#and memory loss

[seiya-starsniper]

(angst prompts) ❛ i’m sorry, have we met? ❜

TJ I HOPE YOU'RE READY FOR THIS. I decided to continue the prompt from @valeriianz [Part 1 Here] to make it more angsty. But also kind of hopeful? Maybe???????

cw: major character death, memory loss

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“Will you give me a sweet dream before I go, old friend?” Hob asks.

Dream’s eyes widen, and he is sure the shock in them must be clear, because Hob startles a laugh.

“Yeah,” Hob coughs, and new blood spurts forth from his lips. “Been here long enough to figure out who you were. Why they wanted,” he hacks again, “you or your sister. I was never going to give you up.”

“I know,” Dream says. “But you must not - “

“I’ve lived a good life,” Hob interrupts him. “But I think it’s time. I’m just happy it was you who came for me, Dream of the Endless.”

“No,” Dream replies, voice trembling. “For you, you may simply call me Dream.”

“Dream,” Hob sighs, awash with a new wave of contentment. “I like that. Lovely name.”

“Thank you, my friend,” Dream says, before he steels himself for what he must do.

“I will give you the sweetest of dreams,” Dream says, trying and failing miserably to keep his voice steady. “Once you are there, you may call upon my sister, and…she will give you her gift.” 

“Sounds,” Hob stutters, “sounds good to me.”

It is little effort for Dream to call forth his sand and place Hob into a deep sleep. In the Dream, he recreates what might have been, in 1989, were Hob not captured, and Dream were a better friend. 

It is not long before he feels the presence of his sister.

“Dream,” Death says, her tone soft and kind. “You must let him go now.”

Dream clutches Hob’s body even tighter. 

“Please sister,” Dream pleads. “Do not take him from me yet.”

“You know that is not my choice to make,” Death replies. “It is his time, and he has made his choice.”

“Will you tell me what his choice it is?”

Death smiles sadly. “You know I cannot.”

—

Hob is running through a field of poppies, his beloved dog at his side. He has been running for some time, he thinks, and yet he is neither tired nor hungry. 

He stops when he feels himself being watched, and when he looks over his shoulder, his dog has padded over to a pale man dressed all in back. 

“Hello,” the man says, first to the dog, and then to Hob himself. 

“Hello!” Hob greets the stranger enthusiastically. “I - I’m sorry, have we met before? You look awfully familiar.”

“No,” the man answers, and Hob thinks he sounds a bit sad about that. Something lurches in Hob’s chest, and he thinks he should rectify the man’s sadness immediately.

“Well, you seem like a kind person, so I’d like to get to know you, if that’s all right,” Hob says, offering his hand out.

The man nods, and grasps Hob’s outstretched hand firmly.

“I am Dream,” the stranger says. “I am lord of all that inhabits the Dreaming. You…you passed in your sleep, Hob Gadling.”

 “You were offered a place to stay here, which you,” the man pauses, “which you accepted.”

Hobs’ eyes widen, and he lets go of Dream’s hand then falls to his knees. “My lord, forgive my impudence, my memories from when I was alive have fled me it seems.” He hopes he has not offended Dream. He does not want to be banished. He wants to stay, he wants-

“Rise, Hob," Dream says. "You may be subject to my realm but I - I was hoping that we…we may become friends.”

Hob scrambles up off his knees immediately, and before he can think any better of it, he tugs Dream into a bone crushing hug. He feels the dreamlord stiffen for just a moment, before his arms rise slowly to return the hug.

“I would like that very much, my lord,” Hob says when he withdraws from Dream.

“Please,” Dream replies. “You may just address me as Dream.”

“Dream,” Hob says. “That’s a lovely name.” Something complicated flashes across Dream’s expression, but it’s gone before Hob can examine it further.

“Thank you,” Dream answers, just the barest hint of a smile crossing his face. “Would you like a drink?”

A table with wine and cheese materializes itself next to where they’re standing, and Hob sits down eagerly. Dream follows shortly after, pouring out a glass for each of them. 

They sit, and then begin to talk.



