#aka things i would have posted on vent but they made it so ugly | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

sunsetika · 18 days

Text

picking up the pieces

the very reason i have been going back to taylor swift songs for comfort (aka a very, very long vent coping with heartache from a breakup)

it's been a whole week since the person whom i thought was my soulmate decided to end things with me.

and while i truly, truly understand and respect it, so much of the things that lead to this hurt me so deeply. it's left me feeling unwanted, unimportant, and so alone.

there's never a right way to go about a breakup. there's never one way to grieve, to pick up the pieces, to move on. and, as imperfect human beings, sometimes it's easy to backpedal. heck, i'm coping by posting in this inactive blog, but i needed to get this out because it hurt too much. everything is so frustrating. but i'm getting ahead of myself. context, to help me understand what lead to this.

we were immensely close friends, quick constants of one another. we it felt almost cosmic just how the world put us together and made us click. within a few months of our friendship, we started dating, and it has been such an amazing ride. i've dated before, had some crushes, was in a long-term relationship, even. but nothing compared to this. it felt like we just vibed so well on almost every wavelength, i was convinced she was my soulmate and my person.

we did as much as we could together. i became a better person with her. despite the problems i went through, everything felt alright because it was made up to me by the universe through her presence.

however, half a year into a relationship, i think things got more serious for me. life got busy for both of us, and i noticed that i have been neglected, for lack of better term. naturally, i understand. and i extend my patience as much as i could, because it is much harder it is on her than it is on me. i simply tried to communicate those needs as gently as i could, because it was the one promise i made sure to uphold: constant transparency and communication. and while we do try to patch things up, we kept falling short.

come june, when i had had enough of bringing up the same concerns only to be pushed aside. our communication, even the smallest sweet nothings, have been sparse, and we felt so disconnected from one another. i knew it was a breaking point for me, but i wanted to give her a say in this. it wouldn't be fair to call it off out of nowhere. i wanted to give a chance for her to reflect, and then we can talk again. and for a moment, it looked like we would. but things got busy again and ultimately, although we tried to enjoy our dates and all, my concerns and attempts at communicating has been pushed aside.

i try to extend my patience once more, as she did say she couldn't pour from an empty cup. that she had too much on her plate. i tried to minimize myself so as not to add to her obligations, but i do have a lot going on in my life as well. and with job application rejections and the constant dread that my life is feels like it can implode at any moment, the need for a constant grew, and my previous feelings of neglect have reared its ugly head again. i promise, i tried to trust her, and i do understand her, but truthfully, i have been let down so many times.

i snapped. i was going through a meltdown and ended up arguing with her, despite knowing that she, too, had a full schedule. i wanted to be the more accommodating person, but i simply couldn't. i fet wrung dry, and i wanted to be taken care of. i was met with coldness, and then follows the space that leads us to our breakup.

it was hell for me. i feel like i couldn't take it. but i did my best to give her the space she needed. even if it meant canceling the one last date we would've had, yet still promising that she won’t ditch me. however, she was flying abroad for a business trip for a week, and i felt like i'd like to at least be civil and wish her well. i asked for her trip details, i went through a total of 5 hours commute to see her off and drop off some stuff to relieve her colds. but she’d continue to ignore me.

eventually, it was pointed out by a friend how i haven’t respected her space by trying to wish her well. it had also made me angry, too. but it sobered me up, and i wrote a long letter expressing my thoughts—on how i understand if she cannot continue the relationship, however, i would really like to try one last time. to really sit down and talk about it.

i stopped contacting her fully, which is why i was surprised that a week after she arrived, she asked to meet up. it came quicker than i anticipated. and i was filled with so much dread. i kept asking what it was about, just so i can ready myself, but i didn’t get definitive answers. i was so terrified, and i hardly slept, marking day 1 of my ugly crying in the shower streak. however, stupidly, i chose to hope. to trust. to think that maybe i am just getting ahead of myself. that maybe she’d want to work things out, too.

when we met up, it was made clear that that wasn’t the case. she said she loved what we had, loved our bond, but had no capacity for a romantic relationship right now. asked to be friends. i felt so pained. i felt myself disassociating. i kept crying and stopping. i was honest: i couldn’t be friends yet. i can’t just switch back to plainly platonic like she said she could. it hurt a lot, but i didn’t contest it. i felt so weak. i asked if she could stay longer, she needed to go back home. i asked i can hold her hand as i walked her back to her bus stop, and she said no. we said goodbye with a hug and me sobbing on her shoulder. i went home and broke down in front of my family at the dining table. i was broken, lost, so hurt. they have never seen me like that.

i left a message saying i was grateful to her. that i loved being loved by her. that i loved being hers. i tried to be positive. she returned the sentiment. but then i realized that she had never specified if she had lost feelings for me—in which i start to nitpick everything and i asked. i was ignored, left on read. i told all my close friends, called some, and the pain kept building up from there.

the next day i cried again in public this time. i started to feel angry because it felt like she didn’t care. i was left with the task of archiving my private instagram dedicated to us. i deleted the playlist i made for her. i had to take down all remnants of her in my room (meanwhile she told me she would keep ours, because it’s all good memories). life went on for her—i found out she didn’t need to go home immediately that day and happily stopped over somewhere else despite saying i had no one to go to and felt so alone. i realized how quick she was to remove me from her bio, mere moments after i said goodbye. i felt like i was removed from my life so quick, i felt like we weren’t even friends anymore, even if she said she wanted to. i didn’t know what she meant by being friends, and i dug my own grave ruminating on everything.

it felt like she wanted to get rid of me so quickly. i can’t help but feel like i was a load she needed to get off her back. i then realized that one of the reason this sucks is it feels like she has made her mind up a long time ago, while i was already faced with the decision with no space to talk it out. and with that realization came another—that perhaps, in not answering how she now feels about me, she may have lost love a long time ago.

(and yes, i can back it with evidence. the very trigger of our big argument: as comfort, i asked for romantic affection and words of affirmation, since i haven’t been receiving any at all recently. she got mad and stormed off. we hardly see each other as it is, we barely are able to talk on chat, and we don’t even flirt anymore. our last kiss was july, and the last time we said i love you was before we fought.)

it was a punch to the gut. i haven’t felt this hurt ever. in hindsight, i should have seem it coming. but i foolishly hoped for the best, because that is what i do. what hurts worse is that she wants to use our friendship as some sort of default shield when in reality, we were much closer (and so much more affectionate) when we were friends than how we were as girlfriends in the last few weeks. it felt so disrespectful and it felt like somewhat of a betrayal.

the next few days were painful, grappling with anger and hurt and frustration. i ended up falling into a rabbit hole of videos of how to cope with breakups, what it means when they say they want to be friends, and how to deal with these. it did bring me enough clarity to realize a few things, but ultimately, there was not much comfort. only a weird silence and a looming darkness. i tried to go on with my days, but i knew i was depressed.

i then remembered that when she broke up with me, she said that she reread all of my letters where i would try to address our lack of communication and understanding. i came to the conclusion that maybe she thinks she’s doing this for me. that what i needed was to be let go because she cannot give me what i deserve. and for a moment, it felt like it would get better. until i was able to pin down what hurt the most in this matter: that she made her own decision about our relationship without me. that she already made the call without even talking to me again. and that made me feel sidelined.

i have done nothing but communicate and understand. i’ve always gave her space to navigate this with respect to her struggles. i’ve compromised, adjusted, and accommodated as much as i could. but in the end, even for this last bout, she couldn’t do it for me.

i feel like i have been a warm presence in her life. a safety net, a constant. someone good to have in your corner, because—impostor syndrome aside—i know i’m a good friend, a good girlfriend. i do everything for people i love with as much love i could give (she helped me realize that before we got together, and when i need convincing that i’m not a bad person, i remind myself of that). i am imperfect, but i always did my best to be her sunshine, her peace, even at the expense of my own to an extent.

i’m a good person to have, but not to hold. that maybe all the upkeep of having me—a not-permanently employed, adhd-riddled, late-twenties girl with strong rsd that she needs visual cues of affirmation to fight the demons in her head—was not worth any time and energy to spare, even as a friend. that i wasn’t relevant enough to make space for, and that my needs, as minimized as they are, are still too much to handle.

and that is all valid. if i were her friend, i’d tell her to prioritize herself. to save some of her remaining energy from the hustle and bustle of work for rest and recovery. i understand this. but she was the one who asked me to be in a relationship. it was my understanding that we would do our best to keep this together. in the end, we couldn’t, and i would’ve understood all this if she had tried to communicate to me better. to actually make the considerations and talk to me.

she said i deserved better. and maybe that is true.

but it’s so hard to feel like that is a genuine reason when i have constantly only been sidelined. it feels so empty when i realized she decided to go no contact at all despite her being the one wanting to remain friends. when we broke up, she told me she wanted to see pictures of her last gift. i sent them and i realized my chat was archived. i texted her verifying if she needed space from me, too, and got no response. she is no longer seeing my stories or interacting with posts, meaning she muted me.

i didn’t even know she wanted to go no contact. it hurt so much, and i knew our friendship was over for now. i had genuinely thought that, with how highly she regarded our friendship, she would still keep the connection as she expressed. but alas, actions speak louder than words. and another deeper cut hurt me—i had also lost my best friend.

it felt even worse. that she was so ready to lose our friendship. that i’m just one person passing through her life when to me, she was the one i thought i’d spend the rest of my life with. i felt so insignificant and hurt that i’m just a life lesson, just another experience to her.

all the pain of that has lead me to this: acceptance. maybe. i don’t know. i have been able to deduce all the answers i’ve been looking for and i am left to pick up the pieces of my broken heart. i have no interest in trying to get her back—i respect her wishes. the last thing i want to do is to coerce her (especially since i always chose to do right by her and even in conflict, raise my concerns gently and kindly, as she says). i feel so betrayed that i don’t even know if i want her back.

my trust for her has been ruined, and as much as i want to see this in a better light, to accept things positively, i can’t. and it’s because she taught me that i deserve to take space, that my feelings are valid and my emotions matter that i know i cannot accept less than my energy matched. and she clearly cannot match that.

still, the pain lingers. i miss her dearly. i miss seeing her texts, her stories. i miss sending her silly memes and pictures of cats. i miss telling her i loved her and that i’ll always be there for her. she has made me so much better and i… i don’t know how to continue experiencing life without her. there is so much i want to share, even as a friend. but i think we’re meant to be apart for now, even if it hurts.

it’s only been a week since we broke up, but it’s been a month of uncertainty and loss. i have had so many fun times with other people i love and yet i’m so frustrated at how the pain constantly eclipses all of that. i feel like have been nothing but a sad blob. i have lost so much of myself this week, and i dread the weeks to come because i don’t know just when things would be okay.

i keep wondering: what if i had just kept my mouth shut. what if i stopped yapping and just accepted whatever breadcrumbs i can get, even if they were hardly bare minimum (after all, i want her in my life, right?)? but deep down i know it’s not what i deserve. and she said it, too.

ultimately, i know she didn’t make the wrong decision. i do want her to be in a better mental state, and if this is what it means to achieve that, i accept it. she is a good person with so much to give, and she deserves her peace, especially with all she has gone through. we both have our faults and shortcomings, but if this needed to happen, it needed to happen. and, to respect her peace and help me heal, i’ve decided to go no contact as well. it hurts, but it’s the only thing i can take control of right now.

i’ll just keep trying to cope with the loss. i wish i would heal faster, but we know that is impossible. i did learn, though, that the amount of pain and hurt we feel is a direct reflection of the love we shared. this simply means i loved her with all my heart, and that is all i could have done.

if you have made it through the whole story, i appreciate you so much. i couldn’t find a safe space to vent without our mutual friends being caught in it. i don’t want to put her on blast, i just needed to get this off my chest, and i feel guilty enough for crying to my friends about nothing but this the past week. i don’t want them to get tired of me because i am tired myself. if you do know her, please don’t let this distort how you see her. she is a genuinely good person and i am merely trying to cope with the hurt of losing her.

but hey, small win: i didn’t check her profile or stories today. here’s hoping that it holds up.

