#wee!stallen

[actuma]

Provincie wees onterecht verzoek af tot intrekking vergunning voor uitbreiding varkenshouderij in Esbeek

De provincie Noord-Brabant wees onterecht een verzoek af van een milieuvereniging om de natuurvergunning deels in te trekken. Dat bepaalde de rechtbank Oost-Brabant vandaag. De provincie moet het verzoek nu opnieuw beoordelen en moet daarbij rekening houden met aanwijzingen van de rechtbank. De provincie verleende in 2016 een natuurvergunning aan de varkenshouderij voor het bedrijf met twee stallen en een uitbreiding voor een derde stal. De derde stal zou plaats moeten bieden aan nog eens 6.100 vleesvarkens (inmiddels stelde de varkenshouderij voor dat aantal te verlagen naar 2.990 varkens) maar is nog niet gebouwd. Een milieuvereniging deed een verzoek om de natuurvergunning voor de derde stal in te trekken, maar dit wees de provincie definitief af in december 2021. De vereniging stapte daarop naar de rechter.  Standpunten Volgens de milieuvereniging verkeren meerdere natuurgebieden in de omgeving van het bedrijf in de problemen, met name het al overbelaste Natura 2000-gebied Kempenland West. Er worden volgens de vereniging onvoldoende passende maatregelen genomen om de verdere verslechtering van deze natuurgebieden tegen te gaan. Daarom verzoekt de milieuvereniging de natuurvergunning voor de derde stal in te trekken, zodat het niet nog slechter wordt. De provincie meent dat het niet nodig is de vergunning voor de derde stal in te trekken omdat er voldoende andere passende maatregelen worden getroffen. Alleen al de verscherpte provinciale stalmaatregelen (strengere eisen die in de provinciale verordening worden gesteld aan stalsystemen) zouden genoeg zijn om de stikstofuitstoot met meer dan de helft te verlagen. Ook wijst de provincie naar de Brabantse Ontwikkelaanpak Stikstof, het landelijke maatregelenpakket ter uitvoering van de Wet stikstofreductie en natuurverbetering en naar de vrijwillige opkoop van 7 piekbelasters (bedrijven met een hoge stikstofuitstoot) in Noord-Brabant. Oordeel De rechtbank vindt dat de provincie onvoldoende duidelijkheid heeft gegeven bij het afwijzen van het intrekkingsverzoek. Zo is er geen aanwijzing of en zo ja, wanneer de landelijke maatregelen worden getroffen en wanneer die maatregelen effect gaan hebben. Verder is het de rechtbank niet duidelijk wat de uitkoop van 7 piekbelasters oplevert voor Kempenland West. De rechtbank heeft daarnaast op meerdere punten twijfels over het provinciale maatregelenpakket mede vanwege eerdere uitspraken over de effectiviteit van innovatieve stallen. Daarom mag de provincie het intrekkingsverzoek niet afwijzen met een verwijzing naar de maatregelpakketten en moet de provincie opnieuw en beter gemotiveerd beslissen op het intrekkingsverzoek. De rechtbank beseft dat dit een hard gelag is voor de varkenshouderij die al jarenlang bezig is met haar plannen. Daar mag de provincie echter geen rekening mee houden volgens de wetgeving. Als de provincie niet inzichtelijk maakt welke andere concrete landelijke of provinciale maatregelen worden genomen om de dreigende achteruitgang van natuurwaarden in Kempenland West te voorkomen, is de gedeeltelijke intrekking van de natuurvergunning van de varkenshouderij de enige passende maatregel. Bron: rechtspraak Read the full article

[pinkletterday]

Your Vigil In My Keeping

Pairing: (pre) Barry Allen/ Iris West

Rating: All audiences

Read on AO3

Summary: No one believes Barry about The Man In The Yellow Suit, which is why it's down to him to protect his new home. But his best friend always has his back.

...

Iris didn't know what had woken her up at first, except that once she had, she was quite sure she wasn't alone in her room. This failed to freak her out. Barry was becoming notorious in the West house for his night-time wanderings.

She sat up to look around for him and almost missed him except for the sliver of light through her half-open door falling on a lump huddled on the floor beside her bed.

"Barry? What're you doing?"

"Nothing," said the lump. "Couldn't sleep. I'm okay."

"You're on the floor, Barr."

"It's fine. I like it here."

"You like it...on the floor?" she said dubiously.

The lump gave what might have been a shrug. "Yeah."

Iris suppressed the urge to roll her eyes. It was at times like these she was reminded that her best friend was a boy and therefore prone to deep weirdness.

She gathered up her own pink Kim Possible blanket and slid to the floor beside him. "Move over."

"What are you doing?," Barry's tousled head came into view as he hurriedly scootched backward, dislodging his own blanket.

"Seeing how much I like the floor," she huddled closer to him, wincing at the roughness of the carpet through her socks. "Hmm. Feels kinda cold."

Barry bumped her shoulder with a sigh. "Go back to sleep, Iris."

He seemed to have built himself a nest here. His Dexter's Laboratory backpack leaned against her bedpost, stuffed full of assorted snacks, a flashlight and Prisoner of Azkaban, among others. "Barry, what are you doing really?"

She knew his ears were going red because he was running his hands along the back of them, which meant he was embarrassed. She couldn't make out his mumbling though.

"Huh?"

"I'm scared the Man in The Yellow Suit will come back," he said, worrying at a corner of his PJs. "I don't want him to get you too."

It wasn't that this hadn't occurred to Iris. The Man In The Yellow Suit (which was how she and Barry both thought of him, all the words capitalized) now featured prominently in her own nightmares. It would have been hard not to, the way Barry still shook with fear when he spoke about him. Unlike her Dad, Iris knew Barry wasn't lying.

But even when her Dad was being an unreasonable grown-up, she still had every faith in him to do his Dad-duty. "Dad will protect us. He has a gun and can arrest people." It's why all the bad guys were scared of him.

"Joe doesn't even believe he exists," he clasped his hands together, running them over his face in frustration. "You don't understand. He can go through walls."

Iris had no answer to that. The small knot of fear in her own chest grew a little bigger. "What'll we do if he comes?" she whispered.

"I don't know. But I've come up with some ideas for booby traps."

He launched animatedly into an elaborate plan involving a tripwire, spray paint, a joy buzzer, the robot from his science fair project "Destructo", and her Dad's old police siren he had found in their attic and repurposed.

"…so while he's blind and on fire and the smoke alarms are going off and Destructo trips the circuit breaker...maybe I can...warn your Dad or something," he finished. Then subsided awkwardly, realizing that this conclusion somewhat lacked the expected panache.

There were some glaring holes in this plan. Her best friend was the smartest person she knew, he just didn't quite think obvious things through sometimes.

This wasn't the time to bring any of that up though.

(Except maybe she would give her Dad a head's up about the spray paint and Destructo, just in case. The school lab had yet to recover from that one.)

"Okay," she allowed. "But you cant stay awake and guard my room every night, Barry," a thought struck her "- how long have you been doing this?"

He rubbed the back of his neck again, looking shifty. "Uh."

Suddenly, all the mornings he had looked like half a zombie made sense. It had worried her Dad so much he had spoken to his psychiatrist again.

She came to a decision and started tugging all her own pillows down onto the floor.

"What are you doing?"

"You need to sleep," she said firmly, pushing him gently out of the way to make a larger, more comfortable nest.

"I can't. I told you -"

"So we can take turns, silly. Look," like she said, common sense sometimes eluded that brilliant brain, "you wont make a very good guard if you're falling asleep halfway. This way we can both keep watch and get some rest."

Barry hesitated, but he couldn't fault her logic. He gave her the flashlight and did not resist when she tugged his head down onto the pillow near her knee, settling down with a small sound of tired relief. She settled his blanket over him, dug out the apple and started reading Harry Potter by flashlight.

She had just begun reading about Harry doing the same when Barry whispered, "Iris. You do believe me dont you? You dont think Im crazy?"

She blinked down at him. What kind of question was that? "Of course I believe you. You're my best friend. You wouldn't lie to me and you're not crazy. Dad'll figure it out soon enough." Of course he would. He was only stubborn and tended to dig his heels in if you pushed him. Kinda like Barry, actually.

"Okay."

"You get some sleep now," she ran a hand through his hair, always so soft and fluffy like a puppy's. "I'll wake you up when its your turn."

Another moment of silence.

"Iris?"

"Yeah, Barry?"

"I don't really know what to do if the Man in Yellow comes back," he whispered fearfully. "What if your Dad cant stop him?"

Iris tamped down on the fear that was making her own heart beat hard. "If he comes, we'll be ready for him."

His clammy fingers closed around her wrist. "You won't let him get you, will you?"

"Of course I won't. I'm tough. Dad says so."

"Yeah you are," the proud smile in his voice warmed her better than a mug of hot chocolate. "The toughest."

"And don't you forget it!," they both snickered. She found his hand and squeezed it. "I won't let him get you either. I promise."

"Promise on what?"

It was good that they had their own version of this, because this was assuredly not a situation where "cross my heart and hope to die" would be appropriate at all. "On all the brownies I'll ever eat!," she said grandly, then came the serious part. "And my Mom's rings."

"Okay. I promise on...all the cookie dough ice cream in Happy Harbour. With extra sprinkles," he swallowed, voice trembling a little. "And my Dad."

The protective anger that coursed through her was stronger than all her night terrors. She laid her head on his and wrapped her arms and legs around his torso, tight enough to hurt a little. But he gripped her just as fast.

