabel madrigal #family madrigal #encanto casita

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villager-request · 4 years

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Hello~ I'm so excited you've started an animal crossing blog! I like playing animal crossing because its really fun to explore a new world and find everything you can. I also enjoy trying to make money and things I can complete. I'm a bit of a competitive and stubborn person but am also caring and friendly. I like music, drawing, and archery. I'm both an adrenaline junky and a scaredy cat. I like cute, aesthetic things, warm colors, and being thematically consistent! Thank you!!

Animal species: Cub

Bear cubs are very adventurous but also have a streak of cautious behavior due to their small size and vulnerability. Like you, bear cubs love to get themselves in situations that get their adrenaline running, but due to also finding themselves a bit afraid of these same situations they will ensure an escape route and a safety net in case it goes badly. Bear cubs are excitable and easily influenced, they will be the first to agree to doing something fun but also might regret it later once they realize what they agreed to. A large number of bear cubs are the lazy personality as they typically gravitate toward self gratifying activities and stay away from things that are difficult or scary for them.

Personality type: Normal

Normal type villagers tend to have a lot of anxiety and need reassurance that their self deprecating feelings are not the reality, they also tend to have somewhat obsessive personalities and like to have very patterned lives. Habits and regularity in hobbies are very important to normal villagers. Normal villagers get along rather well with most villagers and tend to be the “mom friend” of the village since they care a lot about the well being of their neighbors and friends.

Home set/decor: Mushroom set

Your home is rather homey and comfortable, there is a large emphasis on comfort over style in your home but there is still a very consistent aesthetic. You take inspiration from fall colors and themes by decorating with mushroom and leaf themed furniture. Your house might be on the messy side but it doesn’t seem out of place because of the rustic nature of your decorating.

Mystery island type: Tarantula island

You like a challenge, and you like being able to accomplish a lot in a short period of time. That makes this island perfect for you, while you wait to be invited to a developed island, you are able to gather and sell lots of tarantulas to give yourself a head start on your finances for when you arrive in town. You will be glad to leave, however, as you can only ride an adrenaline high for so long before becoming overwhelmed.

Catch phrase: “honeybee”

Most cubs have cutesie catchphrases, so this catch phrase is meant to be cute as well as to bring to mind the fact that the speaker is a bear with the reference to honey.

Villager friends: Cleo, Ellie, Benjamin

Ellie is a lot like you, she likes having a regular everyday pattern and likes to have fun but also have time to herself. You and Ellie go out for brunch every day that you are both available and you enjoy talking together to relieve stress and have a nice comforting moment together. Cleo lives quite differently from you, she is very fashionable and has high standards for all aspects of her life. Cleo brings you on adventures into new ways of living and helps you come out of your shell a bit more. You enjoy your outings with Cleo but she can be a bit overwhelming and you can’t spend as much time with her as your other friends. Benjamin loves simple pleasures like food and movie nights, you and him and Ellie often have dinner together with comforting foods and movies you have watched many times.

#animal crossing #acnh #ac #new horizons #animal crossing new horizons #animal crossing villagers #demidextrous

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austennerdita2533 · 7 years

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Day 6: Canon-ish

A/N: This is the first part of an intended 4-shot. Basically, my idea is to craft some kind of Klaroline kiss/moment for each season of the year while also showing the two of them at various points (and emotional states) in their relationship. I started thinking about how Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall all have a different look or feel about them, and I thought it would be fun to play with that thematically/symbolically. Plus, it’d give me an excuse to play with seasonal imagery.

Anyway, this part is Winter. It’s canon until Liz’s death and Caroline’s grappling with the loss. I’ve also ignored all things Stefan and Caroline. (Loss. Angst. Hurt and Comfort.)

This gave me loads of trouble, so if it’s terrible I apologize but I couldn’t bear to edit it any longer haha. Enjoy. :)

(FF.net)

xx Ashlee Bree

A Kiss For All Seasons

Part 1: Fold Into Me, Shivering

Winter’s kiss wisps across her forehead at a time of shivering delirium and despair.

She’s gone.

It’s not a dream because each breath in tastes metallic and rough, because each breath out rattles and hisses like a dented whiffle ball which has sunk beneath sediment and drowned in the shallowest of streams. It’s real life. It’s real loss, too. And real loss throbs.

