#that things are often fraught and complicated between them

[specialagentartemis]

Hey, would you be willing to elaborate on that "disappearance of the Anasazi is bs" thing? I've heard something like that before but don't know much about it and would be interested to learn more. Or just like point me to a paper or yt video or something if you don't want to explain right now? Thanks!

I’m traveling to an archaeology conference right now, so this sounds like a great way to spend my airport time! @aurpiment you were wondering too—

“Anasazi” is an archaeological name given to the ancestral Puebloan cultural group in the US Southwest. It’s a Diné (Navajo) term and Modern Pueblos don’t like it and find it othering, so current archaeological best practices is to call this cultural group Ancestral Puebloans. (This is politically complicated because the Diné and Apache nations and groups still prefer “Anasazi” because through cultural interaction, mixing, and migration they also have ancestry among those people and they object to their ancestry being linguistically excluded… demonyms! Politically fraught always!)

However. The difficulties of explaining how descendant communities want to call this group kind of immediately shows: there are descendant communities. The “Anasazi” are Ancestral Purbloans. They are the ancestors of the modern Pueblos.

The Ancestral Puebloans as a distinct cultural group defined by similar material culture aspects arose 1200-500 BCE, depending on what you consider core cultural traits, and we generally stop talking about “Ancestral Puebloan” around 1450 CE. These were a group of people who lived in northern Arizona and New Mexico, and southern Colorado and Utah—the “Four Corners” region. There were of course different Ancestral Pueblo groups, political organizations, and cultures over the centuries—Chaco Canyon, Mesa Verde, Kayenta, Tusayan, Ancestral Hopi—but they generally share some traits like religious sodality worship in subterranean circular kivas, residence in square adobe roomblocks around central plazas, maize farming practices, and styles of coil-and-scrape constructed black-on-white and black-on-red pottery.

The most famous Ancestral Pueblo/“Anasazi” sites are the Cliff Palace and associated cliff dwellings of Mesa Verde in southwestern Colorado:

When Europeans/Euro-Americans first found these majestic places, people had not been living in them for centuries. It was a big mystery to them—where did the people who built these cliff cities go? SURELY they were too complex and dramatic to have been built by the Native people who currently lived along the Rio Grande and cited these places as the homes of their ancestors!

So. Like so much else in American history: this mystery is like, 75% racism.

But WHY did the people of Mesa Verde all suddenly leave en masse in the late 1200s, depopulating the whole Mesa Verde region and moving south? That was a mystery. But now—between tree-ring climatological studies, extensive archaeology in this region, and actually listening to Pueblo people’s historical narratives—a lot of it is pretty well-understood. Anything archaeological is inherently, somewhat mysterious, because we have to make our best interpretations of often-scant remaining data, but it’s not some Big Mystery. There was a drought, and people moved south to settle along rivers.

There’s more to it than that—the 21-year drought from 1275-1296 went on unusually long, but it also came at a time when the attempted re-establishment of Chaco cultural organization at the confusingly-and-also-racist-assuption-ly-named Aztec Ruin in northern New Mexico was on the decline anyway, and the political situation of Mesa Verde caused instability and conflict with the extra drought pressures, and archaeologists still strenuously debate whether Athabaskans (ancestors of the Navajo and Apache) moved into the Four Corners region in this time or later, and whether that caused any push-out pressures…

But when I tell people I study Southwest archaeology, I still often hear, “Oh, isn’t it still a big mystery, what happened to the Anasazi? Didn’t they disappear?”

And the answer is. They didn’t disappear. Their descendants simply now live at Hopi, Zuni, Taos, Picuris, Acoma, Cochiti, Isleta, Jemez, Laguna, Nambé, Ohkay Owingeh, Pojoaque, Sandia, San Felipe, Santa Clara, San Ildefonso, Tamaya/Santa Ana, Kewa/Santo Domingo, Tesuque, Zia, and Ysleta del Sur. And/or married into Navajo and Apache groups. The Anasazi/Ancestral Puebloans didn’t disappear any more than you can say the Ancient Romans disappeared because the Coliseum is a ruin that’s not used anymore. And honestly, for the majority of archaeological mysteries about “disappearance,” this is the answer—the socio-political organization changed to something less obvious in the archaeological record, but the people didn’t disappear, they’re still there.

[sophie-frm-mars]

Hi, ex-supporter here. Genuinely hope you’re doing well. I have been tempted to start up my support again because you genuinely are a talented writer/creator and I do enjoy your work.

I hope you understand supporting your Patreon is somewhat fraught. Your private life should be none of our business, but sadly it is relevant here. Moral action, both private and political is central to your work; you have called out plenty of people for abuse & morality drives your politics. We know abuse took place on your end, but that’s all.

A lot of people like myself might be emotionally rooting for you to bounce back from this, but are unable to support you right now because that moral dissonance has not been resolved. We really don’t know if you are like other ‘cancelled’ leftist influencers and just use leftist values to deflect attention away from abuse, or you are actually trying to do better and working on yourself.

You don’t owe us anything. However, many of us who are eager to support you are forced to hold back because trust has been damaged, and there has not been any real sign of reparation or reconciliation. Maybe you think those kind of questions are invasive, maybe you don’t think we are real fans for not sticking by you despite the allegations.

I don’t know, I just want you to know that there are plenty of people who do want to support you, but feel they need to trust you first. And that can’t happen without addressing some things.

Anyways, best wishes. Take care.

Hiya, thank you for speaking to me on this.

Before I say the rest of what I say I want to be clear that between me and the people I was involved with in 2023, there were some instances where I was responsible for harm, there were instances where I received harm and there was also a general pervasive ecosystem of harmful behaviours in the community I was in. This includes people who signed the statement against me, and in one instance one of them did something which everyone to whom I have described it has agreed is sexual assault, though there is more besides.

For the time being I'm not talking publicly more about what happened because it was a very messy situation, and although I have been seriously harmed by issues in my personal life being litigated in public in this way, I don't want to give my full account of my relationships with everyone involved because I don't want that type of harm to be done to other trans women. There are plenty of complicating factors as there often are in real life that social media isn't really capable of parsing. I have made it clear repeatedly that I am open to hearing anything that people involved want to say to me, and I talked in this post in January about that and about what I would be doing to ensure that I put in the work and make sure I don't cause harm like it again

https://x.com/sophie_frm_mars/status/1745414530455261531

I think that that post says everything I would like to say for now, although I regret saying I agree that my behaviour was abusive, because with more distance and perspective I don't think abusive behaviour was actually described to me.

As I understand it via the support that my therapist and friends have offered, my problems in 2023 were that: I wasn't taking my mental health seriously, I didn't learn good kink practice, I had very little appreciation of my own boundaries and when I shouldn't be doing something that someone asks me to do, and I was high basically all the time. I am in therapy and doing DBT and taking my mental health deadly seriously, I have done a huge amount of reading assigned by my therapist about kink, sex, relationships and mental health, I am working in an ongoing way on learning how to effectively communicate, know my boundaries and understand myself well enough to not be in the kinds of situations that risk harm, and I'm no longer high all the time.

(If anyone is interested in those book recs, so far I've read: Tomorrow Sex Will Be Good Again by Katherine Angel; The Right To Sex by Amia Srinivasan; Screw Consent (I hate this edgy title) by Joseph Fischel; Playing Well With Others; The Loving Dominant by John and Libby Warren; I Hope We Choose Love by Kai Cheng Thom; The New Topping Book by Dossie Easton and Janet W Hardy; and Dissociation Made Simple by Jamie Marich. There have been some others, and I've written a bit about them in the book club channel on my discord as I've been reading)

I haven't heard from the people involved. The last I heard from anyone was one of my exes calling me a pathological liar and saying that they just want to move on with their lives, so while I'm doing the work to make sure I act better in future I am just trying to get on with my life and let them get on with theirs. I hope this clarifies why I have not talked further about the situation.