"We'll keep each other safe, Barry. You'll see."

#myfic #westallen #wee!stallen #barry allen x iris west #kid fic #the flash #trauma

[wijngaardbarendrecht]

Manna voor vandaag.

Wees vurig van geest.

Door de omstandigheden zitten we al meer dan een jaar veel thuis.

Minder contacten, minder beweging, minder uitgaan en vakanties.

We hebben allemaal geprobeerd hier onze weg in te vinden.

Maar...het was niet altijd gemakkelijk.

En misschien soms nog niet.

Zo bemerkte ik bij mezelf op een moment een soort gelatenheid.

Gestaag je rondje afwerken, binnen de mogelijkheden bewegen, in een ritme blijven.

Dan kom ik deze tijd wel door.

Maar hé...deze dag en dit jaar zijn ook door God gemaakt! Een dag om iets moois te doen, of een wonder te beleven. Een jaar om plannen te maken.

We zitten niet in de wachtkamer, of op een ziekbed, te wachten op akkoord om wat te gaan ondernemen.

God is ook Heer en koning in deze pandemie van 2021. En wij zijn Zijn erfgenaam.

Heeft u op koningsdag de erfgenamen van

onze koning gezien? Geen muurbloempjes hè?

Naar de troonopvolgster en de andere prinsessen ging aandacht uit.

Veel aandacht!

Ze worden uitgebreid bekeken en

aangesproken. Er is veel voor hen uit de kast gehaald. Hun tuin en stallen werden gevuld met een concert.

Naast de koning vertegenwoordigen de prinsessen zo ons koningshuis.

Waren die meisjes daar verbaasd over?

Nee, ze weten dit en rekenen op aandacht,

ze bereiden zich erop voor. Ze kleden zich ervoor, bespreken wat wel en niet gezegd wordt. Ze kunnen niet zomaar alles zeggen en doen.

Net zomin als wij dat nu kunnen door de beperkingen. Maar dan nog zijn er mogelijkheden te staan voor het koninkrijk.

De prinsessen zijn echt niet stomverbaasd als er een rode loper ligt waar ze overheen moeten lopen, of als ze bloemen krijgen.

Het hoort bij hun positie.

Hoe staat het met onze positie?

Waar staan wij als erfgenamen?

Zijn we aktief bezig met ons land, onze positie en onze Koning?

Verwachten wij nog dat onze positie ons iets brengt, gewoon omdat we erfgenamen zijn?

Of komen we liever niet in beeld?

Zijn we stil en wachten we tot de koning ons roept.

In Romeinen 12:11 staat het volgende:

Wees niet traag wat uw inzet betreft.

Wees vurig van geest. Dien de Heere.

Dat was deze week in mijn gedachten.

Ben ik nog vurig of geloof ik het wel.

Er is genade, ik ben gered en God werkt wel.

🤔🤔 Is dat het dan?

Of mag ik de wereld winnen, door mij te tonen, zoals de prinsessen naar buiten traden met hun vader, de Koning?

Wees vurig staat er.

Zullen we bidden en naar buiten komen,

ons inzetten met en voor onze Koning

en Zijn Koninkrijk?

Beperkingen of niet, over de prinsessen wordt al dagen gesproken. Instagram staat vol over hen.

Zij hebben hun ruimte genomen, dat kunnen wij ook!

Een koninklijke groet van

Esther Schijve

[bakkermotorszaandam]

De buitenslaper

Niet iedereen heeft de luxe of mogelijkheid om zijn geliefde motorfiets binnen te kunnen stallen. Deze buitenslapers staan dus dag en nacht in weer en wind buiten. Hoewel de ene motor daar beter tegen kan dan een ander merk of model, hebben deze motoren wel wat meer aandacht nodig.

Het is altijd verstandig om een goede motorhoes over de motor te trekken. Wij voeren de merken DS Cover en Verheul. Kwalitatief de beste hoezen, duurzaam, en je kunt ze ook over een warme motor gooien. Drie elementen die slecht voor je motor(-lak) zijn worden zo tegengehouden: zon, regen en vuil (vogelpoep!).

Een motorhoes heeft ook een nadeel en dat is dat deze altijd door de wind op dezelfde plek beweegt en dus schuurt. Zorg ervoor dat je een goed passende motorhoes hebt die strak om je motor zit waardoor deze weinig bewegingsruimte heeft om te gaan klapperen in de wind. Je zou op de contactplekken beschermfolie kunnen plakken zodat de lak niet weg geschuurd wordt.

Een ander belangrijk ding is roest. Misschien wel de grootste vijand van iedere motorrijder die zijn stalen trots graag mooi wil houden. De beste bescherming is vet. Uiteraard zijn er ook andere middelen verkrijgbaar die langdurig het metaal beschermen tegen roest. 

Om roestvorming tegen te gaan zijn er verschillende producten op de markt. Van Tectiel-achtige wax, speciale corrosie protectie spray, of specialistisch vet. De meeste producten werken goed maar let wel op of je ze op alle plekken kunt gebruiken. Kan het tegen hitte, wees voorzichtig bij de keerringen, is het gemakkelijk te verwijderen of moet het regelmatig aangebracht worden? Een makkelijk basis product is MUC-OFF Motor protectant spray. Daarnaast is het belangrijk om bij het zien van een roestplek direct actie te ondernemen. Verwijder de roest en voorzie van een juist laagje anti-corrosie. Als je het aandurft haal je de roestige bout/moer eruit, poets het weer mooi roestvrij, smeer de schroefdraad in met vet en plaats weer terug.

Heb je een chopper die rijkelijk is voorzien van chromen onderdelen dan ontkom je er niet aan om toch regelmatig de motor goed te poetsen en alle chromen onderdelen te laten glimmen. Wij verkopen Chroompoets van Belgom, al decennia lang hét product voor deze klus. Op motoren met minder chroom moet je ook poetsen alleen ben je sneller klaar. Goed punt om aandacht aan te geven zijn de voorvork poten, hier ontstaat redelijk snel roestvorming en dit kan snel lijden tot lekkage in de keerringen.

Je motor bijhouden scheelt je veel geld (reparaties) en voor een nette motor krijg je een betere inruilprijs.

In onze showroom hebben we vele motoren die al mooi gepoetst zijn! Daarnaast verkopen we diverse producten om je motor de wassen, poetsen en beschermen.

Bakker Motors Zaandam

www.bakkermotors.nl

#motorbike #motorcycle #motor #roest #motoronderhoud #onderhoud #bakkermotorszaandam #bakkermotors #zaandam #Muc-Off

[ao3feed-westallen]

The Way We Were

read it on the AO3 at https://ift.tt/2JPohVm

by PinkLetterDay

Memories may be beautiful and yet What’s too painful to remember We simply choose to forget So it’s the laughter we will remember Whenever we remember the way we were

Words: 1140, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English

Fandoms: The Flash (TV 2014)

Rating: General Audiences

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories: F/M

Relationships: Barry Allen/Iris West

Additional Tags: Wee!stallens, Fluff and Angst

read it on the AO3 at https://ift.tt/2JPohVm

#IFTTT #ao3feed #fanfic #WestAllen #westallen

[waarwaspaulien]

In Loosdrecht staat het jongste kasteeltje van Nederland, kasteel Sypesteyn. Het is begin vorige eeuw gebouwd door jonkheer Henri van Sypesteyn. Deze meneer wilde niet alleen een mooi kasteeltje om zijn verzamelingen in uit te stallen, hij wilde ook een mooie tuin. Hij kocht daarom 6 ha grond in Loosdrecht en begon met het aanleggen van de tuin. In de fraai aangelegde tuin zijn daarom ook hele oude bomen te vinden, nog geplant door de jonkheer zelf. In deze tuin en bijbehorende weilanden was ik donderdagavond voor een tuintalk, die in het kader van het festival Groen in Gooi en Vecht was georganiseerd.

In meerdere tuinen in het Gooi zijn deze zomer de zogenaamde tuintalks. Ze zijn meestal gratis toegankelijk en enthousiaste sprekers leiden je door de tuin en vertellen van alles over die tuin. Op zo’n mooie avond was dat natuurlijk een feestje. Dus na mijn werk fietste ik vanuit Utrecht door Oud-Zuilen, Maarseveen en Breukelerveen naar Nieuw-Loosdrecht. Ik passeerde onderweg de Vecht en de molens bij Oud-Zuilen en at een hapje op de Strook in Breukeleveen. Het waaide hard, dus het water was leeg.

Molens bij Oud-Zuilen

Molens bij Oud-Zuilen

Om 19.30 uur was ik bij het kasteel. Een aantal jaar geleden was ik al eens bij een rondleiding door het kasteel. De ontstaansgeschiedenis en bouw van het kasteel zijn een bezoek meer dan waard. Verder herinner ik me de prachtige verzameling Loosdrechts porselein, maar ook de andere verzamelingen van de jonkheer die te bezichtigen zijn. Daarnaast is de tuin ook het bekijken waard. Tijdens de tuintalk en -walk liepen we eigenlijk vooral door de weilanden achter de tuin en bekeken de Drecht waar vroeger het afvalwater in werd geloosd, loos + Drecht werd dus Loosdrecht.

