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ghostoffuturespast · 6 months

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Works In Progress 2023: A Cyberpunk 2077 Year In Review

I thought for a hot minute about doing one of those snazzy templates that’s been going around, but editing photos just ain’t my MO and rather than going by month I picked 12 favs that I’ve posted in 2023. Some of them were popular, some of them weren't. Overall, I think I did pretty good for just doing vanilla photomode on console.

You might be wondering why there's a picture of a sticky note. I don't remember when I started doing this, and I'm horribly inconsistent as you can see by the dates, but I'll jot down my word count for my wip chapter and then jot it down again when I remember to later.

I write slow. A lot of times I sit down to write and it feels like the wheels are spinning in place. My minutes and hours don't stretch very far, typically don't add up to much. But days, weeks, months. That's when I can at least measure the progress.

Fic: So It Goes 40/44 - 438,946 words

My V x River Ward and tinfoil hat conspiracy theory long fic. I've spent way more hours on this then I have on any of my VP.

I got tagged by @just-a-cybercroissant @therealnightcity and @wanderingaldecaldo to do some WIP Whenevers. I post my VP pretty regularly, so it’s always seemed silly to do work in progress posts for them, and I don’t know when I’ll have any new writing to share since in between work and the holidays, I haven’t had much time to sit down with anything since my last chapter update. And I've been feeling very... stingy, lately. Especially when it comes to mine and other people's writing. So take this WIP/Year In Review as my offering. Both these series, as am I, are all very much still works in progress.

I confined my reflections for this year below the cut. If you don’t want to read my long-ass essays, you can admire the pictures, maybe check out my fic, or just move along and have yourself a lovely day.

We’ll start with the easy one.

After at least a year of multiple playthroughs (I’ve played all the lifepaths, done all the endings), it only occurred to me at the beginning of this year to start taking VP. Part of the reason I never did before was because I didn’t realize it was a thing and then by the time I did, I figured I didn’t have much to offer. I play on PS5 and only have access to vanilla photomode, so seeing everyone else’s high-fidelity, ultra ray-tracing, modded, posed, full on virtual photo shoot photos, I was like there’s no way. (Not that I’m hating on PC modders, it’s just not everyone has access to mods or a PC capable of running the game, and I’m all for making art and creative endeavors accessible.) On top of that, all I’d ever heard from most other folks was how much vanilla photomode sucked. In the glamorous world of VP, I didn’t think there was any room for me.

But I started snapping pics anyway. And sure, there are a lot of limitations with vanilla photomode. But what that really translates to is opportunities to get creative. I am also a hoe for subverting people’s expectations, and very much believe when there’s a will, there’s a way.

Environmental and landscape shots were my first subjects before I started branching out into portraits and then capturing story moments. Through VP I found an entirely new way to enjoy a game that I’d already played a ridiculous number of times along with also finally being brave enough to share my V with other people too. I’d always worried about that before, if people would like her. Granted, I know Grandpa’s not everyone’s cup of tea, but whether you like her or not, I certainly think she’s made a name for herself over the past few months. Even if most people haven’t really gotten to know her the way I’d hoped.

I’ve taken hundreds of photos this past year. Most of which I’ll never share. There’s a lot of flops, a lot of weird experiments, ones that didn’t quite turn out the way I’d hoped, but I’ve learned something from every single one of them. I know how to spot good lighting, frame shots to create optical illusions, get a very limited toolkit to work in my favor, parkoured on all of the things, and heck, I even figured out how to make Grandpa smooch other NPCs. I’ve done atmospheric, mundane, down right goofy, as well as things that most people probably thought weren’t fucking possible.

I can’t say how long I’ll keep doing this, I’m sure I’ll move on at some point, but for now I’m still enjoying myself. There's a lot to explore in this game and I just can’t stop digging Night City.

Now, for the more complicated thing.

Writing

So It Goes… My peace, my war, my greedy and most ravenous of ghosts.

I’m operating under the assumption that most people following me here probably haven't read my fic or aren’t all that interested in reading it to begin with. It’s fine. But you need to understand this fic, my writing, is the main thing that brought me here. This is also Grandpa V’s story. Most of you have met her, but unless you've been reading, most of you do not know her.

I wrote around 185,000 words and posted 10 chapters this year. 2022 was about 253,000 words and 30 chapters, along with several unrelated one shots. However, I don’t think I’ve done a single chapter this year that was less then 10k, and my longest managed to hit 27k. As of the last update I posted, the fic is currently sitting at around 439k words, 40 chapters, and still isn’t done.

