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I'm not easy to love!!

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Just a reminder: Heathenry does have a term for smoke-cleansing. Recaning. To recan. (Or reocan, in Old West Saxon.) This is cleansing via smoke, whether through incense or a bundle of herbs put together for a particular type of cleansing. Juniper and mugwort are both favorites for this. In case you’re wondering how to pronounce it, it sounds like reekening. The word “reeks” is actually derived from it, signifying a potent smell. For Old Norse fans, this seems to be related to the work reykr. In case you were wondering, Reykjavik in Iceland translates to “Smoky Bay”.

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Percy as young sea prince

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Follow me for highly relatable content.

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The Old God by Monica Doss

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I keep looking into the eyes of those I love, hoping to see the love I pour into them reflected back at me. But no one can love like I can. No one can love as deeply, passionately, intensely. The only way to feel the love I give is to love myself as much as I love others.

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[OC] I laid out what a 5’ by 5’ square was in real life to help my players get some perspective on just how big each map square is. 

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ever notice how men criticize games like animal crossing and stardew valley on the basis of “the entire game is just doing tasks” without recognizing that “kill bad guy” is also just a task but violent?

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The first Lost Boy

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Girl (2018)

There are many resources online about the dangers of binding for FTM guys, but far fewer that address the dangers of tucking.

This film, based on the youth of trans dancer Nora Monsecour and made in collaboration with her, features a young trans girl character tucking with tape in order to pass as a young woman. It is good to see that a film is drawing attention to MTF struggles, and the daily practice of flattening your groin, which can sometimes be very painful.

As an alternative to tape or bandages, I would recommend LeoLines underwear, available through Etsy. There are many reviews by trans women who recommend LeoLines panties and padded bras, and the underwear is so cleverly designed that many women report not even needing to tuck beneath the panties. (Also, as the designer of these products is a trans woman, all the marketing is aimed at trans women, and not crossdressers.)

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Please do not flag this post. It is an educational post, intended for transgender girls who may watch this film and be encouraged to tuck unsafely. It is not explicit.

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Telluric Tarot- Anhydrite and Anemone

Tarot equivalent to Five of Cups- Sadness, mourning, disappointment, regret

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“The whole point of Camp is to dethrone the serious. Camp is playful, anti-serious. More precisely, Camp involves a new, more complex relation to “the serious.” One can be serious about the frivolous, frivolous about the serious”

— Susan Sontag, Notes on Camp (via captainniallac)

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I think it’s worth looking at why bad endings ruin stories. This will be a big rambling thread I’m gonna chip away at so feel free to mute if it’s not your cup of tea #storytalk

I was inspired to write this after @MagnoliaPearl posted something about the ending of Parks & Rec. Which was abysmal. To the point where when I rewatched the series, I stopped before the last season. It’s an ending that felt like a betrayal even though it was a “happy” one

You can’t just toss in good things happening to characters that they haven’t earned. Everyone can’t win the lottery in the last episode. That’s not a happy ending, it’s Deus ex machina that betrays all the things the characters actually struggled for

If you were to draw a story curve, in general a happy ending is one where the characters end up better than where they started but really not too much better. It really depends heavily on how wildly the rest of your graph swings during the rest of your book

Here’s an entertaining clip of Kurt Vonnegut explaining a little tongue in cheek bit about graphing stories that’s actually pretty helpful for explaining what I’m getting at

If you look at P&R that way, it’d probably look a little something like this. It’s easy enough to see where reality breaks

It’s a bit of an exaggeration but not much. The point is, you probably shouldn’t swing too far up from whatever was your highest point during the story. If your previous high was “couple gets married,” then “couple has baby” is a realistic ending. “Couple win lottery” maybe not

Actually, never have anyone win the lottery after the first act. Unless it’s an inciting incident that forms the foundation of the entire story…no lottery. That’s a good rule

But the thing that really got me thinking was why does it matter? The show is over, right? It’s not like I’m then forced to then watch a show about Leslie Knope being President. I think it matters for a few reasons and bear with me here cuz I’m making this up as I go…

One is what I’ll call the Evergreen Ending principle. Which is that even though the story has ended, you need to be able to imagine the characters are continuing to have similar adventures forever. That’s part of what makes an ending feel good, especially for serialized media

Obviously, things will be different because the Real Story already happened. But it needs to be easy to imagine how these characters go on doing essentially the same stuff forever. The only thing worse than the ending P&R gave us would be one where Leslie retires, for example

This is also why I hate epilogues. Like the ending of Harry Potter where they all old and have kids. Let the audience imagine what happens next. That part isn’t for the creator to say. Back off and let your audience take over

If you change too much, even for the better, you’ve also ruined any possibility of the Evergreen Ending. You’ve essentially created a whole new series where everything is different, which only works if you’re then planning to tell that new story

Bad endings can never be fixed. Every other story problem can potentially be resolved. Which I think is why those moments tend to pull back the curtain on a writer’s failings. It’s why writing endings is so stressful

But here’s what I think works. And this is obviously just my opinion and who the hell am I? But I think that when you reach the real end of your story, your plot should be on autopilot. If you’ve done your job, the story will just fly home itself

Don’t try to solve any more problems with plot. Unless you have a twist ending, accept that it’ll be a somewhat predictable finish and that’s okay. The only thing you need to tend to is the audience’s emotional needs. And have those needs reflect themselves in the characters

A real happy ending is knowing the characters are going to be okay. That they’ve finally found a little bit of balance and ended up better than they started. That who they are is good enough and always has been. And that they can handle whatever comes next.

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This is so wholesome

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Justin O'Neal

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