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queerprayers · 11 months

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hello, i hope you are having a lovely day! thanks for having this blog! 💖 my exposure to faith has mostly been through mainstream doubt-unfriendly environments so it felt eye-opening to follow your blog and a few others that are quite welcoming to it!

do you possibly have any recommendations for nurturing faith when one has so many doubts, including the existence of God or belief in the events of the Bible? or possibly even reading recs?

i was raised agnostic in a Muslim-majority country and i have a diverse friend group with Muslims, Christians, Pagans and agnostic friends so whenever i wish to believe i find myself both doubting and also not knowing how anyone chooses any religion or denomination to follow, but i like to think everyone's faith/religion is valid and connects them to God. anyway that was a bit long, thanks for the blog and answering asks again! :)

Welcome, beloved! I'm so glad you're here and it brings me so much joy to know that people can be honest about their doubt here—it's an integral part of so many people's experience and to repress it or pretend it doesn't exist is misleading and painful.

I'm currently reading A History of God by Karen Armstrong (which I'll probably quote from a couple times) and thinking a lot about how conceptions of God have changed over time, and therefore how doubt has changed—we can only doubt when we have something to doubt! For some people, this book would probably increase their doubt (just a fact, not a bad thing), but for me, learning about how culturally-specific and constructed and interconnected religion deepens my faith in a God watching over it all.

One way that I see people talk about doubt (and I've definitely done it myself) is address it as if it were a stumbling block on the road to faith. That it's something we get over. That there's a linear path to certainty. Even when people praise doubt and call it holy, sometimes they imply that that's only because it strengthens the faith that always comes afterward. Doubting Thomas was the first person to name Jesus as God—we know this, this is all true and is very meaningful to so many. But I've learned to accept other ways that doubt exists, because not everyone has this experience. Doubt is a companion sometimes, not a temporary roadblock. Sometimes it's an inherent part of faith, and sometimes it doesn't lead to religious faith at all. In case you need to hear this: don't create some imaginary end of the road where you'll be certain! Maybe you will, but don't expect that of yourself. Your doubt is your questions and your desires, your creative thinking and your love for your friends, it's you caring about finding something meaningful. It's proof that this matters to you, and even if someday doubt is no longer a major part of your religious experience, don't lose it all. Doubt does not need to be cured—it needs to be listened to.

I'm thinking a lot about the existence of God while reading Armstrong's book—how she presents a constructed God, used as a tool for good and evil, and how beautiful and terrible ideas of God can be. While talking about medieval Islam, she tells us this:

. . . [T]he Arabic word for existence (wujud) derives from the root wajada: "he found." Literally, therefore, wujud means "that which is findable" . . . An Arabic-speaking philosopher who attempted to prove that God existed did not have to produce God as another object among many. He simply had to prove that he could be found. . . . [T]he word wajd was a technical term for [Sufi mystics'] ecstatic apprehension of God which gave them complete certainty (yaqin) that it was a reality, not just a fantasy. . . . Sufis thus found the essential truths of Islam for themselves by reliving its central experience."

What if God is more than existence? What if God is more than we could ever believe in—and so instead of believing in Them, we seek to find Them, see Them a little bit more clearly every day? There's such a Christian emphasis on believing the right thing, and I do think it matters what we believe. But there's more than that—there's how we believe, and what we do about it.

C.S. Lewis believed that the fact that we desire something this world can't satisfy is itself proof that we were made for and by something more. I can't talk you into believing in God, and I don't want to. But the desire for more is a space where God can reside, if you let Them. The desire to believe is a kind of belief. Wanting to believe in God is wanting God, and I'm not claiming proof of anything, but I am saying if you connect with that desire, God is already a part of your life, whether because They're there, or because you can't find Them. The lack of God is still a relation to God. Doubt in a god existing is still a relation to God. God exists in relation to you, in you. If we can only doubt when we have something to doubt, if we can only disbelieve when there's something to disbelieve in, that means we have something.

The Bible is more specific than God's existence, and for some this makes it harder to relate to. It is a more clear presence for many people, though—it's something we can hold, memorize, study. Every person of faith relates to their scriptures differently, and I can't tell you exactly how to do so, or which way is "right." But I will say it is not a thing to believe in—"it" is a living, breathing library of transcribed, collected, translated, loved (and hated) books. We could talk about taking the Bible literally vs. metaphorically, or whether it's "historically accurate," or whether God wrote it or told others to write it or had nothing to do with it. Ultimately where I am, the foundation I come back to, no matter how my beliefs change, is that I believe God wanted us to have it. I believe it matters. Once someone asked me whether a psalm was "theologically accurate" and while that's an interesting conversation, my first instinct when reading a poem written thousands of years ago by someone I've never met is not to theologically analyze it but to say, "Yes! I've felt that way too! I hear you! And God hears both of us!" I don't think you believe or disbelieve in myth or poetry or oral history or prophecy or personal letters—I think you listen to them. Before asking yourself whether these things happened, or if we can prove certain figures existed, or anything else super useful but very overwhelming, especially without a history degree, first ask yourself what they would mean if they mattered. What would change about how you move in the world if these books were close to your heart? If you listened across centuries to find people also believing and doubting and searching and finding?

While recommending the Bible (as well as the other books closest to his heart) in Letters to a Young Poet, Rainer Maria Rilke tells his student, "A whole world will envelop you, the happiness, the abundance, the inconceivable vastness of a world. Live for a while in these books, learn from them what you feel is worth learning, but most of all love them. This love will be returned to you thousands upon thousands of times, whatever your life may become—it will, I am sure, go through the whole fabric of your becoming, as one of the most important threads among all the threads of your experiences, disappointments, and joys." Don't believe in a book—live in it, love it, let it weave you together.

Reading A History of God, I'm being reminded how much dialogue there has always been between religions, especially Judaism/Christianity/Islam, and how so much of the Bible is built on traditions outside of it. The writers of the Bible were also living in diverse communities, interacting with and reacting to other faiths, sometimes with hostility but also with synthesis—so much of all three of these religions is built on the local pagan traditions of where they evolved, and all three incorporated Greek philosophy in various ways. None of the major religions of the world are solitary faiths that sprang up out of nowhere—we have always lived with each other, and we've been alternately mad about it and inspired by it.

Having relationships with many kinds of people is beautiful and fulfilling, but it also inevitably brings up questions! I've found myself saying, "I love this person, I think they're intelligent and well-meaning, and they genuinely believe in something I do not. What does this mean for me? Am I doing something wrong?" Embracing others' faiths is, to me, a really important part of loving them, but it's also often a challenge to work through. It has ultimately been beneficial to my faith for me to work through this, but sometimes it just feels hard, and that's okay.

Although I never really questioned the existence of a god, there have been moments in my life where I had no particular conviction that Christianity was true or especially holy. I've been captivated by Jewish and Muslim traditions/beliefs/scriptures, and admired countless philosophies and practices. Christianity has hurt me and so many others—does that mean it's inherently wrong? But in every season of my life, I've said a Christian prayer every night. Everyone experiences religion differently, but for me? I am not a Christian because I think it's better than all other religions, or because I reasoned my way into it, but because it's where I'm from, where I live, where God meets me.

Your statement that everyone's faith is valid and connects them to God—it's a beautiful belief and it opens us to explore and love what we might not be able to otherwise. Reading A History of God—I do believe it's all God. If God cannot hold contradiction, why would I honor Them? How could I believe They encompass the (paradoxical, contradiction-filled) world if They can't exist fully in paradox and contradiction? This Sunday is the Feast of the Holy Trinity for me, and I love its mystery and its acknowledgement that God is always past our understanding, that God has more than one face, that God comes to us in more than one way, can never be pinned down. I and Christians throughout history encounter God as Trinity, but the day that I limit God is the day I have thrown away everything I've worked to build in myself.

The good news for you is if you believe all religions connect to God in some way, then you also believe that you will always be connected to God—no matter how your beliefs change, no matter where you call home, no matter what your practice looks like. We can't let ourselves believe one thing for others and another thing for ourselves—I did this all the time, believing I could never be forgiven but never dreaming of saying that about someone else. Give yourself the same grace and openness and hope you give your friends. You know they are valid, you know you love them—what can that help you learn about yourself? your own validity, your own ability to be loved?

I'll let you in on a secret (in case you didn't already know): the majority of people do not sit and look without bias at the major world religions and decide which one is "true" and convert to it. I'm sure people have done that, and maybe that's what you want to do (I won't stop you). I don't even know to what extent we can "choose" a religion—I think often one (or many) finds us—but for me and so many others, religion is a culture and a practice as much as, if not more than, a belief. And often it's wholly or mostly inherited—I don't know if I would be Christian if my parents and grandparents and ancestors weren't. I don't know exactly what you've inherited, but we all inherit beliefs (even if the belief is not believing in something), and yours are also built on tradition and ideas throughout the centuries.

This all means that doubt is part of any inherited culture and practice. It means that doubt and participating in a religion have always gone together. If religion is action and community and music, you don't have to believe anything in particular to live in it. My Jewish friends have shown me this most clearly—I know of many Jewish people who don't especially believe in the existence of a god, but eat kosher and observe holidays and say prayers. If you ask them why, they say it's because they're Jewish, because it makes them a more fulfilled person, because they're connecting with their ancestors. If religion is connection to God, as you've said (and I agree), then you don't have to have belief to connect with God.

I am absolutely not saying that we should never question the traditions passed down to us, or that conversion is not a valid choice, or that if you weren't raised religious you can't have religion. I just wish to point out that many people do not first believe in a system and then join a faith practice, but the other way around. They practice their way into faith. So often we cannot know what a belief means unless we first do it. Unless it first has meaning to us. From A History of God:

[Anselm of Canterbury, the 11th century theologian] insisted that God could only be known in faith. This is not as paradoxical as it might appear. In his famous prayer, Anselm reflected on the words of Isaiah: "Unless you have faith, you will not understand":

"I yearn to understand some measure of thy truth which my heart believes and loves. For I do not seek to understand in order to have faith but I have faith in order to understand (credo ut intellegam). For I believe even this: I shall understand unless I have faith."

The oft-quoted credo ut intellegam is not an intellectual abdication. Anselm was not claiming to embrace the creed blindly in the hope of its making sense some day. His assertion should really be translated: "I commit myself in order that I may understand." At this time, the word credo still did not have the intellectual bias of the word "belief" today but meant an attitude of trust and loyalty.

If you haven't already, ask to go to a religious service/event with a friend, read/listen/experience the faiths of others. When you encounter things you're not sure if you believe, ask yourself what it would mean for you if you encountered it as truth. If God exists, if God is [insert attribute here], if God commanded [insert commandment here], if this or that book is something God wants us to have—how would that change your life? My belief in a loving God transforms my world. My prayer practice orders my days and centers my emotions. I am living (or attempting to live) my beliefs, not just thinking them. What can you trust, what can you be loyal to, what can you live, even if you don't believe it right now? "Lord I believe; help my unbelief!" (Mark 9:24)

You can live as if something were true, even if you have no proof, even if you're not sure about it. I live as if there is a loving God—I have no scientific proof of this, I have not always been sure of it. But I live as if there is one, and there is more love in the universe because of it. I have only experienced a loving God when I was living in relation to one. You can go to a church without reading its whole catechism, without knowing all the words, without being sure. My pastor once told me he likes the Nicene Creed more than the Apostles' because it says "We believe" instead of "I believe." A creed not as a personal certainty, but as a communal agreement. I don't always know what I believe, but this is what we believe. I can leave it behind, but I cannot pretend it does not exist. It is my inheritance.

My advice for nurturing faith? Be willing to be wrong. Any god I've heard described is outside of our powers of description. It's dangerously presumptuous to think we can be right about God. Once I let go of the pressure to be right, once I accepted that I could be wrong about everything—that's the only way I got to faith. And the worst thing I can think of is coming to a belief through fear (of hell, of being wrong, of uncertainty, of spiritual homelessness). Fear is sometimes present, but come to it because you want it, because it fills your days with life and love. I'm obviously not a scientist or a philosopher—I've never really searched for capital-T Truth, and maybe it sounds like giving up to say all this, to think that I can never be right. But I have only truly come to Christianity when I've accepted that, as Rachel Held Evans said, it's the story I'm willing to be wrong about.

While it's definitely from a Christian perspective (I'm not sure how relatable that will be to you), the book that's calling to me right now for you is Holy Envy: Finding God in the Faith of Others by Barbara Brown Taylor. It's incredibly honest and interested in the experience of exploring envy in a religious context. It completely changed how I approach finding meaning in others' beliefs, and gave me so much peace in my own. And if you do ever begin to follow a religion/denomination, you might need a reminder that you are not abandoning everything else. You may be choosing a home, but you are not locking yourself inside it. We don't look for a home to denounce everyone else's—we look for a place we can live. Taylor says:

I asked God for religious certainty, and God gave me relationships instead. I asked for solid ground, and God gave me human beings instead—strange, funny, compelling, complicated human beings—who keep puncturing my stereotypes, challenging my ideas, and upsetting my ideas about God, so that they are always under construction. I may yet find the answer to all my questions in a church, a book, a theology, or a practice of prayer, but I hope not. I hope God is going to keep coming to me in authentically human beings who shake my foundations, freeing me to go deeper into the mystery of why we are all here.

What are you willing to be wrong about? What do you want to hold close even when you doubt it? What do you want to do, even if you don't believe in it? What brings you closer to the life you know exists for you, the one that fulfills that desire for God? There might not be one religion that is all this for you. Whether or not you ever create/join a concrete belief system, whether or not you're ever sure about any of it, God is with you. Many people live fulfilling lives outside of institutionalized religion; not all who wander are lost; your existence in a diverse community will serve you so well on this journey, which doesn't have an end and always includes doubt, and from which we can always find a new path, and is all encompassed by a many-faced Universe of Love.