De enthousiaste hovenier van Sypesteyn liet ons de enorme dassenburcht zien en wees ons ook op de unieke elzenbroekbossen in het gebied. Deze verzameling bomen op een natte plek, zoals het veengebied, herbergen diverse soorten planten. Al wandelend door een weiland met hele lieve IJslandse pony’s, slootjes overstekend en dwars door een maïsveld, kwamen we bij de Drecht. Bijzonder, want op deze plek kom je niet zomaar.

Daarna liepen we weer terug naar de tuin en kregen nog een kleine rondleiding langs een paar hoogtepunten in de tuin, zoals de fraaie siertuin en een hele, oude, enorm hoge boom waarvan ik de naam vergeten ben. Het was een leuke en leerzame avond. Op de website van Groen in Gooi en Vecht zie je een overzicht van de tuintalks die de komende tijd nog zullen plaatsvinden op de verschillende locaties. Een aanrader!

Tuintalks bij Kasteel Sypesteyn In Loosdrecht staat het jongste kasteeltje van Nederland, kasteel Sypesteyn. Het is begin vorige eeuw gebouwd door jonkheer Henri van Sypesteyn.

[dedebattenbe-blog]

Situering (debat Waar of niet? Presidenten mogen alles zeggen, deBuren - VUB/De Debatten 29 maart 2017) - Nefertari Van den Bulcke

Er waait een noordenwind door Europa. Als u haar niet hoort gieren, dan voelt u haar zeker schuren. Het betreft een snijdend koude valwind, die de atmosfeer doorklieft, en daarbij nietsontziend alles op haar pad eerst neer doet buigen, en vervolgens ter plekke doet verstenen; want in haar kielzog sleept zij de vrieskou mee, die zich met een lichte siddering in onze harten nestelt; en alzo verwerd het mensenhart van een eertijds warm orgaan tot een kille, koele kerker. Het slot zit erop, en wie heeft weet van een sleutel? De akkers liggen er bevroren bij, en wie durft de dooi te voorspellen?

De vermaarde Duitse filosoof Peter Sloterdijk stelt onomwonden de volgende vraag: waar zijn we wanneer we in de wereld zijn? Hij schreef vervolgens een turf van 1635 pagina’s in een poging hier een antwoord op te formuleren. Zijn vraagstelling blijft echter geldig: waar zijn we, te midden van deze krakend nieuwe ijstijd, een tijd van grootse tegenstellingen en diepe aardverschuivingen, een tijd van vermoeidheid ondanks de vermeende tijdswinst, een tijd van eenzaamheid ondanks nabijheid, een tijd van leegte ondanks de opvulling, een tijd van kunnen -‘yes, we can’- ondanks het falen, een tijd van altijd meer en altijd fijn, duim omhoog! Is dit dan waar we zijn? Een pornografische tijd, zo zou men kunnen stellen. Eén waarin onthulling het haalt van verhulling, waarin het obscene spektakel van het naakt -het naakte lichaam, de naakte informatie- het dialectische, spannende spel van de erotiek voorgoed verdelgt, een tijd waarin de ruileconomie ons de gave om te geven ontleert: zijn wij nog bereid om dat ene risico te nemen, het risico van de on-voorwaardelijkheid, het risico van een asymmetrisch verlies – een verwonding, wie weet? ; durven wij onszelf nog überhaupt te verliezen in de Ander, in hem te sterven -een ware liefdesdood- uit liefde voor de immer enigmatisch Andere in al zijn vreemdheid en anders-zijn, zijn wij bereid uit onszelf te treden, en de knusse binnenruimte te verruilen voor een onvoorspelbare en beangstigende buitenruimte? Het is een tijd ook waarin wij de wereld enkel nog in schakeringen van onszelf aanschouwen, fifty shades of myself, om tenslotte te verdrinken in het koude bad van ons vloeibare en grenzeloos uitdijende zelfbeeld. Wij zijn voortaan ons eigen project en wij stallen onszelf uit in tweets, facebookposts en snapchats allerhande. De virtuele afvalberg is on-recycleerbaar. Ze is bovendien geurloos, en daarom stinkt ze.

Het is een tijd ook, waarin wij ons in vrijheid wanen, een vrijheid waar we ons trots op laten voorstaan -‘wij zijn immers geen slaven’- maar waarbij we steeds weer op onszelf worden teruggeworpen. Horen wij thans de echo’s van onze individuele vrijheden weerklinken in de koele kerkers van ons koude hart? Zit er dan tocht op het moderne vrijheidsgebod – wees vrij, wees blij? Bevriezen wij in de brandende hel van het gelijke? Wat hebben we gewonnen en wat hebben we verloren?

Victor Hugo schreef in 1856 een gedicht met de welluidende titel ‘Il fait froid’: het is koud. Hugo heeft weet van de winter, maar hij durft zonder schroom de dooi te voorspellen en hij doet dat als volgt:

 La haine, c’est l'hiver du coeur.

Plains-les! mais garde ton courage.

Garde ton sourire vainqueur;

Bel arc-en-ciel, sors de l’orage!

Garde ton amour éternel.

 Er is al langer sprake van onttovering. Een verlies van bezielende kracht. En terwijl de aarde onder onze voeten opwarmt, blaast de noordenwind koude ijslucht door de kieren van ons hart. De koude samenleving is toe aan een warm bad. Welja, een warm de-bat.

 In het debat dat wij deze avond gaan voeren, willen we pogen een greep te krijgen op wat we verstaan onder vrijheid, zo die al te grijpen of be-grijpen valt, en wel meer bepaald wat we verstaan onder vrijheid van meningsuiting. Indien u een wakkere burger bent, van ogen, oren en poten voorzien, dan hebt u zeker gemerkt dat het onderwerp van ons debat brandend actueel is, de nieuwsberichten staan bol van de polemieken rond de vrijheidskwestie. Maar meer dan brandend actueel, is het debat vooral ook eeuwenoud. Wat betekent het juist om vrij te zijn? We kunnen deze vraag niet inzichtelijk maken, als we ze niet koppelen aan een tweede vraag: wat betekent het om samen te leven? De bindende kracht van de solidariteit wordt vandaag misschien onderschat. Sloterdijk stelt dat ‘de dwingende reden om samen te zijn nog steeds op een adequate uitleg wacht.’ Is de wereld ons te groot geworden? Kunnen we het allemaal niet meer behappen? Is er sprake van een overdosis? Is de elastiek doorgeschoten, de spier verrekt, de schouder ontwricht? Is er nood aan paal en perk? En hoe stellen we dat in het werk?

Zo meteen valt ons de eer te beurt te luisteren naar vier begenadigde sprekers, die hun licht zullen laten schijnen op de kwestie van de vrije meningsuiting, en ons aanbevelingen zullen verstrekken voor de opbouw van een warme samenleving. Wij zullen naar hen luisteren, en hun woorden zullen niet hol klinken, maar tot inspiratie dienen, letterlijk: inblazing, zij zullen ons de ademtocht inblazen, bezielen en begeesteren, en deze ademtocht is altijd warm, voelt u haar warmte al? Ziedaar, de warme samenleving begint hier.

 Over de auteur

Nefertari Vanden Bulcke studeerde Romaanse taal- en letterkunde aan de Vrije Universiteit Brussel en Université Paris Diderot. Zij doceert Frans aan het Academisch Centrum voor Taalonderwijs van de Vrije Universiteit Brussel. Zij schreef deze tekst naar aanleiding van het debat Waar of niet: Presidenten mogen alles zeggen bij het Vlaams-Nederlands huis deBuren op 29 maart 2017.

[karlijn-cornelissen-blog]