I have four more chapters to write. I have written a metric shit ton of words. This is, by far, the longest and most intense creative project I’ve ever endeavored to complete.

When I started writing, I was expecting this fic to be around 100-150k. That seemed to be the average for most long fics. I did not plan on being an outlier. I'm not sure you can ever really plan for that, but I guess I enjoy subverting my own expectations too.

For those of you who are reading my fic, it is my sincerest hope that it shatters every expectation of where you think it’s going. It’s not a joke that I tagged my fic “#an ode to my tinfoil hat”. An ode it has turned out to be. I’ve been sitting on this theory for two years. I have told no one about it. I hope it sticks the landing and hits the way I want it to. I don't know if it will. But fuck, I just want to be done with it so I can move on with my life, take a break, and give myself the opportunity to make and focus on other things before I have to get back on the damn horse.

I wrote less this past year then I did in 2022. I had a lot of life changes, most of which were good, but with times of change come times of adjustment. Along with some realizations that maybe you don’t understand as much as you thought you did. Looking back, I’ve been in a state of unsettled, kuzushi, for a really long time. Which is not a good place to be. It’s how your ass ends up on the ground with a knee knocking out all your teeth. I thought I knew better. Thought I had enough practice to get away from it. But bad habits have good memories.

I think given the circumstances, I accomplished a lot with my writing this year. I don’t know if my writing is exactly where I want it to be. I doubt it every will be, but it’s evolved, grown, and I wrote a pretty hefty stack of words considering I started working full-time again, bought a house with my partner, moved, and have been dealing with the millions of other beans that life tends to throw one’s way. That being said, and for full disclosure, I’ve also been dealing with some of the worst cases of jealousy and envy I’ve had since I was a teenager.

Frankly, it sucks. They walk with me every fucking where I go, hold my hands to whisper back all my doubts. Try to persuade me to my baser instincts, to be cruel and lash out. But that's not aikido. Luckily, I’m not 16 anymore so it’s at least been easier for me to identify the problem. Though I’m still coming up short in terms of actually being able to do anything about it, and will be for at least a few months more.

Yeah, I keep talking about it because I don’t know how many people know that I've been feeling this way. And I’m tired of not talking about it in a room full of creatives, because yeah, I know I’m not the only one that feels this way. And not talking about it just makes all that pent up resentment worse for everyone.

Don’t get me wrong, I love writing. But with the way I work and think, it’s a slow, tedious, and incredibly time-consuming art. With how much my fic has snowballed over the course of writing, it’s left very little room for the other hobbies in my life. And as my fellow writers probably already know, writing is an incredibly insular craft. And unlike a picture or an image, which only requires a glance, reading a bunch of words requires time and commitment.

So, when you put yourself out there and share what you wrote, it’s a lonely feeling not knowing whether or not anyone connected with what you put on the page. Especially, when the people who do read aren’t compelled to voice anything and when the people you’d hope would read don’t. And then you're stuck in the dark, not knowing, because neither of us says a goddamn thing.

I started writing this fic prior to actually joining the CP2077 fandom. And I joined the fandom because I felt alone. I’ve been here a while now, albeit in a few different places, and that feeling still hasn’t gone away. I’m still trying to find camaraderie with my fellow writers and carve out something that kinda sort of resembles a home or a sense of community. I watch my peers around me as they seem to build that with each other, except me.

I’m envious of the things that people make and jealous of the relationships those have created and fostered between said people, because for the life of me, it’s been a struggle to cultivate that since I got here. I know it’s selfish, but I also don’t know what about me makes people so hesitant. There have been a handful of strangers that have shown up for me regularly, but as far as people I call friends in this fandom that have shown up and actually stuck around, I can only name one right now. (I know we're all busy. And I acknowledge my writing's not for everyone. I know maybe some of you are quiet, or shy, or probably a thousand other things. I get it. But that doesn't mean it doesn't hurt any less. People will never know unless you say. Never know unless you take the time to interact or engage. Be brave. And that's true for a lot of things.)

The propensity is for the negative to outweigh the positive. I've got a lot of numbers on my fic, so you would think things would be fine, but at this point they just feel empty. They don't bring me any comfort or real satisfaction. And I hate feeling like the people I know don’t care and that most of you are just talking around me. That I’m some kind of annoyance not fit to interact with. Which may or may not be the case. I don’t know. Again, most of you have never said anything. And maybe I need to accept the fact that most of you never will.