I will say that the last few months have been hellish for me. I have been frequently suicidal, I spent Christmas and new years alone, I lost a tooth because I couldn't afford proper dental treatment, people from within the community I've been ostracised from have been putting pressure on my remaining friends to cut ties with me, Keffals had my abuser on her twitch stream, a bizarre exaggerated and monsterised version of my personal life has been publicly gossiped about by trans people, fash and "leftist" drama streamers alike, I have been doing other work to make sure I can still pay rent and afford my bills and my HRT, and to survive. As I've been getting more stable and more able to focus on things besides this, I've been working on new writing because all I want with regard to my work and my channel is for my writing to help people. I don't want to talk about my private life, but I do understand that some number of people will feel after what has been said about me that they can't move forward with me without hearing the full details. Lots of people in my life have repeatedly encouraged me to publish a full account of everything that happened but I know how the Internet works and I don't want other trans women to be harmed in the ways that I have been harmed.

[bunji-enthusiast]

Could I request Poppy Playtime Dr. Harley Swayer x oc, sfw and nsfw? Please and thank you!

More oc times, nehehehe. Hope this was okay! As usual it does take an analytical stance as I often do in most headcanons.

SFW

At first, Mira would keep her distance from Sawyer. She would be cautious about his erratic, cold nature. While she would see glimpses of the broken person he is underneath, she’d be slow to trust him due to his cruel past. Mira, being intelligent and observant, would likely analyze him from afar, wary of his potential for violence.

As they spend more time together, Mira's kindness and steadfast loyalty would clash with Sawyer’s lack of empathy and narcissism. She might try to understand why he acts the way he does, attempting to reach the human side of him that is buried under layers of coldness. Sawyer, on the other hand, would be dismissive of her attempts to show him kindness, seeing it as a weakness or even as an annoyance.

Despite his cruelty, Sawyer would admire Mira’s intellect and problem-solving abilities. Her logical approach to things would intrigue him, especially in a world that he has often manipulated and controlled. Sawyer might even find himself grudgingly respecting her, though he would never admit it out loud. Mira, too, would appreciate his sharp mind, although she would recognize the darkness within him.

While Sawyer is cruel and manipulative, there’s something about Mira that would awaken a sense of protectiveness in him. It’s not because he feels true care, but because she represents something pure that he finds himself unwilling to break. Despite his volatile nature, he’d go to extreme lengths to keep her safe, though he would never let her know that his protective actions stem from anything beyond a need for control or a selfish form of attachment.

Mira would often find herself struggling to reconcile the person Sawyer was with the man he is now. His lack of empathy and his manipulative tendencies would challenge her belief in the inherent goodness of people. She might try to heal him, but the more she learns about his past, the more she’d realize that some scars can’t be erased. Still, she would never fully give up on him, holding onto a sliver of hope that the person he was can be rediscovered.

While their relationship would likely be fraught with tension, there would be moments of subtle connection. Mira might notice small, unexpected gestures from Sawyer—like when he quietly defends her from a situation or offers her something out of the blue, perhaps as a twisted form of "respect." These moments would create a sense of intimacy, and though they are rare, Mira would cherish them, believing they signify the possibility of a deeper bond beneath the surface.

Despite his cruel nature, Sawyer would eventually realize that Mira’s strength lies not in her physical power but in her emotional resilience. He may try to manipulate her or assert control over her, but Mira’s intelligence, steadfast loyalty, and willingness to stand her ground would frustrate him. It would become a subtle battle of wills between them, with Sawyer trying to dominate and Mira pushing back through her quiet, determined nature.

As their relationship develops, Mira would come to understand that she can't change Sawyer. She might even come to accept that, in his own twisted way, he cares about her. The romance would be far from conventional—there would be moments of tenderness, but also cruelty and manipulation, perhaps leading to a toxic, yet oddly dependent, relationship where both are bound by their own needs and desires.

Mira’s tendency toward pessimism could make her often skeptical of their future together. She would worry about being hurt by Sawyer, but at the same time, his cynical worldview would resonate with her darker side. She might find herself drawn into his complicated existence, both frustrated and fascinated by his inability to change.

Though it would be a long, arduous journey, there could be moments when Sawyer shows a side of himself that makes Mira question everything she thought she knew about him. His actions could become more unpredictable, and in some ways, Mira might help him recognize his own brokenness. For Sawyer, Mira’s steadiness and kindness could slowly erode his bitter outlook on life, though it’s likely he'd never admit it. Together, they could begin to heal each other—perhaps not perfectly, but in a way that is deeply transformative for both.

NSFW

Being intimate with Sawyer takes a different level of patience and skill, especially if it’s not the human being version of him. Even down well the depths of the factory, he’s a cold person at heart, it’s essentially what he’s used to. Appearances and all, due to his nature of reluctance to forming relationships and attachments with people; para-social relations or not. Yet somehow Mira managed to worm her way into his heart this way, it’s unclear at first if he’s staving a way for Mira’s pleasure. As he is personally focused on his own.

Sawyer takes on an analytical approach to it in a way, searching for what makes Mira’s body tick in such ways. Even if veining his potential for violence, he doesn’t have that sort of confidence to violate her body. The doctor much prefers the inner-workings, and that’s through slicing her skin. Though he eventually backs off and admits to her that sexual intimacy is new to him, in the way he had not been to find interest in such a thing.

The doctor isn’t opposed to trying something different if Mira suggests so, or if he brings up the matter. Trying such new things is very experimental for him, which ties into his fascination to see what makes Mira so pleasured.

It’s very much a private affair, he ensures personal privacy. Sawyer may say a lot of things but he knows the importance of intimacy, without public knowledge of such things. Nothing spontaneous either, it’s an eased into thing, and he derives great interest in building up the tension with Mira.

Combined with his knowledge of the human body and experience with the human state, he garners great personal experience in knowing Mira’s body. It can extend to even daily and regular things, such as meetings or activities, he’s tuned to Mira — in a way — and knows if she is uncomfortable or angry about something.

Even if unintentionally, Mira can rile up Sawyer. He finds it difficult and pretentious, but a hint of amusement as well. It’s all quite an interesting process.

[copperbadge]

Hello, Mr. Badge, I seem to remember that you once posted about your processes and systems for staying organized in life with Excel spreadsheets etc. I’ve been struggling a lot with depression and executive dysfunction issues and don’t want it to impact my work.

Do you use the same processes at work? I get overwhelmed with the amount of documentation we have and the exceptions to the rules in our processes.

I'm so sorry you're struggling! It's really rough, and the more complicated the task feels, the more fraught it seems, the harder it is to even get a start. I feel that hard.

As for organizing work like my home life....well, it's sort of the same. I don't make a strong distinction between life and work simply because a lot of what needs organizing in my life IS my work, so it's tough to talk about them separately.

For example, I use Google Tasks to build a to-do list each day, but that to-do list starts with "stuff I'll do before work" then "shower" then all my work stuff, then "evening" and then all the stuff to do after work, ending with "7pm chores" (because I have a lot of stuff to do right around 7pm, which I need to post about elsewhere). Then the stuff I've pushed off to next day is below that, and that just bumps up the next morning. What's important isn't really how I keep the list, but that I keep it in a way that is constantly accessible, and I've trained myself to 1. put everything on it, even stuff like "grocery shop" and 2. check it whenever I feel lost. I don't find google calendars very helpful, however, so while work makes me use one for meetings, everything else goes on a calendar I made in Google Sheets that I'm just super used to by now.