And, as I find myself doing so often, here's some more Rilke to his student, which we can receive whether or not we're young or a Sir:

You are so young, so much before all beginning, and I would like to beg you, dear Sir, as well as I can, to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.

<3 Johanna

P.S.—As well as the things I've quoted from, I would also recommend Not All Who Wander Are (Spiritually) Lost: A Story of Church by Traci Rhoades and all of Rachel Held Evans' books.

P.P.S.—People quote this last Rilke passage a lot, but I'm not sure how many have read the full context? He's mostly giving advice regarding sex anxiety in that letter, which I think is great. It's relevant to most journeys in life, but in case you were wondering what journey it's originally about, there you go.

#i'm the only one who should be apologizing for length :)#asks #had fun thinking abt this one thank u for giving me the space to talk abt this stuff!#oh edit I'm fully aware this ask is like 9 months old but. trying to give myself geace. better late than never?

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preciouslandmermaid · 18 hours

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quiet fury in your head [viii]

Dream of the Endless x F!Reader!Goddess / Sandman Fanfiction

Note: I am still alive. Here is some angst, but then finally some progress with these idiots relationship lmao.

No use of Y/N. See part 1 for all the tags tbh.

Warnings: none !

Rating: 18+

(Read on AO3) || (masterpost for other chapters)

In the years that follow, it rains often in the Dreaming. You are grateful for your cloak to keep the rainwater from your face and hair. The rain reminds you of Dima and it tastes like regret. If only I had not asked for the storm. I could have driven the man to madness without her help. But you wanted the mortal’s punishment to be swift and absolute. You wanted him dead for the crimes he enacted against his child. I don’t regret what I did, I regret that Dima was banished for it. You are, despite everything, the embodiment of rage, and rage is not gentle. It does not deter from its destined path due to human definitions of morality. In your eyes, in your heart, the man deserved to die.

Dream is true to his word and does not speak to you. Sometimes, however, you think you see his shadow between the library shelves, through the birch tree trunks, and among the fields of golden wheat.

My time here must be ending soon. It must. You kick a pebble aside and settle on a damp rock overlooking the churning gray-blue oceanic waters. Dream cannot keep me here forever. He could. Technically. But that was beside the point. You crack the spine of your book and lay it open like a slaughtered offering on your lap.

Once I’m free, I’ll find my way through the fabric of the universe and reunite with Dima. You had two oaths to fulfill: Return to the Otherworld and bury your sister’s tokens and then travel through the various realms and find Dima. She’s the embodiment of storms. She won’t be too hard to find. You trusted your faithful friend would answer your call once you were free of the Dreaming.

You lost your goddesshood, your worshipers, your sisters, and your friend. Yet in the light of what you’ve lost, you haven’t lost your life. You won’t take that for granted. You pull the hood of your cloak a little tighter around your face, ignoring the pinpricks of cold rain, and begin to read.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Sister,” Dream says, “what do I owe the pleasure?”

“What, I can’t come and visit my brother?”Death maneuvers around one of the marble pillars. “It’s rather dreadful out there, you know. Couldn’t you make it a bit more cheery?” She tilts her head to the rain surging across the stained glass windows.

He bristles. The argument with you and Dima’s banishment...it doesn’t matter how much linear time passes...the Dreaming continues to rain. He doesn’t regret banishing Dima. It was necessary. Your unhappiness was collateral damage. Death must pick up on a shift in his expression. She lightens and loops her arm with his. Dream finds he is pulled along by the cosmic gravity of his sibling.

Death is like that, you know. When she takes your hand, you don’t have any other choice but to follow her.

“It’s her, isn’t it?” Death says.

“I don’t know who you mean,” he murmurs. He can’t be that transparent. He isn’t.

“I get it, you know,” she continues, heels clicking over the tiles, “she’s the embodiment of your favorite siblings.” She smiles. The Dreaming sings in response. “Death and Destruction.”

The song of the Dreaming rapidly cools at the mention of their wayward, lost brother. You are not like Destruction. Firstly, you don’t have his sense of humor.

“Why are you here, sister?” Dream tries again to dissuade her from poking into his life and his realm. He is sure she means well, but he doesn’t need a keeper. The situation with you – it’s his realm, his business, and his priority. In time, you’d eventually forget your bond to Dima. He’s sure of it. You’ll eventually grow bored of his silence. You used to be such a restless creature, running through his Dreaming, and he doubts those instincts have vanished in the past few centuries. Time in the dreaming is infinite and he has all the time in the world to wait it out.

He’s certain you will seek him out before he ever seeks you.

Death says, “Are you going to keep her here forever?”

“No.”

“Good, that’s all I wanted to know.” Death smiles again and vanishes. He sighs.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is a city in the Dreaming made of light sandstone and glossy jade. A glass palace is suspended in the sky and anchored to the city below by great iron chains. On sunny days, the light reflects from the castle, and a thousand rainbows illuminate the city, and the fabric merchant stalls are removed, lest they catch on fire from an acute ray of light. The city functions like those in the waking world, with politics, drama, festivals, and ruin. The Dreaming is not a utopia but, its’ inhabitants live lives with intrinsic grooves and patterns like those of a mandala painting.

Today is the ‘Night of a Thousand Lights,’ a decennial tradition within the city. You’ve missed the last two...or was it three? Time. Meaningless to a would-be God. Either way, the last time you were here was with Dima. You see her in every swath of cobalt cloth that’s folded and shelved, in every bright laugh, in the droplets of sparkly water from the fountain where several children are kicking and playing with their loose pants lifted to their knees.

“Kimiyah!” A pregnant woman wraps her arms protectively around the swell of her stomach as she calls for her child.

In a flash, you see Macha, her eyes blazing, her hair shiny copper and fanning over her face. Your memory is a vice. You can remember your sisters as easily as breathing. You simply...choose not to dwell on it. You will dwell when you can act. So long as you are trapped within the Dreaming, you cannot bring them back, no matter how much you wish it. Soon, you promise yourself. The Dreaming will not be my prison forever. You shelve the thoughts like the merchants shelving their dyed fabrics and wander through the narrow, dusty streets.

A pair of massive purple peacocks strut through the street as a leash leads them. Their owner, you presume, holds up a bundle of ribbons for patrons to tie to their lanterns. Your heart aches. You recalled that Dima’s lantern had seven dark blue ribbons tied to it. You hail the gentleman and his dark, bushy eyebrows lift as you pluck three ribbons from his fingers.

One dark green, for Macha, for the fields she so lovingly tended, the green isles of your home.

One silver, for Badb, for the color of her hair, the quicksilver of her tongue, and the shiny pieces that laid upon the burial mounds.

One dark blue, for Dima, for the clouds she pranced through and in remembrance of the storms she wrought.

You are grateful in this moment that Dima is not dead. She is merely banished. It is a fate kinder than the one given to your sisters and the rest of the Gods. You keep wandering, smelling spice, listening to the thousand tongues of mortals and dreams, and stepping through iridescent slices of rainbows that warp around the buildings.

You don’t see Dream, but you feel him. He is inside every inhale. Every speck of dust that clings to your shins. You rub your fingers over the silk ribbon and your eyes linger on the beautiful mosaic architecture of the city. How could someone so infuriating create something so painfully beautiful?

You hug your lantern close to your chest and follow the procession as the sky softens to purple. You nod in gratitude after someone lights your lantern for you and watch the tiny flame dance within.

“Tonight, we release a thousand lights,” a woman said, wearing a ceremonial dress, “and we wish upon them like stars.”

The first lantern is released and swiftly followed by a dozen others. You close your eyes. Reunion. It is the wish that matters. Your freedom is an inevitability, but your reunion with your sisters and Dima is not. You open your eyes and Dream stands before you, less than ten paces away, a pale-faced shadow in a city of golden light and jade and twilight.

Your brow furrows, confusion mixed with anger and desire churns within, and you pointedly turn your face away from him as you release your lantern—the silk ribbons trail after it like a jellyfish’s tentacles.

“Do you need me, Dream Lord?” you ask coolly. He wounded you. You serve him, as Desire willed it, but no more and no less.

The lanterns behind him create hazy, golden starlight as they drift lazily into the sky.

“Will you walk with me?” He offers his elbow.

You slide your hand into the crook of his elbow and fall into step through the throng of dreamers and mortals alike. The children are clapping, and giggling, and pointing to their lanterns as their parents and caregivers hold one another close and smile. There is an air of camaraderie and comfort...and joy. A blissful, and hopeful joy as the Night of a Thousand Lights is a celebration to invite fortune into their lives. A wish made on this night was destined to come true – or so it was said.

“I believe I said I did not wish to speak to you unless it was to release me,” you remind him.

“Yes, I recall.” He steps smoothly and the crowd parts like river water curving around a stone. “Have you made your wish?”

“Does it matter to you?” Your jaw clenches. “Perhaps I wished for Dima’s return, but we both know that will not occur. Are you releasing me or not?”

“When you leave the Dreaming where will you go?”

“To the Otherworld, not only to fulfill my final task to Desire but to see its ruin for myself.” There is no point in lying because there is no victory to be won by keeping your future a secret. You are a creature with ambition if nothing else. “Perhaps to the mortal world for a while. I’d like to see the changes for myself.”

“Will you ever return?”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

His question remains suspended in the air among the lanterns. He has stopped the idle walking and now faces you, aware that his expression is beseeching. He cannot help it. He cannot help himself. He thought his stubbornness would overrule yours, but he has failed. You are within his Dreaming, but not a part of it. They call you the Queen of Nightmares, but he wishes…oh, how he wishes...for more. A Queen of Dreams and Nightmares.

You slide your hand away from his elbow and cross your arms. Defensive. Strong. Your eyes alight with that inner fire – the fire he saw on your first meeting, the eternal passion that burns within you. He could stare forever into your eyes and never tire of it even if eternity passed he found himself at the end of all things.

“I would return if my friend Dima could return alongside me.”

“Is that so?” he murmurs. “Your affection for her has not waned.”

He traces the shape of your smirking mouth.

“Do I seem a fickle Goddess to you?”

“No,” he replies, “you have shown stalwart loyalty.”

You tear your gaze from him and look up into the sky – no doubt searching for your lantern among the others. Dream finds it. He coaxes it downward with gentle wind and a soft hand until the lantern is floating between you. The ribbons wave and flutter, waiting for its next journey into the dark sky. He can guess your wish. You wish for freedom. A wish that he – and only he – can grant. But indulging in your wish will leave him...in a world without you.

“One ribbon for each sister,” he guesses.

“One for Dima,” you lift the dark blue one, “and two for my sisters.”

He feels the ribbon slip from your fingertips and Dream nudges the lantern back into the sky with a small flourish of his arm. “She was my first friend,” you say quietly, “I didn’t consider myself friends with the other Gods. Not really. And my relationship with my sisters...it was close to friendship, I believe, but still...different. Dima chose me.”

The music and sounds of revelry dull around him.

“She worshiped you and she served you,” Dream says, “we...Gods, Endless, we don’t have friends nor do we need them. I am not friends with any of my subjects.” He is close to his ravens, he supposes, but the word ‘friend’ doesn’t fit correctly. It hangs like an overly large coat.

You wave him off in a flippant gesture. “You don’t understand, Morpheus.” You watch your lantern float into the sky among the pinpricks of flickering orange and gold. “And I do not expect you to. I am neither God nor Endless, as I live between worlds.”

Dream takes a step closer. “If it’s friendship you desire, then I can create a hundred friends for you, each more wonderful than the last.”

“I don’t want creations, Dream.” You frown. “You could create an identical twin to Dima, but it would not be her...and I would miss her all the more for it.”

You were happier when Dima was here. He knows this. But, his decision cannot be so quickly undone.

“In time,” he begins, “I will allow Dima to return. I will lift her banishment.”

You shrug and your expression...closes. He feels it like an icy wind at his back. You are withdrawing and retreating. A protective shell encompasses you instead of the bright, white-hot, and righteous anger that he is familiar with. It is at this moment that Dream realizes he misses you. You stand a foot away and yet he cannot reach you. You may as well be on the other side of the Dreaming – if the Dreaming bothered with meddlesome things like directions and width. He has caused you pain and suffering beyond the grief and agony that you dutifully hide.

A raindrop lands on his cheek. He steps closer. His hands are trembling. He wills them to close, to stop. Your head tilts to the side – and he knows that there is some part of you, no matter how weakened or buried, that senses his fear. He is afraid to lose you. He is afraid to let you go. Another step.

“You have done your duty, Morrigan.” He exhales.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You scan Dream’s face for deception, but he is unsmiling and serious. There is no humor to him. He is all dark angles and dark hair and keen, sharp eyes. Your heart trips inside your chest. You lick your lips and step closer as if drawn by an invisible string to him, and your breath shudders from within. Is he saying what you think he’s saying?

“Am I free to leave the Dreaming?”

Dream’s hand cradles the side of your face. The Dream Lord is to be my undoing. You remind yourself of your sister’s prophecy, but it no longer holds weight. If Morpheus was your death and your doom, then surely it would have happened by now. Your older sister was never wrong, but maybe her death rendered her prophecies obsolete. You inhale sharply as Dream’s thumb skates across the delicate skin below your eye.

“You are,” he whispers, “and you are free to return as you wish. The Dreaming will be open to you…and to Dima as well.”

Your fingers crawl along his chest and grip the lapels of his woolly coat. “Do you promise?” Be it God, or Endless, their word is their bond.

A heavy weight presses into your chest. You have dreamed of your eventual release a million times, but you never imagined it would look like this surrounded by flickering paper lanterns and twirling ribbons beneath a palace made of glass. His eyes widen imperceptibly, but otherwise, his expression remains grave.