Blog 2

Hallo allemaal, Allereerst wil ik jullie bedanken voor alle super lieve en leuke reacties die ik heb gekregen op mijn blog. Goede motivatie om nog meer te schrijven. 😉 Wat gaat de tijd snel! Stageweek 3 en 4 zitten er ook al weer op. Ik heb deze twee weken door mogen brengen op de Espoo International School. Vorige week zijn de kinderen vooral bezig geweest met het afronden van de projecten zoals ik in mijn vorige blog beschreef. Het was ongelooflijk hoe zelfstandig deze kinderen zijn en wat een groot verantwoordelijkheidsgevoel ze hebben voor hun eigen werk. Regelmatig bleven de kinderen vrijwillig binnen tijdens de pauze of bleven ze langer werken na schooltijd. Het resultaat mocht er dan ook zijn! En al het harde werken van de kinderen werd beloond met een inloopochtend voor de ouders. Al vroeg stonden de kinderen voor de deur te springen om al hun werk op te halen en op een grote tafel uit te stallen zodat ze het konden presenteren. En de grootste verrassing voor mij: alle ouders waren er! De kinderen waren allemaal super serieus en trots aan het vertellen tegen hun ouders en je zag ze gewoon groeien. Wat ik ook erg bijzonder vond was dat de kinderen niet alleen hun eindresultaat presenteerde maar ook hun ontwikkeling. Bij de creative writing opdracht bijvoorbeeld hadden ze ook een mapje bij met alle eerdere versies van het verhaal. Hier stond ofwel feedback bij van de leerkracht of feedback van het kind zelf. Tussendoor hebben ze een aantal keer zichzelf moeten ‘beoordelen’ aan de hand van een beoordelingsformulier, ook dit werd uiterst serieus ingevuld en de kinderen waren niet snel tevreden met hun werk. Door al deze versies te verzamelen en bij elkaar in een mapje te doen konden de kinderen, de ouders en de leerkracht heel goed zien hoe het kind is gegroeid en dat het werk steeds weer wat beter wordt. Ook kreeg ik deze week een grote verrassing, er werkt namelijk een Nederlandse leerkracht op deze school! Dit was voor mij natuurlijk de ultieme kans om met iemand te praten over het Finse onderwijssysteem die ook weet hoe anders het in Nederland is. Als ik namelijk soms iets vroeg of een opmerking maakte over het onderwijs hier tegen de leerkrachten reageerde ze allemaal een beetje gek omdat ze dat allemaal heel normaal vonden en niet begrepen hoe bijzonder het eigenlijk was. Ik heb bijvoorbeeld dan ook heel vaak excuses gekregen omdat ik zo een ‘saaie les’ had moeten bijwonen, terwijl ik nog nooit zoiets leuks had gezien. 😉 Ik heb dit interview wel bewust een beetje aan het eind van de week gepland omdat ik het belangrijk vond om het eerst zelf allemaal te ervaren en er dan pas over in gesprek te gaan. Doordat de kinderen zoveel zelfstandig aan het werk waren, was er voor mij de ruimte om heel veel te observeren, te luisteren naar de kinderen en de leerkrachten en met de kinderen in gesprek te gaan.  Aan de hand hiervan had ik natuurlijk een hele hoop vragen die ik allemaal heb mogen stellen aan de Nederlandse leerkracht. En van dit gesprek werd ik heel erg blij! Tegenwoordig is er natuurlijk heel veel in het nieuws over het onderwijs in Finland en zie je veel filmpjes en artikelen voorbijkomen. Daarnaast ben ik de boeken Finnish Lessons van Pasi Sahlberg en Teach like Finland van Timothy D. Walker (aanraders!) aan het lezen. Maar toch had ik altijd ergens het gevoel dat het allemaal te mooi was om waar te zijn en dat het misschien op een paar scholen zo was maar dat het verder een beetje zou tegenvallen. Zo had ik bijvoorbeeld al snel ontdekt dat het zogenaamde grote geheim van het Finse onderwijssysteem om kinderen geen huiswerk te geven niet waar is. De kinderen krijgen juist wel iedere dag huiswerk om de korte schooldagen te compenseren, en vaak is dit ook best veel. Gelukkig bleek dit het enige te zijn wat niet waar is en is verder alles gewoon echt zo mooi als het beschreven wordt. Volgens deze leerkracht is het grootste verschil de autonomie die je als leerkracht krijgt. Je mag hier zelf bepalen wat je doet, hoe je dat doet en zelfs wat en hoe je dingen ‘toetst’. Leerkracht: ‘Je zult hier nooit een inspectie krijgen en er zal nooit iemand iets vragen of zeggen over jouw manier van onderwijs, ik zou bij wijze van spreken naakt voor de klas kunnen gaan staan en niemand die het merkt. Als je hier leerkracht bent heb je het vertrouwen van zowel de directie, het schoolbestuur en de andere leerkrachten, maar ook van de ouders en de kinderen.’ Uiteraard vond ons gesprek zich buiten plaats want waar anders?? En midden in zijn verhaal hield de leerkracht ineens op met praten, hij werd afgeleid door een paar jongens van de middle school. Hij vertelde dat hij een van die jongens een paar jaar in de klas had gehad. ‘Deze jongen had op sociaal-emotioneel vlak veel problemen en was op dat moment niet toe aan leren. We moesten ons focussen op zijn sociaal- emotionele ontwikkeling, dat wat op dat moment voor hem belangrijk was. Die staartdelingen zijn we niet aan toe gekomen, ik dacht die komen volgend jaar wel en anders wel op de middelbare school. Doordat er geen gestandaardiseerd programma of toetsen zijn kon ik dit met hem doen. In Nederland zou deze jongen gelijk ‘ten onder’ zijn gegaan aan de standaard toetsen en was hij naar het speciaal onderwijs gestuurd. Doordat de leerlingen hier niet aan bepaalde eisen hoeven te voldoen blijven ze niet ‘verplicht’ op het lage niveau, maar ga je steeds hoger met ze. Op een gegeven moment bereik je dan natuurlijk wel het plafond maar dan heb je in ieder geval alles eruit gehaald en het niet ‘opgegeven’ door het kind maar gelijk naar een laag niveau te sturen. En kijk deze jongen nu staan, hij heeft zo een fantastische groei door gemaakt en hij zit gewoon nog steeds met zijn leeftijdsgenootjes in dezelfde groep.’ We spraken zijn huidige leerkracht en die vertelde dat het super goed met hem gaat en dat hij meer dan goed mee komt met de rest van de groep. Blijven zitten is op scholen in Finland bijna geen optie. De ontwikkeling van de kinderen op zijn/haar eigen niveau staat hier centraal, niet hoe snel het kind leest of hoeveel rekensommen hij of zij binnen een minuut kan maken. Leerkrachten bepalen zelf op wat voor een manier ze met de kinderen evalueren of ze toetsen. ‘Een kind wat geen noot kan spelen of zingen maar altijd heel erg zijn best doet, gemotiveerd en blij is tijdens de muziekles kan ik gewoon een 9 geven. Dat is toch waar het om gaat? Dat kind zal heus niet bedenken om naar de muziekopleiding te gaan.’   En zo heb ik ongeveer anderhalf uur met deze leerkracht gesproken over ‘de wonderen van het Finse onderwijs’. Een nadeel aan het Finse onderwijs kon hij niet bedenken, en ik ook niet. 😊 Afgelopen week was het project week voor de hele school (al is dat volgens mij altijd hier 😉). Het thema van deze week was ‘100 jaar Finland’. Binnen dit thema mochten de kinderen zelf een richting kiezen zoals ‘Sports and Education’, ‘Finnish Art, Design and Culture’, Architecture and Nature’ enzovoorts. De projectweek werd geopend met voor elke groep een ‘field trip’ naar bijvoorbeeld een kunstmuseum of het openluchtmuseum, natuurlijk passend bij de gekozen richting. Vervolgens kregen de kinderen twee dagen om iets te doen of te maken binnen het thema, richtlijnen of eisen waren er niet. En weer stond ik versteld van wat deze kinderen allemaal in twee dagen tijd neer kunnen zetten. Er was werkelijk geen project wat hetzelfde was. Er waren filmpjes, plattegronden, zelf ontworpen spellen, installaties, maquettes, traditionele nagebouwde Finse huizen en gebouwen, nagebouwde design stoelen, schilderijen, zelfgemaakte kleding en ga zo maar door. En dat met nauwelijks hulp of aansturing van de leerkrachten, maar wel met heel veel aanmoediging en lovende woorden. En ook deze projectweek werd afgesloten met een ‘open school’. Dit betekende dat alle kinderen door de hele school rond mochten gaan lopen om elkaars werk te bekijken en ook de ouders waren weer uitgenodigd. Na twee uur kwamen de kinderen terug in de klas met heel veel complimenten op zak en met heel veel dingen die ze hadden geleerd door het bekijken van elkaars werk.   En gister was het dan alweer mijn laatste dagje op deze super school. Het afscheid bleek iets lastiger dan ik had verwacht want ik werd overladen met knuffels, hele lieve woorden van de kinderen en verzoekjes of ik alsjeblieft terug kon komen na de zomer. Maar het grootste compliment van de dag kreeg ik wel van mijn ‘begeleidster’. Ook door haar werd ik, een beetje onverwacht, overladen met complimenten en… Ze heeft me een baan aangeboden! Komend schooljaar gaat ze zelf verschillende scholen opstarten in Finland en daarnaast heeft ze hier een heel groot netwerk dus ze heeft mij er van verzekerd dat ik maar een keer hoef te mailen en dat ze dan gelijk een plek voor me gaat zoeken waar ik kan werken. Heel erg bijzonder! Maar… Wees gerust, ik moet volgend schooljaar eerst nog gewoon afstuderen in Nederland dus voorlopig ben ik nog niet weg. 😊 Tot snel! X Ps. Voor degene die graag een reactie achter willen laten, dit kan helaas alleen als je ingelogd bent en een Tumblr account hebt (wel vrij makkelijk en snel aan te maken 😊).

[pinkletterday]

Title: Sitting In A Tree 2

Pairing: Barry Allen/ Iris West

Rating: PG

Tags: Wip, Wee!stallen

Summary: AU where Iris is the one who realizes her feelings for Barry as kids.

Notes: I still have no idea what this is except a scribble to get over my writer's block.

Sitting In A Tree 1

...

Sometimes a thought, once it crosses your mind, refuses to leave.

Iris had written off her strange impulse to kiss Barry as some one-off meaningless urge brought about by a combination of Barry being his cute self and their closeness. But she hadn't been able to ignore the thoughts that followed.

She became acutely aware of his body heat through his clothes when they hugged or leaned together. How tall he was getting - he had only started surpassing her in height two years ago and was already several inches taller than her. She would have to crane her neck to look at him soon.

She had never really noticed his scent before, but now she realized how much she liked it, it was hard not to track it further. He smelled of their fabric softner, a generic brand of deodorant and sometimes a very shy hint of the spicy aftershave her Dad had given him for his birthday. It was all the opposite of exotic, but somehow so good she had to keep herself from surreptiously sniffing him.

And that was not including the many other tiny details that kept diverting her.

"What?"

Iris came down to earth with a thump. They were in the library poring over their English project but she had somehow fallen into a trance following the moles that trailed down his collarbone into the V of his sweater.

"Huh?" she asked, blinking.