It breaks—tearing, cracking, pulling, shattering, rupturing, wrenching a person into angles so painful or contradictory, that life itself feels distorted. It plunges emotions into a vise that’s so unbearable and inescapable at times, it almost feels impossible to still be alive let alone be expected to stand.

Or talk.

Or move.

Or think.

Or cry without wiping at eyes and waiting to find blood puddled on fingertips instead of tears.

At times, grief even makes it difficult to exist.

After someone dies, especially if you loved that person, the world begins to clutter in a way it never did before: it pinches in at the sides so all the noise can spill in unheard, unseen, clouding your mind and chest with smog that refuses to lift so you can breathe easy again. Everything becomes drenched in the blacks and purples and blues of a bruise, too, until there’s nothing left for us to do but crash to our knees. Until all we can do is shrink inside our gloomy new reality and burn our lung’s raw with missing.

In Caroline’s case, icicles splinter across her chest whenever she blinks against the harsh whites of morning to relive the tragedy all over again.

Mommy.

Instead of Liz’s death providing her with comfort or relief now that she’s no longer suffering, the unfair and untimely permanence of loss hollows her out until she’s raw—numb—freezing. The air around her tastes as toxic and as gritty lead. The din of life, which was once so variable and mellifluous and exhilarating to her ears, rings like television static in her head now. Blurring one minute of monotonous agony into the next without end. More than that, the rising sun in the distance (the same one that used to stream vivid, happy yellows through her window every morning), is far too weak or indirect to do anything besides snake across her moistened cheeks with it pale rays before it leaves her cold and dejected again.

Caroline’s parentless now. Alone. She’s still loved by a few friends, of course, but she feels so incredibly, unbelievably, disconnected from them all.

She’s more or less invisible. A ghost.

None of them see me. None of them know what I need.

She’s a ghost girl stuck in this endless life on her own: more hollow than haunted, more sorry and solitary than surviving. She’s an undead warrior on the outside, perhaps, but she’s all but a living, feeling woman shriveling into pieces of nothing within.

“Please don’t leave me,” her body trembles, the words scraping and shrieking inside her own mind as pain paralyzes them in place so they can’t slip down, so they can’t vault out from her throat. “I need you, Mommy, I still need you…”

But Liz is no longer there to answer. She has taken her last breath, has spoken her last goodbye.

There’s no one here who cares for Caroline unconditionally now…no one else who listens. There’s no one around to hold her hand, to kiss away her nightmares, to kill her insecurities so she can fulfill her dreams. There’s no one left who loves her in ‘alls’ instead of ‘somes’—no one.

How could leave me like this, Mommy? How?

Eyes dark-circled with sorrow and exhaustion, Caroline lies curled on one side of her mother’s bed with her knees hugged to her middle. She never stirs; she never sleeps. She stares out the paned window at a February sunrise obscured by indigo snowflakes that drip from the clouds like sleeted tears that the winter needs to cry. Fresh powder bleaches the ground and builds mounds so high they touch the trees, bending branches until they snap like broken rubber bands, burying all sounds of life beneath it except for the squawk of a nearby crow.

In places where the sky meets the horizon, bleak plums, grays, navies, and ivories scratch the edges of Caroline’s vision and almost make her long for blindness. The world outside as stark and as bone-chilling as the nightmare gnawing her apart on the inside:

Mom died, Mom’s DEAD.

But she can’t be gone, she…no! Mom? Mommy, where are you?

Mommy I—please stay. I need you to stay, okay? I’m not ready to live in a world without you. I—not yet.

It’s too soon, it’s too soon!

Mom?

MOMMY!!!?

Shadows scuttle along the walls. The floors. The furniture. Speckling her room like pox of rotting melancholy, they seem to grow larger and more formidable with each tick of the clock on the wall, their black edges curving into sharp spindly fingers that slice at entering streaks of light like a sword; their trunks expanding to root into corners as if they refuse to timber away.

Caroline, however, makes neither a move to halt their proliferation in her room nor to purge them from the space. Instead, she watches with blinking apathy as one detaches from the doorjamb at the far end of the room like a silky talon and crawls closer. It almost glides across the floor.

How will the shadow consume her, she wonders? With a bite? With a few nibbles? Or will it gulp her down whole and damn her to its full belly of despair, plummeting her into a pit of darkness with no end?

She watches as the shadow drifts forward with a slow yet assured grace. Its movements are cautious. Soundless except for the stray floorboard which creaks when it edges along the foot of the bed and crosses into streaks of daylight, exchanging shadow for skin, swapping an ‘it’ for a ‘him,’ as a man stoops to kneel beside her head.