“Yes.” He rests his forehead against yours. “As long as you promise to return.”

“Very well,” you say and the words come out choked, congested with relief and euphoria. Freedom at last. Freedom. A chance for a reunion just as you had wished. Dream collects your hands and joins them with his at the center of his chest.

Dream whispers, “Until next we meet.”

#dream the endless x reader #dream x reader #the sandman fanfic #sandman x reader #dream of the endless x you #reader insert #morpheus x reader #morpheus x you #dream the endless x the morrigan

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blood-choke · 6 months

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Hello! I just wanted to say that I really appreciate this game and how it portrays butchness. I'm a huge fan of lesbian lit and there are so few butches in media that to see a game have not one, but three, makes me feel a certain kind of way.

Aside from that, I was really drawn to how you portrayed the differing relationships between all the characters. Everything feels so visceral and real, it just feels so crunchy that I find myself wanting for more. I really look forward to seeing how it will turn out for everyone involved.

Additionally, (if this is too spoilery, has been answered, or insensitive pls feel free to ignore) is it ok if I ask how you decide the dialogue and event flow of the choices? I was mildly and pleasantly surprised that flirting with Clear and staying with her in ch 3 would lead to "that" scene, and I'm curious on your writing process on how it lead to that.

Ultimately, I just really want to thank you for sharing your game with us. Im just really glad to be able to experience this game and I hope that you stay safe!

thank you!

overall when it comes to structuring dialogue & choices i tend to write a linear path first & then double back to add more branches.

i had a basic outline of the chapter & knew what i wanted to touch on with each route & what scenes needed to happen, and then i just kinda started writing from there. Clear's was actually the one i wrote first, her sex scene was what i wrote first, and then i went back and built a lot of the route around it.

i wrote Clear's and Hana's routes simultaneously since they were so intertwined, but i ended up rewriting Hana's three times, whereas with Clear i just had to edit it a bit. i knew i wanted them to have that conversation at the table about Clear not having any friends, and then i wrote the scene where mc finds the vampire erotica book. it took some trial and error until i was happy with the dialogue & choices at the table, as well as how i wanted to split the following variations. i tend to do the romantic variations first, and then work my way down, and sometimes i have to go backwards and edit as i write because i'll add something on a whim to one variation and decide that actually i want this to be in all of them.

i am definitely someone that's a bit of a "planster" meaning i do minimal planning and write a lot by the seat of my pants. sometimes it works, other times it puts me in a bit of a bind. like i said i tend to set out with specific information/dialogue/scene/etc in mind that i know has to happen, and build up around it.

with Hana the main focus in her route was that conversation with mc; i wanted mc to get overwhelmed at the store, and for her and Hana to talk about it afterwards, and for Hana to be frustrated at her situation as this person who suddenly has to comfort and take care of mc after being replaced by her. again, minimal planning, i wrote almost her whole route before i started working on Valentina's & i mentioned Standard and his proclivities towards Chinese antiques. this made me realize i needed to rewrite a lot of Hana's dialogue to be more inclusive of her race. i went back to Clear's route, and ended up writing a lot of the conversation with Hana there after she gets back from the store, and then i adapted it to the other routes.

Valentina's route was all about the painting. again, i wrote that initial scene of walking into her room, the description of the painting, and then her first sex scene, and built up from there. there was also the brief meeting with Joan, which was mostly just for fun and to introduce those characters early for anyone that went on V's route, so the next chapter those players will have a little jump on who they are. but the main point was that painting & i think it's pretty obvious with how the whole route plays out, and the fact that the painting is always seen by all players.

this is still a game, so it is gamified quite a bit, with all 3 characters having a potential sex scene in the same chapter at the same time. i planned it that way to make it easy for myself and because that's just how i wanted it to go. i put some stat checks in place to add variations, like if you went with Hana or Valentina in ch2, if you flirted with Clear or not, and again, it was a lot of jumping around and trial and error. i wrote a significant part of Valentina's route out of order, and i finished hers last before i finalized the council meeting (which i had written very early on but like Hana's route i had to rewrite a few times)

i like to describe my process as building a tree. i write the core of it all first, one linear path, the trunk, and then i double back and add in all of the possible branches. it doesn't mean anything that i wrote the friendly, romantic variation of Clear's route first, it just allowed me to use that single variation as an anchor and build up around it without straying too far and losing the plot, hahahaha. i still sometimes stray a little too far... but it's fun that way. it was fun trying to figure out a way to make the rival route different, how to change it while still telegraphing the same overall ideas about Clear & her situation. it's also very frustrating, but it's all part of the process....

#i have no idea if this answers your question. LOL #one thing with writing interactive fiction and something with big variations #is just it really does take a lot of trial and error #again writing a lot of Hana's route but then stepping back and realizing it doesn't quite compare #when held up against the others & having to scrap a lot of it #it happens a lot even with minor things like basic choices #right before i finished V's route i had a huge pity moment where i was like wow this all fucking sucks. but then when i finished it #along with the council meeting and saw it all come together it was really satisfying #it's hard but it's rewarding when it all comes together in the end #not that i think the chapter is perfect by any means or anything lmfao but you know. In General #ask #anonymous

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irainprogress · 10 months

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Book Review + Personal Reflection: The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

Spoilers ahead!

When I first saw the book “The Midnight Library” on my screen, I was intrigued and assumed it would be about a fantasy novel about an actual library. But I was wrong. The Library in the story represents the limbo a woman named Nora Seeds is stuck in as she decides whether to live or die. As I read the beginning of the book, I found it difficult to connect with Nora and be interested in the story. The content was depressing and Nora’s thoughts started to mirror what I had been thinking myself during this gloomy period of my life. I felt overwhelmed and scared so I stopped reading it for awhile (when I say awhile, I mean a few hours because I read this book in the span of 3 days). Nora had lost her job, lost all her connections with her family and friends and felt as if she had no future. She believed she had made all the wrong decisions in her life which led her to where she was now: alone and miserable with untouched potential. As a post undergraduate student, I resonated with Nora’s feelings about life and regrets about missed opportunities. This period of my life feels pivotal. At least, that is how I have come to understand it. The people I meet, the habits I practice and the jobs I work will determine my life in the future. But the future is also the product of the things we don’t do, the decisions we don’t make or the paths we don’t follow. Do I go back to school and pursue my masters? What happens in the future if I don’t pursue the education I'm supposed to or if I don’t pursue any at all? Will I regret not seizing my own potential? Will I be happy being comfortable? These are the thoughts that have been occupying my mind lately.

In the Midnight Library, Nora gets the opportunity to experience the lives she could have lived. A scientist in the Arctic studying glaciers and the relation to climate change. A famous rock star. An Oympian swimmer. A mom of a beautiful daughter and wife of a man that had previously asked her out for coffee in her root life whom she rejected. Each life, I wondered if she would stay. I really thought she would stay in the life she had with Ash and Molly. But it made sense that she didn’t. Instead, she chose to live the life she was already living with a new perspective. Nora realized that, even in the lives where she was glamorous and successful, she still felt unfulfilled.

We can’t dwell on who we can be or who we should’ve been. We can’t be everything. We are who we are at this moment in time. There are limits to The Midnight Library. After all, it is fiction. For one, Nora’s new perspective as the solution is the ideal situation. People have varying experiences with their mental health. Not everyone can treat their depression with a change in perspective. I have experienced that trying to see the situation at hand in a bigger picture helps- but it is a process and it is not linear and it is ongoing, sometimes it is even a cycle. For others, healing from depression is not so straightforward- if I can even call it that- and requires more than just a change in perspective.

Another thing I would like to share is how often I imagined a scene in on the big screen. This book has so much potential to be a film and I really hope it becomes one! I can see a sequence of Nora’s different lives and a cut somewhere in the middle displaying her and Hugo deliberating the possibility of their situation. As much as I found the beginning a little bit boring, which thinking about it now, was probably the intention of the author since Nora’s life was dreary and disappointing, the author did a great job in writing the story and narrating the transfers Nora experienced.

December 2022

#bookreview #bookworm #matthaig #booktok

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its-landezan · 1 month

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Finding Light in the Darkness: My Journey with Anxiety and Depression

Welcome to my personal blog, where I share the raw and real experiences of navigating life with anxiety and depression. In this post, I want to open up about my struggles, victories, and the lessons I've learned along the way.

For years, I battled with a darkness that seemed to consume every aspect of my life. Anxiety gripped me with its suffocating tendrils, while depression weighed heavy on my heart. Simple tasks felt like insurmountable mountains, and each day was a battle just to get out of bed.

Admitting that I needed help was one of the hardest but most important steps I ever took. I sought therapy and medication, surrounding myself with a support network of friends and family who lifted me up when I couldn't stand on my own. Asking for help wasn't a sign of weakness; it was an act of courage. Recovery wasn't a linear path; it was filled with ups and downs, twists and turns. But through it all, I learned to celebrate the small victories the days I managed to shower, the moments of laughter amidst the tears. These tiny triumphs were beacons of hope in the darkness, guiding me forward one step at a time.

As I journeyed towards healing, I discovered the importance of self-care. Whether it was taking long walks in nature, practicing mindfulness meditation, or indulging in a good book, I learned to prioritize my mental and emotional well-being. Self-care wasn't selfish; it was a vital lifeline that kept me afloat.

Opening up about my struggles with anxiety and depression was daunting, but it was also liberating. By sharing my story, I hoped to break the stigma surrounding mental illness and spark conversations about mental health. No one should suffer in silence, and no one should feel ashamed for seeking help.

What is Anxiety? Anxiety is a feeling of worry or fear about what might happen in the future. It's normal to feel anxious sometimes, but when it's too much and affects your daily life, it's called an anxiety disorder. This can make you feel restless, tense, and have trouble concentrating. Treatment can include therapy, medication, and learning relaxation techniques to help manage anxiety.

Symptoms of Anxiety Anxiety symptoms vary depending on the disorder, but Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) typically involves experiencing several or most of the following symptoms:

Excessive worry about various aspects of life

Restlessness or feeling on edge

Difficulty controlling worry

Irritability

Difficulty concentrating

Muscle tension

Trouble falling or staying asleep

Fatigue

Physical symptoms such as headaches, stomachaches, or nausea

Experiencing anxiety symptoms for at least six months

What are the main types of anxiety? The main types of anxiety disorders are:

Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD): Excessive worry about everyday events.

Panic Disorder: Sudden, intense fear attacks without real danger.

Social Anxiety Disorder: Overwhelming worry about social situations.

Specific Phobias: Intense fear of specific objects or situations.

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD): Recurring thoughts and repetitive behaviors.

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD): Develops after traumatic events.

Separation Anxiety Disorder: Excessive anxiety about separation.

Agoraphobia: Fear of situations where escape might be difficult.

What causes anxiety? Anxiety can be caused by a mix of factors like genetics, brain chemistry, stressful events, personality traits, health conditions, substance use, trauma, and learned behaviors. These factors can trigger feelings of worry and fear.

Final Thoughts My journey with anxiety and depression has been marked by darkness, but it has also been illuminated by moments of courage, resilience, and hope. While the battle may never truly end, I am grateful for how far I've come and the person I've become along the way. To anyone struggling in the darkness, know that you are not alone, and there is light waiting for you on the other side.

This article explains anxiety disorders in simple terms, helping readers grasp the topic better and feel more confident in supporting themselves or others facing similar difficulties. Understanding mental health is emphasized as crucial for self-care.

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drew-mga2022mi6011 · 2 months

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Scott McCloud | Making and Understanding Comics

Scott McCloud - Artist

While yes, there are some differences between my silent book and a typical graphic novel or comic (dialogue being the main one), I feel there are a few principles that could be learned from the artform.

Paneling

Most panel to panel transitions can be placed in one of a few distinct categories. One such style of paneling is the moment to moment format. This can be used to slow down the pace of a given moment or to further detail an action taking place. The next is similar to the first, but it features action to action movement, sort of like pose to pose animation.

Subject to subject paneling involves a degree of reader involvement to be meaningful. This would be a transition between two given subjects whilst remaining within the same scene (example; a panel of a killer and a lady, followed by a panel of a city and a scream piercing the night).

Panels which transition between scenes involve deductive reasoning on the part of the reader. The transitions transport the viewer across significant distances of space and time. This could also be accomplished by ending a scene on one page and beginning the next one on the page following.

Another transition involves transporting readers between several aspects of a given scene. This could be a place, idea or mood. This is known as aspect to aspect paneling, and is used frequently during montages. The final type of transition is non-sequitur, which is where there is no logical connection between panels. However, this posits an interesting qualm; can two panels really exist with no meaning to each other? McCloud does not think so. No matter how dissimilar, the reader will automatically try to find reason or meaning in the space between the two panels.

Of these, the 2nd through 4th types are most preferred amongst Western comic artists in that order. Eastern artists don't differ too much from this trend, but also include the 5th type sparingly. The others are virtually never used. In my project, I want to employ these lesser used techniques in my own work.

Simultaneously, it is important to find a balance between too many panels to tell a story, and too little. The art of creating comics is as subtractive as it is additive.

Time

Time in comics is not as simple as capturing a single moment in time in one image. Sometimes, time can pass along a linear path in one image alone. In this example, on first glance this is accomplished through the use of words. However, there is a hidden element to this; this panel contains actions that simply cannot happen at the same time, or those that look cacophonous at once, but make sense when viewed from left to right.

Another way of utilising this principle of time, of events that cannot logically happen at the same time is to have "duplicates" of a character perform an action in sequence (for example, running and jumping over a fence would be shown in one panel by the character running up to the fence, and the same character jumping over it a short distance away from the first character). These can also be used to guide the viewer from place to place within an image and also to manipulate the line of sight to guide the reader from panel to panel.