It sounds like you're having a fairly specific issue, which may not even be related to your mental health (though assuredly the mental health issues aren't helping). If you have a lot of confusing documentation and exceptions in the stuff you do at work, that can be legit stressful even for someone who isn't dealing with other stuff, so I just want you to know that this may not only be a You Problem. My problem is usually the opposite, in that I'm often the first person doing something, or the only person who's done it in a while, so there's no documentation at all. But when I do have documentation I often will simply rewrite it.

After all, just because you have a handbook doesn't mean you have to use it. You can copy it over into another document and make yourself a step-by-step guide and/or a checklist. Like, I do our holiday cards every year, and my "HOLIDAY CARDS" document says "Here's the first thing you do, here's the second, do this before going past that, check this before asking for that". Literally at one point the document says "Stop. Before you go any further, do this step. Even if you don't understand why, do this step" because in the past I've disregarded that instruction ("Why on earth would I do it this way?") and lived to regret it.

Making the guide really, really sucks. Often it will take me four or five passes at a project before my guide is comprehensive (this is my fifth year doing the holiday card project and the document still has some steps missing at the end). But once you have it, it's invaluable, and often in the past I've found other people want my guides because they're fairly clear and precise about what needs doing when. For example, you might say, "Open the file and move column B to in front of column A. NOTE: THERE IS ONE EXCEPTION, THIS IS THE EXCEPTION." Or "Once you've saved the file, save a second copy to your backup folder so you can go back to it if you delete something you shouldn't. Stop and check: is this file from before or after October? If after, remember, you have to also rename it." If you find that there's a mistake you make frequently, figure out what would stop you from making it and add that in.

(We had a guy at work whose last name was VERY long and Italian, and so when I was working phones he got a special entry in the directory document I made -- the first line was all his directory info and the second line was just the phonetic pronunciation of his last name. He found out, which I had never intended him to do, and lost his shit laughing. "No wonder you're the only one who gets it right!")

So my recommendation to you is to create your own handbook, your own templates, and your own way of doing things and just slip that back into the system you have at work. Draw a diagram by hand if you need a flow chart. My approach to all my organizational issues has always been "What would make me do this correctly / prevent me from doing that thing wrong / remind me what to do / make it easier for me to start".

I think of this nowadays as the "Take the cupboard doors off" school of organizing, because to really make full use of my kitchen in a way that I liked, I had to take some of the cupboard doors off. It looks messier and kind of cheap, but it's actually a much more organized system now, and who's in my kitchen other than me?

[txttletale]

youve mentioned offhand ur issues with thirsty sword lesbians, have u talked at length abt this somewhere before and if not do u want to? i want to hear ur thoughts hehe

now before i get into this i want to clarify: i like thirsty sword lesbians, overall! i think it takes some of the best stuff from monster hearts and refines it -- i think it does great and exciting things with pbta playbooks -- i think anyone making a pbta game should check it out because it's full of valuable ideas -- and i've had a lot of fun playing it!

however, i think it's just as flawed as it is brilliant. there's a few different flaws but the biggest one for me is a catastrophic clash between two things the game is trying to be. one on hand, it wants to be a catradora rpg. there's no shame in that, i love games that wear their influences on their sleeves--TSL¹ wants to be a game about kissing your rival after you've both been disarmed, about having a fraught and complicated relationship with your girl best friend who abandoned you to serve the dark lord, about having homoerotic sword duels where your blades lock and you stare into each other's eyes for just one second too long before one of you kicks the other in the chest. i think that's an admirable goal for an RPG and one that TSL hits a lot of the notes of--the fact that the move to "Figure Someone Out" has special questions you can only ask someone when you're duelling them is incredible design. the Strings system, adapted from Monsterhearts, the ability to fluster your enemies when you use the Entice move, the constant focus on what characters desire and how their actions conflict with those desires--so much of the game is working towards that!

unfortunately, the game also wants to be about queer resistance to homophobia and capitalist/imperialist hegemony. this is clear in its sample settings, with their eyerollingly on-the-nose conflicts like defending 'queertopia' and fighting the evil sorceress 'repressia'. but much more importantly, it's clear in the game. several of the playbooks are defined by their relationship to sexual hegemony--the beast is about someone who is othered and monsterised for expressing their existence and the seeker is about someone sheltered and prejudiced moving past that and discovering themselvs and others. like, it's not subtle--

and to be clear, there's nothing wrong with that, either. just as i like a lot of TSL's swashbuckling girl-romancing flirting-at-swordpoint mechanics, i really appreciated how (although the game's outlook on what these forces are is predicably liberal and its tonal approach to these things is one that i personally find teeth-grindingly insufferable) these things are actually integrated into its mechanics. playbooks like the beast and the seeker (and the rest!) imply something about the world the game is set in and its sexual politics. this game is meaningfully queer in the way something like dream askew is, in that its mechanics ask you to actually explore your character's queerness specifically. this is good, and it's something that elevates it above about 90% of ttrpg stuff that sells itself as queer.

so if both these things are good, what's the problem? well, it's that they're two great (or at least--interesting) tastes that go fucking horribly together. the fundamental problem that i have with TSL and one that i think takes a lot of work to get around in your own campaigns is that it simultaneously wants you to be fighting (on the individual level) a lot of antiheroic ultimately sympathetic hot girls you can flirt with and kiss--a lot of 'i can fix her's or 'she can make me worse's--and on the broader narrative wants you to be fighting institutional queerphobia (and often, although this is nowhere near as actually supported by mechanics, a more generalized 'imperialism' or 'capitalism' or 'bigotry'). so you end up fighting 'those stupid sexy homophobes'--people who are according to the text (not just 'lore', but the rules text, the mechanics you're playing with!) simultaneously the violent enforcers of cisheteropatriarchy and a bunch of fuckable lesbians with sympathetic backstories.

& i just think those things are fundamentally at odds. the result is a game that if you try and play it at face value works at cross purposes with itself, attempting to do two perfectly valid things without considering what happens when the streams cross.

it also has a few other flaws--like many other PBTA games, its balance falls apart if you play any long campaign (my group and i had to figure out special alternative level-up rewards!) but it comes with no inbuilt way to neatly conclude a campaign or character. its tone is something that, as i often mention, i absolutely cannot fucking stand--it has a certain sense of humour that feels profoundly dated to me and was never my cup of tea when it was in vogue. this is something i try not to hold against the game bc it is very much a personal taste-level 'cringe' reaction but the game lays it on pretty fucking thick.

more to its detriment, it is profoundly, gratingly liberal in the exact way people who deploy that tone usually are. its understanding of anything outside queerphobia specifically is just a purely aesthetic & thoughtless 'imperialism is bad!'. it manages a more nuanced understanding of homophobia, but it only manages it on the individual level--for a game about queerness and about fighting systems of cisheteronormativity, it has no systemic or material understanding of these systems and no interest in establishing one.