0 notes

sroloc--elbisivni · 4 years

Text

*sits down* *pours a glass of water* *pours one for scott westerfeld* *sips*

so here’s my pitch for an adaptation of Uglies specifically and the Uglies quartet* more generally. vague spoilers. i can’t figure out how to make the readmore work anymore so hit J or start scrolling fast.

*theoretically it’s a trilogy with a bonus novel, but I fuckin love Extras.

First, it’s a webseries, because Hollywood refuses to option a series brutally dissecting the culture of cosmetic surgery and brainwashing through a dystopian lens (gee I wonder why).

The first few videos are amateur vlogging, taking us through the first part of Uglies, aka “Tally and Shay fuck around and find out.” it’s their shared dark web youtube channel, maybe it’s uploaded to the Crims’ private server or something and as bonus content sometimes we see videos that Shay made with Zane before the Crims cut out. either way we have to be convinced, as an audiences, that the girls are sure this is secure. The scene with Paris is never in-video, or if it is it’s just audio of Tally recording herself breaking into the party, so we don’t see the Pretties.

anyway. Tally’s hoverboarding saga, the hypothetical makeover side, sneaking out to the ruins, the good shit. it’s a webseries from the PoV of two kids who don’t know too much about making videos so shots are limited and we can really lean into the suggestions of this world instead of trying to build whole sets.

use of CGI, but only for detail work, leaning into the uncanny valley, making the world of Tally’s city very clean and polished, too clean, and putting skeletons in the Rusty Ruins.

the hoverboarding-down-a-roller-coaster has to be in there, preferably filmed on a GoPro equivalent, but if there isn’t enough budget we cut away from a painted shot of the ruins where Tally’s at the top into static bc the camera went too fast and then it’s Tally and Shay losing their minds with the adrenaline comedown and they kiss nope where was i

Shay’s letter--i can’t remember if it being on paper was a plot point in the books but I’m really feeling video message, ideally uploaded to the same channel, and then when Special Circumstances drop the bomb on Tally we as the audience go oh shit. they’ve seen everything.

this is where the mode of the story changes--no more amateur vlogging, now it’s Tally recording reports for SC. They’re not transmitted, so we just get this video diary of Tally’s trip, a little camera running the whole time, and then....I'm not sure whether it’s Tally talking to herself to vent her feelings, or the footage is cut together as a summary and the video is prefaced with a Very Official Special Circumstances report, so it’s like a debriefing.

The Smoke. That whole thing. the very last part is chaos and confusion and found footage. >:)

PART 3, which is Tally’s video diary of the whole next part of the trip with David. This part is more edited, more condensed, than the earlier parts, and the connecting throughline isn’t always clear. some of it is just the two of them talking, some of it is long epic scenery shots, some of it is after everything goes down and they get Shay back and they’re having these Very Serious Discussions, and those are shot like...the camera is being the record. except for where it isn’t.

SPEAKING OF SHAY. if it’s at all possible to pull this off, Shay is cast with two different actors, one for the first two thirds and one for the last third (and most of Pretties). The first Shay is an actual teenager, zits and all, not a beauty by any means. The second Shay is classic Hollywood cast-a-20-something-as-a-teen, rounded out with makeup to be just inside the uncanny valley. surrounded by everyone else, who’s been living in the woods. This should be the most jarring thing.

The last video is a discussion of informed consent, and the making the plan happens largely offscreen so then there’s a long sequence of Tally hoverboarding back to the city (shot by drone) where she’s just narrating, and the leadup to the ‘make me pretty’ penny dropping that oh. This is Tally leaving a message for herself and she’s not sure who she’s going to be when she watches it.

PRETTIES. Less of an outline on this one, but it works from the same framework of three parts, three storytelling styles--the first part is total Instagram Influencer, professional vlogging, glitz and party culture. The camera is floating now so Tally’s always in frame. Same trick pulled with Tally’s actor so you’re looking at actual different people. Tally and Shay are dating but the conflict is them both refusing to talk about whether this is a casual thing or an actual relationship so when the thing with zane happens it’s a mess.

when tally and zane start looking for the pills, that’s when it flips back to a narration style similar to Uglies, where Tally’s carrying the camera and they’re documenting their crazy adventures, thumbing their noses at SC. maybe it’s also intercut with like, news stories, because trying to film the ice rink scene would be bananas. unreliable narration as they try to pretend they’re completely law abiding.

from the balloon and onwards, it’s all found footage. maybe anthropological stuff of the village, official reports, and then those end with the camera falling to the floor as the anthropologist is like ‘you’re not supposed to be--’ but we do make it all the way to the camp and the Specials showing up, and this is where the CGI comes in again to get just that over the edge of weird badwrong.

Specials is a mix of surveillance footage, recorded reports, and callbacks to the Crims’ channel in Uglies--at least one shot-for-shot remake but way more dangerous. sometimes the camera is just left running on a log in their campsite and no one even notices, and this is the tragedy, they’ve grown so used to their lives being recorded that they don’t even bother to care.

From Tally going down in Deigo until her message at the end, she doesn’t appear on screen, but she does carry the camera in to her saying goodbye to zane.

HEY REMEMBER HOW I LOVE EXTRAS? EXTRAS IS A MOVIE.

by this point there’s enough following and enough buildup that you might actually get a movie out of this, especially since it’s tackling things that are less explicitly ‘societally expected body modification is bad.’

it’s also dissecting the meta narrative that’s been set up throughout the webseries--it starts with Aya recording herself talking to Moggle, and then we zoom out, getting Moggle in the shot, and from there it’s just leaning into the wild fucking scope of this book. mag lev train? hell yeah. mountain?? hell yeah. the flaws in a society obsessed with reputation and vlogging which cannot be successfully explored within that medium??? hell YEAH. I FUCKING LOVE EXTRAS.

I personally think it would be very cool and narratively sexy if the entire thing was subtitled in English and the characters spoke in Japanese except where they switch into English, like in the book, but I also get like....familiarity and the danger of exoticizing. but driving home that this is the whole world that lives like this.

footage from the webseries is recut and narrated over into something more professional, and interspersed with the movie to catch up people who haven’t watched the webseries, and also to show how the narrative of history gets cleaned up. but if it’s done right, three things should happen:

We barely see anything of Tally’s Ugly days and the Smoke. There are shots of her chatting with her friends and laughing, way back from the Ugly days or the Pretty ones, but we never hear her voice except for the final letter

Shay and the rest of the Crims get important footing in the narrative but Zane is nowhere to be seen.

everyone in the audience, including people who haven’t read the books or watched the webseries, should LOSE THEIR MINDS when she shows up

There’s a post-credits scene of everyone covered in cake after it exploded.

*pauses to drink water* in conclusion give me licensing rights and a good director.

#long post #uglies #uglies series #sroloc writes stuff #this is one of the more niche things i've ever posted! which is both quite an accomplishement and also what a shame #more! people! should read! these books!!#sroloc babbles

63 notes · View notes

anhed-nia · 4 years

Text

BLOGTOBER PRE-GAME 9/30/2020: 30 MILES FROM NOWHERE/CONFESSIONAL (2019)

Spoiler alert. Or whatever. It’s not going to matter, you don’t care.

So, I've been away for a minute. Just about any reason to be away from Tumblr is probably a good reason, but I have an especially good one. I'm finally working on a "real" writing project, which demands, and deserves, all of my attention. My social media abstinence isn't just a matter of time management, though. Once I had a long term obligation on my plate, I became very aware of how the short term satisfaction I get from posting mindless rants was eating away at the fuel I have available for sustained efforts. When I wind myself up with a 500-1000 word blog post, it generates a lot of electricity, but I blow it all as soon as I experience the catharsis of posting it, and I'm further pacified by ego-stroking likes and reblogs. Not to sound like a sanctimonious luddite--I mean, I'm still here, after all!--but it turns out that the staying focused on the long haul has been surprisingly revivifying. In fact, I haven't been talking about my big fancy project for the same reason; I don't want to lose any of the juice I've been storing up by wasting it on the shallow pleasure of describing it. Also such things should probably be somewhat confidential until they're approaching the publishing stage, but I digress! There is an actual reason I'm saying all this, that has more to do with this blog.

(Don’t get all excited, I’m not doing EVIL ED right now, I just need a relatable image.)

As I got deeper into my experience of "real" film writing, I started to reflect on the meaning of my personal writing. Like, the point of it. I tend to write in a sweaty, compulsive, sadomasochistic haze, in which I'm sometimes hyperbolically generous, and sometimes--perhaps more often, unfortunately--as nasty as humanly possible. Sometimes the movies deserve it, when they're lazy, pretentious, or otherwise demonstrate an open contempt for the audience aka ME. Often, though, I'm just creating an opportunity to vent my generalized rage and frustration. That can be very entertaining for myself and (hopefully) my teensy-but-devoted readership, but lately I've asked myself whether there isn't some negative tradeoff for all this amusement. In this phase of my life, it's reasonable to assume I'll make more and more friends and acquaintances who create things I don't always care for, but I don't necessarily think they deserve to be abused for it. As much as I have a right to say whatever I want, technically, I'd be embarrassed if I were caught just jacking myself off by making fun of their work in public. And more to the point, I don't necessarily want to contribute to the growing atmosphere in which people feel more afraid to try and fail, because the public so commonly misidentifies sarcasm and mean-spiritedness as intelligence and superiority, and that form of petty darkness spreads across the internet a lot faster than a movie can reach a wider audience. After all, I'm in the process of potentially turning myself into one of those well-meaning failures right now. I could stand to be a little more deliberate about how I speak, and about what, in general.

My father is an art critic, and once in an extra petulant moment, teenage-me asked him in an accusative tone what he thought the point of his profession was. He replied calmly that he wouldn't publish any comment that he didn't think the artist could make use of somehow. I don't know if he always stuck to that policy, but the thought sure stuck with me.

So anyway, over the last few months I've been giving myself a bit of an attitude adjustment, through a combination of personal reflection, and hard work on something meaningful/not for the internet. I've been feeling all proud of myself and shit, but today reminded me that any path to enlightenment is always marked by setbacks, doubt, and temptation. For today, in complete innocence (or at least a melange of innocence and ignorance, as I very much invite this type of problem), I managed to watch TWO (2) movies about an academic film-cum-psychology project, focused on a gang of college buddies who inevitably reveal what bad people they are under the unique conditions of the project, and then the project turns out to be run NOT by its presumed-dead originator, but by the originator's even-crazier lover. It's amazing how particular something can be, and still be utterly obvious and cliche. In my defense, I really tried to turn the second movie off, because it was...just instantly terrible, but the seed of suspicion had taken root--is this randomly selected movie ACTUALLY EXACTLY THE SAME AS THE PREVIOUS MOVIE?--and I just had to find out if this could be true. I suffered, deliberately, for another hour and a half, to confirm my awful hunch. I don't know how I would have felt if I had turned out to be wrong (better? worse?), but I don't have to worry about that now. Now I just have to worry about my overpowering impulse to be as ugly as possible about what I have personally subjected myself to.

(The completely deceptive poster for our not at all witchy or eerie opening feature.)

In need of a passable time-waster this afternoon, I put on 30 MILES FROM NOWHERE. Released in March of 2019, Caitlin Koller's claustrophobic black comedy feels oddly like a product of 2020. A group of estranged, middle-aged college pals of the BIG CHILL ilk--which one of the characters calls out, out loud, just so ya know--come together for a fallen comrade's funeral, only to find themselves trapped in his widow's increasingly creepy cabin in the woods. Said comrade was driven to suicide by the failure of a psychological experiment he conducted that plunged its subject into madness, and if you don't realize right away that the obnoxious and unstable cast are the new subjects of their not-quite-dead friend's renewed project, then you're firing a lot slower than 24 frames per second. The dialog is often decent, aiding a handful of funny, natural performances...but it's hard to forget that you're just waiting for the conspicuously crazy widow to reveal that the "unexplained events" in and around the cabin are part of a controlled attempt to get the guests to devolve into their worst selves, which isn't such a difficult task considering the undesirable state they all arrive in.