Barry was looking down at himself self-consciously. "Why are you looking at me like that? Do I have something on my shirt?"

Iris was really glad that blushes didn't show up so readily on her cheeks as his did. "No, you're fine. Sorry, I just zoned out."

"Wow, you're bored by your best subject?" he teased.

"Meh," she shrugged. "It's Moby Dick. Who likes Moby Dick?"

"You don't like dick, West?," Adarsh Sukwinder appeared so suddenly he might as well dropped out of a bookstack. "Why didn't you say?"

Barry's ears pinkened and Iris rolled her eyes. Adarsh and his pack of sycophants in the nexr aisle snickered.

"I don't like dicks on two legs," she returned, staring at him meaningfully. Adarsh's friends "ooohed".

"So you like detached dicks, then?" he grinned smugly.

"Did you want something, Sukwinder?," asked Barry, eyes narrowed.

"Just curious about West's preferences."

"I prefer you to go away," said Iris. "And take your third grade sense of humour with you."

"Sure, sweetheart," Adarsh winked. "But if you change your mind -,"

"You're the first in line?," Barry muttered.

Iris snorted. Adarsh shot an annoyed look at him.

"Bet you'd like to be, huh Allen?," he sneered.

Iris's heart sped up as Barry blinked at him. "What?"

"Gee, projecting much?," she shot back.

They glared at each other for a long moment and Barry looked between them in confusion.

Adarsh was the first to back down. Not for nothing had Iris spent years practicing her father's Cop Dad eyeballing.

"Yeah, whatever," he rolled his eyes and popped his collar nonchalantly. "See ya later, dick-hater. Dickless," he saluted Barry and stalked off.

"What was that about?," he asked quizzically, watching after him.

Iris rolled her eyes in disgust. "He asked me out on Wednesday. I said no. Hence," she made a disgusted gesture. "Men are so fragile."

"Hey!," Barry tossed a notepad at her with a grin.

"I didn't mean you. You're not a man."

"Wow, thanks Iris."

"Well you're not. You're a boy," she insisted.

"But Snootywinder isn't?" he raised an eyebrow.

"Snootywinder is a dick," she dismissed. "Besides," her heart suddenly beat fast as she smiled at him. "You're a nice boy." A very cute, nice-smelling boy.

Barry slanted a grin at her. Despite everything that had happened to him, it was still the blindingly sweet one he had first given her in elementary school. Iris was suddenly struck by both how different he was now and how much the same.

"Thanks," he rubbed the back of his head and gently bumped her shoulder with his. "You're a nice girl too."

He was so close. The freckles dusted near his eyes transfixed her again, and his scent filled her nose.

Had his eyelashes always been that long?

Barry's grin turned mischievous. "So am I?"

"Are you what?"

"The first in line?"

A jolt of panic shot through her. But she schooled her features into a deadpan expression. "Nope. You're actually second in line."

"Oh?"

"Yep. I'm sorry. But my heart still belongs to Justin Timberlake."

The tension dissolved as they giggled, earning a sharp reprimand from the passing librarian.

///

#the flash #myfic #westallen #wee!stallen #fanfic #wip #barry allen x iris west #au

[pinkletterday]

Dimensions of Loving Excerpt

Pairing: Barry Allen/ Iris West

Rating: All Audiences

Summary: They've always been best friends but a boy and a girl growing up together with a latent attraction had sometimes made for awkward situations.

They had always been shy with their bodies. Another way they werent like siblings. Puberty had been weird. Iris had barely seen Barry shirtless, except in a pool, and she had never come out of the bathroom in just a towel.

There had been something alien and strange about Barry's burgeoning masculinity, and her own curiosity about it confused her. Once or twice she had seen him in the bathroom with the door adjar and been transfixed by the way the towel wrapped low on his hips, the fine trail of hair leading down his stomach. The water droplets trickling down the hard outline of his spine and lean, wiry arms.

She had preferred to ignore it. He was her silly boy, with his abysmal attempts to grow a moustache, hilarious senior year haircuts, freckled and gangly, with a prominent Adam's apple and endless moles on his pale skin. She had found it funny (to her regret) to gush about football players just to see his adorable pout. But she had always assumed he knew she thought his body was perfect, because to her he was perfect. She had tickled, pinched, manhandled and snuggled against him with impunity, revelling in the complete comfort and perfect fit of her body against his ridiculously tall frame. There had never been a slightest lack in him that she could find; when she introduced him to people it had always been with a kind of flourishing pride: "brilliant human, most adorable nerd, the best best friend in the world."

But for all that, there had been very distinct shifts in their relationship over the course of growing up.

They had always been very physically affectionate with each other until, between the ages of thirteen and fourteen, Barry had suddenly become extremely distant and uncomfortable around her, dodging her hands, careful in their hugs, refusing to rough-house with her like usual. It had first puzzled her and then made her mad, figuring it was some weird boy thing, and decided to bully him into being not-weird again.

This impatience had made her launch a tickle attack one day, wrestling on top of him and pinning him down, laughing too hard to realize immediately that his cries of "Iris, stop!" had changed from playful to panicked. He had had to yell at her, freezing her in place at the distress on his face. Then realized why as an obvious hardness pressed against her stomach.

They had flown apart on the sofa as though electrified. Barry had been a picture of mortification, looking like he was going to cry. Iris's own awkwardness and shock had immediately been overriden by the need to get that expression off his face.

"Barry!" she tried to reach out, but he had jumped over the couch and fled.

They had barely spoken to each other for three days after, much to Joe's concern and confusion. Her heart ached at the wooden misery Barry's face but she didn't know how to talk to him beyond the hot flush of her own shame. This was her fault, she knew. He had tried to draw his boundaries and she had been a brat and ignored them.

So it was a second shock when it had been him who approached her to apologize.

"I'm really sorry, Iris. I didn't mean it to happen. I couldn't control it." He was unable to meet her eyes, looking nearly sick with guilt.

"Barry, it wasn't your fault!," she said horrified. "I'm the one who jumped all over you."

He had stared at his shoes miserably, and she hated herself a little more. "Yeah, but. I don't want you to think...that I think about you in that way."

For some reason this had made Iris's stomach drop.

"Oh. No, of course not. I knew that."

"You do?"

"Of course. Look. You're a boy and I'm a girl," she had explained, determinedly powering through the mutual awkwardness. "And we're not brother and sister. So even if you don't see me that way, sometimes your body is just going to register me as just another girl, you know?"

"Just another girl," he had nodded. "Right."

"Right," said Iris cheerfully, bewildered at the way her stomach kept sinking. "It's just a thing that happens. I don't mind."

He looked disbelieving. "Are you sure?"

"Yup." She had taken his arm gently, as though he was a frightened animal, relieved when he met her eyes and lost some of that awful stiffness in her hold.

Taking a deep breath, she had affected a sanctimonious air. "At this age, Bartholomew, your body is going through some changes," she told him solemnly. "You'll notice yourself having some strange...urges. But you should know it's a perfectly natural, beautiful thing -,"

"Oh my God!" he had shoved her away and run, hands over his ears, but she had caught his usual full-blown grin blooming on his red face. Iris had chased him through the house, heart light and laughing, yelling after him about the birds and the bees.

#the flash #myfic #snippet #fanfic #westallen #wip #barry allen x iris west #wee!stallen #growing pains

[pinkletterday]

The Way We Were

Pairing: Barry Allen/ Iris West

Rating: All Audiences

Summary:

Memories may be beautiful and yet

What's too painful to remember 

We simply choose to forget

So it's the laughter we will remember

Whenever we remember

the way we were

Read on AO3

The box of mementos had sat stored away on high closet shelf until Iris had been seized with the need to find some obscure sweater of Barry's. Her frenzied search accidentally knocked it to the floor, the contents scattering every which way, joining the mess she had made of the rest of the room.

She picked up the tiny velociraptor fallen near her foot.

***

They had both loved Jurassic Park. Barry because he was a nerd and Iris because she had seen that T-Rex eat a guy on the toilet and screamed at the time but also thought it was awesome. They would sneak into the kitchen at night to get Jell-o, pretending they were trying to evade raptors. Sometimes Iris was the velicoraptor and Barry had to hide from her.

Her Dad had the living daylights scared out of him once when he came down for a glass of milk at 1am without switching on the light and they had both screamed in his face.

***

The memory rose so vividly that she took a step back and nearly tripped over Barry's old sneakers. They were covered in sharpied scribbles, laces still tied together.

***

Iris had never been able to monitor her own sugar consumption. She used to eat so much candy at fairs that it made Joe and Barry sick just to watch her. She'd puked on Barry's shoes TWICE after eating funnel cake on top of cotton candy and candy corn. Barry told her later, the morning after they had first made love, that this was probably when he figured out he's in love with her for real, because he was too worried and exasperated to be grossed out as much as he should have been.

It hadn't stopped him from jokingly gifting her the sneakers once they'd been cleaned. Iris had retaliated by refusing to give them back.

***

The keychain from her first car gleamed dully from under the side table.

***

Joe still thought it was Iris that crashed his car. It had actually been Barry at the wheel. Iris knew her Dad loved Barry but there was always a shadow of a fear in her heart when he annoyed her Dad a little too much. She had insisted they swap seats and change their story before the cops came and never told him why. She could take her Dad's anger. She's his little girl. But she's never trusted anyone to love Barry as much as she does.