and finally--and this is just one paragraph but it's so fucking awful i feel the need to complain about it here because i think about it often as an example of something i never want to write:

this sucks! real bad! so deeply fucking silly to reassure people in your game that you called Thirsty Sword Lesbians that it's okay if you want to be cishet. like, it would be one thing to make a game where you can neatly extract the lesbianism and have the same game, a surface-level aesthetically queer game with no actual interest in queerness except as a marketing term. it would fucking suck but this paragraph would at least describe such a game. but TSL isn't that!!! . 'thirsty sword cishets' would be a very different and much worse game! awful and self-defeating paragraph. deeply silly concern to address and give airtime to. i didn't buy a game called 'thirsty sword lesbians' to be told 'its okay to be heterosexual i pwommy'

so yea just to reiterate: i like the game overall, i think there's a lot of good valuable stuff in there designwise despite all this. but i'm very ambivalent about it--ironically, i feel a love-hate relationship with this game about love-hate relationships. i admire it and yet i despise it! i long to put it at the tip of my sword and slowly tilt its cover up so that the pages look up at me coquettishly but with burning anger in their page numbers. if this book was a person id hatefuck it, is the joke, thats the joke im making, here, in this post. thanks

¹ i call it TSL whenever i can because the name 'Thirsty Sword Lesbians' makes me cringe out of my fucking skin. genuinely horrible name. i'm sure it's funny the first time you hear it, i got a mild chuckle the first time i heard it to, but it's such an obnoxious thing ot have to say repeatedly when seriously discussing it. should have stayed a placeholder name amiguitas

[nekropsii]

im thinking about the relationship between kankri and porrim because its just so fucking WEIRD like theyre obviously important to eachother or care about eachother to some extent but we dont really know why?? like they dont seem to get along very well

she patronizes him constantly (which is VERY loaded considering they lived on fucking beforus) and ignores his boundaries (calling him patronizing nicknames he doesnt like, wiping his face while he tried to push her off) and he constantly makes insensitive bitchy bigoted comments that go against all of her values and make her angry

and theres not the same dynamic dolorosa and signless had where she raised him like theyre the same age so why do they even talk to eachother?? what is their relationship?? like were they childhood friends or something?? itd make sense if they were both a little different as kids and therefore got along better but then why do they still talk to eachother when they really dont now ITS SO WEIRD

It's... Complicated. They go way back, as far as I can tell.

The way I see it, they do not have a "Mother and Son" relationship- I find that most who assert this often place far too much maturity onto Porrim, who is literally 19 years old. It's more like an Adoptive/Found Sibling relationship between someone with a severe case of Eldest Daughter Syndrome and the social conditioning of a higher-end Midblood on Beforus, and someone with a chronic case of Only Child and the social conditioning of a Mutant Lime on Beforus. The relationship makes more sense to me when you view it this way. It's just... A fraught sibling relationship, formed under societal pressures we can't even fathom. Porrim Maryam, trained by society to cull those beneath her, trying hard not to, and for the most succeeding outside of someone very close to her, and Kankri Vantas, culled and isolated his whole life, becoming a total suck-up to the deeply misogynistic, ableist, hemoloyal culling system as both a method of self defense and as a wielding of the only weapon he really knows. It was used against him all the time, and it works, doesn't it? If sucking up to Able-Bodied Male Highbloods and ridiculing everyone beneath that golden standard is the best way to ensure safety, then he's gonna do it. He's essentially a lifelong voter for the Leopards Eating People's Faces Party.

Ultimately, I think what keeps Porrim by his side is that... I think she believes in him. It's like watching yourself lose your sibling to the Alt-Right Pipeline. I think she thinks he doesn't actually believe most of what he's saying, and that this is all deeply reflexive. She's smart enough to recognize the real systemic issues at play here, and that he's essentially caught in chains between 5 different machines that all want him dead. And she's right. When you actually read the shit Kankri's saying, it becomes almost immediately apparent that he's spouting bullshit, and that he absolutely knows this. I think what keeps Kankri by her side is that he knows she cares about him. There isn't any denying it. She might infringe on boundaries, or be generally annoying to him, and keeps doing that frustrating little thing called seeing through his and everyone else's bullshit and calling them out on it- not just including but especially his- but she cares. I think he knows that at the end of all things what he'd have left is her. Is this to say that if you got Kankri to grow a spine and genuinely believe in things that aren't spoonfeedings of the latest Conservative Highblood Talking Point/Psy-Op, he'd be a good person? Hell no. No way. He has a raging savior complex and is way too eager to throw other people under the bus and insult/ridicule them to their faces. He's an asshole. Just completely slimy.

But, again, sibling relationships know no bounds. This kind of dynamic just feels so... Realistic to me. The way their relationship is so strained but still so strong and ongoing just feels so human. I don't know. This is pretty meandering, I just think about them a lot.

[unhetalia]

any headcanons for alfreds relationships and/or friendships and/or toleranceships with other nations?

Honestly I tend to have a few different versions of one relationship depending on my mood, and for every Alfred ship I like (England, Russia, Germany), the other two relationships have to change with it.

For England, it's the most complicated, because I either have him and Alfred as endgame, or I frame their relationship as father/son, which a lot of people are understandably confused about.

For me, it's pretty simple: these two will always be important to each other in a way that is completely unique from their relationship to anyone else. Don't want to spend too long on them, but their father/son relationship tends to be close, and you can't avoid one if you want to be around the other.

In their endgame universe, things are fraught for a long while, and this tends to be the slowest burn out of all the 'ships. However, Arthur does not let Al out of his sight easily, even if their relationship isn't the most friendly. This relationship basically needs a post of its own, but "complicated yet as always, filled with love" might have to sum it up.

Ivan and Alfred start working together after the Cuban Missile Crisis, when Alfred is forced out of hiding civilian life in order to prevent all-out nuclear war between their countries. They hate each other, at first — Ivan thinks Alfred is selfish for abandoning his government despite disagreeing with them, Alfred thinks Ivan is a coward for not leaving, but eventually they grow to really understand each other. They're together by 1980, and in public AU, Ivan really helps Al when he's ostracised by his people.

If they're not endgame, Ivan is in love with Alfred and he either carries on a charade of hating him in order to be in his space and to make it so Alfred's at least THINKING of him, or they're just... colleagues. Which is sad.

I always have Kiku as being quietly in love with Al, but unwilling to do anything about it. Sometimes, their friendship is unimpacted, and they're close, but sometimes I like to have Al more lonely, and Kiku's feelings will lead to him distancing himself from Alfred. When they're close, Alfred tends to have a bigger group of friends - Taiwan, nyo Philippines, South Korea, nyo India - but when they're not, it usually means I'm craving for a loneloer Alfred. I guess this means his friendship with Kiku leads to his friendship with these others, somehow.

Belarus is (alongside Tony), Alfred's best friend. Alfred isn't scared of Belarus, and Belarus is surprisingly a really good listener - she doesn't get impatient when Alfred talks about x topic for too long, and will even ask (practical) questions. They're not touchy feely, but the two of them accept the other as they are, and both of them need that.

Matthew is another one that needs his own post — I default to a Matthew that both resents his brother yet loves him to the point of obsession. Alfred is oblivious, and always forgives Matthew when he lashes out.

Mexico is their older sister who blatantly favours Alfred (further adding to Matthew's issues). She and Alfred have similar life trajectories - violent revolution and rejection of the traditional "Nation works for government." Matthew's the complete opposite on both fronts, so she just finds it hard to connect with him. Mexico is incredibly independent and can go years without seeing either of her siblings, so she's not in the picture very often, and is not really the type you would talk to about your problems or feelings.

France and Alfred are very close, and I've spoken about that a few times, so I won't go on (/tagged/re: face). There's a lot of mutual respect there.

Scotland adores Alfred, and Alfred adores him right back, and he treats Al completely different to Arthur's other colonies. Northern Ireland and nyo Ireland are similarly close with Alfred, and it's only Wales who does't actually care for Alfred at all and doesn't approve of him.

China is fond of Alfred but mostly in a distant way - he's mostly concerned with his siblings and himself.