It just made me ask myself, what was the point of this? Why do people make movies that are entirely predicated on the shock of the twist, knowing that if the twist isn't so shocking--or is baldly obvious from the start--then the whole experience just falls apart? Why not hedge your bets with a little more depth, or purpose, or style, or really anything more reliable than a smug attempt to prove that your script is smarter than your audience? Even if you do manage to pull off this dubious accomplishment, it reduces your movie to something like the experience of having somebody jump out of a closet and scream in your ear to "get" you. I've always felt concerned that if somebody ever tries to "get" me like that, I might just automatically punch them in the face. But anyway, whatever shred of good will this movie could have accrued with its plucky performances is blown away by the final insult, when the cops arrive to clean up the inevitable bloody mess. The responding officers are hilariously unimpressed and unsurprised by the byzantine scheme that has resulted in a shocking act of violence, because the cabin's "guest book", which our heroes all filled out, was actually the signatory page of a complicated waiver form granting full permission to the hosts to, like, do whatever the hell they want to everybody. Presumably this shit just goes on all the time, leading the local law to shrug off anything that happens to or because of the dumbassed lab rats who frequent the cabin? I dunno. I mean, what can I say? ACAB, I guess!

At the time, I managed to resist the urge to take to the internet and decry the crimes of this lame-o party joke. I really don't like the sensation that a movie is just trying to trick me into thinking something that isn't true. But, this isn't, like, an affront to cinema. People make annoying, below average movies all the time, and maybe you kinda have to, if you eventually want to make better movies. I imagine myself in the shoes of the people who actually put some elbow grease into this production, having to wade through the rantings of internet ghouls like myself while they're trying to see how their efforts are paying off. Making a movie is probably a lot harder than I think it is.

But that's part of the point I'm heading toward. I'm always amazed by people's willingness to pour huge amounts of energy and capital into something to which there is ultimately very little point. I mean, I have bad, unoriginal, boring ideas every single day of my life. But I almost never DO any of them. I have a hard enough time convincing myself to just get out of bed in the morning, let alone devote blood, sweat, and money to deliver unto the world material evidence of my personal mediocrity. I can't imagine thinking it would be worth it, for myself or the unfortunate people who are subjected to my project, to actually execute on my bad ideas. I'm being judgmental, but honestly, I don't even know if my attitude makes me better or worse than someone who accomplishes the task of completing and selling a movie that's mainly a waste of time. Movies are so complicated, and realizing them requires the consensus of so many people, that it's sort of incredible that there are people capable of making one that doesn't have a powerfully compelling motivation behind it. People who are able to do such a thing obviously have something that I don't, and it isn't just "consideration for the audience."

So, I could probably stand to be more forgiving--or just, less eager to absolutely flay someone alive on my dumb little blog because they so opened themselves up to my arsenal of elaborate insults. But like...not all the time. Sometimes, a movie really fucking asks for it, and in revealing itself to me, it has effectively signed a waiver giving me patent freedom to do whatever I want to it. CONFESSIONAL is the latest movie to give me such a gift. After the final credit rolled in 30 MILES FROM NOWHERE, I looked for a little palate cleanser. As little as I like movies that put their single egg in the motheaten basket of a "shocking twist", I also have a problem with what I identify as canned theater. Not that I think all movies have to be lavish productions, but I think they should try to do something that is natively cinematic. It's very rare that I'm impressed by anything that is literally all talk. So, I went in search of some more familiar form of trash to help me recallibrate, and trash is definitely what I got.

(Me crying over my own bad decisions.)

To be fair, I kind of should have known that I was in for a challenging experience. The 2019 found footage thriller CONFESSIONAL is more or less based on the "confessional" part of sleazy reality TV shows, isolating each cast member in a soundproof stall so they can spill the rotten contents of their guts. Unfortunately, I spotted a review suggesting that the movie succeeded, against all odds, at remaining visually dynamic despite the unchanging scenery, and I was intrigued. The reviewer was correct, impressively; the monotony of the coffin-like environment with its dark foam walls was the least of my concerns. Other problems superseded that threat, immediately. The plot concerns a group of college pals who come together to remember a recently deceased friend--a filmmaker who expired mysteriously while completing a psychology-tinged project in which she recorded all of her friends' most shameful personal secrets. Now, somebody else has taken over the project...someone who "has never been identified", according to an early title card in this movie-within-a-movie (EVEN THOUGH THIS PERSON WILL BE EXPLICITLY IDENTIFIED AT THE END OF THE MOVIE SO LIKE WHY), but who seems likely to be the decedent's ex-lover...who continues to expose their subjects' most shameful secrets on film. I mean, what the fuck? Did I somehow manage to pick a second movie with almost the exact same plot??? I couldn't believe it. I didn't know if I could take it. My prospects only got worse when the cast showed up and started talking. I tried to turn the movie off. I backed out and walked away from it, twice. But I couldn't leave it alone. I had to know if it was really the same movie.

CONFESSIONAL concerns characters who are contemporaneously in college, which actually goes a long way to making everything worse. Each of these walking cliches is connected in some way to Amelia, a film student whose mysterious death has created a campus scandal, leaving shattered hearts and lives in its wake. The living have each received a blackmail-flavored invitation to speak about the deceased in a tiny "confessional booth" somewhere on campus, where, predictably, they find themselves locked in until they confess whatever they know about Amelia, and their classmates. I don't know why practically every single movie about young people has to be so miserable, but this is one of those. I assume that it has something to do with the fact that youth is simultaneously so desired and so ignored. People in their teens and early 20s are so sexually coveted, yet so easily dismissed as individuals, that we wind up with all this media that panders to them relentlessly (or at least, panders to the legions of ticket-buying perverts who enjoy watching them prance around), without almost any consideration of how they actually think and act, and look. Movies like FAT GIRL and WELCOME TO THE DOLL HOUSE may be accused of their own form of pandering, a venal form of voyeuristic schadenfreude, but at least they reflect something of the awkwardness, isolation, and incompleteness of adolescence; something more than the dissociated, pornographic fantasies of adults who have long since forgotten what it was like to be powerless and ignored, or desired by people who don't even like you.

Not that CONFESSIONAL is supposed to be a work of grim realism, but it is most definitely rooted in a fantasy about college life that makes its contrived, message-y plot a lot harder to take. With almost the sole exception of "the nerdy one", every single character looks like a Bratz doll, oozing an exaggerated indecency that belies the movie's pretentious insistence on addressing the sex & gender Issues of the Day. What you get is a really good example of what happens when millennial characters are modeled, not on any actual millennials, but on other forms of marketing that are aimed at millennials, which are themselves just based on other preexisting youth-targeted commercials, et al ad nauseam. Even setting aside the deliriously slutty wardrobe choices, makeup appears to have been laid on with a trowel, coating each actor in a thick creamy layer of spackle that only makes any scars, pits, or other evidence of individuality look utterly bizarre. Accordingly, everybody preens, pouts, and generally behaves as if they're about to take off their clothes, which might be a huge relief given the profusion of chafing, cheapo mesh and straps they're laboring under.

So, ok, not every movie can have a great costume department, but the dialog here is a perfect match for the disastrous aesthetic decisions. Actually, this is the real reason I almost walked out on CONFESSIONAL. If I may ramble briefly, without substantiating any of my broad-ranging claims: Sometime in the late 90s/early 00s, horror cinema seemed to suffer a degenerative slide away from genuine thrills and chills, and into a version of the genre that is best characterized as the Slutty Halloween Costume approach. Any sense of existential dread, revulsion, or bodily vulnerability was widely replaced by a cutesy, Hot Topic-y preference for fast fashion and sex appeal, in which bloodshed more facilitated an informal wet teeshirt contest than any real fear induction. Horror's new mall goth look came with an equally shallow, boring verbal affectation: a sullen, sleazy, tooth-sucking sarcasm, that ushered in a new era in which, instead of making fun of the scummy coked-out dialog in porno movies, we now expect everybody to just talk like that, because it's hot. There's probably a line to be drawn between this unfortunate development, and the boneheaded real-world trend of identifying "sarcasm" as an important personal selling point on dating sites, but I won't try to prove that here. For now, I will just say that as soon as I heard the CONFESSIONAL characters start to speak, with their sneering, insinuating tones, with the vocal fry, with the head wagging, the jutting jaws, the smoldering gazes, the juvenile dragging-out of horny grownup words like de-bauch-er-y...I almost lost my nerve. Listening to these little creeps hissing and spitting for 84 minutes is a lot like being hit on by some barfly who continues to bludgeon you with his hot breath and corny lines without ever noticing that you've thrown up into your pint.

Uh, anyway. So what actually happens in the movie. Why would anyone ever allow someone to record video of them revealing the ugliest, most embarrassing parts of themselves? Especially a kid, for whom popularity and reputation are often a matter of life or death--literally and specifically, in the case of this story. The flimsy reason is that the late filmmaker, Amelia, was the most awesomest girl ever. Everybody loved her, because she was so sweet, and so smart, and so cool, and so nice, and so deep, and so original, and so talented, and so sexy, and just like, the bestest most perfectest girl in the whole wide world. N.B. "The greatest of all time" is, perhaps counter-intuitively, a really bad quality that makes for really shitty, boring characters. For better or worse, Amelia is rarely on screen (and when she is, she's no Laura Palmer, frankly), so it's up to the viewer to just sort of imagine a type of person who could make you act against your best interests on account of you just like them so much. After all, so many of the characters were obsessed with her in some way, that it's like they're here to help you clap your hands and believe in this seductive, compelling part of the movie, that just isn't actually there on the screen. The anonymous antihero behind the confessional booth scheme slowly extracts from each character the selfish, destructive behavior that in some way contributed to the tragic loss of the most amazing person of all time--and part of the result is, if not a very interesting excuse for Amelia's death, then a story so wacky that I really wish they had centered the movie on it, instead of on the tawdry soap opera we're locked into. Even if that imaginary movie had been really bad, and it probably would have been, at it would at least have been entertaining.

Part of what leads up to the death of Amelia is the existence of a secret school fight club, led by a stereotypically sleazy gender studies major, named Major, who is out to prove men's inherent superiority. The club is called CFB, or Cock Fights Back, which is somehow a garbled pun relating to cock fights, and Trump's famous line of "locker room talk": "grab'em by the pussy" > "pussy grabs back" > "cock fights back". CFB is different from your ordinary fight club in that the fights are always between girls and boys, and the boys are always blindfolded, in order to prove that a fully-abled female is no match for even a handicapped male. To complicate things, a new designer amphetamine is gaining popularity on campus, called "odds-on", meaning that it makes you the odds-on favorite in your CFB fight. As awkward as that is, it also seems that men are never the guaranteed winners of these fights, which makes you wonder why Major insists on continuing to host them. As much as I would have preferred to watch a stupid movie about this stupid idea, I'm stuck instead with a movie in which Major is such an aggressive MRA because he's secretly gay, and he thinks that hating women is a great way to hide that...as if that isn't what we all openly suspect about aggro MRAs. Secret gayness is a big part of this movie, involving multiple characters, although it amounts to very little other than the perpetuation of some stale, harmful cliches about how unfulfilled homosexual urges lead to suicide, sexual abuse, and murder. CONFESSIONAL is just as reliant on this grim vision of gay life, as it is on its weirdly obtuse discussion of drug addiction, for the suffocating sense of self-importance that it uses to try to elevate itself above its porn-y trappings. None of the movie's hot button issues are given any real thought, but are only dragged through the mud to create the illusion that there's a point to all this, thus relieving the film of any sense of innocence that could have made its condescending sleaziness forgivable.

Admittedly, I can't really remember all the details of the film's tortured intrigue anymore, even though I basically just saw it. A lot of its meandering revelations just left me thinking, "Why did I need to know that? Why should I care?" I do know that about half way through this ordeal, I became really anxious about whether it would turn out that CONFESSIONAL did NOT have exactly the same plot as 30 MILES FROM NOWHERE after all, and I put myself through all this for nothing. But no, I was right to begin with. The wonderful Amelia's ethically dubious film project has been picked up by the unhinged lesbian character who loved her so much she wanted to become her, and killing Amelia and usurping her confessional project was apparently the best way of doing that. I guess exposing all the dark, violent secrets of all these tangentially involved characters was just an added bonus, or whatever. Ultimately, this ugly, ignorant PSA about something-or-other only deals itself further damage by relying so heavily on the potential of its clumsy twist to blow your mind, which it does not at all.