But this is me trying to start conversation.

It’s really shitty, knowing that the thing I want the most is also the thing holding me back. I know how to work on it too, not that it’s any guarantee. The problem is I’m still writing and in a needy state of greed. And because I’m slow, I don’t have the time or the energy to be generous. I can only take right now. I can’t give.

Relationships require both.

I can’t bring myself to read other people’s writing. I can’t comment, or like, or share if I haven’t read anything. I'm desperate for conversation, but I also don't have the time or assurance to facilitate it with other people right now. And for some reason people never seem to want to talk to me, especially when it comes to writing. I want to be part of conversations, talk deeply with other people. But I can’t speak right now, I'm not in a place to offer generosity without someone first giving it to me.

And generosity and grace is what we all need.

Four more chapters and I hope my ghosts will finally let me read in peace.

#cyberpunk 2077 #2023 year in review #year in review #virtual photography #writing #from the top #fic: so it goes #long post #i can't guarantee a safe space but i can guarantee a brave space #if anyone's been feeling similarly and wants to talk about it my dms are open #the door's always open

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allycryz · 4 months

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Back on my Strahd hyperfocus planning for a possible campaign this summer and am once again annoyed at Tracy Hickman's foreword to CoS 5e.

I'm going to paste it below in full under the cut so no one can say I'm taking it out of context, but I will bold the parts I find especially annoying:

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We turned the corner, and there was a vampire.

I groaned and rolled my eyes.

It was 1978, and I was playing in one of my first dungeon adventures. It was being run by a friend I had known in high school, John Scott Clegg, and it was typical of the type of adventure that people played in those days. It was all about exploring a hodgepodge collection of rooms connected by dungeon corridors, beating up the monsters that we encountered, searching for treasure, and gaining experience points.

Now we were face to face with random encounter number thirty-four: a vampire. Not a Vampire with a capital V, but a so-many-Hit-Dice-with-such-and-such-an-Armor-Class lowercase vampire. Just another monster in the dungeon.

I remember thinking at the time, What are you doing here? This creature seemed completely out of place with the kobolds, orcs, and gelatinous cubes we had seen thus far. This was a creature who deserved his own setting and to be so much more than just a wandering monster. When I came home from that game, I told all these thoughts to Laura.

That was when Strahd von Zarovich was born.

Strahd would be no afterthought—he demanded his own setting, his own tragic history. Laura and I launched into researching the mythology and folklore surrounding the vampire. We started with the vague, black-and-white image of Bela Lugosi in 1931, but found so much more.

The first "modern" literary foundation of the vampire was penned by John William Polidori based on a fragment of a story by Lord Byron. It was while at the Villa Diodati—a rented house next to Lake Geneva, Switzerland—that Byron and Polidori met Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin and her husband-to-be, Percy Shelley. One night in June, Byron suggested that they each write a ghost story. Mary Shelley's contribution to the effort would later become Frankenstein. The short story "The Vampyre," published in 1819, was Polidori's contribution. He was Byron's personal physician, and the first of the so-called "romantic" vampires under Polidori's hand was actually modeled after Lord Byron.

Byron—like the fictional vampires that he inspired, from Polidori's Lord Ruthven down through the penultimate work of Bram Stoker—was a decadent predator, an abuser hidden behind a romantic veil. He was a comely and alluring monster—but a monster nevertheless. The romantic vampire of the earliest years of the genre was not just a spouse abuser but a spouse killer, the archetype of abuse in the worst kind of destructive codependency.

For Laura and me, those were the elements that truly defined Strahd von Zarovich—a selfish beast forever lurking behind a mask of tragic romance, the illusion of redemption that was ever only camouflage for his prey.

Initially we were going to title the adventure Vampyr—one of a series of games we called Nightventure that Laura and I were self-publishing back in 1978. The castle was called Ravenloft, and when Halloween came around each year, our friends asked us if we could play "that Ravenloft game" again... and so the better title won out. It was, in part, because of this design that I was hired by TSR, Inc., to write Dungeons & Dragons adventures in 1982. Soon thereafter, I6 Ravenloft was published.