Cuba loathes Alfred because he believes if Al had done his job, his people wouldn't have been impacted the way they were. Most people who dislike Alfred are in the same boat. These include, surprisingly, Spain and Portugal, who both see Alfred as irresponsible and "not doing his duty right."

Similarly, there's a subsection of England's colonies/ex colonies who resent Al. Anguilla, Barbados, Bermuda, Gibraltar, Falkland Islands. (Canada).

If you have any characters you want to ask about in particular, please do!

[bestworstcase]

I am vexed bestworstcase, vexed! I am trying to write dialogue/interactions between Salem and Oscar and struggling with their characterizations. I keep turning the interrogation/false-start reunion scene in the whale over and over again in my mind. What would it look like for Oscar and Salem to be forced to talk to and interact with each other on more even ground or working towards a truce? (With a big ol Oz shaped elephant in the room.) I want to get across Oscar as an active participant with autonomy and not flatten him, while also reckoning with Salem’s complex headspace around this whole shitshow. Do you have an idea of how you’d approach writing that dynamic? Any advice on how to make such a dynamic hold true to their characters while being an interesting exploration of their relationship? [What fucking happens if they’re kind to each other when they’re both expecting cruelty???] Genuinely interested in your thoughts on this considering the show itself will inevitable have to revisit this dynamic at its climax and conclusion

basics first. my general read on salem is that she has a solid grasp of what makes people tick but struggles to articulate her thoughts clearly, and this has cascading impacts on her speech: if she isn’t delivering planned and rehearsed remarks, she seems to either circumlocute (in ways that are, textually, confusing: “what are you saying” + her inner circle’s wildly different interpretations of what she means) or just say nothing at all.

i think this reading explains salem’s manner of speech far better than the pure ‘manipulative, lying puppetmaster’ angle a lot of the fandom ascribes to her, because there are these incidents—like the interrogation scene—where salem is being manipulative and her tactics are very cunning but undermined by her erratic or flat affect and unclear speech; if she were a masterful manipulator being cryptic on purpose for the sake of deception, she would be able to turn that off and speak plainly in situations where being cryptic is counterproductive to her purpose. but it really doesn’t seem like she can do that.

complicating all this is that 1. i think salem is aware that she’s Not Good at conversation, and 2. she wants to be understood. her constant seething about ozma’s lies is partly from the traumatic betrayal of her trust and also partly because he’s spent the intervening centuries poisoning the well against her to ensure that anyone who meets her will have the preconceived notion that she’s an unfeeling, unreasonable, inhuman monster. so there’s a degree of self-protection in her silence and her aversion to talking about herself, i think—if ozma couldn’t give her the benefit of the doubt, why would she expect better from anyone else?

with oscar specifically—i’m assuming a post-v8/9 context—there’s also the complication of salem having. tortured him. the last time they spoke which i feel is almost a bigger goliath in the room than oz is, because salem is actually pretty on the ball with separating oscar from her feelings about ozma. but the torture is very personal and very fraught for both of them; do you acknowledge it? apologize? ask for an apology? if oscar doesn’t bring it up, should she? is salem doesn’t acknowledge what she did, how does oscar navigate whatever feelings he might have about that or assumptions he might make as to why (is she pretending it never happened? does she think it doesn’t matter? will she get angry if he brings it up? the last time he tried to reason with someone ironwood shot him off a ledge)? it’s delicate.

some uh, general things that i try to hold in mind when i write dialogue for salem:

what is she thinking and not saying?

why isn’t she saying it? is she afraid of not being understood or is she not able to see the gaps or is she not sure how to put it into words?

what does she mean?

is this something she planned out in advance (or something she talks about often enough to have a sort of script in her mind), or is she speaking off the cuff?

when in doubt, she should probably say less

remember that her affect gets erratic and weird when she’s really uncertain

does she have people on her side whom she can kind of rely on to fill in the gaps (eg, summer) or is she on her own?

her soliloquies are eloquent, even poetic; her speech tends to be simpler. she rarely uses metaphors in conversation.

she tends to answer questions by giving examples that imply her intended meaning, and i am… not sure she realizes that she’s doing it. (cinder in v5 is a good example: salem says “never underestimate the usefulness of others; take leonardo, he was one of ozpin’s most trusted, and now…” when what she means is she’s hoping she can turn ruby against oz later)

when she isn’t sure how to respond she sort of stares blankly into the middle distance for a second or two. (she does it with cinder in v5 and oscar in v8)

oscar is similar in a way because i think he spends a lot of time in his head and it’s rare for him to get to a point of emotional enough to let out… any of the deep existential fear he’s living in, and i get the sense that he’s very conscious of what he says—which can come out in awkward stammering but also in a very deliberate cadence when he’s feeling more confident or determined or too focused on what he’s trying to express to feel self-conscious about it. but at the same time he’s easier because he doesn’t have, gestures at salem and her labyrinth of emotional armor, all of that. and wasn’t alone for millions of years.

with the specific context of olive branches and peace talks i think—esp at first—salem’s liable to be pretty tangibly awkward? because being asked questions and engaged with like a Person instead of a Fairytale Witch runs so counter to her expectations for how people will treat her. kind of a rattling experience, and nerve-wracking.

rewatching scenes is always useful. i try to take note of like body language and cadence ’cause achieving dialogue that feels in character is as much about how the character talks as what sort of things they say. and also thinking about character goals and emotionality—what are they trying to get from this interaction, how do their feelings influence their speech, do they succeed or fail and why?—is helpful too. what motivates the words they say? what motivates the thoughts they keep to themselves?

[ilikereadingactually]

Asunder

Asunder by Kerstin Hall

i've been seeing a LOT of marketing for this book, so i was pretty excited to get around to reading it. i think there are many really intriguing ideas here! the world Hall has created certainly feels broad, and her characters are distinct and each have their own charms. I can definitely understand the kind of reader this book is for! unfortunately it didn't really make full enough use of the ideas and world and characters for me, and what was probably intended to be a heartbreaking ending instead felt somewhat confusing and a little bit flat.

the cosmologies and political/social divisions in this world are quite complicated: there are dead (or mostly dead) old gods, the Bhatuma, who were slayed by the newer demonic Ephirite, and humans might work either Bhatuma or Ephirite magic depending on their culture. the main character, Karys, has sold her soul to a horrifying Ephirite in order to be able to communicate with ghosts and see the inner workings of both kinds of magics by opening the Veneer. there are also clearly political divisions, marked by borders and by bias; Karys's status as a deathspeaker clearly holds different connotations to different secondary characters and in some cases puts her in danger, while other kinds of magic—like the Hounds, dog-like taxis with bowls for backs, and the Silkess, a giant spider that serves as a kind of train—seem ordinary, or at least not scorned. i wanted to know so much more about every single one of these elements! this is the sort of fantasy that drops the reader right in without a lot of exposition up front, which i personally adore, but that method requires eventual payoffs for the trust we're asked to extend. i was very willing to go with the flow, but i never felt that any of the underpinnings of this world were adequately explained or demonstrated.

then there's Karys, and the man she is accidentally sharing a body with, Ferain. their banter is very charming; as i've said on this blog before, romantic plotlines are not really my thing, but the slow building of trust and camaraderie between them will definitely appeal to many readers! we get to see bits of their backstories, particularly Karys, and i did grow fond of them both as the story went on. but the side characters who gather along the quest felt charming but a bit shallow to me; i wanted to know them, and wanted to like them, and by the end still felt that i didn't have a good handle on who they each were as people at all.