This isn’t just any man, though.

Oh, no.

But one with eyes that are rimmed in lightning yellow. One who smells of cedar and cognac and cologne. Tastes of oranges dipped in rust. Touches with hands made of calloused buttercups. And snaps necks for sport.

He’s someone who charms a crowd with dimples and drawled threats before he strikes swiftly, and completely. He’s a wolf who’s determined to paint away his personal miseries with other’s blood. This is a man who often stars in Caroline’s dreams, and his face is one she not only recognizes, but knows—

Intimately.

“Kl-Klaus? Is that…is that really you?” she croaks uncertainly.

“It is.”

Dizzy, disbelieving, greens and blonds and brown leathers all swirl together in front of her, so she rubs at her puffy eyes then squints harder at the blurred shape of him. Her next words come out more froggy and weak than questioning.

“You came back. You’re—here,” Caroline says with a puff of breath. “You’re back in…back in Mystic Falls?”

“I am.”

“But I didn’t call or—no…no texts were sent?” He nods in confirmation of this, which puzzles her further. “You couldn’t have known that she—and the funeral? No way could you have been there because I, because I never…”

“Wait a minute,” her brows pinch, heavy lids lifting slowly to his face, “did you…did you break into the house?”

Klaus compresses his lips together, shrugs at her sheepishly. Caroline responds to this by smashing her face into her pillow with a groan and an agitated ‘un-freaking-believable.’ Then, in one swift movement, she throws the blankets over top of her and rolls over flat. Onto her back.

“Don’t be angry with me, love.”

She snorts. Pulls the covers higher.

“I realize my relationship with my family is dysfunctional at best,” he tries cautiously, his voice dipping low, “but I do have experience in parental loss. I know what it’s like. How it feels. The way it cuts you and—” she crosses her arms, holds her breath “—burns.”

Caroline cringes and squeezes her arms tight like she’s holding herself together.

“I only worried on your behalf because I know how deeply you cared for the sheriff, so I trailed you home…lingering outside in case you bolted with no reference to your humanity because I didn’t want you to do anything rash you’d regret later. I just, I wanted to keep you safe and protected. To…help you avoid any extra pain.”

"It wasn’t until you screamed that I couldn’t—it didn’t seem right to—not when you sounded so—how could I not look in?”

He pauses for a moment. Clears his throat, cracks his knuckles.

“Anyway, I thought you might be in want a friend,” he offers placatingly, pressing his palms flat against the sheets so he can lean forward a bit and hover above her. “Someone to be a shoulder. A punching bag. A hand for you to squeeze. Whatever…” his voice wobbles uncomfortably, “whatever it is you need.”

“And what if what I need is for you to, you know,” she swallows hard, “get the hell out?”

“Then I’ll go, Caroline.”

She tuts but it lacks bite. “Go where? Back outside to hide behind more snow until I snap?”

Resigned, almost as if he’d expected this kind of reaction, he draws back with a small hiss like he’s been stung, “No,” he answers cooly, his words heavy and flat, “I’ll do as you bid and head home. To Louisiana.”

The air between them becomes stagnant. Oppressive all of a sudden.

“You mean you’ll leave me here?”

“Yes.”

“Alone?” she asks.

“If that’s what you wish,” he sighs, “then yes.”

“Oh.”

Time seems to slow here, silence stretching and growing like a beanstalk weed between their two bodies. Klaus plucks at a mattress spring with his thumb, its notes sharp and discordant underneath her back as he stands to pivot on his heels, readying himself to glide back into the shadows from whence he came. Leaving her alone in Mystic Falls again, setting her free like he promised two years ago.

Caroline hears him shrug his arms into his jacket with a grunt. Or maybe it’s a growl? A humph? Regardless of the noise he makes, there seems to be a sluggish dereliction to his movements. A hesitancy to proceed. And it’s probably because he’s preparing himself for the long trek through miles upon miles of snow that’ll weigh him down like ice before he reaches New Orleans. All of that slush waiting to seep in, hoping to blacken his toes…

He’s more than likely dreading the sound of orange embers crunching into snowy ashes beneath his feet as he retreats from her warm hearth and stomps out through the door again. He probably loathes the idea of submerging himself into a frigid morning all because she’s almost commanded him to go. Leave.