Dad had given them a beat up Ford Escort for them to share when they were seventeen, but Barry had refused to get behind the wheel again till he left for college.

***

The Titanic poster that had half-unrolled across the floor had been a gag gift from him the Christmas he had come home his freshman year.

***

They had been too young for the Titanic fever when it had first come out (except for everyone getting sick of that Celine Dion song) but when they had been about ten, Iris had taken it firmly into her head that she needed to see what the fuss was about. Dad hadn't let them because he thought they were still babies who didn't know about sex, which made Iris all the more determined.

She had gotten Barry to steal his parents' DVD copy and bring it with him one day he was sleeping over at the Wests' house. They watched it together in their basement, giggling and blushing at the sexy parts. Barry yelped and covered his face with his hands, ears burning, when Kate Winslet disrobed, and Iris covered up her own embarrassment by laughing and throwing popcorn at him.

At the end of the movie, Barry had been crying into his own popcorn but Iris was incensed.

"Well that's....just stupid!" She steamed at the tv. "Are you CRYING?"

"NO," Barry sniffled. "But it's not stupid. Why is it stupid?"

"She let him DIE, Barry!" Iris fumed. "They could have shared that door! Taken turns! Or made HIM get on it!"

"It's a minus freezing sea, Iris, not a swimming pool. You can't jump in an out of it like that. Besides, then she would have died," said Barry, looking at her in incomprehension.

"Well duh!" Iris huffed and threw her hands up in indignation. "You dont let the boy you love DIE for you. How is that romantic?"

"It's romantic cause he sacrificed himself so she could live," insisted Barry. "That's what you do when you love someone!"

"Oh yeah, I love you so much Im just gonna up and LEAVE you, have a nice life!"

"That's not fair!" said Barry, seeming irrationally hurt. "It's not like he had a choice! You just dont get romance, Iris. You don't even like musicals," he concluded in a superior tone.

Iris gaped at him, then closed her mouth and returned to the point at issue. "Anyway. It's stupid. She doesnt deserve him. I'd a died with my man if it was me."

"Well then you're stupid," said Barry with uncharacteristic vehemence. "You're worth way more than some guy!"

"I happen to love that guy!" Iris yelled back.

"What guy?"

"Whatever guy!"

"Fine! Go die for Whatever Guy!"

"You too! Go drown yourself for little Miss Cant-Share-A-Frggin-Door Priss!"

They glared at each other before the absurdity of the argument dawned on them and they started to laugh.

"Is everything okay down there?" Joe's voice called down to the basement.

They looked at each other wide-eyed and at the TV before Iris scrambled to eject the DVD.

That night, after her Dad had turned off the light with a firm admonishment to go to sleep, Iris snuck into Barry's camp bed and under his covers where he was reading with a flashlight.

"Hey," she poked him. "Just to be clear, I know you're a sappy nerd -"

"YOU'RE a sappy -"

"But," she continued determined, "no sacrificing yourself for any girls, okay? I need my best friend around."

Barry had a weird expression on his face.

"What?"

"You're a girl," he observed rather too casually. "Im not allowed to give you the door either?"

Iris swatted him, appalled. "Especially not me! We're partners Barry! The whole point is that we go down together!"

"You jump, I jump, Jack," grinned Barry at her over the beam of the flashlight.

Iris poked his pointy nose. "Except we mean it, Rose."

***

The loft had grown dark during her reminiscing. The floor was chilly beneath her but her limbs were too heavy to move.

She simply sat, Barry's sweater forgotten on her lap, spinning the tiny lone raptor in her hand. Lost among the debris of their life together that he had left behind when he walked into the Speed Force, the ghost of his last kiss still tingling on her lips.

You lied to me again, Barry. You lied.

#myfic #westallen #fanfic #the flash #barry allen x iris west #wee!stallen #post s3 coda

[pinkletterday]

What I am supposed to be writing: The Flash 5x4 Westallen family Fix-it fic.

What I started writing: Westallen "best-friends-to-lovers" smut

What I ended up writing: Wee!stallen.

I'm just going to write Barry and Iris as kids till I die. It will be an excellent way to go.

Bonus -

What's in my WiP folder: Coldflash (2) and Olivarry (3) fics.

I AM A SLASH WRITER. HONEST.

#wee!stallen is fucking cute #and probably the whole reason I'm stuck in this hellish shipscape #my babies #the cutest babbs #idk why more people dont write them #westallen #on writing #wip #personal

[pinkletterday]

Writer's Year In Review

This year has been a revelation. I went from deeply, irrevocably believing I can't write fiction at all to knowing that I'm actually pretty good at it!

It's given me the confidence to find work as a freelance writer and editor in real life, after years of unemployment and anxious paralysis resulting from chronic illness and trauma. A lot of other factors also helped but the fic writing played a huge role in getting my shit together.

General Fic Stats:

Word Count on AO3: 92284

Fics posted to AO3: 23

Favourite Fic:

Kiss It Better (Westallen).This fic is my baby. I love little Iris and little Barry in it so much, the hurt and confusion in each other they attempted to heal, how that healing carried into their adult love and family. It will always and always be my favourite thing I have ever written. Wee!stallen is my jam, and the reason I ship them so damn hard.

Do Not Go Gentle (Westallen). Ngl, I love this for the sheer amount of truly gratifying comments. Every single one of them have been emotional and flaily. It all makes me feel like I may have finally levelled up. Hallelujah. xD

Funniest Fic:

The Care and Feeding (Queenwestallen). This is my ultimate OT3. This fic, written as a list and discussion is 95% humour and contains some of my best banter and (I feel) characterization. An element I'm really proud of is how I managed to center and include all their important non-romantic relationships in their conversations. Iris's boisterous female friends, Oliver's friends, Cisco and Caitlin's snarky commentary all shoehorned themselves into the list with hilarious and wholesome results. 

It's not a popular OT3 but I feel like it's a good first attempt to drag this ship to water. xD

Cutest Fic:

Dancing Queen (Olivarry). Even after a year this contiues to be the fic with the highest kudos ratio (except for the more recent one) and the second most bookmarked. I love getting comments on this because they are all some variation of "my teeth hurt. I have diabetes!" xD Well, I did build it around a rainbow sprinkle icing sugar donut, but there is a significant dollop of angst there in the middle. A flangst donut.

Your Vigil In My Keeping (Westallen). This fic has less than 200 hits but has the highest kudos ratio of all. I guess kid fic isn't everyone's cup of tea, but Wee!stallen is cute af yo. I headcanon the origins of Barry and Iris's steadfast partnership in this story, where her faith and belief in him is as strong as his protectiveness of her, all tied up in the language and innocence of children.

Kinkiest Fic:

WA Smut and Kink Collection. I literally just posted this yesterday lol. So far it's just a face-sitting short, but I have quite a few hard and soft kinks lined up. Westallen needs more hard smut tbh, and they have such a unique powerfully loving dynamic that every kink I'm writing has required me to come at it a little bit sideways with a whole lot of emotional focus.

Saddest Fic:

Three fics I can't choose from.

Do Not Go Gentle (Westallen). This is basically Iris's grief and fear in a raging tempest, and it's strongly implied that the future Nora has warned them of will come to pass regardless of what they do. The fact is that there already is and will be a timeline where Iris loses Barry, just as there must be one where she won't, because that is the nature of potentiality. 

The Paradigm of Uncertainty (Westallen). This was a drabble almost, that ruminates on the probability that speedsters do not erase timelines but abandon them, along those versions of their loved ones. It's as @rkwago's brilliant comment says: "Iris hurts in so many weird, cosmic ways that her life is almost an eldritch horror house," which is the most perfect description ever of what it means to be a time traveller's wife.

The Universal Constant (Gen, background WA). A lot of people find the way Barry goes off on Joe cathartic in this fic, and so do I. But it's not so simple. I don't think Joe was wrong to form the views he did, or that anyone was in the wrong really. As @sophiainspace pointed out, it's a mediation of grief and love, their parallels and continuations between parents and children and lovers. The fact that it takes Henry's death for Barry to find the adult language to articulate to Joe why he will always believe in his father's innocence is a tragedy that cuts three ways.

(This fic is also the reason I have a folder in my drive marked "how to get away with murder" and probably a likely reason to get me arrested one day. xD)

Most Popular Fic:

Strangers In The Cold (Coldflash). The Coldflash fandom is a joy to feed. This was my first smut fic which was preceded by an entire chapter of banter about nothing in particular (except it ended up establishing a background that gave birth to the Coldflash vs Olivarry polyam series) And holy wow, for a newbie writer, the response has been amazing. Looking back, I wince at a lot of writing mistakes and its undeniably rough, but it really bolstered my confidence.

(I feel a little guilty that all my other CF stories are still in my WiP folder while I update the polyam series at snail's pace.)

The Shape of Us (Westallen). I wrote this on tumblr half-asleep one night, half as a rambly headcanon...and woke up to literally one hundred freaking notes. What the hell. Now at over 260, it's the most popular fic I've ever posted on tumblr.

I never consciously intended it to be a body-positivity fic but apparently women really relate to the insecurities of growing older and watching our bodies change with marriage, children and the sheer hectic pace of life. Even my non-fandom friends reblogged it simply for its representation of "real women". Barry's response is my own wish fulfillment fantasy; the sort of total acceptance and validation that we wish we could hear it the times we can't find it in ourselves. In light of the virulent body-shaming Candice Patton has been subjected to ever since she was revealed to have gained a fuller figure in S5, I'm very glad to have written it.