So that was it, that's how I burned a whole afternoon allowing my mind to implode-not-explode under the ponderous force of TWO (2) movies about exactly the same exhausted cliche that is still being peddled by certain pretentious assholes as fresh and exciting, and beyond the capacity of the audience to anticipate. There's probably a whole slew of other movies that employ this overly familiar "surprise", but I don't have it in me to dig them out of my long-suffering brain. Feel free to contribute in the comments. For now, I must prepare myself for the ordeal of Blogtober, during which I will *hopefully* choose my screening selections and words more thoughtfully than I have in previous years, when this blog was motivated by just as much abject misanthropy as these movies, which do nothing but willfully insult the audience's intelligence. Maybe today's detour into degradation will help me go forth toward more additive experiences, having purged several lungfuls of meaningless venom from my system, and this season will bring with it more interesting, provocative posts than the last. Or maybe not! In any case, I promise to keep trying my hardest to make it funny.

PS I actually love both FAT GIRL and WELCOME TO THE DOLLHOUSE. I’m “just saying”.

#blogtober #2020 #confessional #2019 #30 miles from nowhere #horror #thriller #black comedy #found footage #brad t gottfred #jennifer wolfe #jennifer bosworth #caitlin koller

10 notes · View notes

hush-ricky-blog · 7 years

Text

Rant

For a while I’ve been running into some interesting posts about Rick, and I say interesting, because some of these arguments about how overall awful Rick Grimes is, come from a section of the fandom that praise and excuse every questionable action if it’s done by a certain redneck and/or grey haired queen.

According to this special kind of Rick haters, there’re specific moments when Rick was especially selfish, manipulative, a terrible leader, a plain asshole, and so on.

Some even like to compare him to Ed and Merle…Yep.

I’ve collected some of my favorite arguments that I’ve read or heard from these haters about why Rick is the absolute worst, and tried my best to understand their reasoning. Let’s start from the beginning, shall we?

*Warning for heavy use of sarcasm and some strong language*

Merle. Everyone remembers the oldest Dixon and his peculiar personality. And we all remember how he and his brother got separated in Atlanta. Yes. It was all Rick’s fault, because, Merle being (probably) high and dangerous, pointing a loaded gun at people in the group, brutalizing them and yelling them racist and sexist insults is definitely Rick’s fault. Rick! You were supposed to let that one pass and just hope nobody got killed instead of handcuffing Merle! How dare you, Rick Grimes? Don’t you know whose brother Merle is and how upset he is going to be when he finds out?

Rick’s assholeness is so strong, it’s even able to make T-Dog trip and drop the handcuff’s key down the drain without him needing to be present. What a dick! It’s not like he went back to Atlanta with Daryl to get Merle out of his dire situation. What a selfish prick! You only went back for the guns, didn’t you? Don’t you know Merle is a good fella by association and totally worth risking your life? He’s Daryl Dixon’s older brother. For that alone, he’s better than you!

Another one of Rick’s most dickhead moments was when he completely dropped the search for Sophia for a few days. I know, what a selfish coward! Rick, it was only your son in the brink of death. You’re the leader. Carol counts on you to find her daughter that not only did you lose somehow, but abandoned too because you were supposed to be an expert walker killer by then. Drop the selfish, fatherly worry, leave your son to die, and go look for that girl who shouldn’t even be your responsibility in the first place!

Oh, and there’s more. Rick turned into a grade ‘A’ asshole at the end of season 2, didn’t he? A dictator. Dictator of a group of people who can up and leave whenever they feel like it…Something I don’t understand is, if no one HAS to follow Rick, why would they continue to do so? To follow such a terrible, selfish, coward, dicktator when no one’s forcing them to? Why subject themselves to live under such an oppressive regime, I wonder? Could it be because if they leave they’d have to be responsible for themselves and they’re just not up for that? I mean, it’s easy. Rick’s responsible for everyone’s actions. Everything ends up being his fault somehow. He’s even responsible for the kids of the group like they were his own. He’s the leader; therefore, it’s his fault Sophia got chased into the woods by a walker. But why would Carol continue to stick around the man that got her daughter killed when she could’ve perfectly gone off into the night in search of that man of honor she so desperately craved for, and send Rick a post card with a picture of…Daryl, probably, since he’s the only honorable man around? Doesn’t matter that said “honorable” man yelled at her in her face, called her a stupid bitch (Daryl sure has a lovely way of talking to women), called her pathetic, blamed her for her daughter’s death (Even though I deeply dislike him, I have to say, I’m with him on this one. Unlike Carol, at least Rick tried to help her. He didn’t just stand there and watch as a flesh eating monster chased her into the woods, letting Lori of all people hold him back) and pointed out to her just how alone and hopeless she was. But that’s okay, because Daryl is allowed to act like a tremendous dick when he’s upset. Let him vent! He’d just lost that little girl that he…uh…well…They occupied the same space for a while, okay? So he was in every right to feel as upset as he needed to, making everything about himself, throwing all his anger on that little girl’s mother who’s duty was to put her grief on hold to comfort that grown ass man, even putting her face up in case he’s feeling in need to punch something. He sure looked like he wanted to.

Nah, but Rick’s still the worst.

And there’s more. Rick’s selfishness reared its ugly head once again when they rescued Maggie and Glenn from Woodbury and he dared, he DARED to tell Daryl he needed him. What a manipulative asshole that Rick is! To use such a delicate situation to take advantage of Daryl’s loyalty and manipulate him into helping him? What a selfish prick! It’s not like it was dark as hell and they were being shot at from left and right, or that Glenn could hardly walk after being tortured by Daryl’s own brother. These are Daryl’s feelings we’re talking about. He was upset and to hell with everything else if Daryl’s upset! Everybody, stop the world and coddle that huge man-child! How dare Rick be so selfish and ask him to wait at least until they got Glenn and Maggie safe back to the prison after they were harassed, tortured and almost executed, to talk to Merle, AKA the causer of such atrocities toward the young couple? How dare you, Rick Grimes? Don’t you know Daryl wants to talk to his torturer of a brother after he lost him because of you?

Good thing Daryl didn’t give in to Rick’s manipulative ways and got what he wanted. He split from the group anyway and of course, got himself caught. So it was up to Rick to risk his selfish ass once more and go back to Woodbury with —still traumatized after Merle took her to the Governor who sexually harassed her— Maggie, to save Daryl and his torturer brother from having to kill each other. How more selfish can Rick get? Can’t he stop thinking about his own gain for two minutes?

The worst of Rick’s selfishness and dickness comes right after, though, when he DOESN’T, I repeat, he DOESN’T immediately jump to welcome Merle to the prison to live with Maggie and Glenn after he tortured Glenn, brought Maggie to the governor to be harassed, tied Glenn to a chair and threw a walker at him, and almost executed them both. How dare Rick have doubts about letting torturer, racist Merle into their home and become part of their family? How dare he make Pookie upset? So much selfishness going on around, it’s unbelievable!

But good thing Daryl didn’t give a shit about those selfish assholes and came back to the prison with his torturer of a brother in tow. He even saved selfish Rick’s ass in the process. That lousy leader surely owes him his life. And good thing Daryl saw to his own interest for once (‘cuz he’s so selfless, oh yes) and FORCED Glenn to just be okay with the man who kidnapped him and Maggie for absolutely no reason and brought them to the hands of a maniac, living with them from then on:

“Don’t be selfish, Glenn! Yer not s’pposed to make me upset. I’m Derle. Ma feelings come first. And Rick was a total dick for not putting down the welcome mat for my torturer brother Merle! Don’t he know he’s supposed to give me what I want? Besides, Merle ain’t a rapist. He’s just a torturer, sexist and violent racist like myself. Oh, yeah. I tortured a kid, too. Totally Rick’s fault, though. He made me do it…”

Really? Season 2 Rick Grimes, who at the time of the farm couldn’t even leave Randall to die in that fence, told the man who just happened to have a brother who liked to torture innocent people for fun, to torture him? Suuuuuuure.

“…We like to call women names, me an’ ma brother: like stupid/dumb bitches, whores and ugly skanks (Hey, that one was dead, so it don’t count!). We yell at them all we want. Heck, I even come off as shy to the fangirls even when I’ve rudely yelled my piece of mind on people’s faces for half the series. It’s all part of our Dixon charm. Like my jokes toward Glenn. No harm feelings. It’s all in good fun. He still thinks I’m one of the good things in this world (LMFAO. What a forced fucking line, my God!), even when I’ve been racist toward him, put ma brother’s hand in his backpack even if it grossed him out, forced him to live with his torturer, got him killed, leaving his pregnant wife a widow, then went to Hilltop for absolutely no reason other than to force ma’ presence on her and putting her life and her baby’s life in danger by solely showing up there when the saviors were after my ugly ass self— not giving a crap how much it clearly hurt Maggie having me around— till she forgave me. To hell with Maggie’s pain. I’m Derle and ma feelings come first. Maggie had to make me feel good about myself and absolve me of any guilt. Wasn’t ma fault, anyway. I’m Daryl and I had to punch Negan ‘cuz I was pissed. Dwight stole ma’ vest, ma’ bike and ma’ crossbow and killed my best friend in the world, Denise. I had to avenge those very important things to me, along with my bruised pride. Don’t matter I’m pushing fifty and should have at least some control of my actions by now. And while we’re at it, I’mma pretend like it wasn’t my idea to kill the saviors in the compound in exchange for food from The Hilltop. All the blame will fall on Rick’s shoulders, anyway. Don’t matter it wasn’t his idea. Don’t matter it wasn’t his, but my fist connecting with Negan’s jaw. I can act as reckless as I want without repercussions ‘cuz I can do no wrong. I can get a teenage girl drunk on moonshine, get drunk myself (and very violent) and whip my dick out with her in the room (Hey, I turned around!), pee in front of her, yell at her, make her feel bad for having a good childhood, manhandle her outta the shag to teach her to use ma’ crossbow while pressing my body up against her back. (No, it ain’t inappropriate! I’m Derle and I’m always innocent) I can yell at her, mock her pain and suicide attempt after she saw her dead mother walking out of that barn, and label it as just a call for attention! Mock her way of coping with her dad’s death, comparing her with a dumb college bitch. I can tell her all the people she cares about are dead, that she ain’t ever gonna see her sister again and there ain’t hope left. But it’s totally fine ‘cuz I was upset! I’d just seen Hershel’s head being sliced off the rest of his body and I needed to lash out at his teenage daughter (who saw the whole thing too, by the way), ‘cuz when I’m upset, don’t matter who’s with me or how old they are or who they’ve just lost, they gotta think of ma’ feelings first and comfort ME! But all is good, cuz don’t matter how gross I act, all I gotta do is flex ma’ biceps, ride ma’ brother’s neo-Nazi bike (yeah, I know that shit stayed at the prison, but he’d still be riding that shit if it hadn’t) and blow shit up to have fangirls drooling over me and praising or excusing all the gross shit I do.”

Seriously, how does he get away with all of this? Had Rick done half this shit, you haters would, to this day, still be calling him a violent sexist, racist torturer and you know it!

Anyway, let’s move on.

Another one of my favorite arguments to why Rick sucks so bad is when some of you Rick haters gave him shit when he took some time for himself and his son during season 4A. Like he wasn’t busting his back under the Georgia sun, from sunrise to sundown, to put food on their plates. But who gives a shit about fresh vegetables when Daryl can go out, shoot a couple arrows and have some real food on their plates instead? Everybody pat Daryl in the back and shake his recently licked hand (gross) because he’s the real hero and Rick is just being selfish and useless again. “What do you mean Rick’s growing food? He’s not bringing in as much meat as Daryl Dixon, so it doesn’t count!”