To go off on his own and freeze like me.

At the thought, a fresh chill kisses the back of Caroline’s neck. It momentarily anesthetizes her lungs and she cannot breathe; she cannot think. She cannot feel anything except the frostbite which pricks down low, too low, and buries itself somewhere below skin deep.

The whole world shifts inside her own head again as arctic wind gusts across a few remaining fragments of coziness: of old memories tinged pink with brandy smiles or marshmallow’d cheeks, of scarved hopes for the future knitted in bright, pretty patterns, of rich caroled dreams hummed sweetly into ears with full-bodied meaning, of soft painter’s hands which curled over top of stupid fears or desires like mittens to ease her shuddering, warming her to the bone. All of them slipping away on a sled she’s about to let crash straight through the North Pole so they may never resurface again.

Except how could she bear it? How could she survive the barrenness without them, all the cruelty? How could she find the strength to keep breathing after she lets one final sliver of warmth slip away because she’s bitter and hurting and broken? Where would her optimistic flames entomb themselves? In permafrost? In tundra? In icebergs crowding the sea?

Deep-down, Caroline knows that one biting word from her would silence Klaus for good. One more dismissive statement is all it would take to send him back to New Orleans where he belongs, thereby freeing her up to mope in this room forever. There’d be no more judgment to combat from him, no more concern. But to what end?

So her mouth can match the blue which has settled in around her heart since her mom passed away? So she can shudder harder at the falling flakes of grey and white which accumulate outside her window and aim to bury her beneath centuries of unrelenting snow? So life’s color can leak and harshen until it’s nothing more than a dead block of ice for her to kick?

As if winter isn’t teeth-chattering enough already!

Licking her lips, Caroline exhales before she slides the blanket down the bridge of nose enough to peek up at him. She rakes over his consternated expression. She watches when his body stiffens and squares in preparation of her next words. It’s as if he’s waiting for a dismissal to scythe through the air and lash him up.

“Okay, and what if—” she gulps, her voice dry and a little muffled. “What if I say I don’t want to be alone in this room right now? What then?”

Klaus’ eyes widen, hope spilling into their depths. But only for a second. A scratch of his chin followed by one, two, blinks and it sinks back into his pupils like an illusion. Like it was never there.

“I’ll make sure you aren’t. You won’t be, if that’s what you desire,” he says simply.

“And if I cry?”

He shrugs. “Then you cry.”

“I think I’m out of tissues.”

“You can use my clean sleeve then. I’m sure it’ll do just fine,” he offers drily.

She quirks an eyebrow. Shoots him a dubious look.

“What? I’m not allergic to tears, Caroline, for Christ’s sake.” He rolls his eyes. Wanders closer again. “Not immune to them either, unfortunately, if that’s what troubles you,” he adds under his breath.

Dragging a desk chair behind him, he erects it near her bedside table with a flick of his wrist. And sits.

“But you’re allergic to me, is that it?”

When he opens his mouth to respond only to slam it shut, puzzled, she gestures nonchalantly and says, “You can sit next to me on the bed, Klaus. There’s more than enough room for two, you know. It’s not like I think you have cooties or anything.”

Scooting over and up, she pats the open area with her hand. He doesn’t move.

“Well, come on then!” she tries again, less sarcastically this time. “Take off your shoes so you can climb in here. It’s drafty.”

After a few more seconds of gawking silence, Caroline, feeling both tired and fed up, rolls her eyes before she launches herself onto her knees to grab him by the hand, forcibly tugging him down onto the sheets beside her—shoes be damned!

They crash back against the pillows intertwined: Klaus’ arm braced ‘round her shoulders to cushion the fall; her nose scraping the lapels of his jacket. Her chin bangs against his clavicle and they tumble into the headboard cuddling. It’s an accident, of course, but one that feels comfortable. Oddly natural, too. And instead of shrugging him off or pushing him back so she can erect an elaborate pillow fort between them like she ordinarily would, she veers from expectation and tradition by throwing the blanket over his legs.

Next, she curls into the crook of his neck. Rests a hand in the center of his chest. Exhales. And thaws against his side as she listens to the rush of his ancient heartbeat, feeling it thrum through her own bones like this lullaby:

‘Hold me close; hold me tight; and everything else will be alright,’

Klaus initially tenses at the intimate contact. Afraid to move a muscle in case she changes her mind or wants to pull away, probably.