Least Popular Fic:

Carry On (Gen) This character study of Oliver Queen only has 135 hits a year after posting, which is par for the course with gen. But has a solid 12% kudos ratio, which means it's probably as good as I think it is. It's one of my favourite and easiest fics I have ever written.

Love Me Like You Do (Olivarry) Lordy, if my first Coldflash smut filled me with confidence, my first Olivarry smutfic all but ruined it. I struggled with it for a long time, unlike SitC, which I suppose shows in the over-descriptions. I got carried away with the quipping and I guess Barry topping at all is really not popular with slash fans?

Still, I'm honestly toying with the idea of deleting and rewriting it. At least it was a learning experience - don't write smut unless it makes you feel horny yourself.  

Most Challenging Fic:

Do Not Go Gentle (Westallen). I think the reason stories you knock off in two hours are instantly popular while the ones you slaved over for weeks barely get any attention is because the process is reflected in the ease of reading. But this one is an exception. It was an absolute monster, taking three weeks and several revisions to wrestle into submission - and it paid off in spades!  Going by the response, I seem to have achieved the wow factor I was going for.

My only regret is that I posted it on tumblr before the last revision that finally made it work, so that too many readers saw the lacklustre version rather than the polished one.

Honorable Mention:

A Stitch In Time (Olivarry for now, eventual Queenwestallen) Baby's first multi-chapter! Admittedly chapters 3 and 4 have been languishing in my drive for a few months now and this thing has 100% more deleted scenes and outtakes posted to my tumblr than the actual story on AO3. But I'm so proud of it! I learned to write action scenes because of it, how to write climaxes, dream sequences, news articles and tell a story in several different formats. It made me rediscover my empathy for Felicity and write her as a PoV character, think deeply on Laurel Lance's losses and give voice to her struggles, and explore how a real friendship and understanding could evolve between Oliver and Iris out of their mutual love for Barry. (Centering female characters within manpain narratives, ftw! Otoh, I centered Iris so much it veered off the Olivarry rails into Queenwestallen territory on its own)

There is so much meaty conflict and delicious looming disaster in this story that I'm determined going to keep at it, even if slow and steady. If only to bring the light of Barry/Iris/Oliver into the world. xD

Holding On (Olivarry). This real-world disability AU deals with chronic and mental illness and the precariousness and personal demons of that reality. I tore out the rawest parts of my life for this fic and put them on display so that I couldn't bear to show it to anyone for a year after it was written.

I'm very glad I did finally brush it off and put it up because it has struck a chord with so many people, especially other Spoonies. The low number of hits on a fic that deals in hurt/comfort rather stings, as I can't help but think the disinterest is because of the "disability" and "neurodivergence" tags. But I still think it's one of the best things I've written and one I'll always be proudest of.

General Reflections:

Things I've learned over the past year of writing:

- Self-deprecation is not my friend. I need to be honest enough with myself to acknowledge when my writing is good, because either I self-validate and build confidence or I become a black hole of insecurity where validation goes to die. And if I think I'm a bit better than I actually am, it's not just okay but necessary to believe it.

- What I call writer's block is perfectionism, anxiety and physical and mental fatigue. If I don't eat, sleep, hydrate and acheive a relaxed mental state, I won't be able to write. 

- Momentum is more my friend than any amount of inspiration and motivation. Sitting my ass down and make it a habit to churn out X number of words a day, even bad writing, will do more to help me than polishing an idea to a high shine. 

- If I don't forgive myself for the stories I can't write I'll never write anything. I am doing this for free, to share the love and joy and therefore obligated to no one. 

- I'm capable of writing things I don't have the first idea how to write. My fingers on a keyboard can paint the picture my brain can't visualize. 

I don't believe in New Year's resolutions, but I am going to make it a personal goal to write at least 15k words per month, learn to stick to a posting schedule where possible.  and end next year with an additional 150k words posted. 

To everyone who follows this blog, commented, reblogged and liked my posts - I see and remember and appreciate every one of you. You're the reason I feel seen and valued and why I am motivated to keep writing through all the difficulties life throws at me. <3<3<3

#the flash #myfic #fanfic #westallen #olivarry #arrow #oliver queen x barry allen #personal #barry allen x iris west #coldflash #queenwestallen #leonard snart x barry allen #oliver queen x iris west #writing #meme #review #year in review #happy new year #pinknote

[pinkletterday]

Writing a Wee!stallen fic. Why did I make Barry and Iris fourteen year olds. I don't know anything about fourteen year olds. I can manage a 15 - 16 year old and just about imagine age thirteen. But what is fourteen like? It's so...transitory.

More to the point, what is a fourteen year old boy like, other than a mess of elbows, hormones and self-consciousness?

Doesn't help that I grew up conservative and gender-segregated so that I was developmentally stunted as a teenager and had virtually no contact with boys till I was seventeen.

Pretty sure I've made Barry way too mature. Teenage Barry would be the dorkest dork that ever dorked.

#personal

[pinkletterday]

I've been followed by a whole buncha people over the last two days, so this is to say hello!

Hi, I'm Hussie! 31, disabled, Mother of Dogs. I do not live in the Western world, which means I have to google everything to write fic, such as "why do Americans use a funny bat to play cricket" and "if a biscuit is a cookie then what is a biscuit".

I wrote a thing once when I was twenty and then nothing at all till last year when my wifey @wonderingtheblue gently encouraged me to take my frothing mad DCtv crossover feels and use it to write The Westallen Wedding Album. I now write mainly Olivarry and Westallen and occasionally Coldflash. My OT3 is QueenWestAllen which I think only about five other people ship :/ I started writing slash myself because there is a dearth of non-WA fic for polyshippers like me that doesn't relegate Iris to a literal sibling. Even before I shipped them, Barry and Iris canonically felt like a package deal. My Olivarry and Coldflash fics feature either poly romantic Westallen or queerplatonic Westallen. I love romantic Westallen but queer-platonic WA is my jam (followed by queerplatonic Oliver/Iris) and I love love love writing Barry and Iris as kids (look under the Wee!stallens tag)

Thank you so much for your kind reblogs and comments on That WA Post (is what I'm calling it in my head because 160 notes wtfffff)!

Please don't be offended if I don't follow back. I only follow a handful of writeblrs on this blog because this is mainly a fic writing journal that I use to not get distracted by a busy dashboard. I don't actively seek out fanfic to read anymore (no time, no spoons, must write) but I'm open to fic recs and links.

This is an 18+ blog so if you're a minor please be responsible for curating your own content. I don't care about shipping and this is an antis-free kink-friendly NSFW zone. I'm usually good about tagging everything but please let me know if you need anything tagged.

I am however, deeply uncomfortable with IRL shipping. Not ruminating on actors' personal lives is a hard line for me. I also don't support hate blogs of any kind.

I don't actually watch any of the DCtv shows except Legends anymore (the ableism and sexism has become more and more triggering) and I'm going to get my Westallen + Cisco fix from Youtube this season. I'd much rather use it to fuel my creativity and connect with lovely and talented people. <3

Constructive criticism of my writing is more than welcome! Please feel free to send me your ideas for where I can improve and your take on my ideas (gently pls I am a Soft) in the comments or in asks. And I'll love you forever if you leave feedback in the reblogs, comments or tags - even seeing a tag like "this is really nice" makes all the pain worthwhile.

Hope you'll enjoy my blog and that we'll get to know each other better!

#can you believe the urban dictionary had the best definition of queerplatonic? #introduction #fyi #personal #pinknote

[pinkletterday]

Kiss It Better

Pairing: Barry Allen/ Iris West

Rating: All Audiences

Summary: Barry and Iris only have one parent between them. They make do.

Read On AO3

Iris doesn't really think about her Mom not being around at first. She and her Dad are a unit unto themselves, with Grandma to make dinner and tuck her in when he works late. He can weave her cornrows with the best of the other black girls' Moms and makes better pancakes than any of them, she's certain.

So she can't quite tell why she gets so mad when Suzie Harris, who's jealous of her for some reason, scornfully asks "Where's your Mom?" at Parent-Teacher day.

"She's in heaven with the angels," says Iris aloofly, quite confident that there's no way Suzie's parents can claim higher company.

"She must like the angels more than you then," shoots back Suzie and Iris gets in trouble for ripping her stupid ribbons right off her stupid head.

Joe gives her a talking-to that's perhaps less stern than usual because he can tell Iris is really hurting beneath the small thundercloud face. But Iris won't tell her Dad what Suzie said because she knows, somehow, that he would be hurt if he knew. She goes to bed without her supper with nary a word, but she's too tired to not be miserable by the time Joe comes to tuck her in.

"Why did Mommy leave?" she whispers, curling forlornly under his big, strong arm.

The hand carding through her hair stops suddenly. "She didn't have a choice, baby girl," says her Dad, sounding as sad as she feels. But something in his voice makes her think he doesn't really believe it.

Iris makes friends with Barry and she likes him a lot but when Mrs. Allen comes to pick him up from school and calls him her "beautiful boy" she gets jealous and wistful. Barry always has both parents around him in pictures and his Mom makes them PBand J sandwiches when she comes over to his house (which she does more and more because Granma Esther is sick and Dad says "he needs the hours")

When they play house, Iris insists on being the Dad and Barry agrees to be the Mom. Iris pretends to strap on her gun and badge, drops kisses onto Barry's and the children's heads at the table and bids goodbye in a deep voice that makes both of them giggle. Iris watches with avid interest as Barry reads Luke and Leia bedtime stories and makes them noodle soup when they're sick.