Since then, fans of Ravenloft have seen many different creative perspectives on Barovia (a country which, by absolute coincidence, is featured in a 1947 Bob Hope movie called Where There's Life). It continues to be one of the most popular Dungeons & Dragons adventures of all time. In its various incarnations, each designer has endeavored to bring something new to the ancient legend of Strahd, and to each of them we are grateful.

But the vampire genre has taken a turn from its roots in recent years. The vampire we so often see today exemplifies the polar opposite of the original archetype: the lie that it's okay to enter into a romance with an abusive monster because if you love it enough, it will change.

When Laura and I got a call from Christopher Perkins about revisiting Ravenloft, we hoped we could bring the message of the vampire folktale back to its original cautionary roots. The talented team at Wizards of the Coast not only graciously took our suggestions but engaged us in a dialogue that delivered new insights on the nightmare beyond the gates of Barovia.

Now we invite you again as our guests to pass through the Svalich Woods if you dare. For here the romance is tragically dangerous... and a true monster smiles at your approach.

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It's just so

Patronizing

It would be an entirely different post to talk about the meaning of the vampire figure in folklore and literature and what it represents; because you cannot pin it to simply one meaning. Vampiric folklore can speak of fears of disease and death and plague, Dracula can represent xenophobia AND classism AND sexuality, Polidori's Lord Ruthven can be a high society predator AND an emblem of repressed queerness

But even if Tracy was correct that the vampire has one specific meaning...so what? Why can people not subvert and change the stock characters of fiction? Is there really a problem if Interview with a Vampire turned tropes on their heads? I'm no fan of Twilight but its sin is absolutely not "it made Vampires hot and romantic"

This is especially galling because when you release a ttrpg story or system out into the world, it's going to be changed at every table. For every group that runs a module as is, there are dozens making it their own.

I do think Strahd as written, as a monster who cannot recognize his faults is fascinating. I also think there are a lot of possibilities to mine if you have a table who likes romance and intrigue. My most frequent table plays a lot of Good Society and they get very excited when similar options show up in other systems.

And, honestly, at the end of the day Tracy just sounds like every guy whining that they made vampires sparkly and those aren't reaaalll vampires and every internet user handwringing over oh no there are people who find villains hot

#curse of strahd

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nikkireedsource · 1 month

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Nikki Reed Wants You to Rethink the Too-Small Pair of Jeans in Your Closet

Our columnist reflects on a childhood spent creating one-of-a-kind creations with her mom.

Welcome to Take Five, my recurring beauty and nutrition column on ELLE.com culled from a lifelong passion for animals, the outdoors, and feeling good. For me, the notion of taking five—whether the number pertains to ingredients in a food or just a moment to ask your body how it's feeling—can make all the difference. Consider this your 300-second-long wellness retreat.

"Hey Mom, I have an idea. Can you come here for a second?" I yelled as I came through the front door. Everything magical that happens in our "sewing den" begins with those words, and last week was no exception. I dropped 40 yards of old fabric down on the table in front of her. She looked at me with the kind of smirk that belies the actual excitement we both know she's feeling in these moments. "This week, it's muumuus," I told her. The words "I need five minutes to make a coffee"—a futile attempt at stifling her joy—exited Mom's mouth too quickly. This is just the game we play, that we've always played, because the truth is: nothing makes the two of us happier than a sewing project.

My love for clothing started very young, and not at all in the way you're probably imagining. You see, I had a mother who was constantly sewing together a mixture of hand-me-downs and scrap fabric to make new clothes. She was also clever enough to make it a game of sorts so that I took an immediate interest in the process and remained invested. Mom never let on that being a single parent didn't afford her the luxury of back-to-school shopping sprees. I never felt I was missing out on buying new outfits at the mall, because I didn't yet know that adding in a strip of leopard print velvet down the sides of my older brother's skater pants, in an attempt to feminize them, wasn't other kids' "normal."

To me, this was just the way it was done. It was also creative and exciting to play designer. Mom made these endeavors feel like a choice—we were choosing to cut up old T-shirts to make our own custom designs. Mom used specific language like "one of a kind" and "customized," so I always felt a sense of ownership and pride when kids asked me where I got my clothes. I distinctly remember her taking me to the bead store for yet another project we would work on together. This one involved capri pants, which, in my family, was another way of saying "jeans that had gotten too short."