The general idea is that in comics and graphic novels, time and space are intertwined. For a reader, moving between panels is an indication that both time and space could have passed, but it is not known by how much. Further, this is seldom consistent. This is easily navigable in most cases, provided that ample elements are given in each panel to allude to this change in space-time. Sometimes, this can be achieved through the very spacing between two images on the paper. Other times, the size of the panel could be a hint. All this to say that these "elements" need not be present in the image, but instead could be that image itself.

Conversely, the timelessness of an image could be accentuated by removing the borders of that image altogether, such as in full page illustrations or illustrations that run off the page altogether. A factor that is unique to comics and other such media is the fact that the past, present, and future are all visible at once and are all considered "real".

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mousenkeyboardisnarrative · 4 months

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Initial Research - Linear, Branching, and Non-linear Narrative Types

Linear Narrative

A linear narrative is a "normal" narrative that is a series of events that is not changed by the player and their actions inside of the game. Linear narratives are often used in books or movies, but they can also be found in games that include a set story.

Here are a couple of positives to linear narratives:

They could create a more interesting story with more character depth and development compared to other narrative types.

They can provide the player with a clear goal.

They can control the feel or the "tension" of the game better than other narrative types, making the game more interesting to play and follow along.

And here are a couple of negatives about linear narratives:

It limits what control the player has over the game, making the game less interactive than others.

It effects the game in general, making it a one time play and can not be played again.

It forces the player to agree with the storyline and the decisions the developer and characters make in the game.

Here are some games that feature linear narrative features:

Uncharted: Unchanted is a series of games that follow the story of a treasure hunter called Nathan Drake and his group. The game clearly shows signs of "scripted" scenes and events that make this a linear narrative game.

Portal: Portal is a puzzle/platformer game that requires the player to use a device that can create portals. The device is called the Portal Gun, and allows the player to create portals on specific surfaces, requiring the player to be strategic when it comes to the locations that the portals should be in. The game has a fixed storyline, that is told through the main Boss called GLaDOS.

The Last of Us: The Last of Us is a action/adventure game based on two characters called Joel and Ellie, two survivors of a zombie outbreak that happened across the USA. The game has a fixed storyline which is is told through scripted cutscenes and speech.

BioShock: BioShock is a first person shooter game that takes place in a city called Rapture, but now is a ruin. The game has a set storyline, that is revealed through audio logs and radio messages.

Half-Life 2: Half-life 2 is a sci fi first person shooter game that continues the story of Gordon Freeman, a scientist who fights against the Combine that have taken over Earth. The game has a set story, that is told through scripted sequences, dialogue, and cutscenes. The game's story is immersive and interactive, making the game interesting even though its a set story path.

Branching Narrative

A branching narrative is the opposite of a linear narrative in which the player can make decisions that can change the story. Depending on what decisions the player makes, the outcome changes (normally 7 times).

The positives of branching narratives are:

They offer a far greater control over the game, making the game more enjoyable and more interactive.

They make the game better to replay due to the multiple different variations that the game features, so its different each replay.

They allow the player to think for themselves, allowing their creativity to control the story rather than the game designer.

The negatives of branching narratives are:

They could sometimes create a story that doesn't have as much "depth" or detail as a game with a linear narrative.

It could cause the player to be confused due to the sheer amount of options that they could pick from (especially difficult for disabled people).

Here are a couple of games that feature a branching narrative:

Mass Effect: Mass Effect is a sci-fi game that focuses on the commander, Shepard. The player must save the galaxy from ancient machines called the Reapers. Due to the game featuring a large range of branching in its story, I have placed it in list part of the list.

The Walking Dead: The walking dead is a zombie game that follows the story of a character called Lee Everett. The main story of the game is for the character to protect a young girl named Clementine through the apocalypse. The game is mostly linear, but features a few branching narrative features, making it part of this list.

Detroit: Become Human: Detroit is a game that takes place in the future where androids (robots) are like humans. Due to the ability to branch from the story and create your own story in a way, I have included it on this list.

Until Dawn: Until Dawn is a horror game that follows a group of friends who are trapped in a cabin with a serial killer. Its a interesting game due to its horror mechanics and the ability to branch the story.

Non-linear Narrative

A non-linear narrative is a type of narrative that does not follow a order set by the developer. Non-linear narratives can include flashbacks, "flash-forwards", parallel stories, or multiple characters thoughts (or perspectives...). Non-Linear narratives allow the player to experience or "play" any part of the narrative at any point they would like. For example Minecraft allowing the character to either miss the boss entirely and just build, or speed run to defeat the boss. Other examples of games with non-linear narratives are Braid, The Stanley Parable, and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. This is one of my favourite out of the three as it gives me more control over my game.

The positives of non-linear narratives are:

It makes the game more enjoyable to play due to the fact that the story can branch off depending on what the player wants, making it more complex than other linear narrative games.

The game gives the player more creativity and curiosity, making the game more interesting to play each time.

The negatives of non-linear narratives are:

Games with this type of Narrative can not really have story's, as they can span so far from the story due to its creative aspects.

Most games with this type of Narrative also focus more on the mechanics and coding of the game, rather than the story.

Here are a couple of games that feature a non-linear narrative:

Minecraft: Minecraft is a sandbox game that allows players to explore, build, and survive in a near endless, randomly generated world. The game has no goals or storyline that the player has to follow, which lets players create their own stories through their actions and choices. Players could build up their buildings, or they can focus on fighting and defeating the two bosses in the game.

The Stanley Parable: The Stanley Parable game is a game that showcases what non-linear games could be and what they offer to games. The game follows the story of Stanley, an office worker who finds himself in a near endless life? The game has lots of different endings and places that the player can explore and mess around with, making it a very open game.

Braid: Braid is a puzzle game that allows the player to manipulate time, like my previous game. The game features a non-linear plot, allowing the player more control over the game (or changing themselves into a cat if they would like to).

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt: The Witcher 3 is a fantasy game that includes a main character called Geralt of Rivia. The main characters aim is to find their lost daughter. Due to the game featuring multiple quests, characters and locations (that can be explored in any order), I believe this game is a non-linear narrative.

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selormohene · 9 months

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day 24 (thursday, july 27th 2023)

(Written Friday morning, posted Friday afternoon because currently at Sue’s cabin and relatively off the grid.)

I wanted to read a bunch of books this summer and that hasn’t necessarily panned out. (Well the literature I’ve made some progress on, the social science not so much.) I also wanted to do a bunch of math, and that’s been happening, although much more slowly than I’d anticipated. Partly due to the omnipresent problem of sleep and partly due to the fact that what I’ve been studying so far (calculus, a little linear algebra) was only a preliminary to what I really wanted to study, (differential topology, and in particular, the algebraic and categorical aspects of differential topology). But it now occurs to me that in trying to follow my interests, as I’ve mentioned before sometimes getting into the groove is more important than following a specific path. Of course this can sometimes have adverse effects such as only being inclined to study stuff you don’t have the prerequisites for and thus not being able to study them properly, and which is precisely the problem I’m currently trying to fix. But I think the point is that being unwilling to study because you don’t like what you’re working on can be just as much of a failure mode as only working on stuff you enjoy without having an adequate grounding in the fundamentals, which will just end up working against you. The real solution, I think, is some combination of discipline and freestyling, which I’m trying to carry out but could probably do a better job of doing. That is, realise that you have to eat your vegetables but find the best way of making them go down (or develop a taste for them), but also add a little bit of meat and potatoes every now and then to the extent possible to make the meal as a whole more palatable.

On the social science front there were a few books I’d wanted to read but couldn’t get into. But I’m currently reading The Anatomy of Racial Inequality by Glenn Loury and it’s really good. I can’t remember when I first came across his work but I do have respect for his general position on and complex approach to racial issues in the United States, most of all the fact that he doesn’t seem to be primarily interested in recapitulating progressive bromides despite his sympathy, at various points in his career, with various of them. For instance all the talk about self-confirming stereotypes, adverse selection, and differentiation are best seen as challenges to perhaps uncomfortable notions we may have regarding racial self-perceptions and behaviour informed by them, without falling into moralising generalities about respectability politics and the like, which is what takes the place in popular discourse of the sort of game-theoretic argument he’s advancing. This represents, to me, a vindication of heavy-duty mathematically informed theory in wielding a more complex vision of things and in so doing giving us the ability to make more sensitive moral assessments of the situation in question. Many of us ignore the theoretical complexity of the world or just can’t perceive it and don’t realise that we can’t, which is bad, but even worse is recognising that the world is complex but somehow also thinking that all the complexity filters down to moral assessments which happen to align simply with our prior simple moral beliefs.

This reminds me of the accusation of pandering to the beliefs of whites — of being a “coon” or “Uncle Tom” — the levelling of which I’ve always found distressing. Like “pick-me,” it comes across to me as partly a form of projection, in the following sense. If you can’t assess the truth of a socially relevant belief in others (or even the potential utility of some purported piece of socially relevant information) independently of what white people make of it, it seems like you’re the one who has them living in your head. Of course there’s a difference between realising that what white people think (and more importantly what they do) matters, and adopting an evaluative system based on theirs. Your evaluative system should be based on your own values, and should incorporate the values of racist white people only as relevant information (regarding what use they will make of certain information, how they will react to you, how other people will react to them, etc). In particular I’m not trying to deny that there are black people whose value systems are entirely oriented around those of white people, I’m just saying that a more subtle and ultimately self-defeating way of having one’s values so oriented is manifested in only assessing people whose beliefs, prescriptions, motives, actions etc. seem to align with values that white people also hold as being motivated by alignment with white value systems, and only assessing the content of their beliefs or prescriptions or actions in terms indexed to white value systems yourself. In particular it shouldn’t be that hard to say “person X is only saying this for white approval and/or claim X is exactly what a racist would want to be the case, but it could still be a useful thing to consider the relevant claims and what to do in light of their potential truth and/or their prevalence.”

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strangebiology · 2 years

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Why I don't Worry about Being a Gross Vulture Person

One of the agents I was talking to about my book proposal for "Carcass: On the Afterlives of Animal Bodies" was asking me if I had a more personal take, rather than "here's what happens to dead animals."

How does my personal journey work into it? It's a science book... I really couldn't think of anything, until later when I'm a bit boozed up and going on about my Tragic Backstory (ok it's not that serious, let's call it...Things That Informed my Behavior and Personality.)

When I was younger I believed in sort of a narrow definition of success, as was generally defined by my family and school: get good grades, go to good college, get good job. There's sort of a uniform, linear path that we all follow and some get higher on the ladder than others. If I do well at these pre-specified things, I'll get accolades and attention and happiness. Beyond that, only very lucky people can have very good lives, and I'm not lucky.

This turned out to be pretty wrong.

I joined track and field and I LOVED it. And I was very good at it. I set the all-time school record for the 100M hurdles. Track was very important to the formation of my beliefs and values, which is weird because it's just running in circles.

Here's where it went wrong (or...right?): my parents absolutely hated track. I started coming home with a medal or four every weekend or so, and they wanted me to quit. They successfully sabotaged two invitationals and called the school to make them pull me out (now they say they were just faking the phone call, and they didn't pull out their star hurdler/jumper, so IDK.)

I thought "How come I'm not getting appreciated for doing something objectively well?"

Years later, I was running at one of the beautiful spots the track team had shown me. I went into a ravine. I found cow bones.

I started finding more bones of other animals. Sometimes a little fleshy. I learned more online about cleaning. Posted about them here. I processed a few fresh carcasses.

Of course my parents thought it was gross and weird and wanted me to stop. I can't blame them, being disturbed by dead animals is a very culturally normal opinion. And you know, if I had been in a different timeline, I might have said "you're right, this is objectively gross and weird, and because I respect your opinion, I will stop."

But that's not how it went. I just said "Oh, please, you hate everything I do. Regardless of how normal it is."

They could have stopped me, but they wasted their judgement on something completely innocuous, and it's worthless now. I only got more invested in dead animals as the years passed.

The lovely thing is, and I can't speak for anyone else, but I really don't have social trouble because of my interest in dead animals. It's only been good for my career, it brought me this blog, it got me 171,000 followers on TikTok, I write about bones professionally a lot, and I'll probably write a book about it soon. People I meet are generally either fascinated or they just go "oh that's not for me." I've been told one(1) time "oh this will eliminate you from large portions of the dating pool" but I literally have no interest in dating someone who is gonna be that put off by a weirdo. I'm a weirdo at heart even without the bones. I'm so happy that I don't have to fake normalness, and everyone I care about, and most of the people who follow me online, are either neutral or they love it.

I do want to express my gratitude to everyone who has either supported me, said anything nice, bought bone merch, or followed. And I also want to thank the people who do hate dead animals, understand that their personal ick factors don't dictate morality, and proceed block or scroll on by.

#dead animals #personal #vulture culture

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urmomsstuntdouble · 3 years

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congrats on 100! is it possible for you to write some headcanons for china?

of course! and ty! also, quick shoutout to @mysticalmusicwhispers for some of the inspiration for this :)

He is a firm believer in the concept of chaotic time (i will be discussing various interpretations of time as they are described in The Fourth Turning by Neil Howe and William Strauss, as their books about American generations live rent free in my brain), which is defined as “history having no path. Events follow one another randomly, and any effort to impute meaning to their whirligig succession is hopeless.” It’s sort of the original way that people percieved time, and this interpretation of time can be found in a lot of indigenous cultures, as well as in popular nihilism. I think part of why Yao thinks this is because of all the changes in political leadership he’s had throughout his life, which prevent him from being able to apply an overall narrative to the universe. This can make some things like diplomacy a little difficult for him, as many of the other world powers are proponents of linear time- The idea of “time as a unique (and usually progressing) story with an absolute beginning and an absolute end.”