i have to say though, this was a pretty long book, but it was a speedy read in spite of my struggles with it! the plot moves along at a good clip, and it was compelling enough to carry me through. i often felt a bit unsure as to why plot points were happening, and how they connected to the rest of the story, but the prose itself was very readable and hooked me right in. that said, the ending really didn't do it for me, emotionally or narratively—but again, romance is not my thing, and the book took a much more romantic turn at the end, so ymmv.

i think my final takeaway here is that i had a really good time reading this book, even though it didn't blow me away—and i think for readers who are less invested in the whys and hows and more interested in fast-paced action, some h/c goodness, and the romance of it all, this will be a hit.

the deets

how i read it: an e-galley from NetGalley, as per usual these days!

try this if you: dig a big-feeling fantasy world, enjoy some demonic horror in your books, love a fraught and fun "there was only one body" situation, or are into bi tsundere heroines.

a line i really liked:

Marishka watched her eat, smiling slightly. She stroked her rabbit's pale ears. "I heard an interesting story this morning," she said. Karys swallowed a mouthful of dipped bread. "Oh?" "Apparently Scuttlers was visited by a Lure during the night. A naked woman rose out of the sea, tempting the good people of Psikamit to a dance below the waves." Karys finished the last bite of her bread, and reached for another piece. "I wasn't naked," she said.

pub date: August 20, 2024! it's out there, go forth and find it!

[3liza]

saw someone call tbe Margaret Mead femur thing "bullshit" the other day so I just looked it up and it seems that at worst the exact quote about the femur is considered possibly apocryphal, it's cited in a lot of books by people who were her contemporaries and definitely could have heard it at a lecture, but was never explicitly confirmed or recorded on tape by Mead herself.

there's also a debate (which I know NOTHING ABOUT) I am just reporting what I read in a few legit-seeming articles today) between people who think her book about Samoan teenagers was western fantasy nonsense (reasonable accusation), or that she was even explicitly hoaxed by the people she was writing about (this also has precedent), but the guy who wrote the book in which all of these refutations of Mead's work is himself a known crackpot who was extremely mad at her and likes to do stuff like lobby other researcher's schools to try to get their phds revoked. and the people he was interviewing may, themselves, have had good reasons to lie to him about the whole thing.

I don't know if there is Samoan consensus about this incident either but the Pacific cultures are not a monolith, not even within Samoan culture, and have extremely differing mores between them, and the colonization and exploitation of those islands has explicitly been targeted at destroying their pre-european contact cultures, so it's entirely possible that one culture would agree with Mead while another would agree with her detractors, with no hoaxing or just trying to fob off the meddlesome white people even needing to be involved. it's also possible that in 1928 when her book came out everything she observed within her observation area was true and settler colonialism has destroyed the culture that existed at that time.

anthropology in general is both extremely fraught and extremely complicated even before you start factoring in the personal biases of the researchers and how rapidly the acceptability of various truisms change over the decades. but it doesn't appear that the femur anecdote is known to be a hoax, or misquote, or bullshit, it just seems to be apocryphal, which is worth pointing out but not the same thing. healed bones appear in a lot of animal species however so maybe the original intent was to dismiss the claim that it is unique to humanity or to "civilization", which is true, it is not unique. I think a healed bone often does signify love and social interpersonal caretaking but those things aren't unique to humans.

[this-daydream-is-dangerous-13]

First of all, I can't thank you enough for all the work you have put out on Haylor. Also, I was relieved to see your analogy of TK and agree with it. My question to you is do you think that Blondie knows that she's hurting Harry by getting with someone else so quickly? I never imagined that she would do this after the fiasco with MH. I'm also afraid that she's looking for an excuse to not make a commitment to Harry.

TYSM for your kind words, Anon. It is a lot of fun to have somewhere to outline all these thoughts and discuss them because I don’t have IRL, local friends who want to discuss Haylor with me. It’s been a joy interacting with you all here.

On to your questions: I think Blondie is the queen of compartmentalization and keeping her shit held close to her chest. If she lets herself think about it, she would for sure realize her choices hurt H. I just don’t think she is letting herself think about that right now.

In my social media avoidance, I am listening to the audiobook of Jennette McCurdy’s harrowing “I’m Glad My Mom Died”. One particular passage jumped out at me earlier today:

- while her Mom was in hospice and dying, McCurdy broke up with her the guy she’d been seeing. Looking back, she admitted that it was so much easier to just pursue the heady, infatuation stages of relationships and run away when things started to get serious because that required honesty and compromise and vulnerability and hard work. And I thought: bingo!

For weeks, I have been saying TK is uncomplicated. We know that Blondie sure loves the “delicate beginning rush” (and H adores that delicate point of view) because it’s FUN! And carefree! And all the discussions about “how do we merge lives? Deal with communication issues? Etc.” are all well in the future.

The May MH fiasco was a reunion of sorts, and I bet early on Blondie was like “and thaasaaaat’s why it didn’t work out last time. Shit.” I speak from personal experience when I say that reunions are initially amazing, but very quickly force some hard conversations about all the things that led to the breakdown in the first place. And that is scary and hard. And doable, sure, but complicated.

Story time: when we were 17 and 19, I fell deeply in love with my best male friend. We dated for a couple years but broke up because we needed to grow up and figure our shit out. The in between times were messy (and included me drunkenly enacting the song Question….? when he dated someone I hated despite me having a different LT boyfriend). We reunited at 22 and 24, and it was amazing at first and then quickly became fraught. We legit had a discussion where we agreed: “our options are (a) this goes the distance or (b) we cannot speak again” because we couldn’t just be friends anymore. We figured out shit out and are happily (and beautifully imperfectly) married, but it took and takes work. It is absolutely worth it but it is hard! And it really could have gone either way.

So the prospect an actual, official public reunion—knowing that they’ve publicly cultivated the “peaceful friendship” Tree told us all about after the Grammys—is scary and risky. It might be too much for them ever to contemplate, even if they want to be together otherwise. And Blondie has been through what many people (me included) would consider a divorce. Hell, same with HS and the OW coparenting stuff. They’ve both been vulnerable then badly burned in the recent past.

So I think Blondie continues to run (which @womanexile tells me is often what one TF does). And new relationships have no baggage, at least at first. So here we are.

What do you think, besties?

[astraveil]

would love to know the dynamic between Astra and Y'shtola

HOO BOY I HAVE A LOT OF THOUGHTS ABOUT THEM ACTUALLY

Y’shtola and Astra weren’t exactly close in ARR; comrades, sure, but on a level most would consider just cordial. Getting to know each other better through the ordeal that was pre-Titan events and commiserating with the absurdity of it all, the two grew closer over time and would have certainly considered themselves good friends by the end of 2.0.

After ARR and the events of the Crystal Tower raids specifically, Astra was a fucking MESS. Heavensward was essentially the peak of her self-destructive behavior, throwing herself headlong into danger and into the arms of whoever she deemed fit for a night (with the okay from Aethis, of course). This included Y’shtola.

Even if the both of them look back on that time with a bit of regret, as neither of them were entirely in the best headspace when it all unfolded, both Astra and Y’shtola understand the importance of opening up to each other more than they did in the past.

They’re close now, a certain desire to protect the other blossoming between them even if it largely goes unspoken. Y’shtola is often the one that reminds Astra of the importance of taking care of herself, the whole of Shadowbringers opening her eyes to the lengths Astra would go to protect and not worry her friends and loved ones, especially at the cost of her own health and safety. It frustrates her, but she understands where it comes from, many a conversation being had between them as if they’d always been close from the start. Fraught with a certain tension at times, closer than most would consider a simple friendship to be, but then again…a lot of things in Astra’s life are quite complicated. They’ve learned to live with it, never broaching beyond that unless they were both absolutely certain they needed more than just each other’s company at any point (this includes parts of shadowbringers. things were stressful).