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[invisibleicewands]

The second season of "Good Omens" will give us more of many people's favorite supernatural entities: Aziraphale (Michael Sheen), the angel with a penchant for fine wine and old books, and Crowley (David Tennant), the demon who can't help but have a conscience.

The supernatural entities' time on Earth, however, gets disrupted when an amnesiac angel Gabriel (Jon Hamm) shows up (naked, no less) on the doorstep of Aziraphale's bookshop. "I loved playing the scenes where Jon just sits there with that stupid grin on his face and just drives Aziraphale bonkers," Sheen told me in an interview conducted before the SAG-AFTRA strike about his experience shooting season 2.

Sheen and I talked about what it was like to don Aziraphale's robes once more, how the story in season 2 grabbed him, and his favorite details of the production's Soho set.

What it was like for you to don Aziraphale's robes again in the second round of episodes?

Well, it was wonderful. Yes, it was absolutely wonderful. I mean, during "Good Omens," the first season, was one of the most enjoyable professional experiences I've had — working with David [Tennant] and playing these characters and working with Neil [Gaiman] on something that I've been a fan of since the book came out. So it was just an absolutely joyful experience, that first [season].

So to be able to come back to the character and that world and to take the story forward into new places, it was just glorious. Yeah, I loved it. And it was very moving, the first time I put the costume back on. It was very moving to meet the character again, to feel him suddenly appear again. It was wonderful.

Then seeing David appear as well, because David was ill when we started filming on season 2. I think he had Covid and so he couldn't start. So I did the first week or something, or the first four or five days, without him, and then suddenly there he was. He walked onto the set in full Crowley garb and it was very emotional.

How did Neil describe what Aziraphale would be doing in season 2? How did he lay out the season at a high level for Aziraphale?

I can't remember now. I'm sorry. I can't remember that, how he described it, because having done it, I now have no memory whatsoever of how he described it to begin with. But I know what we wanted to explore and I always remember what he was aiming to get to by the end of the second series, because of ideas that he and Terry [Pratchett] had talked about with where the story might go. So I remember him talking about where we were aiming to get to, and obviously it begins with [Aziraphale and Crowley] no longer working for their respective companies. They're sort of out on their own. They're a team unto themselves now.

And then this fly gets stuck into their ointment and everything changes again. So I feel like, if my memory serves me correctly — which it invariably doesn't these days — I think it was about the idea of Gabriel coming into their lives again in a very unexpected way, and then that eventually building to the point that they get to at the end of this series, which I won't say because that would be to give things away.

Speaking of Gabriel, and you see this in the trailer and especially in the first episode, Crowley and Aziraphale are like an odd couple in certain ways and it's almost like they got a child. How is that dynamic with Jon Hamm [who plays Gabriel]?

Well, certainly for a character like Aziraphale, it's great comic material. For a character like Aziraphale, who frets and worries, stresses, and gets exasperated, to have a character who just is totally exasperating that he has to look after was just a very rich area to explore. But yeah, very much so.

I mean, they are like a married couple, even though they're a very odd couple, they do complement each other in all kinds of ways. And yes, they suddenly have this person who's dependent on them […] but they're also aware, having had past experiences with him. So it was a brilliant idea to have Gabriel suddenly show up with apparently no memory of who he is and to have them have to look after him and deal with him. It's a brilliant device, I think, and it was great to play.

I loved playing the scenes where Jon just sits there with that stupid grin on his face and just drives Aziraphale bonkers. They were great scenes to play, and I really enjoyed them. And it was great to see Jon again. I mean, we had such a great time together on the first one, and I know Jon anyway, outside of "Good Omens," and it was just so great to get to spend more time together.

I know for the second season, the Soho lot, it was a whole street, right? Created in Scotland?

It was a whole block, or more than a block even, of Soho that was built in the studio. It was extraordinary. I mean, in this series, not only do we expand the world of Soho in story terms to where we meet all the people who run the different shops and cafes and stuff around there, and we get to know that community a lot more. But also it physically grew as well.