It all seems like what Daddy and Grandma Esther already do for her (except Barry is a scientist-astronaut-doctor Mom and the children are sick with space measles, which calls for his specific skill set) so Iris concludes she probably isn't missing out on much. But then Mrs. Allen will call them in for snacks and there's something in the way her lemonade and sandwiches taste, like the way her hugs feel, that makes Iris's tummy feel hollow.

Mrs. Allen's smile is kind and her hair is really pretty in the sun. Iris realizes she cant really remember what her Mom looked like, not really. She only remembers the pictures and a sense of love and home when she sniffs the old perfume bottle she keeps in her closet. It seems a grave injustice suddenly, that Barry gets to have both parents.

Grandma Esther passes away that year and now it really is just Iris and her Dad. The house feels as big and empty as the space in Iris's heart. Daddy is working all the time and tired and sad and Iris is at Barry's more than ever and it hurts to be in that house surrounded by Barry's careless comforts and the easy love of both his parents. It makes Iris mad. One day she actually shoves a bewildered Barry away and stomps off home, determined to make Daddy feel better, make both of them feel better. She can be the Mommy, they don't need anyone else, she'll make dinner like Mrs. A does, lay the table nicely and have a proper sit down meal again and Daddy would be proud and not sad anymore.

But all she ends up doing is somehow nearly setting the kitchen on fire and getting into a lot of trouble for lying to the Allens and going home without telling anyone. Joe is tired and angry and grounds her and Iris runs upstairs away from the ruined kitchen and slams into her room because its not fair, its not fair. She takes out her Mom's perfume bottle and sniffs it but its almost completely evaporated. She realizes she can remember the scent of Mrs. Allen's hugs and Granma's clean soap better than she can her Mom's and she's so enraged she smashes the bottle.

Iris feels guilty when Barry approaches her again tentatively at school, unsure of what he'd done wrong. She tries to hold onto her anger but it has simply turned into a tight knot of misery and she bursts into angry tears, much to Barry's alarm, confessing that she misses her Mom which is stupid because she can't even remember her. But she remembers she and Dad were happy when she was here and what if she really did go with the angels because Iris wasn't good enough?

Barry listens to this all with grave patience and says that that's silly, Iris is the most awesome person in the whole world and her Mom must have known that cos Moms know everythingand they love you more than anything. If it helps, she can share his Mom sometimes, if she wants. Iris doesn't have the heart to tell him that he's missing the point, but his staunch support does help a little.

It gets better over time. Iris learns to hide her jealousy but the space in her heart continues to ring hollow and the house is still too big except for when Barry comes over. She rather selfishly wishes he lived with her than in that land of plenty that always feels a little alien to her, and makes Barry a little alien as well.

And then she gets her wish in the most awful way possible.

That lost look in Barry's eyes, so suddenly ripped away from his warm two-parent home and thrust into the big, empty spaces of her own, is too awful to see. They are finally connected now, in a way they hadn't been before, marked by loss, of having learned too young the ephemeral nature of love, safety and security. When Iris looks into Barry's eyes now she sees that empty space reflected back at her and it is the worst thing she could possibly imagine, far worse than the consciousness of different worlds that had seperated them before.

(A small part of her is terrified by the thought that maybe Nora was taken because she had been jealous of Barry. She's old enough to know this is illogical but a part of her fervently hopes it never occurs to Barry.)

Barry's not like her though. They both remember Nora, with her long gold earrings and honeysuckle-scented hair, the hugs and the lemonade, the warmth of her that seemed to seep into the very walls of their home. Iris can never even hope to replace that.

But you know. Not having a Mom is new to him, but she's old hat at it. Sure, she's never lost her Dad, but they can't afford the easy, comfortable lifestyle the Allens could. While Iris had never really gone without, she's conscious of money and necessity in a way that Barry simply isnt.

(She can also tell when it begins to dawn on Barry that they are black in the way she had realized years before.)

It's all very concerning. Barry is Difficult and Troubled (is how his social workers says it) and honestly kind of a jerk sometimes. Her Dad lets him get away with a lot (although it took a while for Barry to understand the unspoken Rules of Dad - never make him tell you to do something twice, all decrees are final, and No Backtalk) but Iris is on tenterhooks all the same. Barry is not from their world and she gets it, she really does, she knows being furious in her bones, but she's really scared if Barry doesn't stop pushing her Dad that her Dad will reach the limit of his patience and send him away. She knows Dad would never do that to her but Barry doesnt belong to him the way he does to her.

The only thing she can do is try and clumsily spackle over the hole Nora left. Dad can be as good a Dad as Dr. Allen, she's sure, but they have to do without a Mom and boys dont seem to do as well without one as girls do (Dad was kind of hopeless for a while after Grandma died).

She makes her and Barry packed lunches for school, makes him lemonade like his Mom's and hot chocolate the special way Grandma Esther made it. They bake brownies and watch musicals and do homework together. She monitors the laundry situation, runs interference between him and her Dad and sneaks into his room to hold him at night when he cries in his sleep. And even though Taking Care of Sick Kids is a Dad thing in the West house, when he gets so sick he can't stop crying for his parents even with Iris and her Dad holding him between them, she slips away and comes back with some Campbell's chicken noodle soup. It's a far cry from Nora's, but it's a start.

(Sometimes, they take turns at it. "Kiss it better" becomes a game for them. Iris put a butterfly plaster on Barry once and unthinkingly placed a kiss on it the way Nora used to do. Barry had liked it and reciprocated unexpectedly when Iris had scraped her knee in turn. This eventually escalates over the years into getting in slap fights and tickle fights where they knock knees and elbows and heads and the other has to "kiss it better")

It's all an awkward roadmap of Mom Things she's pieced together just from watching Mrs. Allen, but it seems to work. Dad is mostly amused by how she bosses Barry around and takes care of him and he soon stops having outbursts.

The nightmares don't stop though. Iris doesnt tell her Dad that she's started having them too, of a man in yellow grabbing Barry and Dad and flying away on angel wings.

***

Many years later, Iris realizes nightmares can come true when, months after a finally freed Henry Allen walks away from his son, her own world crumbles with the card-castle of her parents' lies. She is keeping vigil at her dying mother's bedside, her heart a storm of hurt, fury and incredible sadness when Barry slips quietly into the room. He lies down beside her on the cot and the awkwardness of love confessions and dead fiancés between them dissolves as their eyes meet, the mutual resonance of betrayed love again seamlessly dropping them back in sync. Then it's finally his turn to hold her as she curls into him and shakes with silent weeping, once more two lonely children huddling to cover their empty spaces.

The nightmares continue to become real - Barry loses Henry forever, Iris doesnt speak to Joe for a year.  But dreams come true as well. Their old love transforms into romance and desire and they find each other again and again, in their bed, in their home, in their vows. Adult life speeds them past the shadows of their child selves, facing down each insurmountable hurdle the universe throws at them. They struggle to balance the facets of their lives but they do not fall out of step again, always running in tandem, passing faith back and forth, frequencies attuned to each other through time and space, never looking back.

And so Iris manages to dam the nebulous anxiety percolating at the back of her mind until she's four months pregnant. The fear hits her full force at three am, propelling her out of bed to a frenzied search through the house.

She drags out the box of old photographs and stares desperately at a young and lovely Francine holding her toddler self close. Grandma Esther is stern and loving through faded sepia tones, and Nora kisses and hugs a young Barry whose sunshine knows no pain.

It's him that finds her sitting on the floor in the wee hours, awash in second-hand memories and tears.

"I can't remember them, Barr!" she wails as he draws her into his arms. "I keep trying but I can't even remember Grandma that well, and she loved me so much! I don't remember what a Mom is like, I don't -," he murmurs into her hair and rubs her back soothingly while she tries not to hyperventilate, "I don't know how to do this, Barry."

He waits till she calms down and leans their foreheads together. In his eyes, a glimmer of the familiar pain reaches out to touch her grief.

"I don't know how to do this either," he confesses, "And I've had two Dads. But we'll figure it out. If it helps," his mouth quirks up at the corners, "I'll be the Mom and you be the Dad."

They both collapse into giggles through their tears.

...

A few more years later, Dawn and Don are bundled on the living room sofa like a pair of sick little blanket burritos. They are watching Singing In The Rain for the umpteenth time (a lesser evil for Iris at this point - it could be worse. It could be Frozen 2) while she makes dinner (Nora's chicken noodle soup for Don and Barry and Joe's gumbo for her and Dawn)

Barry's on the phone with the pediatrician when she slides in next to them, carefully setting the bowls aside to feel their hot foreheads.

Dawn looks piteously up at her. "Don't feel good, Mommy."

"I know, boo," soothed Iris. "Here, let Mommy kiss it better."

She plants a smacking kiss on first Dawn's head and then Don's, making them giggle, and looks up to find Barry gazing at them with a strange expression.

"What?" she asks worriedly. "Does the doctor want us to bring them in?"

"Nah," says Barry smiling. He pockets the phone and slides in next to their son, bookending their family. "She said their Mom and Dad should kiss it better."

And Iris realizes, as Barry's sunshine grin reflects her own, that it is no longer the pain of empty spaces that holds them in sync.

End

#kiss it better #wee!stallen #westallen #character study #don allen #dawn allen #joe west #francine west #nora allen #barry allen x iris west