See, I didn't realize at the time that bellbottoms that allowed my socks to show meant I'd outgrown my jeans because Mom always made it into a game of What Can We Make Next? We bought all kinds of beads that day and settled on the idea of sewing them to the bottom of my freshly chopped-to-the-knees jeans. As a result, I became known as a trendsetter, rocking an upcycled wardrobe before "upcycling" was even a term. For much of this time, I felt like the coolest kid in the world.

Then, the mean girls caught on. After fielding a few put-downs from girls who were just as insecure as I was on their quest to find their own identity, I came up with a new plan. Since neither of us could afford flashy new outfits, my best friend Brenda and I would combine our piggy banks—filled with the little money we made from birthdays and singing door-to-door—and share custody over all of our clothes. Fortunately, we went to different schools, so we knew we could pull it off without anyone knowing. Here's how it went: One of our parents would drive us to Forever 21, we'd pick out the coolest of the cool new outfits, split the bill, and keep a detailed journal of who wore what, when, while trading pieces of our wardrobes every couple days.

For a while the plan functioned flawlessly. Mondays, I wore the red pants with the white tank top and jean jacket; Brenda wore the crop top and glittery skirt. Tuesdays, we'd swap. We discovered only one issue, but it was a major one: Brenda and I weren't the same size. All of this outfit coordination happened right as I was approaching my first and only growth spurt. I was suddenly tall for my age, something I only experienced for a short period of time. I had long, gangly legs, no boobs, and giant feet. Brenda, on the other hand, was perfectly proportionate and didn't require the constant tailoring that I did. Our plan was short-lived, and I found myself, once again, back at the sewing machine with Mom. Perhaps that's where I was meant to be.

The truth is, we all end up craving the very same things we may have loathed as a child. I see this more and more the older I get. We mirror our parents, and we long for every nuance, every tiny reminder that we are their child. I am, without a doubt, my mother's child. From my ripped jeans to the 14 holes punched in my ears; from my passion for feeding everyone to the creative explosions that result in spontaneous furniture construction in our backyard; from taking in every helpless animal that needs to be bottle-fed to seeing the merit in making my own clothing and designing my own jewelry and bags; from East to West and everything in between, I am my mother's child.

Every project we excitedly take on together is peppered with all of those reminders, and sewing is no exception. I am currently navigating a new chapter of my life in the fashion industry with my line, Freedom of Animals. I'm attempting to create a sustainable line of products constructed from recycled materials. In doing so, I can't help but smile, because I'm reminded daily of my childhood. I'm beginning to truly understand consumerism—our desire for more styles, cheaper products, and a faster turn-around with a new model. I'm learning how the fashion industry should function, and even better, how it shouldn't: Mass-producing overseas while using toxic chemicals in unethically run factories is heartbreakingly destructive to our planet and all of its inhabitants. I'm comprehending all of this information and I'm wondering if Mom had it right all along. Maybe choosing to value what we already had and turning it into something new wasn't a way to appear "with the times" but rather a notion that was indeed ahead of its time. The difference is that we didn't know then what we know now, and we have the chance— individually and collectively—to use this knowledge for good.

Reusing, repurposing, and upcycling clothing is the future, and yet we were doing it then simply because that was our only option. So how can we get people to do that very thing, before it becomes our only actual option? Now is the time to allow our ingenuity to be born of necessity. Once we've sucked the planet dry of any and every resource available while we satisfy our need for "more, more, more," we won't be afforded the luxuries we mindlessly enjoy today. This is why I'm turning to you. Maybe we can all take a few seconds to think about what we have, what we want, and then somehow merge the two. Perhaps that pair of jeans that seems too small just needs a little bit of leopard print sewn down the sides, those old dish rags you're ready to throw away are calling for a second life as an outdoor dog bed, or that T-shirt you outgrew is begging to be cut up into headbands. Be creative, get inspired. Then send me some of your creations, and I'll send you some of mine.

Original article

#nikki reed #reads #elle #take five #wellness

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mantacid · 4 months

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Long post inbound.

As a math tutor I often try to catch up with my student’s interests and hobbies. “What kind of things do you do?” I will ask. “Are there any ‘pet projects’ you’re passionate about right now?”

The answers are usually the same: most kids play online games with friends, do homework, play some sport maybe, or more commonly can’t really think of any particular hobby they have. Some have unique hobbies, like collecting car key fobs from eBay, or learning game development. But the majority of answers I get are generic in nature.

I don’t bring this up with the intent to criticize the lack of any of these creative endeavors in younger children. With the amount of responses I’ve received that fit the previous description, I am fully aware that either allistics just… don’t share their passions in casual conversation as much, or that it is my level of passion that is abnormal.