That’s not to say that Yao is terrible at diplomacy- He’s actually very good at it, and can talk people into buying just about anything from him.

He has an entire house that’s just filled with his old stuff. Clothes, pottery, paintings, manuscripts, trinkets, et cetera. It’s not very organized, though, and some things can never be moved because if somebody were to touch them, the objects might get damaged.

His weapon of choice is a gùn staff, when it comes to gun-less fighting. I think he likes to bop people on the head with it when they’re being annoying.

This is sort of based on some ancient chinese military history that i don’t fully recall so I’m not sure what to type into google but. very deadly with the gùn.

On that note, he’s very well practiced in both Northern and Southern style Shaolin kung fu, but you probably wouldn’t know that unless you’d been around him for a while. He gives me massive “old person doing tai chi in the park” vibes. Where kung fu is concerned, I think his favorite animal thingy would be the crane? I feel like he’d really like a lot of crane forms even though he’s a bit short for it. (also im very sorry if im getting this wrong or talking about it in the wrong way! i pracitce shaolin kung fu, although i haven’t been able to really engage with it during the pandemic, so my memory might not be 10/10)

His spice tolerance?? through the roof. The things this man eats could kill a human

To me, Yao feels like one of the most human characters in hetalia, because he’s the oldest. Part of this is just because he’s the oldest, so he’s been through the most stuff- While other prominent characters are depicted as being kind of messy young adults who haven’t figured everything out yet, Yao has a calmness about him due to his age. Don’t get me wrong he’s still a bit messy, but he’s messy by choice?? like. from @peonycats latest china drawing. that was voluntary. But at the same time, I think he could fit the wise old mentor trope if he had the patience to be a mentor. He’s lived through so much that he has experience with pretty much everything one could encounter. This is also a double edged sword, because it can make him a bit impatient, especially with things he feels he’s already seen and done before. Sometimes he’s just over it, ya know? (side note i feel like that’s smth he’d be able to bond with India over- being done with all these modern kids who want to do stuff that he’s just endlessly bored by.)

He has a love-hate relationship with C-dramas. On the one hand, they’re interesting stories and imbue nostalgia. On the other hand, they can be super historically inaccurate at times- One complaint I’ve heard is that the hairstyles are often inaccurate for the sake of making the actors look really pretty.

short king

His government is often wary and not trusting of him, because they see him as being a sort of relic from previous times. Like a potential threat to their sovereignty? idk, just. mutual distrust.

idk where this came from but I’ve seen the hc that one time the italy brothers were like yo you knew our grandpa right? we just wanna talk- and then china goes yah we used to fuck and i think that’s so funny

He nibbles at his food, eating sort of like a bird, and does the same with water.

Despite being kind of thin himself, will absolutely pester the shit out of his kids (even if theyre on bad terms) for not eating enough. in the same breath he’ll also berate them for eating unhealthily, and take huge offense if they won’t eat his food. like even if they’re just not hungry that time yao will develop a grudge and he’ll make sure you remember that you didn’t want to eat his food that one time. how rude of you >:(

i probably have more thoughts but theyre either too jumbled/not well worded in my brain or not present at the moment. i hope you enjoyed these!

writing requests

#i hope that was snazzy for ya!#yao feels very prickly to but maybe that's because mandarin sounds pointy to me #its a spiky language!#but anyway Enjoy #hetalia #hws #hws china #hws hc #writing requests #ceros posting

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myelocin · 3 years

Text

love, sicily | kozume kenma

Synopsis: Perhaps it’s through serendipity that you’ll begin to look at the world past the rose colored lenses and finally see the kaleidoscope of gold that it brings.

Characters: Kozume Kenma, Sugawara Koushi

Genre: Fluff, Travel, Eventual Romance, (Mutual) Pining | WC: 4000+

Playlist | Pinterest Board

A/N: This is a commission from @haiikyuuns ! I had a lot of fun with this one so thank you for trusting me miss maam ;A;

commissions

Track 1: Paris in The Rain | “I look at you now and I want this forever; I might not deserve it but there’s nothing better.”

Sugawara Koushi is what comes with Paris.

He’s the first, the only, and the current. It’s through summer nights under city lights, where you first are introduced to what love could be.

Where it could be this. Only this.

The summer of ’13 looking like living in an okay city that doesn’t really have much to offer in the rural side of southern Japan. One convenience store by the train station, and a teashop that most teenagers wouldn’t exactly prefer to frequent. Sunsets by the shore are nice, because your world had always just been nice.

It was okay.

Watermelon and ice drops in June, falling leaves in September, snowy paths you had to shovel every weekend in December, and the Sakura blossoms in March. Routine was okay, so you settled that you were too.

Koushi was who looked like what love could be to you. The word “eventually,” fitting. To be in a constant state of pondering if the word love could ever be redefined.

And in a way, it does. He doesn’t exactly become love, the more you think about it, but rather he just remains as is. Your constant; a day one of some sorts. Serendipity as a thing reserved for what could only be thought of as fiction, because reality had never been an ugly place for you.

So looking through rose colored lenses it was.

From your place you settled the most comfortable in—in the sidelines—you sat and watched Koushi bloom. Where for years it stayed okay. As is. Still a routine that frankly neither of you wanted to break.

Where eventually, the first crack of that well maintained schedule looked like a roundtrip ticket from Tokyo to the city of Paris, a suitcase, backpack, and a map of a city unknown to you.

The sight of Paris and Sugawara Koushi. Silver hair and hazel eyes. Every color that’s linked to what you’ve always known as home found in him. The pastel pink of his lips like the rose petals from outside his home, the silver of his hair as the clouds in the sky because for some reason rain always triumphed over sunshine.

And Paris, in the rain, with what you think as love, in front of you. Seen through your eyes as what you tell yourself is it—the greatest that love could ever become, because all you’ve known are shades of pastels with just a hint of silver.

Just one, perfect, palette that seemed to be enough for you.

(Until it wasn’t for him.) (It never occurred to you that just a few shades and a set of familiar streets would never be enough for him.)

“Paris is great, isn’t it?” Koushi turns to you and says, where he holds his hands out and past the balcony to catch a few drops of rain.

He looks beautiful. (Always has, you think.)

You nod your head.

“I’m coming back here next month because I got the job, actually,” he smiles, looking wistful.

You pause.

Rain still pours, and there’s a little bit of thunder. You think to yourself that if he chose to say any other set of words other than a watered down version of “I’m-leaving-you-and-that-good-for-nothing-town-forever,” you’d already be pulling him down into the streets and kiss him under the rain.

“Like,” you say, trying to sound out your thoughts; your throat feels dry. “—like forever?”

Koushi looks far away, and when he leans further to catch more raindrops, he feels far away. Further away, you think. Has he always been this far away?

“I hope forever,” he laughs, then turns to you. He’s smiling like you share his happiness with him. Are you happy along with him?

Silver hair kind of white against the backdrop of Paris in the rain, and hazel eyes that still look like all the shades of home stare at you. Your palms feel clammy, but you smile.

He turns away, and the rose colored lenses you’ve always seen the world with suddenly crack.

(When you sleep that night, Paris in the rain just becomes a city caught in a thunderstorm.)

Track 2: Paris | “if we go down, then we go down together.”

Kozume Kenma’s always hated looking at a city caught in a downpour.

He was never much for traveling, but he knew a city like this was meant to be explored.

He sighs, suitcase in tow as he opens the door to his hotel room and face plant into the bed. The skies above a city meant to live in sunshine continue to weep, so he turns on his side, facing the window to ponder. Not necessarily about much, because his thoughts have always been quite linear.

Kenma liked schedule. Predictability.

Booking a ticket to Paris three days after Tetsurou’s drunk speech was not predictable.

And because he spoke of the devil, his phone rings, flashing Tetsurou’s name in big, bold letters.

“You know,” Tetsurou’s voice drawls. “I don’t know what on God’s green earth even possessed you to jump on the first flight out of here to fucking—“ he pauses to inhale, before continuing, “—Paris out of every other city, but you did, and everyone’s confused as fuck.”

Kenma shifts in place, frankly wondering the same thing, but of course he’d never tell him that. There’s an ache that comes when he cracks his neck, but it’s a familiar one. He supposes that he’s used to a lot of things. The ache in his neck; the black roots that always grows faster than he can retouch them; Tetsurou’s voice that still sounds worse than his mother’s nagging.

“Why are you even there?” his voice comes again over the phone.

“You told me that I needed to do more,” Kenma replies.

The city still weeps. He wonders if someone’s out there trying to catch raindrops, or perhaps dance and kiss in the rain.

After all, it’s Paris, he thinks. A lot happens in a city people shroud with love.

“Do more,” Tetsurou parrots, confused.

Kenma nods, blinking with the tap, tap, tap that comes from the rain against his window.

The gears don’t turn in Tetsurou’s head until after a few more moments pass, his eyes eventually widening at the memory from three nights ago. It’s always been known that Kenma’s been more of a reserved person when it came to most things in life. Ever the calculated, side character type of person. For the most part it was okay, but he supposes that even the most silent could still have moments where they want to peek a little outside the view from inside the box.

Over the phone, Tetsurou smiles, nodding his head.

“You gotta live a little more, Ken, “ he remembers himself telling the younger man. Given that he was a little past tipsy when he made that impromptu speech, there was never an intention to say it as something to be understood as more than just a passing comment.

“See the world,” he said.

Kenma booked a ticket that night, and three days later he finds himself looking at Paris in the rain, with not much of a plan in mind.

“Do more,” he remembers.

And Tetsurou thinks that this counts.

“You trying to prove something to someone?” he asks Kenma, voice suddenly honest.

Kenma sighs, closing his eyes and thinking of the little world he lives within the big wide universe. He’s never really felt small, but sometimes even Tokyo gets lonely.

“Something like that,” he answers.

“—let’s show them we are better.”

The funny thing about serendipity is that it looks nothing like how it’s supposed to look like.

All your life, when you thought of happy moments in regards to love it was always an image that you thought was set in stone from day one.

Instead, it looks like this:

Wet concrete, a cup of coffee, and the rooftop with the view of the city that’s done nothing but weep since the day you arrived. The rain smelled nice, at least. There was always something about the way it lingered that reminded you of home.

—Of silver, and hazel, and pastel colors, and a goodbye that was said like a hello.

You sigh because you just know Sugawara Koushi’s the kind of person that means to linger after the exit.

But like the nature of serendipity, it’s three minutes later where things take a turn.

It turns into looking like a stranger with golden stars for eyes, a question always looking like it’s wanting to break past the barrier.

He shuffles awkwardly in place, looking like a deer caught in the headlights when you turn your face to look at him. You squint, having half the mind to greet him with a broken bonjour before he’s eventually bowing his head profusely and explaining that he’s sorry with an accent familiar to you.

Classic Tokyo boy, you snort.

“Rain kinda ruined the skyline, huh?” you prompt, breaking the silence.

He shrugs. “Not really here to see the city.”

You blink, not exactly phased. You came here following Koushi, so you were practically in the same boat.

“To do more,” he answers. Vague, you think.

Maybe not the same boat. The same ocean, riding the same current maybe, but not the same boat.

“Do more,” you repeat. “So like, are you soul searching?”

“This is beginning to sound like a bad fanfiction,” he mutters, shaking his head, then sighing. “I guess I’m trying to look outside my comfort zone.”

“Ah,” you nod your head. “So kinda like soul searching, but not really; I get it.”

Beside you, he straightens his back. “You do?”

You shrug. “Everybody’s always seeking for something aren’t they?”

He exhales a sigh that sounds more like a laugh so you laugh along with him.

“Mandy,” you say, giving him your name.

“Kenma,” he says, giving you his in return. “So what’s your story?”

You sigh, thinking about it and realizing that you’ve been feeling a little more lost than found lately.

“You really wanna dive straight into that?”

Kenma thinks of what do more exactly means, and settles that maybe this could be count as something to find the meaning to that.

He shrugs. “I’ll dive in if you do,” he answers, and just like that, the man besides you turns from just a rooftop stranger into a stranger with a name who knew just a little bit more about you than the usual you would think is okay.

(Maybe it’s Paris, or maybe it’s just the way your world has kind of tilted, but as you sound out your tale it feels kind of okay.)

Track 3: Roses | “Get drunk on the good life, I'll take you to paradise.”

“You’re going where?” Koushi asks you, eyes wide.

“Italy.”

Serendipity looks like this too. Wide eyes, and an unconvinced tilt to the head. It sounds like Koushi pacing back and forth in a room, his suitcase packed and ready to go, as is yours, but the destination on your respective tickets going somewhere different.

“Shit,” he says. You pause; he never was the type to curse much. “Do you need me to go with you?”

“I’m going with someone actually,” you decline, voice quiet. Mentally, you curse yourself. Why is your voice even quiet? Looking at it from an objective point of view, you’re an adult. You’re in control of your own salary, and sometimes impulsive decisions are granted because in the long run they’re good for the soul.

“You’re going with a stranger,” he deadpans.

You open your mouth, but no words come out. He had a point.

“Are you okay?”

The words he says sound familiar, and a part of you sighs to itself because in a way you’ve missed the familiar. Paris wasn’t familiar, and neither was the idea of Koushi telling you the forever kind of goodbye. Truth is, he could romanticize the see you later parting all he wanted, but that was kind of it. See you later becomes a couple photos you’ll stare at on social media then scroll past, then eventually into just greeting during the holidays before it dwindles into silence.

Just a box of photos of you and him from the coastal side rural city of your hometown, kept in a box, stored in an attic.

“I’m okay.”

