because sometimes there are invisible tests and invisible rules and you're just supposed to ... know the rule. someone you thought of as a friend asks you for book recommendations, so you give her a list of like 30 books, each with a brief blurb and why you like it. later, you find out she screenshotted the list and send it out to a group chat with the note: what an absolute freak can you believe this. you saw the responses: emojis where people are rolling over laughing. too much and obsessive and actually kind of creepy in the comments. you thought you'd been doing the right thing. she'd asked, right? an invisible rule: this is what happens when you get too excited.
you aren't supposed to laugh at your own jokes, so you don't, but then you're too serious. you're not supposed to be too loud, but then people say you're too quiet. you aren't supposed to get passionate about things, but then you're shy, boring. you aren't supposed to talk too much, but then people are mad when you're not good at replying.
you fold yourself into a prettier paper crane. since you never know what is "selfish" and what is "charity," you give yourself over, fully. you'd rather be empty and over-generous - you'd rather eat your own boundaries than have even one person believe that you're mean. since you don't know what the thing is that will make them hate you, you simply scrub yourself clean of any form of roughness. if you are perfect and smiling and funny, they can love you. if you are always there for them and never admit what's happening and never mention your past and never make them uncomfortable - you can make up for it. you can earn it.
don't fuck up. they're all testing you, always. they're tolerating you. whatever secret club happened, over a summer somewhere - during some activity you didn't get to attend - everyone else just... figured it out. like they got some kind of award or examination that allowed them to know how-to-be-normal. how to fit. and for the rest of your life, you've been playing catch-up. you've been trying to prove that - haha! you get it! that the joke they're telling, the people they are, the manual they got- yeah, you've totally read it.
if you can just divide yourself in two - the lovable one, and the one that is you - you can do this. you can walk the line. they can laugh and accept you. if you are always-balanced, never burdensome, a delight to have in class, champagne and glittering and never gawky or florescent or god-forbid cringe: you can get away with it.
you stare at your therapist, whom you can make jokes with, and who laughs at your jokes, because you are so fucking good at people-pleasing. you smile at her, and she asks you how you're doing, and you automatically say i'm good, thanks, how are you? while the answer swims somewhere in your little lizard brain:
how long have you been doing this now? mastering the art of your body and mind like you're piloting a puppet. has it worked? what do you mean that all you feel is... just exhausted. pick yourself up, the tightrope has no net. after all, you're cheating, somehow, but nobody seems to know you actually flunked the test. it's working!
aren't you happy yet?
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this is literally the coolest gimmick blog i have ever seen, i took a genetics class in tenth grade and i’ve been obsessed ever since. could you analyze this ask too?
String identified:
t ta t ct gc g a , t a gtc ca tt ga a ’ c. c aa t a t?
Closest match: Lysandra bellargus genome assembly, chromosome: 10
Common name: Adonis blue butterfly
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SO what i would've done in my epic perfect ending to the umbrella academy is:
EITHER
- ok, if we must do the downer ending where they sacrifice themselves to save the entire world and must no longer actually exist. what would've been a lot more satisfying and clever in addition to that is: the umbrella academy comics exist in the new world.
Claire is the writer/artist mastermind behind the series, because she has this strange near-memory of someone once telling her these bedtime stories about a group of dysfunctional but endearing superheroes. she assumes it must've been her imagination, but still, there's a resonating echo of love.
boom. our brellies live on and get to learn and grow and be happy in some way, even if it's in fiction.
OR
- when Five is talking to all the versions of himself in the Five Diner, he first thinks it's the whole family that's the problem with the timeline and yeah, that they'd need to die so everyone else could live, but then!
the other versions of him tell him that no, it's not the whole family that's the wrench in the gears of the universe. it never has been. it was him.
this whole time, he's been looking for answers in every direction but within. he was the only variable he hasn't considered, the last unknown.
more specifically, it was him leaving his family that broke the timeline and caused the curse of the inevitable apocalypse.
that led to the Commission, to the Kugelblitz, to the Umbrella Effect/Keepers Cult - to every possible bad ending, in every timeline Five and Lila ever saw.
so, uh... maybe after a conversation with Diego and Lila if they wanted to resolve that whole situation more.... maybe after a conversation with Viktor (Five's childhood best friend, despite the show literally always forgetting about that)...