Even in the face of Astra’s near-death in Endwalker, Y’shtola would always stay just close enough by her side as she recovered over those few moons, helping where she was needed and reminding Aethis and G’raha to not run themselves completely ragged in the face of it. She could’ve sworn she heard Astra call her Shtola in the wee hours of the morning at least once, beads of sweat on her brow and locked in the midst of a dream, most likely…whether or not she hallucinated it from stress, she’s never been quite certain.

In summary because I’ve been yapping long enough, Y’shtola holds Astra’s well-being in incredibly high regard and vice versa. They’re essentially ride-or-die for each other now, even if Y’shtola isn’t afraid to chastise Astra’s more reckless decisions.

[stokesy55]

now imagining a really dramatic scene where vk's mother-in-law slaps him so hard he actually loses his balance and falls on the floor. she raises his hand to strike him again. he whimpers, squeezing his eyes shut, preparing himself for another stinging blow. it never comes. vk looks up in wonder to find his husband's british friend standing in front of him, grabbing his mil by the wrist to prevent her from hurting him further. cue dramatic music. 😂😂😂😂

yeah, so yuvi can be vk's husband, they have a really cute friendship. yuvi was actually one of vk's first and bestest friends on the international team, yuvi really took vk under his wing when he debuted. i can see vk being very taken with yuvi in this au, because he was taught always that his primary duty is to pleasure his alpha, and not talk back if/when his alpha hits him. so vk being a bit scared how yuvi will be, then yuvi turns out to be so kind and sweet towards him, buying him gifts, new clothes, putting flowers in his hair, generally making sure he adjusts well to his new home. and while yuvi is very sweet and attentive and caring, he isn't really very progressive. vk asks him once, timidly, if he can re-enroll in school as he wants to continue his education. yuvi just looks at him, bemused, then laughs, ruffling his hair. "what will you do with a degree, my love? hang it on the wall? i'll give you paintings for that." and the casual way in which yuvi jokes about vk's mere desire to complete his education makes vk realize that he'll never be allowed to grow past traditional omega roles here. so he resigns himself to his life, telling himself that it can be worse, his husband could be abusive, or cheating, or a drunkard and yuvi is none of those things, he's been unfailingly kind to him and he should be grateful for that, but inside there's a part of vk that yearns to be more than what society allows omegas.

do you think jimmy takes vk away as soon as possible, or do vk's in laws force them to stay on until jimmy actually bonds vk, because they know that bonding an omega so soon after their first bonded alpha has died is a tricky process, fraught with risks and complications that often fails. and they give jimmy an ultimatum. if he can bond vk within a stipulated number of months, well and good, if not, he has to give the omega up to be burned alive.

aww yes i love the idea of vk being squished by ali when ali comes home <3 but in the beginning, vk will feel so guilty when he starts falling in love with jimmy, because a) he's seen how much ali and jim love each other and doesn't wish to come between them. and b) he feels he's being unfaithful to yuvi's memory, he isn't really over him yet and it will take him a long time to. then he starts falling in love with ali too, and he's even more ashamed of himself, because really he's just being a slut now, pining after a beta, his husband's beta, to be particular. the first time ali and vk kiss, vk flees into another room, sobbing, thinking he's messed it all up with his brazenness, jimmy will throw him out of the house now and he'll have nowhere to go. ali bangs on the door until his own fist starts bleeding, just to get vk to come out, calm down and listen to him.

vk not knowing proper english in the beginning would be so cute and funny. at the restaurant, he always asks ali to order for him, because really he has no idea what anything on the menu means. and vk being too timid to venture out to explore london by himself, because he doesn't know the language all that well, so jimmy taking a week off work just to show vk around 🤭🎀

do you think vk does a job in this au? what does he do? also, because we've had enough cuteness, it's time for some angst, what is vk and ali/jim's first fight about in this au? 🤭😜😂

Ahaha - yeah that sounds about right :P

That all seemed to track with Yuvi - I like him being all sweet and making VK feel special but still sticking to the omega customs and VK reserving himself to “it could be worse.”

I think Jimmy takes him straight away; there is too much fear if he leaves they’ll kill VK and VK is seen as the family’s business settlement to Jimmy. They’d hand him over.

Aww yeah exactly - and yes to Jimmy taking time out to show VK around! Ali tries to help him with his English all the time (and probably starts learning a bit of Hindi in the process)

I don’t think VK has a job because he wouldn’t think that was his role. He wouldn’t have aspirations even though Jimmy would let him go get a job. He probably works with Ali on the farm.

There are a whole array of things they could fight about 😂

[elemmacil]

For WIP Wed! <3 This is from one of the very first Vash/Wolfwood projects I started, several months back. It may well wind up being a work that gets absorbed into other works, but. Mainly I wanted to write about Vash and Wolfwood both being aware of but deciding not to acknowledge their feelings for one another because of how much more complicated and fraught it’d make their lives. Except, then they’re put up by somebody from Vash’s past, who is still pining away for him many years later, and it stirs up all that gunk in their hearts, and [handwave] something something

“Not often we get a view like this, huh.”

Without waiting for permission, Vash joins Wolfwood on the gently sloping roof. Folding his long legs under himself and leaning back on his prosthetic hand. With a gentle sigh, Vash smiles.

So that he doesn’t get caught up on tracing the slope of Vash’s nose or contemplating the softness of his hair like a sad sack, Wolfwood follows the direction of his gaze. Below them is the flat stretch of Jaye’s property, where thoma are curled up and slumbering peacefully. Away beyond the edge of Goldcrest’s plateau is what looks and feels like an endless expanse of gently rolling waves of sand under an even more endless expanse of velvety dark sky flecked with stars. To the north, a cluster of glowing worms moves across the sky like a ribbon caught in the wind.

If Wolfwood were the sentimental type he might admit that it’s as close to beautiful as things really get, on No Man’s Land.

“Mm,” Wolfwood agrees.

Quiet settles between them for a while. Not exactly the easy, comfortable kind that Wolfwood’s grown accustomed to. With a stifled sigh, he stubs out his cigarette against a roof tile.

“So what’s the story, there, hm?”

Vash doesn’t startle or feign ignorance. He’s been expecting the question. Unless Wolfwood is misreading the way Vash’s shoulders dip, he might even be relieved to finally answer it. Huh, Wolfwood thinks without humor. That’s a first.

“Jaye’s a good person. A little rough around the edges, some would say,” Vash’s lips quirk. There’s a joke there that Wolfwood is missing. “But kind. She, uh. I was in a bad way when we met. Didn’t exactly make a good first impression, but… But she helped me when she didn’t have to, and didn’t want anything in return. I convinced her I could help around the ranch for a while, anyway, which went fine until there were a herd of thoma running amok through town. Ugh, it was a nightmare.”

Covering his face with a hand, Vash laughs. Nightmare or not, the memory is obviously fond. Wolfwood forces a smile.

[tayfabe75]

If cardigan is about Matty, what do we have with august and betty, considering that these three songs are one love story?

Kinda interesting that Matty and Betty rhyme... I know the story with all these names, but it's still funny to me

The pesky teenage love triangle strikes again! Anon, I admit - I have the same concern. Is Matty Betty because they're the same number of letters and end with a "t-t-y"? And, would that then mean that Taylor is James? After all, she was named for James Taylor… Or, is Matty James because they're both male? Your guess is as good as mine! I do, of course, have some speculation about the love triangle… (you knew it was comin'!)