You’re not. Sugawara Koushi and the little world back home is all you’ve known, and even if Paris in the rain became just a city caught in a thunderstorm to you, this wasn’t height of what the rest of the world had to offer.

So you smile. “I just wanna do something a little different for a change. I’m okay, I promise. A change is good right?”

The smile he gives you has you feeling terrified.

“—we could be beautiful.” | Italy

And the truth is, a lot of things really could be just that.

Kenma reminds himself that there’s a lot more to Italy than just the deeper saturated colors in the sky, and wider bloom of the roses, but sometimes his eyes wander. Doing more, rings in his head—again and again kind of like as if it’s a broken record.

So “doing more,” begins with thoughts.

He looks at you. A stranger he met by coincidence at a rooftop of a weeping Paris two weeks ago and now he’s suddenly walking along the coast of Italy with you beside him. He knows your name, a little bit of your story, and the fact that you have EDM music plus a couple of sad boy hour songs in your playlist.

He watches you smile when you lean down to smell the flowers, then wonders why you seem to look happier against the pink roses instead of the classic red.

All it takes is for you to smile at him, once, starry eyed and looking like all you know is the sun, and his thoughts stop for just a second before it spirals.

It fucking spirals. How does it fucking spiral?

The first thought that rings true and crystal fucking clear to him is that he’s certain that he wants to know than more than what he already does.

Why do you look happier next to pink instead of red? Why did it look like you wept with Paris? Why are you in Italy with a stranger you barely even know?

“—hideaway.”

Truth is, you think that Italy’s just a hideaway. One extra week away from home, so that goodbye isn’t goodbye yet.

When you look at Kenma whose eyes look distant when he stares at the distance, you wonder if he’s keeping his eyes on the horizon or trying to look past it.

Maybe Italy’s a hideaway for him too.

“Say you’ll never let me go.”

You fall asleep each night trying to tell yourself that he belongs with the city that cries, while the pastel colors of home would always be there for yours to cherish.

You don’t know what exactly you want to let go of just yet.

Serendipity has you looking at the world like it exists for you to conquer it, and perhaps for some it does. For you, you think you just want something to call yours, and for someone to call you theirs.

Track 4: All We Know | “Maybe we should let this go.”

Kenma’s the first to tell you about letting go.

You have half the mind to ask him of what exactly there even is to let go of, but it’s this one night in Italy where Sicily pours all over again.

“I didn’t know Europe liked to cry,” you laugh, staring at the streets outside.

“Maybe it’s just crying for us,” he offers as a response. To be fair, his words did work as if it’s consolation, so you give him credit for at least that and laugh with him.

Kenma’s nice.

He’s a stranger, but he’s nice.

It’s in Italy where you learned that he liked computer screens over window panes, and the buzz of Tokyo over the silence in Miyagi. He’s young, but he’s settled. There’s a house he’s trying to call home, and a kotatsu that serves him well during the winters.

He was a setter for a team, and has a friend that nags even more than his own mother.

Kenma likes apple pie, and despite the initial impression, he’s pretty good when it comes to conversation. He blushes when you look at him in the eye and smile, but eventually he stopped trying to avoid your gaze whenever you did do that.

You can feel him looking at you again, so you tug on your coat and walk towards where the awning of your impromptu shelter ends, palms stretched out to catch the rain.

(You think of Paris.)

“Wanna make a run for it?” Kenma suggests, hands shrugged in his pocket, and eyes looking like two pools of the most beautiful gold in front of you.

(—then you don’t.)

“Kozume Kenma’s getting kinda bold now,” you snicker, walking closer towards him then to the edge as the rain falls harder.

He puffs his cheeks, turning away from you to face the side, and shrugs off his coat to hold it above his head and your own.

And it’s true, you think; there’s something about gold eyes against dark streets and the bokeh of city lights that just fit. You think to yourself that you know his name, and a little slice of his life, but you want to ask him more.

You’re in Sicily with a familiar stranger, and it’s in this fleeting, little, perfect moment where you think that Paris has always just been a city. Never a chapter in a romance book or the postcard that you dreamed of standing in.

Italy looks like rain and now, and gold, and familiar strangers.

You’re not in love, but maybe you should let some things go.

A car drives past, and the streets clear. There’s more than just a few puddles on the ground, but Kenma’s eyes look like a prettier shade of the moon when it turns gold. He’s chuckling, in the way you think only you’ve heard among all the people in the world, and he feels close.

“—we’ve passed the end so we chase forever.”

So close that he could kiss you.

Is this what doing more means?

Maybe, he thinks; there’s a lot of maybes that comes with serendipity. With a sharp breath, you look at each other, then break out into a run.

“—this is all we know.”

You’re drenched in the rain and you’re laughing. Kenma’s long past given up trying to squeeze out rainwater from his jacket and instead just leans against the wall to look at you.

He likes to think that he’s part of the reason as to why you’ve smiled so much today.

“You good?” he hears you ask, and he nods.

“All good.”

He means it.

Track 5: Right Here | “Can we just talk it out like friends?”

“Are you running away because of someone?” Kenma asks.

You let his question sit for a few moments to think it through. Are you?

You don’t know, so you sigh, then look at him. “What does love look like to you?”

Kenma shrugs, but doesn’t ask about your question. Instead, he looks forward, twiddles with the frayed string of his sweater and gives you his truth. “It looks like a lot of things.”

He takes your silence as a response, so he continues.

“I love grocery stores at midnight,” he shrugs. “No lines.”

You nod your head, accepting his answer; you suppose that love could be that too. “I love League of Legends,” you try. “Even if some players can get toxic.”

“We should game then,” he mutters.

“Bet.”

You snicker, looking to the side and pretending like you didn’t see the faint dust of red on his cheeks. If he asks, you’ll just say that it’s because of the red in the sky and leave it at that.

He doesn’t, but he does ask for more slices of you. “What else?”

“I love how sunsets look in my city,” you say. “Cosplaying. The stars. My immaculate playlist. Pink roses over red. Purple hair.”

He nods, happy with the fact that he’s piecing together little bits and pieces of you.

“You love someone too,” he says, but the lilt in his voice gives away that he’s asking rather than just stating it.

You think about what he says. When you thought of love it’s always looked like all the shades of silver and maybe a couple palettes with just pastel. It looked like the beige of Paris and the cotton candy skies from home.

Then in comes the rain, the world drenched, and past the rose colored lenses you finally begin to see the first hues of every other color.

Italy, with this vibrant, beautiful kaleidoscope, and Kenma, who stands in the center of it.

You see gold, gold, gold.

“You love someone,” he says, and when the world love registers in your ear you think about how much you loved getting caught in the downpour from last night.

“I do love someone,” you tell him, because a part of you would always call that love. It’s in Italy, next to a stranger, where you learn that love doesn’t always have to be this or that. In reality, it’s actually as simple as being this and that.

The waves off the coast, and the sunny city from the postcards drenched in front of your eyes. The calm before the storm, then the beauty of how the rain falls and wind howls right after. You come to love running from point A to point B in a downpour, with a stranger who held his jacket over you and him as an attempt to keep you dry.

Love can be Koushi, still, and always.

As you calling him later that night and telling him about the adventure that serendipity took you in. He tells you a little bit about Paris, and how he’s always going to be right there, when you need it.

You nod to yourself as he says those words, because you’re fine with the fact that even if he won’t, you can always tell yourself that you’re right here for you.

Track 6: Nobody Compares To You | “Nobody, nobody, nobody compares to you.”

To Kenma, you are what comes with both Paris and Italy and the serendipity found after trying to find a face to correlate with “doing more.”

You’re sitting beside him, on the window seat of a plane headed home, and he spends the duration of the flight above seas thinking that he doesn’t want to approach a goodbye.

At the end of the day, he realizes that he’s just a stranger. And maybe to you he’s just going to be a photograph in an old SD card you’d look at once every couple of years before forgetting about it in an attic, or losing in some corner of a house that would you see you for the rest of this lifetime.

He’s never looked at unpredictability in the face. His whole life he’s sneered at the sight of a break in routine, and what’s unfamiliar, because not everything is laid out for him to acclimate to.

He thinks to himself that maybe Italy would be enough, and the downpour of Europe are wild enough of a memory to catapult him into seeing a little more.

Because he saw so much.

“Do more,” he hears Tetsurou say.

Was booking the first flight out of the country without a plan enough?

Kenma shakes his head no. It was a step, but it wasn’t enough.

Telling himself that he’s always going to have Sicily isn’t enough. Leaning in close, almost kissing you once, and watching the hues of the world burst like fireworks and settle into paintings against the depths of your eyes just once isn’t enough. Knowing that you love to play league but not know who your favorite champions are don’t even come close to being enough either.

He wants this, and wants to know you.

He’s certain that Mandy is a name he’s always going to remember despite the age, but he wants to ask you so much more.

Kenma acknowledges the thought that he wants more photographs on his phone and nights where he’d have no choice but to run across the street in a downpour. The truth that he finds in Italy is that there’s nobody like you, because you are who comes with the colors that he never thought he’d discover outside of Tokyo.

Suddenly the routine he’s bound to come home to isn’t enough anymore.

You’re both skies above Japan, and he wants to look at you watch the sunset and talk about all the things you love again. Whether it be in Italy or Paris. Japan or the rest of the world. Under the shelter of sunlight or in the eye of the storm.

He wants to ask you why you love pink roses more than red.

This isn’t love—not just yet, but it could be.

Track 7: Something Just Like This | “How much you wanna risk?”

All you’ve known is silver, but perhaps gold works too.

Kenma stands beside you, luggage in hand, and the exit a few steps away. How much does he want to risk exactly?

Not a whole lot.

The routine that used to be enough was never a whole lot.

He shifts his weight back and forth between each foot as he wracks his brain with thoughts of what he could say.

On the other hand, you don’t want to say goodbye.

Something just like what you have now is nice. The company of a stranger you saw the world be doused in colors in with is nice. Parting then potentially forgetting isn’t nice.

You think to yourself that maybe all you’ll be to him is a face to match a name, and a stranger meant to remain in only photographs of this slice of his life.

As you close your eyes, the colors of pastel and silver flashes behind your eyelids, but they aren’t blinding. You know it’s not because of just Italy and that rooftop in Paris that gives an answer as to why you’re suddenly seeking gold.

How much do you wanna risk? What exactly is there to risk?

Kenma’s the first to break the silence. “Do we say goodbye here or are we going to do something dumb like book another ticket to another country?”

You bite back a laugh, peeking at him through the curtain of your bangs. He doesn’t look away this time, so you offer him a smile when he meets you halfway.

Now that you think about it, Kenma’s always sort of met you halfway.

(It’s nice.)

“I don’t think my bank account would appreciate me booking another ticket on impulse right now,” you laugh.

Kenma’s eyes glimmer, and you think, gold.

“So you’re saying you’d still go with me?” he asks.

“Not everybody is a CEO to their own company, so maybe next time,” you chuckle, amused at the way he seems to deflate ever so slightly at your words.

“Next time,” he mutters, nodding to himself. “We’ll see each other next time?”

You shrug. “I mean, I’d run in the rain with you again.”

He laughs, shoulders shaking a little, eyes crinkling along with his smile. “See you in the next time?”

The way you smile at him has Kenma thinking about the boundaries evident between saying that he wants to do more than actually doing more. So it’s when you’ve turned your back, a few meters already away from him where he exhales a sigh and calls out your name.

You turn around before he even finishes.

What you see is gold. Gold, gold, beautiful gold; as the center of the kaleidoscope of colors.

“If I kiss you the next time, would you kiss me back?”

Kenma’s still as he sounds out his words, the taste of it foreign in his tongue. But he welcomes it this time. You’re looking at him like he gave you the sun, and he holds his breath.

“Earlier in the trip, back in Paris you said you were looking for something,” you tell him first. “Did you find it?”

A pause, then a smile. “Answer my question first.”

You think about what you’d have to risk if you answer yes, but the only thing that comes to mind are colors you know you’re starting to grow out of, so you roll your eyes, laughing. “Then I’ll look forward to that next time.”

He exhales, shoulders feeling light. “Good to know because I think I found what I was looking for too.”

You prolong the see you later. “Was it yourself or something else?”

The answer comes to him naturally, and he grins. “A little bit of both, actually.”

#nc.commissions #haikyuu #haikyuu x reader #haikyuu scenarios #haikyuu imagines #kozume kenma #kozume kenma x reader #kozume kenma scenarios #kozume kenma imagines #kenma x reader #kenma #kenma scenarios #kenma imagines #kenma fluff #sugawara koushi x reader #sugawara koushi imagines #haikyuu fluff #hq!!#hq!! x reader

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the-iron-orchid · 3 years

Text

BOOK II: THE HIGH PRIESTESS

Chapter 1: The Seer (~2330 words)

Warnings: None

Back to table of contents

The landscape is desolate, a place of tawny sands and little else. The sky overhead is oppressive, thick with dark, lowering clouds. Where the two meet, the slim line of the horizon pulses with a viridian glow.

My arms hold fast to Asra’s waist, the scent of his hair in my nostrils. Beneath us, I feel the loping stride of a great beast, shaggy and immense. I realize that I must be dreaming... and in dreams, I have made contact.

“Mast -” I stop and swiftly correct myself. “Asra, where are we?” I ask him. It is only then that I notice the path of shining obsidian before us, snaking ahead to the horizon - clear, and yet ever-changing, its reflection of the sky above further confusing the perception.

Asra says that we are far enough away... but for what?

For answers, he says. For clarity. He senses a terrible storm on the horizon; something is changing, and not for the better.

I am instantly reminded of what the Countess said, her dream-visions of a terrible future, which must not come to pass.