When she doesn’t, he relaxes. One hand drops atop the one of hers already on his chest while the other fingers silky tresses near her ear, plucking them strand by strand so they fall back against her sweatshirt with a sweet tap tap. His mouth also teases the crown of her head. It hovers close enough for her to feel each tickle of his breath against her skin, but remains far enough away that she misses the softness of his lips.

Sliding down lower onto the mattress, he kicks his shoes off onto the floor, lets a foot hook around her ankle, then folds her tighter into the furnace of his arms.

“I must say,” he murmurs against her hair, “a literal pillow is the last thing I expected to be for you today.”

“It’s only because I’m cold. February sucks and I miss my mom, okay? Don’t read too much into it.”

“Whatever you say, love.”

“Oh, shut up, will you? I can hear your smirk from here,” Caroline huffs into his shirt.

“Ah, sweet, sweet proximity.” Klaus sighs contentedly. “It’s half the battle, truth be told.”

“Ugh! You’re so exhausting.”

“I don’t see why,” he answers wryly, “it’s not as if I’m complaining.”

“No, but I know what you’re thinking.”

“Perhaps you do,” he hums in that assured, taunting way of his, “but you can’t fault me for being more than willing to comfort you given the chance.” His fingers draw soothing circles on her back. “So, if body heat is what you need from me right now, then fine—take every last ounce of mine and zip yourself up in it. Wrap it around you like a duvet, because it’s all yours.”

“Suuure,” Caroline drawls sleepily. She yawns. “Until I accidentally elbow you in the nose once I fall asleep, you mean.”

“No. I’m here and I won’t leave you. Not even if you make me bleed,” Klaus says, all pretense gone.

“Oh, you and your ridiculous promises. I swear!”

He responds to this with a low chuckle. It soon flattens into something more weighted and measured when he draws her in to deposit a sweet, earnest kiss across her forehead.

“Ridiculous or not, sweetheart, the promises I make to you I do and will keep. You can count on that,” he adds in a whisper. “You can count on me.”

Emotion clogs her throat at this; stings the corners of her eyes.

It’s right at that moment, with Klaus’ firm and unshakable finality, and his body spooned around her, that Caroline feels a ring of fire spring to life around her heart, thawing her all the way through with hope and waking her up to one devastatingly beautiful enormity: he’s the one person left who’s always wanted to be there for her. And he isn’t going anywhere. Not today. Not tomorrow. Not in a hundred more lifetimes.

“I guess we’ll have to wait and see about that, won’t we?” she shivers, cuddling closer and melding into his warmth.

“Don’t worry, love. Time is on our side.” She feels Klaus’ lips tug upward in smile. They sweep across her forehead again in kiss, but this time, they deliver promise as well as comfort, “We will.”

Thanks for reading. xx

#klaroline #klarolineauweek #klaroline drabbles #klaroline fanfiction #half agony half hope #ashlee bree's writing endeavors

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celebratethemundane · 7 years

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This is an opera in three acts. This is a work about perception. There is no image on the screen just yet. It isn't about the perception of small facts. It isn't about the physiology of perception. It's about the perception of self. It's about the meaning of truth. The definition of fact. This is an opera in three acts. Or it's a kind of opera and about three acts. This is a work about being done to. This is work about learning how to think. This is an opera in three acts. The first act is in real time and ends in a montage. Act II is symbolic. What is the same, what is different. What is outside, what is inside. Like man is chicken, only here we deal with eggs. Act III is tragic, horrific, mythic. It is a documentary record, it's about scrutiny on a mass level. About what has been and what could be. I needn't remind you about processing and mass extermination, you remember about the scientific study of human beings. This is a work about coercion. Coercion can be quick and brutal. That is the worst crime. Coercion can also extend over the whole of life. That's the ordinary, the usual crime. Bureaucratic crime can be brutal or merely devastating. We need not make a choice. Sartre says: "Evil demands only the systematic substitution of the abstract for the concrete, that is, it demands only the derealization of the fully human status of the people on whom you carry out your ideas and plans.”

Statistics. For an institution to be evil it need not be run by Hitler. As Stephen Curtis observed: "it need only be run by heartless people, sometimes called intellectuals or scientists". In the name of responsibility, native peoples have been colonized and enslaved. The lives of women, children were turned into subjects people regulated in every degree, for their own good. This is a work about the tyranny of expectation.