Regardless of which of the aforementioned causes is true, it got me thinking about the sheer number of projects I take on, and the amount of time I dedicate to them. And I came to the conclusion that this phenomenon may have to do with my ADHD.

When a kid with ADHD either forgets to do something or can’t muster the executive functioning to do it, they’re usually punished in some way. This punishment, if it doesn’t come from their parents or teachers or peers or societal expectations, will come from the anxiety and panic that results from suddenly remembering the thing that was supposed to be done three days ago, or perhaps from their frustration of knowing they didn’t do it without knowing why.

Over time, the brain learns these patterns, and associates being relaxed and idle with a nagging feeling of “I’m forgetting something”, or “I’m supposed to be doing something right now.” The brain does this as a defense mechanism, attempting to proactively prevent the kind of anxiety and punishment that has historically been the result of such idleness.

In other words, your brain learns that — when you’re being idle or “lazy” — it’s an indicator that some task has been forgotten.

The result of this learned pattern? An adult who will never have a “lazy day-off” of their own volition. Not when they’re sick, or injured, or sleep-deprived, or in great need of a break. Because the ADHD brain has learned the erroneous pattern that being relaxed means you’re forgetting something.

And when the camel’s back finally breaks, and the body forces you to take a day off, you never enjoy it fully. There’s always that nagging of “you could/should be doing something productive right now.”

It took me awhile to unlearn that pattern.It still comes back sometimes. It’s easy to know on a surface level that you don’t need to prove your productivity by denying your body the rest it needs; it’s harder to internalize and act upon that knowledge.

I want to know whether anyone else can relate to this; I think I may be onto something here.

#adhd #projects #neurodivergent #poll #long post

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warsofasoiaf · 3 years

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Writing Characters With Believable Military PTSD

I typically write these writing and worldbuilding essays from a dispassionate perspective, offering advice and context to prospective writers from as neutral a point of view as I can manage, with the goal being to present specific pieces of information and broader concepts that can hopefully improve writing and build creators’ confidence to bring their projects to fruition, whether that be writing, tabletop gaming, video game programming, or anything that suits their fancy. While writing this essay though, I struggled to maintain that perspective. Certainly, the importance of the topic to me was a factor, but ultimately, I saw impersonality just as a suboptimal presentation method for something so intensely personal. I do maintain some impartiality particularly in places where historical or academic context is called for, but in other respects I’ve opted for a different approach. Ultimately, this essay is a labor of love for me, love for those who suffer from military PTSD, love for those who love those who suffer from it, and love for writers who want to, in the way that they so choose, help those two other groups out. Thus, this is a different type of essay in certain segments than my usual fare; I hope the essay isn’t an unreadable chimera because of it.

This essay focuses on military-related PTSD. While there are some concepts that translate well into PTSD in the civilian sphere, there are unique elements that do not necessarily fit the mold in both directions, so for someone hoping to write a different form of PTSD, I would recommend finding other resources that could better suit your purposes. I also recommend using more than one source just in general, trauma is personal and so multiple sources can help provide a wide range of experiences to draw upon, which should hopefully improve any creative work.

And as a final introductory note, traumatic experiences are deeply personal. If you are using someone you know as a model for your writing, you owe it to that person to communicate exactly what you are doing and to ask their permission every step of the way. I consider it a request out of politeness to implore any author who uses someone else’s experiences to inform their writing in any capacity, but when it comes to the truly negative experiences in someone’s life, this rises higher from request to demand. You will ask someone before taking a negative experience from their own life and placing it into your creative works, and you will not hide anything about it from them. Receiving it is a great sign of trust. The opposite is a travesty, robbing someone of a piece of themselves and placing it upon display as a grotesque exhibit. And if that sounds ghoulish and macabre, it’s because it is, without hyperbole. Don’t do it.

Why Write PTSD?

What is the purpose of including PTSD in a creative work? There have been plenty of art therapy actions taken by those who suffer PTSD to create something from their condition, which can be as profound for those who do not have it as it is therapeutic for those that do, but why would someone include it in their creative works, and why is some no-name guy on the internet writing an essay offering tips as to how to do it better?