Asra tells me that soon we will reach a crossroads, a nexus, a liminal place. He says that I will make a choice, one that changes everything for me... and for others. I feel his hands over mine, squeezing very briefly. But they are trembling, just a little, and he lets go hurriedly - as if the touch might burn him, or me, if held too long.

A chill wind rises around us, bearing the sands up with it in a vortex. It blots out first the landscape, then the horizon… then everything.

The last thing I hear is Asra’s voice: “Rest now, ya albi. I'll be back soon.”

---

I awaken to late morning sunlight slanting through the small windows - rather later than I wanted to sleep, but it seems that the previous night left me exhausted. I stumble into the kitchen, yawning, and rouse the stove salamander so that I might brew a pot of strong tea. He, too, needs to use his abilities regularly, lest they cause him trouble. If I am to be out, he should have a good round of exercise first.

Over my tea and a scone that has seen better days, I consider what I should bring with me to the Palace - a change of clothing, spell components, my current journal… I’m certain that they will be able to provide me with writing instruments...

It keeps my mind off of my strange dream, and its portents. For now.

Fortified with multiple cups of tea (the scone, not especially improved by toasting, was left out on the doorstep for the pigeons), I pack my things. The bag that Heron made for me is very special - it holds much, much more than it appears to. Then I set about readying the shop for my absence. I dust down the counters, and ensure that the stove salamander has a supply of coke to consume.

I go up to the rooftop to water my plants, such as they are. Heron has a lush rooftop garden that provides us both with herbs and vegetables year-round; I have a planter box full of pretty flowering weeds. But the basil is doing very well in its bucket, and the aloe in its large bowl. There is also a forgotten bean that started to sprout, now residing comfortably in an old mug with no handle. Hopefully I won’t be gone so long that they all wither in the midsummer sun… well, the aloe will survive, I am sure.

When I come back downstairs, I must turn away a few customers, hopeful for a reading. Everyone wants to know what the future holds.

If only I could ask the Arcana about the past, everything that came before the last three years. Three years of struggle and pain, of learning to be an adult human all over again, after whatever accident or illness took that part of me forever… for the most part. Once in a while, a dim memory will float by, like a distant iceberg on the sea of my mind. To try and grasp such memories is to invite pain and terror, and so I let them go.

But sometimes, there are things that I know or can do which I did not learn in the last three years with Asra and Heron. I must assume that these come from Before, written so far below the surface of my mind as to escape erasure. I dance fairly well, and I sing better than that. And while Asra and Heron are always cautious in how they teach me, I very often feel that the small, shallow pool of my magic bubbles up from something much deeper, an underground ocean in the caverns of my soul.

It is a place I cannot explore, not even with the seemingly unending patience and help of my teachers. When I have tried, it leaves me bedridden for days, my body unresponsive, my mind a maelstrom of vivid hallucinations. Giants, ghosts, talking animals… a deeper dimension to my relationship with Asra, which is almost certainly wishful thinking on my part.

They tell me that my power springs from something very fundamental and dangerous, the primordial Chaos that underlies creation. By the same token, Heron’s magic springs from the primordial force of Order, and Asra’s from a direct connection to the Magical Realms that lie beyond our own. Each of us is something different, and yet the same.

They both tell me that I’m making wonderful progress, that my power and ability will continue to grow; it simply is not a linear progression. Magic grows in fits and starts and flashes of understanding.

I hope they are right.

As the day wears on, I must be on my way to the Palace. I thoroughly lock up the shop, tracing the wards on the doors (not that this seemed to help against last night’s intruder). As I am doing this, a sudden prickle down the back of my neck causes me to start in alarm - a huge shape has materialized at my side, seemingly from nowhere.

Eldritch energy immediately crackles around my left hand, but I rein it in - they are doing nothing in particular besides looming, so large that they block my access to the side alleyway entirely. Two glinting eyes watch me from within the depths of a rough hood of furs, draped over a massive body that is crossed again and again with ropy scars.

I clear my throat. “Er, excuse me… I need to pass through there.”

For a moment, they simply continue to look at me. Then, they shift their weight, and start moving out of the way. There is a strange muffled clanking, as of chains.

“Thank you.” I nod curtly, settle my bag on my hip, and start walking past the large figure.

“He will return. Though uninvited.” The voice is deep, so deep it’s like the thunder of a waterfall. “He will offer you an escape when you need it most. Turn him down, or you will fall into his hand… just like the rest of us.”

I pause at this apparent prognostication. A teller of fortunes, I know a seer when I hear one.

“Take this, or my warning is for nothing.”

I turn back to the person, curious. The light just barely strikes two glimmers of green from within the hood. Pinched between the huge thumb and forefinger is a little leather pouch on a thin cord. Grudgingly, it seems, the figure holds it out to me. I reach a hand out, palm up, and they drop the item into it, as if unwilling to touch.

And without a further word, they turn and shuffle away. Oddly, no-one seems to take notice of the hooded figure, despite their immense size - normally, people would be gawking, pointing even.

How odd. I scrutinize the tiny bag in my palm with my magical sight. It radiates a faint aura of protective magics. I glance up again - but the figure is gone.

The pouch is well-sealed with complex warding knots, and the leather is inscribed with a sigil. Bringing it to my nose, I smell the warm, woody scent of myrrh resin.

Philosophically, I hang the little pouch around my neck. My magical sight shows nothing malicious in it… and I can use all the protection I can muster, I’m sure.

I step into the flow of traffic and noise as I cut my way through the bustling Market, but I hear little of it; I am lost in my own thoughts. Who is the he spoken of by the seer? Julian tried to give me some warning or other about Asra… but I’m not sure I credit that. He seems to have some personal vendetta. Julian himself, perhaps? What more warning could one need about a wanted criminal?

As I climb the steps that lead into the market plaza, a black shape catches my eye - it’s a large raven, perched on one of the lines of colorful lanterns that crisscross overhead. The bird looks back at me with one beady eye, blacker than my own, then croaks and turns its head. I, too, turn my head, following its gaze.

...and my heart stumbles and skips a beat as I spot Julian Devorak, walking through the crowd as if nothing at all is amiss, his face bare to the world... and unblemished. His temple shows no bruising, no hint of a wound where last night he bled.

He hasn’t seen me yet. Half of me wants to flee, but the other half is intensely curious as to how he can walk about so freely, a fugitive from the law. And how has he healed so quickly?

It is this second half that sends me after him.

Unfortunately, this means I must move against traffic, and I am not large. I also don’t want to form an obvious eddy in the crowd with my movements. Devorak is making his leisurely way along the market stalls, seemingly without a care in the world. Is he looking to get caught? Wanted posters litter the city, and between his height and that profile, it’s not like he is anonymous in any way. An eyepatch only distracts so much.

The raven gives a sudden shriek, and Devorak turns, our eyes locking for a frozen moment through the crowd.

And then a cart passes between us, causing me to step back involuntarily. When it is gone… so is he, vanished as if he had never been there at all.

I pause, traffic flowing around me, and wonder at my own actions. The man is a wanted criminal, maybe even a killer. Why on earth would I put myself in danger by following him around, no matter how curious I am? Shaking my head at myself, I rejoin the foot traffic, resuming my interrupted journey.

Maybe it was Julian that the giant of earlier was warning me about.

A voice cuts through my reverie, a voice I know. It’s Selasi, the baker, whose stall Asra and I often frequent - one of the small handful of merchants who seem unfazed by us. He asks if I’ve eaten, saying that there are spiced pumpkin loaves fresh out of the oven, almost cool enough to eat. He cajoles me to sit and talk with him in the meantime.

A pot of tea isn’t enough to fuel my day. My stomach rumbles to resentful life as the scent of the spiced bread reaches my nose.

“Well… I can’t stay long,” I tell him. “But I am starving!”

Selasi laughs and waves me to the back of the booth, where I seat myself up against the sun-warmed wall of the building behind. An enormous orange fluff of a cat appears from under a table, and rubs itself against my side. Absently, I scratch it between the ears.

The baker offers me a steaming cup of tea, asking after Asra.

“Oh, out on a journey again.”

“Of course! Where to this time?”

“I… don’t know, actually. He didn’t say.”

Selasi frowns slightly. “Really?”

“It seemed really important. Maybe it’s a secret.” I shrug, sipping my mint tea.

The baker folds his arms and shakes his head with a sigh. “Nothing new, I guess. Your Asra on a mysterious journey, that is. But what about you?”

I lift my brows. My Asra, indeed. “What about me?”

He grins widely. “They say that the Countess’s own carriage was spotted here in Center City, late in the night. You can’t miss it, not with all the escorts on horseback. Circling around not far from your shop, even.”

I do my best to cover over my surprise. Selasi loves gossip as much as he loves to bake, and maybe even more. It’s harmless, but I don’t know that the Countess wants her business all over the market.

“Really? I wonder what she was after?” My stomach chooses that moment to let out a long growl, and I laugh. “Me, I’m just after pumpkin bread. I’m a simple creature.”

Selasi laughs, throwing his head back. “Keep your secrets, then, just like your master.” He shakes his head and pulls a fresh loaf from the cooling racks. “One hot for now, and one cool for the road?” he asks, and I nod, giving the cat one last pat before rising and placing my empty cup aside.

Selasi wraps the loaves for me, and I hand over my coin. I place the cooled one into my endless bag before taking a big bite out of the warm loaf. The outer crust has a pleasing bite to it, the inside soft and fluffy, the spices fragrant. “Mmph! Delicioush azh alwayzh! ’ll zhee you lader!” I say around the mouthful of pumpkin bread, waving as I exit the booth.

“Don’t keep the Countess waiting!” he says, almost making me choke on my bite of bread.

I suppose it’s true what they say… the only thing that travels faster than magic is gossip.

#the arcana rewrite #arcana rewrite: tides of chaos #jinana aditya #chekhov's bean sprout lmao

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alwaysalreadyangry · 3 years

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most of the UK reviews i’ve read of martin eden have been a disappointment, tbh. i don’t know if this is because critics have been busy with cannes or because outlets here just don’t have the space, or because it’s kind of seen as old news. i have seen no real engagement with the politics or form beyond a couple of cursory lines, and it’s a shame because... i think it’s really rich wrt those elements?

so i am looking again at the (wonderful) review from film comment last year and it’s such a shame that it’s not available freely online. so i thought i’d post it here behind a cut. it’s long but worth it imo (and also engages really interestingly with marcello’s other films). it’s by phoebe chen.

COLLECTIVE CONSCIOUSNESS Jan 3, 2020 BY PHOEBE CHEN

EARLY IN JACK LONDON’S 1909 NOVEL MARTIN EDEN, there is a scattering of references to technical ephemera that the 20th century will promptly leave behind: “chromos and lithographs,” those early attempts at large-scale reproduction; “a vast camera obscura,” by then a centuries-old relic; a bullfight so fervid it’s like “gazing into a kinetoscope,” that proto-cinematic spectacle of cloistered motion. These objects now seem like archaic curios, not much more than the flotsam of culture from the moment it shifted gears to mass production. It’s a change in scale that also ensnares the novel’s title character, a hardy young sailor and autodidact-turned-writer-célèbre, famously an avatar of London’s own hollowing transmutation into a figure for mass consumption. But, lucky him—he remains eminent now on the other side of a century; chance still leaves a world of names and faces to gather dust. Easily the most arresting aspect of Pietro Marcello’s new adaptation is its spotlight on the peripheral: from start to end, London’s linear Künstlerroman is intercut with a dizzying range of archival footage, from a decaying nitrate strip of anarchist Errico Malatesta at a workers’ rally to home video–style super 16mm of kids jiving by an arcade game. In these ghostly interludes, Marcello reanimates the visual detritus of industrial production as a kind of archival unconscious.

This temporal remixing is central to Marcello’s work, mostly experimental documentaries that skew auto-ethnographic and use elusive, essayistic editing to constellate place and memory, but always with a clear eye to the present. Marcello’s first feature, Crossing the Line (2007), gathers footage of domestic migrant workers and the nocturnal trains that barrel them to jobs across the country, laying down a recurring fascination with infrastructure. By his second feature, The Mouth of the Wolf (2009), there is already the sense of an artist in riveting negotiation with the scope of his story and setting. Commissioned by a Jesuit foundation during Marcello’s yearlong residency in the port city of Genoa, the film ebbs between a city-symphonic array and a singular focus on the story of a trans sex worker and her formerly incarcerated lover, still together after 20-odd years and spells of separation. Their lives are bound up with a poetic figuration of the city’s making, from the mythic horizon of ancient travails, recalled in bluer-than-blue shots of the Ligurian Sea at dawn, to new-millennium enterprise in the docklands, filled with shipping crates and bulldozers busy with destruction.

Marcello brings a similar approach to Martin Eden, though its emphasis is inverted: it’s the individual narrative that telescopes a broader history of 20th-century Italy. In this pivotal move, Marcello and co-writer Maurizio Braucci shift London’s Oakland-set story to Naples, switching the cold expanse of the North Pacific for the Mediterranean and its well-traversed waters. The young century, too, is switched out for an indeterminate period with jumbled signifiers: initial clues point to a time just shy of World War II, though a television set in a working-class household soon suggests the late ’50s, and then a plastic helicopter figurine loosely yokes us to the ’70s. Even the score delights in anachronism, marked by a heavy synth bass that perforates the sacral reverb of a cappella and organ song, like a discotheque in a cathedral. And—why not?—’70s and ’80s Europop throwbacks lend archival sequences a further sense of epochal collapse. While Marcello worked with researcher Alessia Petitto for the film’s analog trove, much of its vintage stock is feigned by hand-tinting and distressing original 16mm footage. Sometimes a medium-change jolts with sudden incongruity, as in a cut to dockworkers filmed in black and white, their faces and hands painted in uncanny approximations of living complexions. Other transitions are so precisely matched to color and texture that they seem extensions of a dream.