Honestly, I never got why Carol gave him shit for stepping away from leadership (and killing for the group), after she gave him shit for being a bad leader. She wants him to lead; she doesn’t want him to lead? I don’t get it. I mean, they had Sasha, Glenn, Hershel, Daryl and herself to lead the group during Rick’s break. Why did she need Rick for? To look for the Governor and kill him? Well, he’s Rick and everything is his responsibility, right? It’s not like Daryl had THE biggest reason to kill him. The Governor only killed his brother after all.

But seriously, what was her deal with Rick? Whatever it was, if Rick was doing it, it wasn’t good enough. Was she taking on her late friend Lori who never seemed satisfied with anything Rick did or say, maybe? Oh, right. Rick was abusing Lori by not talking to her during the prison, so he deserves it. That’s why Carol gave Rick her abusive husband’s watch, because she saw and abusive man in Rick (or what I like to call: “The reach of the century”). So it’s like she was telling him: “Here, keep this watch, you abusive bastard. It suits you. It belonged to another abusive bastard.” Seriously? After everything Rick went through with Lori— and by everything I mean, Lori picking up one-sided fights with Rick before the apocalypse just to get a reaction she knew she wasn’t gonna get from him (Lori, you should’ve gone to Daryl if you wanted a man to yell in your face and call you a bitch…Oh wait. He did. Or was it Rick he called a bitch that one time?), getting pissed off at Rick for being quiet, calm, and reasonable, telling him to speak about his feelings then acting impatient like she didn’t want to hear him after all when he tried, telling him she doubted his love for her and Carl in front of Carl, followed by Lori abandoning him in that hospital, not even bothering to check for her own damn self if her husband was alive (well, I guess we can’t really blame her for that. Why would she risk her life for someone she wasn’t sure she even loved anymore?), and just a couple weeks later, she was playfully having sex in the woods with Rick’s best friend like they’d been at it for a while; then, when said friend turned dangerous, she insinuated to Rick, in not too subtle terms, that he had to kill Shane to protect her and Carl, and when Rick did just that, not only to protect them, but himself as well (Yes, Shane took Rick to that clearing to kill him, even if some of you like to brush over that fact just so you can compare it to Carol killing Karen and David. Seriously, you would defend Shane over Rick even when he tried to rape Lori, just so you can frame Rick as the bad villain that exiled poor, innocent Carol… *smh*), she pushed him away — After all that treatment Rick got from Lori, which reeks of psychological/emotional abuse for it left Rick feeling insecure and like everything he did or say was the wrong thing in her eyes, he was supposed to pretend like nothing had happened and things between them were fine and dandy? He was already giving her his share of food and keeping her and Shane’s baby alive. Wasn’t that enough?

Nope. I guess it wasn’t. Rick was totally being abusive....But yelling in someone’s face that they got their child killed because they minded other people’s business instead of keeping an eye on them and telling them just how alone they are while calling them a stupid bitch isn’t abusive? Suuure.

Huh. Interesting how Daryl blaming Carol for her daughter’s death parallels so perfectly Negan blaming Rick for Carl’s…Interesting.

But I’ll give it you. Rick WAS a dick when he exiled Carol. Yes. And he should’ve left the decision to the Council instead of making it himself— although I do understand why he might’ve wanted to make sure Carol was away from his kids when, had they been the ones sick, there was a high chance she could’ve killed them if it was for the benefit of the whole group— but don’t tell me those were mercy killings on Carol’s part, because all I saw was Karen walking into that room with just a cough, then next thing I know— and judging by how awfully smitten Tyreese was with Karen, he probably was gone the time it took him fetching those flowers—she’s turned into a pile of ashes. Glenn survived. Sasha survived. Lizzie survived. There’s no guarantee that Karen and David would’ve died. Both Rick and Carol fucked up. Both did things they shouldn’t have done and made decisions that weren’t theirs to make, but only one of those ended with two innocents dead.

But who cares about that? Rick’s still a coward for not immediately telling Daryl that he exiled Carol when he got back from that run. Wait...so Carol didn’t just stand there watching as Tyreese and Rick beat the shit out of each other and kept her mouth shut about killing Karen? Oh, I believe she did.

Also, Rick exiled Carol, yes, and that makes him the worst and blah, blah, blah, but Daryl didn’t seem as upset with Rick as he should’ve, considering Rick pretty much sent the love of his life to an almost certain death. Hell, he even seemed more upset about losing Rick when he was yelling at Beth. He almost teared up at saying his name. And this is why I often wonder, how is it that to this day, Rick is still getting shit for that, even after he accepted he made a mistake and apologized to Carol, but Daryl, expert tracker he is, was instantly forgiven for not even making the slightest attempt at trying to find Carol??? Oh, right. Daryl was huuuuurting during that time, so he gets a pass on that. He always gets a pass on everything.

Let’s continue, though.

I’ve read more than once the argument saying that “Rick is a narcissist who thinks he’s better than everyone and no one else can handle things like he can, and he’s a jerk to people for the same reason,” from some of you, and it just baffles me. Didn’t Carol treat the Alexandrians like little kids (except for Sam, who probably would’ve preferred the kiddie treatment), and didn’t she totally patronize everyone at the Kingdom and was unnecessarily harsh on everyone, calling the place and everybody living there a joke? Didn’t she also act like a total jerk to Jerry, the most adorable person on the apocalyptic world, after he made her a pie? And didn’t Derle act all high and moral, in other words, a total dick toward Bob, an alcoholic, because he had a bottle of liquor in his pack instead of medicine after he was more than helpful in their search for medicine then prepared the shots that saved Sasha, Glenn and Lizzie? And wasn’t he a gratuitous jerk toward Denise more than once, making fun of her anxious gestures, while she was talking to him? They did. They fucking did. They are BOTH guilty of the exact same thing you blame Rick for…But oh, no! God FORBID Rick Grimes from being a jerk toward Gabriel, who tried to get them all kicked out of Alexandria.

So if Rick is harsh on people, he’s a narcissistic dick, but Carol is queen and totally in her right because damn! Those overly nice kingdomers and their overbearing hospitality won’t leave her in peace! And Daryl is…the absolute hero? Did I get it right?

Oh, but there’s the Andrea, Tyreese, Michonne, Glenn, and OBG thing at the prison. I mean, Rick handled Andrea pretty roughly when she showed up at the prison, and he nudged Michonne’s bullet wound and was overall awful toward her, and he choke-held Glenn against the wall. I know, right? What a tremendous dick!…Except, Rick was hardcore hallucinating during that time. He was having actual conversations over the phone with Lori, Shane, Jacquie, etc. He saw Lori several times, and Shane too. His mind was in complete wreck. He was going through a psychotic episode, so bad, he’d had to be medicated, and possibly, temporarily put away into a mental health facility had the world been what it used to. He was NOT in control of his actions. But somehow, he was on his own, armed, wandering the portions of the prison that were infested with walkers, going outside the fences in search for his wife’s ghost, putting himself in danger over and over again, and aside from Glenn and Hershel who tried to talk to him once or twice, no one else even bothered to help him, or at least, prevent him from endangering his life or the life of others. They all just let him fend for himself.

But putting blame aside, shouldn’t Rick’s temporary mental illness excuse him from his deplorable actions during that time (which lasted till the end of season 3) or that only works with that unwashed man-child?

And since Rick had to pull himself out of that mental breakdown on his own, his self control was still pretty weak when he beat up Tyreese into unconsciousness. Even then, he still tried to keep himself together and reason with Tyreese, but I guess his still frail mind just lost it after those two brutal, and very much unprovoked, punches.

But wait…do you even remember Tyreese? He’s the one who totally didn’t get Judith out of the prison. It was all Carol who saved that ungrateful bastard’s daughter, even when he got hers killed, because that’s how selfless and forgiving Carol is. And she singlehandedly saved Rick’s ungrateful ass out of Terminus, right after he sent her to her death. She is so the queen of the universe!

…Please.

Carol created the diversion and killed some snipers, yes, no one argues that, but if Rick hadn’t gotten loose and killed those two butchers, they would’ve still gotten slaughtered, your precious Daryl included, and we wouldn’t have had the absolute best reunion in the history of the walking dead. Forget about Rick finding his son. That Caryl hug is the real deal! *wink*

Now we’re on the shipping subject, remember when some of you gave Rick and Michonne shit for being selfish in bed right after Denise got killed? What a couple of selfish asses! They’re so meant to be!

Well…at least when Rick and Michonne are being selfish, they either stay within earshot in case shit hits the fan and they’re needed by their people, or they do it while ALSO gathering supplies for their community; the community they’ll come back to no matter what. Unlike Derle’s unreliable ass who fucks off every five minutes for some personal revenge, or Carol who downright abandoned them (also, right after Denise was killed), knowing there was a war coming and knowing she’d be needed to go all Rambo -armed with machine guns up her sleeves- on the saviors, but unwilling to kill for them anymore.

“Good luck fuckers! It’s time for some me time.”

But Carol and Daryl are totally not selfish, though. Rick is the only selfish one around. Sure.

Hey, I’m not blaming Carol. Good on her. She deserved her time off from killing for them. Hey! Just like Rick in season 4— No wait, Rick didn’t deserve shit, because he never killed for them, and he totally hadn’t carried the weight of leadership all the way from the farm since no one else wanted to burden themselves with it.

What am I saying? Rick LOVES to be the leader. He gets off on the power it gives him. Even though he’s said MORE THAN ONCE that he didn’t ask to be in that position and basically, didn’t want to be in it. Even though he seemed perfectly happy at the prison with planting veggies, setting up snares in the woods, feeding the animals, and raising his kids as his main obligations; even though he told Maggie he’ll follow her lead once the war’s over. Even though he told Michonne he’d be up to lead the new world after the war, but ONLY if she’s by his side leading with him (Oh, in case you don’t know what I’m talking about, this conversation took place in 7x12, that Richonne episode a lot of you sabotaged by not watching). If he were in fact thirsty for power, like some of you like to claim, why on earth doesn’t he take full advantage of it and enjoys the privileges that come with it like Negan does? Why doesn’t he have the first claim on every supply they find and keep the best for himself? Why doesn’t he sit in a throne and have people call him King? Why does he even bother to go out on supply runs anymore, risking his life, when he could snap his fingers and have ten of his people doing it for him? Why doesn’t he just send out orders left and right while he sits back on his rocking chair while sipping on margaritas?

Nah, but he still deserved Negan to humiliate that power thirst out of him.

And just in case you’re that special kind of Rick hater that says: “…But if it weren’t for Rick, none of the saviors mess would’ve happened!”

Excuse me; I must’ve missed the scene were Rick put up signs leading toward Alexandria, or the scene where he shot up a flair to let their position known to the saviors. If we’re gonna start handing out blame for their encounter with Negan, your precious Daryl had A TON more to do with the saviors mess than Rick ever did. He was the one with the brilliant idea to kill all the saviors in exchange for food (and a cow) from the Hilltop. He was the one (along with Abraham) that underestimated the saviors in the first place, forgetting to mention that tiny HUGE detail that he had the advantage of an RPG when he finished those bikers on the road in the blink of an eye. And he was the one that let Dwight get away, allowing him to later lead the saviors to Alexandria...But you’re right! I do blame Rick for that. I blame him for listening to Daryl’s dumb ass idea and trusting his gut when he clearly shouldn’t have!

And as for the whole Oceanside community argument... I know. What they did was awful in every way you look at it. But I find hilarious how the blame is put mostly on Rick’s shoulders. I must’ve missed the scene where Rick says, “Here’s what we’re gonna do. We’re gonna go in and rob those women of their guns, and you’re all gonna do it and like it.” And where is the scene where it’s stated that this was his idea at all? It’s more than likely that it could have been Tara’s…or even your precious Daryl’s idea? It was HIS idea to attack the saviors first, after all. It could’ve perfectly been his idea this time too. And even if it wasn’t and it was in fact Rick’s idea, Daryl was there as well, setting up explosives and taking those women hostages and stripping them off their guns like the rest of them. And unlike under Negan’s ruling, no one’s life (or that of their loved one’s) is at stake if they don’t follow Rick’s “orders.” They’re all free to either go with him or stay back if they don’t agree with his approach, or speak up if they don’t agree with his plans (though they probably should do it before said plan is being executed, Derle!). Everything they do as a group is on everyone who participates. They were ALL there. ALL of them who went there willingly are equally as guilty and horrible as Rick.