Certainly, one key element is that it’s real, and it happens. If art is to reflect upon reality, PTSD suffered by soldiers is one element of that, so art can reflect it, but what specifically about PTSD, as opposed to any other facet of existence? Author preference certainly plays a factor, but why would someone try to include something that is difficult to understand and difficult to portray? While everyone comes to their own reason, I think that a significant number of people are curious about what exactly goes on in the minds of someone suffering through PTSD, and creative works allow them a way to explore it, much the way fiction can explore scenarios and emotions that are either unlikely or unsafe to explore in reality. If that’s the case, then the purpose of this essay is rather simple, to make the PTSD examination more grounded in reality and thus a better reflection of it. But experiences are unique even if discernable patterns emerge, so in that sense, no essay created by an amateur writer with no psychological experience could be an authoritative take on reality, the nature of which would is far beyond the scope of this essay.

For my own part, I think that well-done creative works involving PTSD is meant to break down the isolation that it can cause in its wake. Veterans suffering may feel that they are alone, that their loved ones cannot understand them and the burden of trying to create that would simply push them away; better instead to have the imperfect bonds that they currently have than risk losing them entirely. For those who are on the outside looking in, isolation lurks there as well, a gulf that seems impossible to breach and possibly intrusive to even try. Creative works that depict PTSD can help create a sense that victims aren’t alone, that there are people that understand and can help without demeaning the sense of self-worth. Of course, another element would be to reduce the amount of poorly-done depictions of PTSD. Some creative works use PTSD as a backstory element, relegating a defining and important element of an individual’s life as an aside, or a minor problem that can be resolved with a good hug and a cry or a few nights with the right person. If a well-done creative work can help create a bridge and break down isolation, a poorly-done one can turn victims off, reinforcing the idea that no one understands and worse, no one cares. For others, it gives a completely altered sense of what PTSD is and what they could do to help, keeping them out, confusing them, or other counter-productive actions. In that sense, all the essay is to help build up those who are doing the heavy lifting. I’m not full of so much hubris as to think this is a profound piece of writing that will help others, but if creators are willing to try and do the hard work of building a bridge, I could at least try to help out and provide a wheelbarrow.

An Abbreviated Look At The Many Faces and Names of PTSD Throughout History

PTSD has been observed repeatedly throughout human history, even when it was poorly understood. This means that explorations of PTSD can be written in settings even if they did not have a distinctly modern understanding of neurology, trauma, or related matters. These historical contexts are also useful for worldbuilding a believable response in fictional settings and scenarios that don’t necessarily have a strict analogue in our own history. By providing this historical context, hopefully I can craft a broad-based sense of believable responses to characters with PTSD at a larger level.

In the time of Rome, it was understood by legionnaires that combat was a difficult endeavor, and so troops were typically on the front lines engaged in combat for short periods of time, to be rotated back for rest while others took their place. It was considered ideal, in these situations, to rotate troops that fought together back so that they could rest together. The immediate lesson is obvious, the Romans believed that it was vital for troops to take time to process what they had done and that was best served with quiet periods of rest not just to allow the adrenaline to dissipate (the "combat high"), but a chance for the mind to wrap itself around what the legionnaire had done. The Romans also recognized that camaraderie between fellow soldiers helped soldiers to cope, and this would be a running theme throughout history (and remains as such today). Soldiers were able to empathize with each other, and help each other through times of difficulty. This was not all sanguine, however, Roman legions depended on their strong formations, and a soldier that did not perform their duty could endanger the unit, and so shame in not fulfilling their duty was another means to keep soldiers in line. The idea of not letting down your fellow soldiers is a persistent refrain in coping with the traumas of war, and throughout history this idea has been used for both pleasant and unpleasant means of keeping soldiers in the fight.

In the Middle Ages, Geoffroi de Charny wrote extensively on the difficulties that knights could experience on the campaign trail in his Book of Chivalry. The book highlights the deprivation that knights suffered, from the bad food and poor sleep to the traumatic experience of combat to being away from family and friends to the loss of valued comrades to combat and infection; each of these is understood as a significant stressor that puts great strain on the mental health of soldiers up to today. De Charny recommended focusing on the knightly oaths of service, the needs of the mission of their liege, and the duty of the knight to serve as methods to help bolster the resolve of struggling knights. The book also mentions seeking counseling and guidance from priests or other confidants to help improve their mental health to see their mission through. This wasn’t universal, however. Some severely traumatized individuals were seen as simple cowards, and punished harshly for their perceived cowardice as antithetical to good virtue and to serve as an example.