I mean, in the studio, in Bath Gates up in Scotland, there was just this huge Soho set with cars driving around in it and hundreds of people and all these shops and the detailed work in these shops. I mean, this is what I always get blown away by on productions, is the detail that goes into the design. I mean, Maggie's record shop, every single album in there had to be made up. It was just made-up albums, made-up names of bands. I would spend hours in between takes, just wandering around looking at the designs of these records and the ridiculous names of bands that they'd come up with. It was brilliant. And the pub and the magic shop — oh my God, the magic shop, I just wanted to live in. It was just brilliant. All that detail and all that design work was fantastic.

You've had a long and very impressive career, and among many other roles, you've played now an angel, a vampire, and a werewolf. Is there any other supernatural being you'd want to play next?

I played a lot of different things. I'm not sure. Have I played a ghost? I'm not sure if I've played a ghost. Maybe I have. Yeah. I'm up for any supernatural beings. I'm open to any and all.

[dikdikpronouncedxylophone]

The most terrifying part of having memory issues is when you can feel something from 5 seconds ago be thrown out the window and there's an empty hole where it once was. You remember that you forgot something.

[solidwater05]

Apparently this needs to be said so

Forgetting things is morally neutral! Memory issues are morally neutral!

You're not a bad person if you...

forget things quickly

forget people

can't remember entire stages of your life

can't remember important things

can remember some things very well and forget other things all the time

can't remember things (or anything!) about your interests

forget to eat, sleep, go to the bathroom, etc

forget to reply to texts

remember things and immediately forget them again

can't remember birthdays, events, etc

frequently answer 'I forgot' to questions

can't retain new information

forget things you used to know

only remember things when it's too late

have vague, distorted and/or unreliable memories

depend on others to know how an event you were in played out

have other symptoms that are worsened by memory issues and vice versa

... and anything else I might have missed!

[caintooth]

seeing people my age talk about how scared they are of memory loss, which they only associate with old age, is so surreal to see as a 24 year old who has actively experienced memory loss for a long time now

there are causes for memory loss besides dementia and alzheimer’s, i hope y’all know that. dissociative disorders, trauma, brain injuries, thyroid problems, even just stress and lack of sleep can fuck up your ability to store, process, and access memory. and that’s just a few of the many causes i can think of off the top of my head right now.

please stop treating disabled people like some scary “other” that you might become only in the distant, decades-away future. we are your age, too. you may become one of us sooner than you know. stop acting like memory loss marks the end of a life, when so many of us have so much living left to do!

[humunanunga]

Enough of the trope where memory loss undoes the damage or the corruption or whatever. More content where removing memories just removes the context.

The tragedy of needing to grieve and not knowing what or who you lost or why. The angst of having trauma and being denied the awareness that it's trauma. The suspense of being different somehow and left to wonder how and when. The tension of knowing that something is off and you can't find where it hurts. The Adventure Zone gets it. Kingdom Hearts gets it.

There is an aching inside you and you don't know how it got there.

[plague-parade]

i feel like we dont talk enough about how distressing and disturbing memory loss issues are. forgetting what you were talking about halfway through a sentence, putting something down and instantly forgetting where you put it. having to reread one paragraph over and over again because by the time youve moved onto the next sentence you dont remember what the one before it said. always doubting if your memories of things are real, not being able to remember important life events.

its so incredibly scary, it feels like your mind is constantly playing tricks on you and you start to doubt whats real and what isnt.

“i forgot” is treated like a lazy excuse when it’s genuinely such a big issue for so many people.

[sleepy-bebby]

[feral-ballad]

Mohammed El-Kurd, from Rifqa; “Rifqa”

[Text ID: “I cried—not for the house / but for the memories I could have had inside it.”]

[sapsuckers-and-stardust]

Watching Star Trek IV

Whale biologist: why do you hang around with that weird guy who calls you admiral and why are you so close?

Kirk: *hesitates*

Whale biologist, who lives in San Francisco in the 80s and is rapidly drawing many correct conclusions: that’s okay we don’t have to talk about it.

[thebibliosphere]

There are a lot of things I'm sad about in my life. You don't get to go through the kind of medical trauma I've been through and come out unscathed on the other side.

But one thing I'm really bitter about is that I can't remember my wedding anymore. The pernicious anemia took it from me and wiped my brain clean. Except it's not clean, not really. I remember it in patches. Like red wine stains on a white rug that have never quite lifted out no matter how hard you try.