*whinny voice* “Oh, but Pookie’s still so good and pure…”

LMAO! No, he’s not.

And last but not least, the Jadis thing. *Sighs* I mean, this woman betrayed Rick and his family, shot him on the side, threw him down the wall and down the mountain of garbage, took him and Carl to Negan where Negan almost killed Carl, had one of his people beat up Michonne, made him fight a walker twice with no means to defend himself, stripped him down and took photos of him half naked for her own twisted pleasure, objectifying him and downright sexually harassing him, but he turns his back on her once…ONCE!...and you’re trying to paint Jadis as his poor little victim and Rick as the mean woman abandoner????

Wow…*snorts*

To be honest, I’m not all that surprised. Like I said before, some of you would defend Shane (who tried to rape Lori, let’s not forget) over Rick, to make Rick look as the bad guy… Again, SMDH.

Now, I’m not saying Rick’s never done inexcusable shit. Of course he has. Among other things the, at times, indiscriminate killing (that of which Carol AND Daryl are also guilty of), he punched Aaron without having a reason to and threatened to kill him, he killed police man Bob when he tried to run away, his overall behavior during 5B-6A, he considered giving Michonne up to the Governor. He backed out, yes. But still considered it and got Merle to —“Oh, that’s right! Daryl lost his brother for real this time because of this and Rick is the one to blame!”

Give. Me. A. Fucking. Break.

Merle already had the idea to ambush the Governor set in his mind way before Rick even told him anything about taking Michonne to him. He was going to do it anyway. It was HIS damn decision.

But good thing though, that good ol’ Daryl Dixon, redneck with a heart of gold (even though he was very into killing innocent workers from the sanctuary, rammed a truck into the Sanctuary and effectively killed a bunch while handing Eugene an escape plan in a silver platter which then led to the saviors attacking both Alexandria and The Kingdom…Good job, dumbass!), got to kick evil Rick Grimes’ ass this season and finally stood up to him for all those times he was a prick toward him…

LMFAO!!

Standing up to Rick for what, exactly? For taking him in as part of his family? For trusting him? For influencing him into becoming a better person?

Yes. You read that right. Rick had a major role in Daryl becoming a somewhat decent person. Remember when Daryl asked Rick if Glenn was worth risking his life back in season 1 after he got taken by The Vatos? We all know what Rick’s answer to that was, and that answer had a huge impact on Daryl’s future actions. If Daryl ever learned to care for other people, aside from his brother and himself, to the point of risking his life for them, that’s the moment that did it. Shocking, right? Selfish Rick Grimes taught golden boy Daryl Dixon how to be selfless? How about that? Hell, even Merle found his brother awfully changed after those months spent with his buddy officer friendly, and I’m thinking Merle knew what he was talking about since he knew Daryl all his life. And to quote Merle’s exact words to Daryl after he stopped him from robbing that family on the road:

“Is that something your sheriff Rick taught you?”

Yes, Merle. That’s exactly what Rick taught him. After all, before Rick came along, Daryl was just a racist, sexist, violent redneck waiting for the chance to rob a camp filled with innocent people, and children among them…wait, that sounds familiar. And Rick’s supposed to be the bad influence on Daryl? Ha! Yeah right! And if there’s ever been a Merle 2.0 in the show (what I’ve seen some of you like to call Rick), it’s Daryl himself. That’s exactly who he would be, had Rick not entered his life.

You can praise and excuse Daryl’s questionable behavior all you want, but try to make him look as if he’s better than Rick…and even…better than Ezekiel (excuse me for a moment while I have a laughing fit) out of some of yours desperate need for him to be with, also NOT better than Rick, Carol!?!? Not a freaking chance! That would require for him to start acting like the grown man he is, taking full responsibility of his actions (not just admitting guilt to get forgiveness after he gets people killed), and drop a whole lot of that innate selfishness, that of which Rick’s being widely accused of having, but Daryl himself has in spades. And maybe take a fucking shower without having to be threatened to be hosed down if he doesn’t. Gross!

Oh...one more thing. Some of you actually want to steal Judith from Rick and Michonne when they just lost Carl so Caryl can raise her? Are you freaking for real?!?!

#caryl #daryl dixon #carol peletier #jadis

20 notes · View notes

anticraptainswan · 8 years

Note

That other anon is right, you're big on dish it out but can't take it. And call anything you don't like hate. Also, Neal did say "august talked me into it" and Hook always takes responsibility for his bad acts. Or this all just your right to headcanons (which you feel csers don't have and get mad about)?

I don’t dish out any hate that isn’t properly tagged so..... That’s the difference.

It would be one thing if I was tagging all my anti posts, etc in your ships tag, etc but I don’t so yeah.....

I didn’t make this blog for you all to hate and stalk.

I made this blog so people would have a place to vent about how CSers (aka you people) treat others in this fandom.

I made this blog so we could all talk about what we feel is problematic with CS/Hook.

I didn’t make this blog so you all could send rude messages for people having another opinion other than yours.

I keep anon on for a reason that has NOTHING to do with you CSers. I keep it on because sometimes, people don’t want to be known who they are. People are afraid to come off anon because they worry that if you all see their URL, you’ll think it’s okay to send them hate after you see it.

And I’d rather you send me hate then them.

You want to send me hate and tell me that you hope I die or call me fat and ugly or whatever? Fine, do it. I don’t give a shit.

So send me hate or don’t. I don’t care.

But I do encourage you to think about this next time you send someone hate: How would you like it if I came into your blog and started harassing you about your CS headcanons? How would you like it if I came into your blog and started listing all these things that Hook HASN’T taken responsibility for. (Newsflash, it’d be a long ass ask because it’s basically everything. He’s so irresponsible it’s laughable but whatever) You would hate it and call me a terrible person for invading your inbox.

So don’t act like some high and mighty person like you’re doing a public service. This is just you being a goddamn hypocrite is all.

#anon #asks #anti CS fandom #anti CS shippers #anti CS #anti Captain Swan #anti Hook #Anonymous

2 notes · View notes

kyetalksshit · 7 years

Text

Update for the first time in SO LONG

Hey guys!

So it’s the 4th of july and I’m tipsy. Happy shitty ass holiday to all of u who care about it. I don’t. Fireworks are boring and sound like gunshots and loud ass cis white republican christian people get louder than usual about how “great” this country “used to be,” and get to celebrate the day this country was founded on native american genocide and rape and began an era of slavery and racism and a bunch of other motherfucking goddamn bullshit.

Anyway.

I told a storytime on my youtube channel about my ex who I called Gregg (bc he looks like Gregg Sulkin, or at least I thought he did back then. It’s actually a two parter so far. I have yet to get to the part where he dumped me over text and then tried to be friends with benefits with me, I refused, I tried, he refused, we fought a lot, repeat cycle. Wow that was a fucking shitstorm. Finally unfriended him a couple of months ago because of a shitty ass facebook post and I just didn’t have the energy anymore. Plus, he has a girlfriend now, and at this point any desire to communicate with him was based on a pure physical attraction and/or wanting to have some sort of intellectual conversation with him because, as much as I honestly still kind of resent him, I do admire his brain. Anyway.)

So when I told the storytime, I spent a good hour going through my tumblr for posts about him (and his, for posts about me, which I remember desperately hoping for back when I was still with him or right after we broke up) and it kind of made me miss blogging.

This has been the longest intro in the fucking world. Oh my god. Ugh.

Anyway.

I just kind of wanted to get on here and talk a little bit.

I don’t remember what my original pushing thought was, since again, I’m tipsy, and I got so sidetracked talking about “gregg” (though let’s be real, if any of you watch that storytime and have followed me for long enough, you know exactly who I’m talking about. He doesn’t even follow me on tumblr anymore. He unfollowed me a long time ago, actually. And now that I’m talking so much about him I’m kind of tempted to text him, which would obviously be a fucking bad idea, but you know. I’m a masochist. We’ll see what I do later I guess. I don’t know.)

I’m kind of miffed today. And by that, I mean I’m actually hurt but too prideful to say I’m hurt. My family is very clearly celebrating for this shit holiday, which they don’t know that I don’t care about, by the way, and no one even invited me. Yeah I was working most of the day but I got off at 8, and anyway I hadn’t told them I was working. My mother probably just “assumed I had to work and couldn’t make it” again. Even though she promised to make more of an effort to invite me to things. My heart hurts.

Yeah I don’t care about fireworks, but I love my family and I miss my niece and my sister isn’t talking to me because apparently I’ve changed and she misses “Amber,” not “Kye.” (Oh yeah, I go by Kye now. Just, btw.)

What she doesn’t seem to realize no matter how many times I tell her, is that Amber, that girl she grew up with that she apparently misses so goddamn much, she doesn’t exist anymore. She was a fucked up piece of shit too, if I’m being honest. I call my past self Amber instead of “past Kye” because I don’t know her anymore. You know why?

Because I’ve been through so much motherfucking goddamn bullshit since then. I was raped. I left my family for a goddamn year over some slightly shitty but WAY overexaggerated bullshit (that, let’s be real, I’ll never fully forgive myself for) that was twisted into a horror story by the evil ex whose name I can’t even fucking SAY because it makes me feel fucking nauseous. I almost killed myself a couple of times. I cut over and over and motherfucking over again because I was so goddamn depressed, I got kicked out of TWO apartments (once because my roommate was just a bitch and wanted any made up excuse she could find, the other because my alcoholic roommate who sexually assaulted me MY FIRST NIGHT THERE and who is STILL my dm for one of my dnd games and tries to pretend he fucking cares about me, hallucinated our neighbors trying to kill us and made me take him to the hospital and file a police report when it was just his goddamn mind). I’ve been so broke for the past couple years I was a camgirl for awhile. I did live camshows for money. I also sold photos and videos of me naked, sometimes taking requests. It made me fucking miserable and gave me flashbacks but I was jobless and had to pay rent. I’m not going to lie, I’ve been considering starting again because I’m broke as fuck and I want to cry from how stressed I am most of the time, but I haven’t yet. You know why?

Again, I was raped. And sexually assaulted, not just by that roommate, but also by two family members (like when I was a kid) who will remain unnamed (who never even said I’m sorry, by the way, even when I brought it up. I still hang out with one. How fucking sick do I have to be to still hang out with a family member who sexually assaulted me and apologized to my sister for touching her, but not me?). But also because I’ve been in this deep disgusting ass pit of self fucking loathing recently. I feel fat and ugly and nasty more often than not, every time I get a crush or a lust-crush on someone I start to feel guilty about it because how dare I burden someone with the weight of having to deal with my affection? I feel lonely and also selfish for feeling lonely, I miss my family but I also avoid them. And then I get upset when they don’t invite me to things.

This is the last holiday I’m ever going to spend living in North Carolina. Connor and I are leaving for Los Angeles on August fucking 5th. I’ll be around for my brother’s and my cat’s birthday (incidentally they’re both on August 2nd), but then I’m gone. I won’t be able to make it to Christmas this year because let’s face it, I won’t have the money. The soonest they’re going to see me after I leave is MAYBE Christmas 2018, and I’m not even sure that’s going to happen. Hell, I’m not even christian anymore, celebrating it feels weird.

Also, going back to this whole name shit and “I’ve changed” bullshit, Amber was an asshole. She made racist comments and used to say the “n” word back in high school. She literally laughed in boys’ faces when they asked her out if she wasn’t attracted to them, not even just because they were “out of her league” because she (rightfully) didn’t believe in “leagues,” but just because if she was going to say no, she was going to be a bitch about it. I remember one of my best friends’ little brothers asking me out in 9th grade, and he was in like 7th. He was OBVIOUSLY too young for me but I should have been fucking nice about it. Instead, I laughed at him, literally fucking laughed at him, and just said “omg bye.”