- Your sex? - Female. - Age? - 33. - Race? - Caucasian. - Ethnic background? - Austrian and Russian. - Ok, could you remove your shoes, please? And stand against the wall.

She is being told how to think, what to think, the nature of action. She is being instructed in what to feel.

- Up on the board, please.

This is a lesson in sinking or swimming, in which sinking and swimming have a lot in common. Her body grows accustomed to certain prescribed poses, certain characteristic gestures, certain constraints and pressures of clothing. Her mind learns to think of her body as something different from herself. It learns to think, perhaps without awareness, of her body as having parts. These parts are to be judged. The self has already learned to attach value to itself, to see itself as a whole entity with an external vision. She sees herself from outside, with the anxious eyes of the judged, who has within her the critical standards of the ones who judge. I needn't remind you about scrutiny, about the scientific study of human beings. Visions of the self. About the excruciating look at the self from outside, as though we're a thing divorced from the inner self. How one learns to manufacture oneself as a product? How one learns to see oneself as a being in a state of culture, as opposed to a being in a state of nature? How to measure oneself by the degree of artifice? The remanufacture of the look of the external self to simulate an idealized version of the natural.

- Reach up again.

How anxiety is built into these looks? How ambiguity, ambivalence, uncertainty are meant to accompany every attempt to see ourselves, to see herself as others see her. This is a work about how to think about yourself. It is a work about how she is supposed to think about herself. How she learns to scrutinize herself, to see herself as a map, a terrain, a product, constantly recreating itself, inch by inch. Groomed, manufactured, programmed, reprogrammed, controlled. A serval mechanism in which one learns to utilize every possible method of feedback to reassert control. Read from a work on cybernetics serval mechanisms. Read from a work on self-abuse. Read a list on items for the true self. A list of gifts for the wedding guests to choose from. Read from a list of dos and don'ts. Read from a list of glamorous makeovers. Read from a list of what men do and what women do.

- Shoulder spam is 15.

Read from a list of girls' toys and boys' toys. Read from a list of average incomes of men and of women. Read from a book of resignations and defeats. Read from a manual on revolutionary society.

- Shoulder to waist is 15. - Foot length is 9 and 3/8. - Get up on your toes, please. - Extend your neck. Ok... head on tiptoes height, 67 and 1/4. - Stand on your tiptoes, put your hands, relaxed, at your sides. - Ok, on tiptoes to fingertip height, 29 and 3/4. - Stretch your arms out, please. - Arms' spam with arms extended, 64 inches. - Middle finger length 3 and 3/8. - Take off your socks, please. - Toe, 1 and 3/4. - Hair length, 23 inches.

There is a boy, whom we shall call Tommy Smith. In nursery school, he was a top member of his class. A happy, normal, healthy, highly intelligent youngster. But as he approached the age of 5, the records began to show a flattening of his growth curve. He lost weight and stopped gaining in height. The staff nutritionist calling at his home for a checkup found that the boy's appetite had fallen off sharply, he was not eating enough – particularly, not enough milk – and the result was a shortage in his intake of proteins and minerals. Actually, the whole staff, for some time, had been noticing symptoms of retardation in this apparently healthy boy. The psychologists had reported that Tommy had regressed in mind, as well as in body. His IQ rating had dropped. He seemed tense, anxious, uncertain. His inner strains were reflected in his responses to the Rorschach ink spot test, the Thematic Apperception Test, and other psychological techniques. A clue to his trouble was disclosed by one of these techniques: doll playing. Three dolls, representing a man, a woman and a small boy, were placed on the floor, together with an assortment of doll furniture and other household accessories. Tommy proceeded to play house, and in his play he set the mother doll off to the office, put the father doll in the kitchen getting the next meal and wondered aloud wether the little boy doll would grow up into a man. Maybe, he speculated, the boy would become a woman and go off to the office, like mama. Here was the anxiety that underlay Tommy's loss of interest in food, his interrupted growth and his lapses in IQ. It turned out that the doll drama reenacted his actual home situation. Tommy's mother had a job, which kept her away from home from early morning until late afternoon. The father, whose business hours were not exact, did many of the housekeeping chores, fed and dressed the boy and took him to and from school. Because the mother frequently came home exhausted, the father often put the child to bed. It was all very confusing to Tommy. He was at the stage in which a normal boy wants to identify himself with the male figure but his family set-up was such that he was not certain what the figures stood for and, anyway, he was not sure that he wanted to be that kind of man. It was all very confusing to Tommy. He was at a stage in which a normal boy wants to identify himself with the male figure but his family set-up was such that he was not certain what the figures stood for and, anyway, he was not sure that he wanted to be that kind of man. The Child Research Counsel is not a clinic, it does not treat diseases or disorders, but when symptoms come to light in the course of its research it calls them to the attention of the parents and the family physician. In this case, the parents finally recognized that their son's disturbance stemmed from themselves. In this case, the parents finally recognized that their son's disturbance stemmed from themselves and they immediately made adjustments, correct [...]. The mother went on half time at her business and made it her main job to love and care for Tommy [...] went on half time at her business and made it her main job to love and care for Tommy. The father relinquished many of his mothering services. The father relinquished many of his mothering services. Within a few months after this real [...] Tommy was a much happier and better adjusted boy. He was eating so voraciously that the family doctor had to advice cutting down on his carbohydrates. His height and weight resumed their growth and again he stood head and shoulders above his classmates [...] budgets test.