I look at the pictures on my bookcase, and they feel like remembering a story someone else has told me. There's a young woman in a white dress wearing my face, and she looks happy. I'm happy for her. But you can see the strain around her eyes, too. The pain she's hiding because no one with authority believes her when she says her body doesn't feel right. That something is Wrong.

They won't believe her for another decade. They won't believe her until it's almost too late, and it's that lateness that will rob her of her memories and turn them into a wavering rainbow suspended in the fine haze of watery sunlight that occasionally surfaces through the blanks.

There's one memory that's real, though. Solid. It's not my vows. It's not my father walking me down the aisle. (Though those are there, just hazy and dream-like). It's our first dance.

It's the lights dimming around the room as the staff cleared the floor, causing the fishbowls full of white roses and LED lights on the tables to wobble like pools of moonlight against dark paneled walls.

It's the band inviting us out onto the floor and us giggling because we know what's coming next, and no one else does. It's the twang of a banjo reverberating around the room through the speakers, followed by the dulcet tones of Kermit the Frog wondering why there are so many songs about rainbows.

It's us waltzing around the enclosed circle of light, singing to each other out of tune and grinning like idiots as everyone around us starts to laugh.

It's everyone joining in on the song because it's the Muppets, and everyone knows the words. It's 100+ people singing the Rainbow Connection, some laughing, some a bit tearful, because it's bringing back memories. Because it's making a new one.

It's looking up at my new husband through the brain fog and all the pain in my body and thinking, "I want to remember this moment forever."

I don't know what entity was out there listening to me at that moment and chose to grant that wish. I don't know why this is the one memory that stuck while everything else in my brain got decimated into scattered, fragmented snapshots. But I'm so, so thankful it is.

Though, I could have done without it randomly coming on my YouTube music out of nowhere to hit me in the emotions like a brick to the back of the head. Jesus Christ.

[myfakeplasticlove13]

I guess some things you can never leave behind, they don’t belong to the past. They belong to you :,)

[bone-apple-teeths]

I feel so so bamboozled. I got spoiled for the Gerry and Gertrude reveal right and everyone is all like "aww Gerry is so happy I'm so glad he's ok in this universe" and there's so much freaking fanart already and then I actually listened to the episode... guys there is something wrong with that boy. No one, and I mean NO ONE, is that nice to two strangers dressed in civil service uniforms who knock on your door at 5 in the morning. Like he invited them in before they even introduced themselves. I don't care how untouched by fears he could be in this universe (and he's not) no person is normally just like "hey random lady, take my painting I spent many hours working on and have hanging in my kitchen." Just something is very off there I am very worried for the future.

[foamloam]

Sea, Swallow Me - Cocteau Twins

[chroniccoolness]

this post is for the people with memory issues

people who's memories are getting worse every day, who's memories are stable but poor, people who can't remember what they did today or yesterday or this week, people who's childhoods are a faded blur. people who have slow greying-out amnesia that seems to just fade in and out of existence, and people who have complete blackouts, and people who have both. people who mourn the happy memories they know they've lost, who fear the bad memories they've lost that still affect them.

people who have "emotional amnesia" that makes it feel like none of their memories are their own, because there's few or no feelings attached. people who can ONLY remember the feelings from certain or even most memories, not actual events. people who's memory issues scare them or make them angry or make them miserable. people who's memory issues get them called childish or difficult or rude. who can't remember the names or faces of those they love. who are constantly forgetting the things that "you'd remember if you really cared". who misplace everything. who remember so little of their lives that they barely know who they are. people who's memory issues come from trauma/dissociation, ADHD, traumatic brain injury, brain fog/chronic fatigue, drug use, alcoholism. people who have no idea what causes their memory issues. people who's memory issues come from something else entirely.

i love you, you're strong, and you deserve support and care for what you're going through. memory issues can be frustrating and upsetting and disabling, and your suffering deserves to be recognized. whether you're soaring through recovery or are only ever going to get worse, you deserve good things in life and to live the fullest you can, regardless of how much you remember.

[loveletter2you]

whenever i read a memoir i’m like how did you remember all that