She also didn’t know how to stand up for herself. She was mousy and depressed and anxious and small and hated herself and so who gave a fuck if people used her because what good was she herself anyway? Like yeah, Kye is fatter and her mental health has gone down the fucking drain (no really, my counselor thinks I’m borderline and I really need to be medicated honestly because it’s so hard to function I’m scared I’m going to fail at trying to be alive) but at least she can mostly say no, and she can cut people out her life when she wants to. At least Kye can pinpoint when people are trying to manipulate her (though if we’re being honest here, and holy fuck we really are, since the fucking evil ex aka my rapist, my mind is warped as fucking hell and I don’t know what’s real anymore. The amount of manipulation I have imagined and overreacted to is insane. My uncle wallace won’t talk to me because I overreacted when he had a shitty opinion and posted it on a status of mine, and I took it as him attacking me. I want to cry every time I think about it but I already sent him one long message explaining why, and then the next day I sent a really long apology message. I don’t know why I keep fucking things up with everyone I care about. It feels like Connor and my cat are the only ones I have anymore, and even Connor can drive me crazy sometimes because obviously, that’s how people are who live together and have known each other for 8 fucking years, and I’m so hard to live with and deal with because of the bpd and the fact that my anxiety shows itself in irritability and the amount of times I’ve snapped at them for fucking nothing is absolutely ridiculous. I’m mad that they still haven’t learned how to drive and we’re moving in a month and it’s looking like I’m going to have to drive by myself from one coast to another while they blissfully chill in the passenger seat and doze off or play on their phone or whatever, but in reality they’re probably really anxious about it too and they probably feel bad but can’t make theirself do it and it’s just I feel so shitty all the time oh my god).

I don’t even know what the point of this post is, I just think I needed to vent somewhere that I don’t have to be careful what I say because no one reads this shit anyway. The second I vent where ANYONE in my family can see it, they’ll all jump down my throat for being “disrespectful to my parents” or some other bullshit. They fucking love bandwagons. One of their favorite phrases is “my army is bigger” and honestly that shit scares me because yeah, it is. And that goddamn army is too fucking prideful (like me) to accept when they maybe should hear someone out, and they will literally cyberbully you if they can. It may sound whiny, but I really do feel like I was cyberbullied that day with uncle wallace. I’m not even kidding (and again, no one reads this so I don’t feel bad saying this because it’s tru) I legitimately wanted to kill myself that day. Everyone was jumping down my throat AGAIN over something I said that hurt my mom when I didn’t even know it hurt her. If I had, I would have taken it down and apologized. They were also attacking me for an immature snapchat saying “fuck you and your shitty ass opinions” which was about my uncle, and yeah I deserved a little of that bullshit but I admitted that was wrong very shortly after. He wouldn’t even hear me out, but I was the bad guy, the disrespectful, ignorant black sheep who treated everyone like shit. I keep trying to pretend I’m over the whole thing but I’m so not. I won’t forget who said shit to me and who didn’t. Because that shit fucking hurt.

I don’t want to tell Connor how mad I am over something they may not be able to control, I don’t want to fucking rub my sister’s face in how ‘not’ Amber I am (also, just, sidenote, the main reason I changed my is really because I hated Amber and wanted some control over my life and it really has made me happier, but also honestly it was partly because my fucking rapist has never called me “Kye” and so when I’m having fucking rape flashbacks I can separate myself from it so when she insists that Kye is horrible and she hates me now (she didn’t say that but she said I wouldn’t be in her life if I weren’t family and let’s face it, I’m not in her life rn anyway and I may as well not be family with how I’ve been treated recently, not that it’s not partly my fault, but still) and that she misses Amber, who she grew up with, who is the one she misses, not me, not who I am now. Honestly, when we were fighting it felt like she only said that because she needed a concrete reason to be mad at me so she grasped onto the fact that I’ve changed, which my whole family complains about, but

Look at all the motherfucking goddamn fucked up shit I’ve been through in the past few years. OF FUCKING COURSE I’VE CHANGED. It hurts like hell that my ENTIRE family is mad that I’m not the same girl who left them for an abusive fiance. Like yes, I’m kind of a bitch now when I need to be, and yes I overreact to things BECAUSE I’VE BEEN THROUGH TRAUMA U DON’T JUST FUCKING GET OVER THAT, and yes I changed my name and I’m not the motherfucking goddamn same but how dare you want me to be?

I WANTED TO DIE. EVERY DAY OF MY LIFE. I HAVE NEVER HATED MYSELF AS MUCH AS I DID THEN. I HAD TWO EATING DISORDERS, AN ADDICTION TO CUTTING (for which I’m now getting urges so I’m going to end this soon), I HATED EVERYONE I KNEW, I WAS FUCKING SO DEPRESSED I COULDN’T EVEN, UGH, I WAS ONLY SLEEPING ONCE EVERY TWO NIGHTS SO I WAS HALLUCINATING, I PUSHED AWAY EVERYONE WHO EVER GAVE A SHIT ABOUT ME, I SNAPPED AT EVERYONE WHO WAS NEAR ME WHEN I WAS ANXIOUS AND I DIDN’T KNOW MY TRIGGERS. NOW I CAN AT LEAST SEPARATE MYSELF FROM THE SITUATION SO I DON’T HURT PEOPLE AS MUCH. I DON’T TALK ABOUT THE VIEWS I HAVE THAT CONFLICT WITH EVERYONE ELSE’S SO I DON’T HAVE TO ARGUE WITH ANYONE. I HAVE MADE MYSELF SMALL, THEN MADE MYSELF BIG, AND REVERT TO SMALL WHEN I’M AROUND THEM, BUT IT’S STILL NOT FUCKING ENOUGH FOR THEM.

WHEN, please fucking tell me WHEN, when will I be enough for them?

#angst #family #drama #blogging #update #happy fourth #fourth of july #independence day #trauma #survivor #venting

0 notes

statusreview · 6 years

Text

Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room

If you have some ugly things in your laundry room you’re interested in hiding, or you’re just looking for photos of a laundry room with a top loader (since most online photos feature front loaders with a big counter over them), well this post is for you. After months of simmering in the background, the beach house’s laundry room/mudroom finally came together over the weekend. It’s a pretty simple room that we’d been planning and shopping for since way back in December (yes, as in 2017), but it always got stuck in line behind other tasks like building the walk-in pantry and constructing the wall-to-wall bunks beds. With those out of the way, it was nice to clear out all of the lumber, tools, and random dust bunnies that had been calling this room home and make it a working, functional space that’s approximately 89% nicer to look at.

Let’s take this makeover tale waaaaaay back, shall we? This was arguably the UGLIEST area of the beach house when we originally bought it. And that’s quite a title to hold, given the stiff competition.

This room had originally been a porch that someone “enclosed” at some point. I say that in quotes because it wasn’t done very well (they used interior flooring instead of siding) which caused this whole section of the house to get soggy and rot over time (there were fist sized holes in it by the time we purchased it). That, plus the failing foundation is why we had to have this whole side area of the house rebuilt entirely (it was set in sand as opposed to having concrete footers… and sand slowly sinks… as did this area of the house).

But by the end of last summer, it was starting to take shape, thanks largely to drywall and the floor tile we laid. It was from Lowe’s and was nice and easy on the budget (we used Warm Gray grout by Mapei with it).

But for the last 6 months or so, other than finally hanging some light fixtures that we designed (this is the onyx color), it has largely been a dumping ground for all of our project supplies. Since we don’t have a garage or a shed (yet – a shed is on the list), all of our tools, scrap wood, boxes, etc, ended up in here.

After our laundry appliances arrived around Black Friday, it still resembled a work zone more than anything else. This is the washer and dryer we got, which are the current models of what we bought for our own laundry room four years ago (we really really like them, hence buying them again for the beach house).

So how did we jump from that mess to this weekend’s mostly-finished room? Let’s break it down.

The biggest challenge in finishing off the laundry room was the ugly stuff on the wall to the left of the washer, aka our tankless water heater (you can see it more clearly two photos up). We wanted to cover it all with some sort of cabinet, but still leave it easily accessible for service and so we can still turn it off every time we leave (when a house is vacant, turning the water off = great peace of mind). Our solution? A good old fashioned IKEA hack. Ignore the lack of cabinet organization for now – that’s still on the to-do list (are you sensing there are around 348 things that are still on that list?).

We discovered that an Ikea PAX wardrobe could fit nearly perfectly in the space that we had available between the wall and the washer. They sell one that’s about 20″ wide, which would fit as long as we cut out a hole to slide over the water heater’s breaker box (which we needed access to anyways). And the 24″ depth would allow the whole thing to sit in front of the water heater without sticking out too much beyond the washer, creating a nice little built-in nook for them.

Even though we have nine foot ceilings in here, we chose the shorter 79″ height (instead of the 93″ one) so it was visually similar to the height of the window and the two doorways in the room, rather than being the one super tall object in the space. It’s nice because it feels like the window height on the right sort of balances the cabinet height on the left when you face the laundry area:

Back in late January we picked up the PAX at Ikea, but it wasn’t until a visit in early March that we actually found time to start building everything. I should point out that I was in this position when our contractor Sean popped over for a visit.

Creating access for the water heater was easy. The two side panels provide the majority of the structural integrity to the cabinet (the back panel is much thinner, sort of like a veneer) but I thought cutting a section out of it and leaving the rest of it in place would help keep things square and provide more helpful storage than making the unit completely backless.

So before attaching the back panel, I used a jigsaw to cut a big section out of it (you can see my cut lines marked below). After everything was assembled it didn’t feel compromised at all with that opening in the back – although I’d warn against making any cuts this large in the sides since those provide most of the support.

Once I nailed the remaining pieces in place, we were left with this generously sized access hole in the back of the wardrobe. I had Sherry take this photo of me for scale.

Then I thought it might actually be better to use Sherry for scale since I’m the tall one, and she basically used it like a photo-booth and “showed me what she was working with.” #NailedIt

We did have to cut a smaller hole in the side so it could slide over and give us access to the breaker box for the water heater. Here you can see it after it was cut (as we were figuring out what wooden spacers we needed to add along the side so we could firmly secure it to the wall). Screwing those boards along the side into the piece (and into the wall studs) also provided a lot more strength to the cabinet, so that small cutout for the breaker box didn’t make it wobbly or anything on that side. I’ll share a little more detail about those side boards that we added in a second.

As for how we made that rectangular cutout for the breaker in the right spot (can you imagine if we messed that up?) we just took careful measurements of where we needed the cutout to be placed, and then we marked it off and taped along the cut lines, which helps to make the cuts cleaner and less splintery. Whenever cutting in the middle of any material with a jigsaw, I liked to drill holes in each corner (this is a 3/4″ bit) so that it’s easier to navigate the blade around the turns. You can go back and square off the corners if you want a crisper edge afterwards.

The last step before putting the PAX in place was to add some blocking against the wall (which you saw me testing out two photos above). Since I couldn’t anchor this piece to the back wall like Ikea intends, we knew we wanted to screw ours into the side wall instead.

First we had to add some boards to bridge the distance between the cabinet and the wall so we could firmly attach everything. I screwed the boards into walls studs, making sure the vertical piece was placed 3/4″ behind where the front of the PAX would eventually sit – this way we could eventually add a 3/4″ white filler piece right against it to conceal the 2 x 4″ boards (that’s how you make it look a lot more built-in).

In this picture below you can see the white filler piece (just a primed piece of 1 x 3″ board that we cut to size) and later added against the wall to cover the blocking behind it. We’d later caulk it, which always makes things look more seamless.

We also added a large flat panel on the other side to give it the appearance that the cabinet goes all the way back to the wall, even though it doesn’t. It’s just a 1/4″ sheet of plywood that we cut to size and painted to match (Behr’s “White” matches this door perfectly – literally, that’s the name).

You can see below that before installing the side panel I added some more 2×4″ blocking against the back wall so that I had something to secure the back edge of the plywood into. That top board is because I used some leftover plywood to add a top piece too. Mostly just so anything we end up storing on top of the PAX doesn’t fall behind it.

So with the cabinet portion pretty much done (we still need to add hardware and figure out the interior organization) it was on to adding shelves above the appliances – which Sherry captured sooooo graciously in this photo of me screwing the brackets into the wall. Guys, I think I have a career as a lunge model.