Five gets on the timeline train one more time, then jumps back to the day he ran away. maybe he's young again but with all his memories intact, because he's figured out how to control that now, maybe he just tells his younger self not to mess with time travel or leave home.
either way, Five goes back to dinner. then he grows up with everyone.
Ben doesn't die, because Five being there helps save him somehow. Klaus gets better, Allison learns to let go, Diego and Luther reconcile, and Viktor has a best friend to tell him he's always been special, and help him sort out his powers properly.
Lila and the other Sparrows and Jennifer are still alive in this version of events, they just grew up differently, in different places and circumstances. they all find their way to the Hargreeves, because of course they do. Allison has Claire. my beloved Grace is there.
Reginald dies, and they dance at his funeral. the world doesn't end eight days from then, or any time after that.
the show ends with the gang dancing to I Think We're Alone Now, but they're in the same room this time, all together in their old house, and everything is the way they've always deserved.
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the problem is that being single is seen as the consolidation prize, and not the natural neutral state of being-a-person. at the end of the movie or the book or the poetry, there is a person waiting for you at the altar, and they love you. if the play is a comedy, everyone gets married. the metaphor is about how you are not-whole. the metaphor is about how everyone is going to be happily-ever-after. the metaphor is that romantic love is the most important resource on the planet, not just all-love. all-love is not a thing, that is a disappointment. the treasure is not the friends we made along the way. the treasure is the girl you landed.
the metaphor is that you cannot be alone, that means you are broken. are you getting over someone? that is acceptable, you can be getting over someone, but not for long. you must be single because you would rather not be single. you must be single and looking to not-be-single. you must want to date, eventually.
friendship and community are never seen as being equal-to or even-better than romantic connection. that person is your one! you need to find them. you need to hunt through the sand particles until you can shift out some kind of gem. this is regardless to your own experience of the beach and the sun. you need to be somewhere with someone.
if you are taking this time alone to heal, that is so sad. everyone gives you this little pitying look. the understanding is that you are not actually happier than you were before you were single. it is seen as a sort of pity - oh, you are choosing yourself, making yourself the priority? - that isn't quite right. you must mean that you are making yourself ready for the right person. you are just laying the bed better this time. open up your heart. you'll find them, we promise!
what do you mean you're really-truly genuinely-very happy? you are probably misremembering what it was like to be in a relationship. and besides, once you meet your person, that time will look grey and bland and wasted. your person is the only way for you to see in color. so what if you have taken this time - for the first time in your entire life - to actually-for-real do the fucking work. you can be proud of yourself, sure. but the way we need to know that you got better is that you get a partner. you're healed enough for the next bad part!
people don't choose to be single, they just say they're choosing to be single - they actually mean "nobody wants to date me." it doesn't matter how many people you have gently rejected or how many times you've talked it over carefully in therapy. what matters is that you are single, and by all accounts - that means you are something worth our pity. your successes and life all seem pale in the sunlight. sure, you have done amazing things and finally found your way in life. what matters is that there wasn't a person in the room with you while you did it.
you want to tell them - that's the whole thing. i didn't know how to be alone in the room. i didn't know how to handle the silence. every moment was so sharp, and i kept choosing the wrong way to close the door. i have spent my entire life in the empty well, living in the ricochet of someone else's cruelty. for once i have built myself a ladder. for once everything i taste is all mine, every bite of sunshine and laughter. i have learned how to sleep out in the open with my memories. recently, they have started to purr.
your father rolls his eyes. listen. this isn't about you. i just want a grandchild in my future.
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