- The abdominal [...] standard. - Will you remove your pants, please. - Abdominal extension height is 38 and 1/2 inches. It's above standard. [whistle] - Can you remove those pants too, please. - Hip girth is 36 and 3/4 inches. Bellow standard. [horn] - Hip height is 34 and 1/2. Above standard. [whistle] - Mid-tight girth is 19 inches. Standard. [bells] - Put your hands to your side. Total crouch length is 24 inches. It’s bellow standard. [horn] - [inaudible] - The vertical trunk is 16 inches. Standard. [bells] - Crouch height to floor is 30 and 1/4 inches. It's above standard. [whistle] - Knee girth is 14 inches. Standard. [bells] - Ankle girth is 9 and 1/4. It's standard. [bells] - Step down, misses, will you? - Please, be sited. - Stretch your legs out a little bit. - Sitting spread girth is 36 and 1/2 inches. This is bellow standard. [horn] - Straight. - Sitting height erect is 34 inches. Standard. [bells] - Just relax. - Sitting height normal is 32 and 3/4 inches. That is standard. [bells]

Her mind learns to think of her body as something different from herself. It learns to think, perhaps without awareness, of her body as having parts. These parts are to be judged. The self has already learned to attach value to itself, to see itself as a whole entity with an external vision. She sees herself from outside, with the anxious eyes of the judged, who holds within her mind the critical standards of the ones who judge. She knows the boundaries of her body, she does not know the boundaries of herself. She's been carefully trained in a mechanical narcissism that it is a sign of madness or deviance to be without. Her body grows accustomed to certain prescribed poses, certain characteristic gestures, certain constraints and pressures of clothing.

- Just relax. Ok. - Vaginal depth relaxed is 6 inches. That’s standard. [bells] - Ok, would you get up a moment? Get over here, lie down with your head [inaudible]. - Feet all the way down. [inaudible] Arms on the floor. Point your toes up. - Toe height, 9 inches. - Hip height, 7 inches. - Move your arm out a little. Breast height, 7 and 1/4 inches. - Head height, 8 inches. - Can you, please, stand up. Step over the scale, please. - Weight’s 119 pounds. Standard is 124 and 3/4. Bellow standard. [horn]

To lick one's lips to make them wet, to cross or uncross one's feet or legs. To sit forward or back, upright or compressed. To think of sitting as disposing one's limbs. To keep thighs and knees pressed together. To tighten the muscles of the stomach. To cast the eyes down. Not to look too often into the eyes of the other. Not to glance sideways. To keep the brow smooth. To smile. To refrain from moving the mouth unnecessarily. To keep hands together. To keep hands in the lap. To keep the hands at the sides. Not to let them dangle. To check stray hairs of the head. To tighten or untighten the muscles of the scalp. To remember the line of the neck. To pluck stray hairs. To draw on one's face. To add paint on top of flesh, a liquid mixture of thin mud, colored material, grease, tar derivatives and other unknown artificial and derived substances. To add colored powder. To learn what is called the color of flesh. To see one’s features from up close. To regard them as invisible, as in a raw state, until outlined or painted over. To see some hairs as important and needed and others as bad, unwanted. To approximate an ideal. To add black paint to the eyelashes, to the eyebrows. To think of changing the color and shape of one’s hair. To judge the body, always finding it faulty. To separate the idea of ‘tight’ and give it meaning. To need to be less or to need to be more. To have more appealing flesh. To see the body as a vehicle for the attainment of an imposed desire. To want things. To have to get them. To see one’s parts as tools, as armament to be deployed strategically for the purpose of attaining things. The mind has learned to thirst for a private self, to suppress the desire and fail to acknowledge the thirst. To welcome the rest but provided by the privatized domestic space. But even here she is not immune from judgment. The total woman remembers to bathe every day. To manage her image in such a way that her personality disappears and her ability to absorb and to be projected upon, to present herself for dilatation [?] substitutes for private desires of the self as self, in which masochism is the definition of fulfillment. They say women are masochists by nature, what is nature? I say masochism is a crime against women.