Martin’s writer’s optimism is built on a faith in language as the site of communication and mutual recognition. So follows his tragedy.

Patchworked from the scraps of a long century, this composite view seems to bristle against a story of individual formation. It feels like a strange time for an artist’s coming-of-age tale adapted with such sincerity, especially when that central emphasis on becoming—and becoming a writer, no less—is upended by geopolitical and ecological hostility. At first, our young Martin strides on screen with all the endearing curiosity of an archetypal naïf, played by Luca Marinelli with a cannonballing force that still makes room for the gentler affects of embarrassment and first love. Like the novel, the film begins with a dockside rescue: early one morning, Martin saves a young aristocrat from a beating, for which he is rewarded with lunch at the family estate. On its storied grounds, Martin meets the stranger’s luminous sister, Elena Orsini (Jessica Cressy), a blonde-haloed and silk-bloused conduit for his twinned desires of knowledge and class transgression. In rooms of ornate stucco and gilded everything, the Orsinis parade their enthusiasm for education in a contrived show of open-mindedness, a familiar posture of well-meaning liberals who love to trumpet a certain model of education as global panacea. University-educated Elena can recite Baudelaire in French; Martin trips over simple conjugations in his mother tongue. “You need money to study,” he protests, after Elena prescribes him a back-to-school stint. “I’m sure that your family would not ignore such an important objective,” she insists (to an orphan, who first set sail at age 11).

Anyone who has ever been thrilled into critical pursuit by a single moment of understanding knows the first beat of this story. Bolting through book after book, Martin is fired by the ever-shifting measure of his knowledge. In these limitless stretches of facts to come, there’s the promised glow of sheer comprehension, the way it clarifies the world as it intoxicates: “All hidden things were laying their secrets bare. He was drunk with comprehension,” writes London. Marcello is just as attentive to how Martin understands, a process anchored to the past experiences of his working body. From his years of manual labor, he comes to knowledge in a distinctly embodied way, charming by being so literal. At lunch with the Orsinis, he offers a bread roll as a metaphor for education and gestures at the sauce on his plate as “poverty,” tearing off a piece of education and mopping up the remnants with relish. Later, in a letter to Elena, he recounts his adventures in literacy: “I note down new words, I turn them into my friends.” In these early moments, his expressions are as playful as they are trenchant, enlivened by newfound ways of articulating experience. His writer’s optimism is built on a faith in language as the site of communication and mutual recognition. So follows his tragedy.

One of Marcello’s major structural decisions admittedly makes for some final-act whiplash, when a cut elides the loaded years of Martin’s incremental success, stratospheric fame, and present fall into jaded torpor. By now, he is a bottle-blonde chain-smoker with his own palazzo and entourage, set to leave on a U.S. press tour even though he hasn’t written a thing in years. His ideas have been amplified to unprecedented reach by mass media, and his words circulate as abstract commodities for a vulturine audience. For all its emphasis on formation, Martin Eden is less a story of ebullient self-discovery than one of inhibiting self-consciousness. There is no real sense that Martin’s baseline character has changed, because it hasn’t. Even his now best-selling writing is the stuff of countless prior rejected manuscripts. From that first day at the Orsini estate, when his roughness sticks out to him as a fact, he learns about the gulf between a hardier self-image and the surface self that’s eyed by others.

WITH SUCH A DEEPLY INHABITED PERFORMANCE by Marinelli, it’s intuitive to read the film as a character study, but the lyrical interiority of London’s novel never feels like the point of Marcello’s adaptation. Archival clips—aged by time, or a colorist’s hand—often seem to illustrate episodes from Martin’s past, punctuating the visual specificity of individual memory: a tense encounter with his sister cuts to two children dancing with joyous frenzy; his failed grammar-school entrance exam finds its way to sepia-stained shots of a crippled, shoeless boy. These insertions are more affective echoes than literal ones, the store of a single life drawn from a pool of collective happening.

But, that catch: writing in the hopes of being read, as Martin does (as most do), means feeding some construct of a distinctive self. While the spotlight of celebrity singles out the destructive irony of Martin’s aggressive individualism, Marcello draws from Italy’s roiling history of anarchist and workerist movements to complicate the film’s political critique, taking an itinerant path through factions and waves from anarcho-communism in the early 1900s to the pro-strike years of autonomist Marxism in the late ’70s. In place of crystalline messaging is a structure that parallels Martin’s own desultory politics, traced in both film and novel through his commitment to liberal theorist Herbert Spencer. Early on, Martin has an epiphanic encounter with Spencer’s First Principles (a detail informed by London’s own discovery of the text as a teen), which lays out a systematic philosophy of natural laws, and offers evolution as a structuring principle for the universe—a “master-key,” London offers. Soon, Martin bellows diatribes shaped by Spencer’s more divisive, social Darwinist ideas of evolutionary justice, as though progress is only possible through cruel ambivalence. Late in the film, an image of a drunk and passed-out Martin cuts to yellowed footage of a young boy penciling his name—“Martin Eden”—over and over in an exercise book, a dream of becoming turned memory.

In Marcello’s previous feature, Lost and Beautiful (2015), memory is more explicitly staged as an attachment to landscape. Like Alice Rohrwacher’s Happy as Lazzaro, Lost and Beautiful plays as a pastoral elegy but lays out the bureaucratic inefficiency that hastens heritage loss through neglect. Rolling fields make occasional appearances in Martin Eden, but its Neapolitan surroundings evoke a different history. Far from the two oceans that inspired a North American tradition of maritime literature, the Mediterranean guards its own idiosyncrasies of promise and catastrophe. Of the Sea’s fraught function as a regional crossroads, Marcello has noted, in The Mouth of the Wolf, a braiding of fate and agency: “They are men who transmigrate,” the opening voiceover intones. “We don’t know their stories. We know they chose, found this place, not others.” Mare Nostrum—“Our Sea”—is the Roman epithet for the Mediterranean, a possessive projection that abides in current vernacular. Like so many cities that cup the sea, Naples is a site of immigrant crossing, a fact slyly addressed in Martin Eden with a fleeting long shot of black workers barreling hay in a field of slanted sun, and, at the end, a group of immigrants sitting on a beach at dusk. Brief, but enough to mark the changing conditions of a new century.

Not much is really new, however: not the perils of migration, nor the proselytizing individualists, nor the media circus, nor the classist distortions of taste, nor, blessedly, the kind of learning for learning’s sake that stokes and sustains an interest in the world. Toward the end of the film, there is a shot of our tired once-hero, slumped in the back seat of a car, that cuts to sepia stock of children laughing and running to reach the camera-as-car-window, as if peering through glass and time. It recalls a scene from Wim Wenders’s Wings of Desire, which leaps backward through a similar gaze, when the weary angel Cassiel looks out of a car window at the vista of ’80s Berlin and sees, instead, grainy footage of postwar streets strewn with rubble in fresh ruin. Where human perception is shackled to linearity, these wool-coated and scarfed seraphs—a materialization of Walter Benjamin’s “angel of history”—see all of time in a simultaneous sweep, as they wander Berlin with their palliative touch. Marcello’s Martin Eden mosaics a view less pointedly omniscient, but just as filled with a humanist commitment to the turning world, even as Martin slides into disillusion. All its faces plucked from history remind me of a line from a Pasolini poem: “Everything on that street / was human, and the people all clung / to it tightly.”

Phoebe Chen is a writer and graduate student living in New York.

#martin eden #film

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bearpillowmonster · 3 years

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FF6 Review (Overall)

I'm going to rate similar to the way I did FF7 Remake, but in only 2 parts, so there will be an overall review then a separate deep dive into the characters.

I played this game using an emulator and I'm not ashamed of it because I used the FF6 Relocalization project which I'll link

Basically nerd talk and explanation of what that means: It's basically a retranslation of the original SNES script using the GBA port as a base and mixing and matching some of the best parts so there you go. They have a way to mod the PC version to have the OG sprite work because sheesh is that thing ugly and they also have a way to resprite and resound the GBA version but this is the easiest and logical solution to get the best of all worlds. There's also "Anthology" which is the PS1 port that adds some CG custscenes which I just watched off of YouTube because it's only a few of the major scenes.

Anyways, yeah, I'm glad I emulated it especially because of the fast forward function. That first chunk would've been rough without it because you're left just waiting for one of your party's commands to be ready but it eases up as the game goes on because you get pretty busy with the combat.

I'm not a fan of turn-based RPGs which was the main reason I haven't touched a 2D FF game until now so this is my first and oh boy, what a first!

Could you just watch a playthrough or read the story then? I wouldn't recommend it. There are certain things that I feel are better experienced.

Gameplay actually wasn't all that gruesome, as I mentioned, it got better thoughout but I know for a fact that I didn't do everything it had to offer because I see other people doing it online and I just had no idea how. That's not to say it's not newcomer friendly though, I mean I beat the game, didn't I? I think it would've just gotten complicated and made me confused if I learned how to do everything in the game anyway.

I found myself liking some of the mechanics and recognizing some of the systems from games as late as today (I'm not sure if this is where they started but I wouldn't be surprised). The random encounters weren't all bad because of the emulator's speed up function but there were definitely times where it felt a little out of hand with the amount I was getting. (I'm looking at you Cave to the Sealed Gate!) So it's all pretty familiar, though there are "Relics" which are kind of like Materia but each member has 2 each where it gives you an ability, f.e. Reflect, every attack hits, extra power, auto cast protect, heal with every step, etc.

One of the drawbacks of using BSNES though was that there was no toggle for a L or R shoulder button, just turbo and while that's not a big problem, that is the button to Flee a battle, so I just never fled. There is an item that lets you escape any dungeon or battle but I didn't really use it, same with the permanent item that Mog has in the cave (pretty late in the game). I'd rather there be a repel than the warp stone, but I figured that if I just fought whenever the opp arrived then I wouldn't have to grind, which is another thing I hate about RPGs! Luckily, I didn't really feel the need to grind other than for the ending.

Difficulty wasn't really a grind but make sure once you get to the floating island, that you know what you're doing because that level was annoying and I felt a very stong spike in difficulty as soon as I landed on it. Another thing is that sometimes it'd glitch and an enemy would have infinite health so I'd just sit there on fast forward, watching and watching then finally use Libra and no damage was made, might be an emulator thing, might be a game thing and although rare, it still happened.

There are these sections called scenarios where the game branches off into multiple different paths and you can choose which order to follow the specific sets of characters. I really like that aspect and makes it seem less linear and interactive because it's letting you choose how to tell the story. I have a thing for games that let me interact with it (That opera scene is pretty interactive too).

For a 2D sprite game, it has quite a personality with its cutscenes. They can be very cinematic and defintely makes the characters just that more engaging with some of their mannerisms.

Ok, I get it now. The music is bomb. If anything, that would be worth doing a remake for, to get orchestral and updated versions of some of the themes. (I'd probably cry at that opera scene) But Celes' theme is probably my favorite. The PC port has pretty good remixes for the most part though.

Could this use a remake? It's a trivial matter because I think a good majority of fans want it to be remade and I understand why but at the same time I understand the other side of the argument as well. This was the last 2D FF game and that's special, in a way, the story kind of reflects that. And I think with all the personality comes a bit of caution because you might see something in these characters or scenes that may be misinterpreted or done differently in a remake, similar to how you read a book and just imagine how it's playing out. I think it lays enough ground so that you don't "have to interpret" like with most NES games (how the Super Mario Movie was born) from an outsider's point of view, it may first seem that way though. (myself included (yes, I know this was SNES era. Shut up!))

What would I want out of a remake? I would want the airship to return and be able to move around freely but keep the towns pretty faithful (which makes for more linear opportunities). I could see Edgar's tools being used similar to Barrett's but we have "First Soldier" now which is a 3PS Battle Royale, why not have his tools play similar to that? Then actually give him story opportunities to pick up his tools rather than "just because you bought them" It would be a nice natural progression. I would suggest the same with Sabin and Cyan, have them learn their Blitz and Bushido moves by being taught by Duncan, you do learn one move from Duncan in the vanilla game but I'd see it as more opportunity to build your characters and make it feel rewarded. So, in those aspects, I would like to see FF6 remade or improved but as for everything else, they should keep it a lot similar to the original than FF7R did. I think that's where a lot of the criticism with FF7R came from (as well as what I mentioned in the previous paragraph) While I'd prefer a gameplay overhaul similar to what they did with R, I'd rather keep the essence. There aren't sequels or spinoffs or anything of this game so this is all it has (unless you count the ports but that's minimal).

In the CHARACTERS section, I compliment the side-quest system but I would like there to be a better indication as to "what" you're doing, rather than just looking up the next steps or be left to travel around until the goal is clear. They have the quest completion menu as well as waypoints in FF7R, I could see that being put to good use in a game like this. It would also be cool to actually "visibly" wear the gear that you equip to your character but I understand why that isn't utilized in most of the games (probably makes for better character models) especially considering most of these characters' costumes could use an update. You didn't get to use the Magitek suits nearly as much as I thought you would from the marketing and even the dang cover and logo, so a remake could improve on that as well. Another small complaint is that it doesn't tell you what the items do WHILE you're in battle, only when you're in the menu, sorting them and while some are staples like Phoenix Down, I still don't remember what the heck a 'Gold Needle' does.

Overall I'd probably rate the FF games that I've played (but maybe not finished all of) as such: FF7 > FF13 > FF6 > CRISIS CORE > FF15 > FF12 but I think 6 and 13 are kind of interchangeable because if you said one over the other, I wouldn't really argue.

#ff6 #final fantasy #review #ffvi #final fantasy 6 #final fantasy vi #game review #game #it's also considered ff3 but nah

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