Like the cabinet, the shelves serve the dual purpose of storage AND hiding ugly stuff. The bottom shelf is intentionally placed there to make the washer hook-ups and the dryer plug less visible, while also spanning that annoyingly large gap behind the appliances (since the dryer hose often prevents them from going right up to the wall, we find there’s always at least an 8″ gap back there for things to fall down, never to be seen again). Our dryer vents directly out the right wall there and because of some studs in the way, we actually have about a 12″ gap behind the appliances, so these 12″ shelves fill that space and help prevent us from dropping stuff behind the appliances.

They don’t interfere with using the washer (turning the knob, opening it up to load it, etc) because the shelf basically starts right above the back edge of the washer and dryer if that makes sense. So it doesn’t stick out over them like a diving board (that would mean the washer door wouldn’t be able to be opened fully – so keep that in mind when choosing a shelf depth).

You may remember we actually did something similar in our laundry room at home – creating a shelf to cover the ugly stuff and fill that weird gap. We’ve found it to be a great solution for top-loading washing machines since you can’t just throw a counter over everything like you can with front-loaders.

We knew these iron brackets from Etsy (which Sherry actually found via Little Green Notebook) would be perfect for this situation because they come in lots of sizes (we ordered the 12″ depth and the “natural waxed” finish). One great thing about them is that because the shelf board just lays on top and is cradled by the bracket’s front lip, we can easily lift and remove that bottom one if we need to access the plugs or valves behind the appliances.

The shelves themselves are just 1 x 12″ whitewood boards from Home Depot that we stained to look closer to the old pine doors and floors in the house (we did one coat of wood conditioner, followed by a light coat of Puritan Pine by Minwax, and a few thin coats of Safecoat Acrylacq to seal it).

Apart from using the baskets to store some laundry supplies and setting our detergent right out there in the open, the shelves are mostly just decorative thanks to things like the gold frames and a few other accents Sherry added. So it’s nice to know that there’s room to spare for some more functional things up there if the need arises. But hopefully we’ll always find a place to show off the coffee cup that inspired us to make the beach house pink. Sherry said that someone on Instagram suggested we stick it in a glass cloche so nobody thinks it’s garbage and throws it away. Probably a smart move.

We still need to tweak the mudroom area of the room so it’s a little more hardworking, but for now we just brought down one of the wood benches we had upstairs (it’s from Target a while back and is no longer sold, but here’s a similar one). We had already hung some hooks last winter to give us a place for winter coats – which will now transition to a place for beach towels (like this blue Turkish towel that Sherry whispers sweet nothings to). We’ll probably end up with a similar set up, just maybe with more hooks/storage space. We’ll keep you posted.

Doing laundry isn’t something I’d describe as “exciting” but I will say that updating this room makes it noticeably more pleasant than having to step over a saw and a ton of scrap wood on the way to the washer and dryer. Once our outdoor pathway is done, which will lead to this side door as well as the back patio and the outdoor shower (not that it’s even started – ha!) we expect this door into the mudroom to become a primary entrance, especially after sandy trips to the beach. So it will be nice to walk into a good looking space versus some weird wood graveyard.

And since most of the questions we get revolve around paint colors & room sources, Sherry put together a little mood board for this space for anyone who is looking for the same tile, light fixture, gold frames, etc. Oh and the walls are White Heron and the trim is Stone Isle (both Sherwin Williams).

1 /2 / 3 /4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 / 12 / 13 / 14 / 15 / 16 / 17

***P.S. If you’re interested in bonus photos, tips, project ideas, and behind-the-scenes info delivered straight to your inbox, you can click here to subscribe to our free newsletter.***

*This post contains affiliate links*

The post Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room appeared first on Young House Love.

Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room published first on https://ssmattress.tumblr.com/

0 notes

endlessarchite · 6 years

Text

Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room

So how did we jump from that mess to this weekend’s mostly-finished room? Let’s break it down.

Once I nailed the remaining pieces in place, we were left with this generously sized access hole in the back of the wardrobe. I had Sherry take this photo of me for scale.

Then I thought it might actually be better to use Sherry for scale since I’m the tall one, and she basically used it like a photo-booth and “showed me what she was working with.” #NailedIt

1 /2 / 3 /4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 / 12 / 13 / 14 / 15 / 16 / 17

***P.S. If you’re interested in bonus photos, tips, project ideas, and behind-the-scenes info delivered straight to your inbox, you can click here to subscribe to our free newsletter.***

*This post contains affiliate links*

The post Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room appeared first on Young House Love.

Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room published first on https://bakerskitchenslimited.tumblr.com/

0 notes

truereviewpage · 6 years

Text

Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room

So how did we jump from that mess to this weekend’s mostly-finished room? Let’s break it down.

Once I nailed the remaining pieces in place, we were left with this generously sized access hole in the back of the wardrobe. I had Sherry take this photo of me for scale.

Then I thought it might actually be better to use Sherry for scale since I’m the tall one, and she basically used it like a photo-booth and “showed me what she was working with.” #NailedIt

We still need to tweak the mudroom area of the room so it’s a little more hardworking, but for now we just brought down one of the wood benches we had upstairs (it’s from Target a while back and is no longer sold, but here’s a similar one). We had already hung some hooks last winter to give us a place for winder coats – which will now transition to a place for beach towels (like this blue Turkish towel that Sherry whispers sweet nothings to). We’ll probably end up with a similar set up, just maybe with more hooks/storage space. We’ll keep you posted.

1 /2 / 3 /4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 / 12 / 13 / 14 / 15 / 16 / 17

***P.S. If you’re interested in bonus photos, tips, project ideas, and behind-the-scenes info delivered straight to your inbox, you can click here to subscribe to our free newsletter.***

*This post contains affiliate links*

The post Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room appeared first on Young House Love.

Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room published first on https://aireloomreview.tumblr.com/

0 notes

additionallysad · 6 years

Photo

Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room https://ift.tt/2FCCphE

So how did we jump from that mess to this weekend’s mostly-finished room? Let’s break it down.

Once I nailed the remaining pieces in place, we were left with this generously sized access hole in the back of the wardrobe. I had Sherry take this photo of me for scale.

Then I thought it might actually be better to use Sherry for scale since I’m the tall one, and she basically used it like a photo-booth and “showed me what she was working with.” #NailedIt

We still need to tweak the mudroom area of the room so it’s a little more hardworking, but for now we just brought down one of the wood benches we had upstairs (it’s from Target a while back and is no longer sold, but here’s a similar one). We had already hung some hooks last winter to give us a place for winder coats – which will now transition to a place for beach towels (like this blue Turkish towel that Sherry whispers sweet nothings to). We’ll probably end up with a similar set up, just maybe with more hooks/storage space. We’ll keep you posted.

1 /2 / 3 /4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 / 12 / 13 / 14 / 15 / 16 / 17

***P.S. If you’re interested in bonus photos, tips, project ideas, and behind-the-scenes info delivered straight to your inbox, you can click here to subscribe to our free newsletter.***

*This post contains affiliate links*

The post Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room appeared first on Young House Love.

#additionally sad home renovations

0 notes

interiorstarweb · 6 years

Text

Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room

So how did we jump from that mess to this weekend’s mostly-finished room? Let’s break it down.

Once I nailed the remaining pieces in place, we were left with this generously sized access hole in the back of the wardrobe. I had Sherry take this photo of me for scale.

Then I thought it might actually be better to use Sherry for scale since I’m the tall one, and she basically used it like a photo-booth and “showed me what she was working with.” #NailedIt

We still need to tweak the mudroom area of the room so it’s a little more hardworking, but for now we just brought down one of the wood benches we had upstairs (it’s from Target a while back and is no longer sold, but here’s a similar one). We had already hung some hooks last winter to give us a place for winder coats – which will now transition to a place for beach towels (like this blue Turkish towel that Sherry whispers sweet nothings to). We’ll probably end up with a similar set up, just maybe with more hooks/storage space. We’ll keep you posted.

1 /2 / 3 /4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 / 12 / 13 / 14 / 15 / 16 / 17

***P.S. If you’re interested in bonus photos, tips, project ideas, and behind-the-scenes info delivered straight to your inbox, you can click here to subscribe to our free newsletter.***

*This post contains affiliate links*

The post Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room appeared first on Young House Love.

Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room published first on https://novaformmattressreview.tumblr.com/

0 notes

lowmaticnews · 6 years

Text

Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room

So how did we jump from that mess to this weekend’s mostly-finished room? Let’s break it down.

Once I nailed the remaining pieces in place, we were left with this generously sized access hole in the back of the wardrobe. I had Sherry take this photo of me for scale.

Then I thought it might actually be better to use Sherry for scale since I’m the tall one, and she basically used it like a photo-booth and “showed me what she was working with.” #NailedIt

We still need to tweak the mudroom area of the room so it’s a little more hardworking, but for now we just brought down one of the wood benches we had upstairs (it’s from Target a while back and is no longer sold, but here’s a similar one). We had already hung some hooks last winter to give us a place for winder coats – which will now transition to a place for beach towels (like this blue Turkish towel that Sherry whispers sweet nothings to). We’ll probably end up with a similar set up, just maybe with more hooks/storage space. We’ll keep you posted.

1 /2 / 3 /4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 / 12 / 13 / 14 / 15 / 16 / 17

***P.S. If you’re interested in bonus photos, tips, project ideas, and behind-the-scenes info delivered straight to your inbox, you can click here to subscribe to our free newsletter.***

*This post contains affiliate links*

The post Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room appeared first on Young House Love.

Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room published first on https://landscapingmates.blogspot.com

0 notes

billydmacklin · 6 years

Text

Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room

So how did we jump from that mess to this weekend’s mostly-finished room? Let’s break it down.

Once I nailed the remaining pieces in place, we were left with this generously sized access hole in the back of the wardrobe. I had Sherry take this photo of me for scale.

Then I thought it might actually be better to use Sherry for scale since I’m the tall one, and she basically used it like a photo-booth and “showed me what she was working with.” #NailedIt

We still need to tweak the mudroom area of the room so it’s a little more hardworking, but for now we just brought down one of the wood benches we had upstairs (it’s from Target a while back and is no longer sold, but here’s a similar one). We had already hung some hooks last winter to give us a place for winder coats – which will now transition to a place for beach towels (like this blue Turkish towel that Sherry whispers sweet nothings to). We’ll probably end up with a similar set up, just maybe with more hooks/storage space. We’ll keep you posted.

1 /2 / 3 /4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 / 12 / 13 / 14 / 15 / 16 / 17

***P.S. If you’re interested in bonus photos, tips, project ideas, and behind-the-scenes info delivered straight to your inbox, you can click here to subscribe to our free newsletter.***

*This post contains affiliate links*

The post Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room appeared first on Young House Love.

Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room published first on https://carpetgurus.tumblr.com/

0 notes

vincentbnaughton · 6 years

Text

Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room

So how did we jump from that mess to this weekend’s mostly-finished room? Let’s break it down.

Once I nailed the remaining pieces in place, we were left with this generously sized access hole in the back of the wardrobe. I had Sherry take this photo of me for scale.

Then I thought it might actually be better to use Sherry for scale since I’m the tall one, and she basically used it like a photo-booth and “showed me what she was working with.” #NailedIt

We still need to tweak the mudroom area of the room so it’s a little more hardworking, but for now we just brought down one of the wood benches we had upstairs (it’s from Target a while back and is no longer sold, but here’s a similar one). We had already hung some hooks last winter to give us a place for winder coats – which will now transition to a place for beach towels (like this blue Turkish towel that Sherry whispers sweet nothings to). We’ll probably end up with a similar set up, just maybe with more hooks/storage space. We’ll keep you posted.

1 /2 / 3 /4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 / 12 / 13 / 14 / 15 / 16 / 17

***P.S. If you’re interested in bonus photos, tips, project ideas, and behind-the-scenes info delivered straight to your inbox, you can click here to subscribe to our free newsletter.***

*This post contains affiliate links*

The post Disguising Ugly Stuff In A Laundry Room appeared first on Young House Love.

0 notes