To accept the idea that one takes one’s place in a list of statistics. To accept the idea that there is meaning in measurement. To accept the idea that there is something to be learned about the self from measurement. Do you believe in Tommy Smith? What is the effect of negative expectation on intelligence? On performance? What is the effect of negative expectation on women’s intelligence? On performance? On growth? Scientists who measure are not innocent. Scientific human measurements have been used to education. To keep certain races and nationalities out of America. To keep women subordinate. To keep women in their place. Often the people who invented both the idea of testing and the test themselves, the ones who declare the test significant are some believers in the genetic superiority of their own group, in the superiority of men over women. Testing to maintain social control. Sir Francis Colton, Lewis Terman, Henry H. Goddard, Edward L. Thorndike, Cesare Lombroso, Paul Popenoe of the genetically inclined Human Betterment Foundation, HH Loughlin of the Carnegie Foundation, Carlton Koonz [?], Arthur B. Jenson [?], William Shockley [?]. Many of these men are pioneers in the testing movement or on record testifying to the racial superiority of white Nordic males, to their natural superiority over people of all other races and, of course, over women. […] The need for testing to keep control over society. To the fact that class differences reflect differences in native ability. To the fact that sex differences determine differences in native ability. To the absolute need to train people to fit their proper place. To accept the idea that one takes one's place in a list of statistics. To accept the idea that there is meaning in measurement. To accept the idea that there is something to be learned about the self from measurement. Do you believe in Tommy Smith as reported by George W. Gray in Scientific American? Here the meaning of human life remanufactured by those dedicated to the so-called scientific understanding human life. What is science? Science is a tool that amounts to the engineering of life by bureaucrats, or worse. Those who invent measurement are not innocent.

We continue with Tommy Smith as written up by George W. Gray in Scientific American in 1967. This is not an unusual case he reports. He goes on to quote Dr. Gene Deming, a pediatrician specializing in biometrics: “We're all familiar with the fact that in junior high school the typical girl is much larger and more grown up than the typical boy the same age. She's not interested in dates with these small boys, she wants to go with older boys. It is interesting also to see how the curve follows the personality pattern. The growth of a feminine type of boy with a soft rounded body and a greater interest in dolls than in baseball, for example, usually follows the typical girl's pattern. Similarly, girls of the tomboy type usually have a growth pattern conforming to that of boys.”

The absolute need to accustom people to fit their proper place. To take an example, only one example – Lewis Terman, one of the fathers of the testing movement, wrote: “In Germany, there is the rather anomalous problem of an educated proletariat. Thousands of graduates from the classical Gymnasien, which, for the most part, ignore the problems of real life, find themselves misfits in the industrial and political world and drift about discontentedly until finally they contribute to swell the now formidable army of German socialists. But in this country our more practical sense has brought it about that few of our secondary schools dish out the formal studies to all indiscriminately. The result is that our high-school graduate more frequently finds a place in the world where he can expend his energies, not only to his own profit, but to the advantage of society as well.” The absolute need to accustom people to fit their proper place. Terman also wrote: “It cannot be disputed that, in the long run, it is the races which excel on abstract thinking that eat while others starve, survive epidemics, master new continents, conquer time and space and substitute religion for magic, science for taboos and justice for revenge. The races which excel in conceptual thinking could, if they wished, quickly exterminate or enslave all the races notably their inferiors in this respect.” The absolute need to accustom people – women, blacks, Orientals, those supposedly inferiors in abstract thinking – to fit their proper place. To accept the idea that one takes one's place in a list of statistics. To accept the idea that there is meaning in measurement. To accept the idea that there is something to be learned about the self from measurement. The absolute need to accustom people to take their proper place. The absolute need to accustom people to fit their proper place.

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