Recently, Taylor chose to mash-up 'August' with 'Getaway Car' and 'The Other Side of the Door', which is interesting. On Twitter somewhere, I saw some comments about how we're getting all sides of the story, here. August: the perspective of the other woman, Getaway Car: the perspective of the cheater, and TOSOTD: the perspective of the woman spurned.

When it comes to making sense of this storyline, there are a few things I like to consider. It seems like there was some sort of undefined "situationship" between Taylor and Matty in the early days - I'm basing this off of 'Is It Over Now?' and 'TooTime', songs that share a melody.

While Taylor's song is lyrically much more fraught, Matty does imply that he's cried over this "situationship" ("you wet my eyes"). Pair that with Taylor's 1989 tour speeches, like this one before 'All You Had To Do Was Stay':

"I don't really like grey areas. I don't really like when people say 'I don't know', when it's a basic yes or no question. Do you want to be with me? Yes or no is the answer. And I tend to think that, you know, relationships are much less complicated than we make them if we simplify it to two basic options. Would you like to hear the two basic options, Boston? Okay. I think that your two real decisions and your two real options in a relationship are: you either leave or stay."

Recently (I think at MSG?), Matty introduced 'A Change of Heart' by describing himself as an "indecisive young man"… now, I get that most people don't think that song is about Taylor… however, that wasn't historically the case! (and that's certainly an interesting rabbit hole to fall down…)

Anyway, there are two theories that I really like, both suggested by my fellow "Tayfabe" collaborators:

The first theory being that 'August' might refer to opioids. Often, Matty describes his relationship to drugs almost like a romantic relationship:

"It's just… you know, if you break up with your missus for a good reason, even if you love her, you can understand it, you know, you can get on with it. But if you still fucking love her, it's really hard, you know? I think that would be the best way to describe it."

(Interestingly, Taylor speaks about addiction as an intro to the song 'This Is Me Trying' in the Long Ponds film… pair that with the "This Is Us Trying" engraving on NOACF… and you start wonderin' some things, no?)

The second theory being that Taylor could be both Augustine and Betty! That somewhere in her tumultuous timeline with Matty, she's found herself at one point being his "girl", and at other points, being "the other woman". Either way, she seems to deeply empathize with poor Augustine:

"August was obviously about the girl that James had this summer with, right? So she seems like she's this bad girl. But really, she's not a bad girl, she's like really a sensitive person who like, really fell for him and she was trying to seem cool and seem like she didn't care because that's what girls have to do, and she was trying to let him think that she didn't care, but she really did and she thought they had something very real. And then he goes back to Betty."

Something about the way she says this makes me think that no, Taylor is not actually Augustine, but there might be another reason she humanizes the "other woman" so much. Maybe because it's a friend of hers?

Warning: High (and morally dubious) speculation ahead

Anon, I'm personally a bit uncomfortable with celebrity gossip, but since so much of fandom song speculation seems to hinge on the gossip aspect of things, I thought it might be worth mentioning! Now, Matty used to date Halsey. It is alleged that a few of her songs are about Matty (more on that soon). Of course, Taylor and Halsey are friends as well as collaborators! I believe Taylor actually gifted her a Folklore cardigan, and Halsey posted an IG story of herself wearing it and lip-synching along to 'Illicit Affairs':

Don't call me "kid" Don't call me "baby" Look at this godforsaken mess that you made me You showed me colors You know I can't see with anyone else

If you're at all familiar with the Matty x Halsey lore, you'll know that her song 'Colors' is alleged to be about him, as well as the song 'Is There Somewhere', which shares a theme with 'August' in that it's about being the other woman:

Your girl's got red in her cheeks 'Cause we're something she can't see And I try to refrain but you're stuck in my brain All I do is cry and complain, because second's not the same

Now we'll go back to Taylor's quote about Augustine:

"So the idea that there's some like, some bad villain girl in any type of situation who like, takes your man, is actually a total myth because that's not usually the case at all. Like, everybody has feelings and wants to be seen and loved, and just like… Augustine, that's all she wanted was love."

(Oh, and to address the elephant in the room: Yes, I'm pretty sure Matty and Halsey dated in 2013. I know not everyone is on the same page when it comes to the "Tatty Timeline", but there are a few hints that Taylor and Matty met at least as far back as the Red era…)

Lastly, I'll leave you with this, Taylor's forecast for what ultimately becomes of James and Betty:

"Cardigan is from Betty's perspective from like twenty to thirty years later, looking back on this love, that was this tumultuous thing. In my head, Betty and James ended up together, right? So in my head, she ends up with him, but he really put her through it."

I definitely veered a bit off-course here, anon, forgive me! lol

And, of course, thanks for the ask! ♥

[elliepassmore]

Voyage of the Damned review

5/5 stars Recommended if you like: fantasy, murder mystery, LGBTQ+ characters

TW suicidal ideation

The beginning of this was...interesting. It definitely starts in media res and it was a little discombobulating trying to figure out what exactly was going on and who was who and what was important. Things got much better once we were on the ship, in my opinion, and the introduction of the main set of characters provided a lot of useful exposition.

In this world, the country is split into twelve smaller states, each with their own ruler, animal symbol, and associated hair color (i.e., green hair for the dragon state, pink hair for the bunnerfly state, etc.). On top of that, each of the ruler's of the states are Blessed with a power, though the specifics of these powers are closely guarded secrets, even the other ruling families often don't know what each other's powers are. The Blessing passes from parent to child seemingly at random, most of the characters seem to have gotten them as children, at which point the parent loses their power. Once all the heirs have obtained the Blessing, they go on this voyage to...honestly I'm not really sure what they're going to do other than they're trying to reach this sacred mountain.

Despite there being a unified nation, there is a lot of tension between the different ruling families and states. The so-called Uppers, or states closer to the emperor and further from the defensive wall, tend to look down on the states that are lower. But even amongst the Uppers there's tension. So honestly it's no surprise someone gets murdered.

I really enjoyed the murder mystery aspect and following along with Dee as things ramped up. While the first murder really does seem to come out of the blue, the ones that follow are much more complicated, because everyone seemingly has a motive and everyone has secrets they're keeping close. As the investigation continues, things get increasingly fraught and dangerous. Dee, Grasshopper, and Wyatt end up in the crosshairs of not just the murderer, but of the fear of the survivors as well--people stuck on a boat with a murderer and looking for someone to blame.

I liked the friendship that bloomed between Dee and Grasshopper. The fact that no one else particularly cares how the six-year-old is doing on a murder cruise really goes to show how power and suspicion can warp you. Dee cares though, and he's by Grasshopper's side almost the entire time, determined that if all else goes wrong, then at least she should be protected. Grasshopper was super funny, and sometimes scary, and I loved the levity she brought to things. I do think she talks younger than a 6yo at times though.

A surprising combination that I liked was Dee and Wyatt. The two of them did not get along when the voyage started, but I suppose murder brings people together. Wyatt and Dee are pretty different, but at their core they're more similar. Both feel isolated for one reason or another, for Wyatt his health and for Dee his lack of magic, and are deeply protective over their states. As the story progresses, the two grow closer and I liked seeing where things were headed with them.

There was a twist toward the end that I didn't particularly like. The book was building toward something and I was actually hoping we'd get to see it, but then it does a complete 180 and essentially announces something that completely deconstructs so much of what had happened internally with Dee. He really came into himself during the course of the voyage and while the ramifications don't really seem to be there in the book, for the reader (i.e., me) I felt that this twist really just hollowed a lot of that progress out. There's also some major 'forgive and forget' going on here that I was just like ?!