World War I saw a sharp rise in the reported incidents of military-related PTSD and new understandings and misunderstandings. The rise in the number of soldiers caused a rise in cases of military PTSD, even though the term itself was not known at the time. Especially in the early phases of the war, many soldiers suffering from PTSD were thought to be malingering, pretending to have symptoms to avoid being sent to the front lines. The term “shell shock” was derived because it was believed that the concussive force of artillery bombardment caused brain damage as it rattled the skull or carbon monoxide fumes would damage the brain as they were inhaled, as a means to explain why soldiers could have physical responses such as slurred speech, lack of response to external stimuli, even nigh-on waking catatonia, despite not being hit by rifle rounds or shrapnel. This would later be replaced by the term “battle fatigue” when it became apparent that artillery bombardment was not a predicative indicator. Particularly as manpower shortages became more prevalent, PTSD-sufferers could be sent to firing squads as a means to cow other troops to not abandon their post. Other less fatal methods of shaming could occur, such as the designation “Lack of Moral Fibre,” an official brand of cowardice, as an attempt to shame the members into remembering their duty. As the war developed, and understanding grew, better methods of treatment were made, with rest and comfort provided to slight cases, strict troop rotations observed to rotate men to and from the front lines, and patients not being told that they were being evacuated for nervous breakdown to avoid cementing that idea in their mind. These lessons would continue into World War II, where the term “combat stress reaction” was adopted. While not always strenuously followed, regular rotations were adopted as standard policy. This was still not universal, plenty of units still relied upon bullying members into maintaining their post despite mental trauma.

The American military promotes a culture of competence and ability, particularly for the enlisted ranks, and that lends itself to the soldier viewing themselves in a starkly different fashion than a civilian. Often, a soldier sees the inability to cope with a traumatic experience as a personal failure stemming from the lack of mental fortitude. Owning up to such a lack of capability is tantamount to accepting that they are an inferior soldier, less capable than their fellows. This idea is commonly discussed, and should not be ignored, but it is far from the only reason. The military also possesses a strong culture of fraternity that obligates “Don’t be a fuckup,” is a powerful motivating force, and it leads plenty of members of the military to ignore traumatic experiences out of the perceived need not to put the burden on their squadmates. While most professional militaries stress that seeking mental health for trauma is not considered a sign of weakness, enlisted know that if they receive mental health counseling, it is entirely likely that someone will have to take their place in the meantime. That could potentially mean that another person, particularly in front-line units, are exposed to danger that they would otherwise not be exposed to, potentially exacerbating guilt if said person gets hurt or killed. This is even true in stateside units, plenty of soldiers don’t report for treatment because it would mean dumping work on their fellows, a negative aspect of unit fraternity. Plenty of veterans also simply never are screened for mental health treatment, and usually this lends to a mentality of “well, no one is asking, so I should be fine.” These taken together combine to a heartbreaking reality, oftentimes a modern veteran that seeks help for mental trauma has often coped silently for years, perhaps self-medicating with alcohol or off-label drug usage, and is typically very far along their own path comparatively. Others simply fall through the cracks, not being screened for mental disorders and so do not believe that anything is wrong; after all, if something was wrong, surely the doctors would notice it, right? The current schedule of deployments, which are duration-based and not mission-based, also make it hard for servicemembers to rationalize their experiences and equate them to the mission; there’s no sense of pairing suffering to objectives the way that de Charnay mentioned could help contextualize the deprivation and loss. These sorts of experiences make the soldier feel adrift, and their suffering pointless, which is discouraging on another level. It is one thing to suffer for a cause, it’s another not to know why, amplifying the feelings of powerlessness and furthering the isolation that they feel.

Pen to Page - The Characters and Their Responses

The presentation of PTSD within a character will depend largely on the point-of-view that the author creates. A character that suffers from PTSD depending on the presence of an internal or external point-of-view, will be vastly different experiences on page. Knowing this is essential, as this will determine how the story itself is presenting the disorder. Neither is necessarily more preferable than the other, and is largely a matter of the type of story being told and the personal preference of the author.

Internal perspectives will follow the character’s response from triggering event to immediate response. This allows the author to present a glimpse into what the character is experiencing. In these circumstances, remember that traumatic flashbacks are merely one of many experiences that an average sufferer of PTSD can endure. In a visual medium, flashbacks are time-effective methods to portray a character reliving portions of a traumatic experience, but other forms of media can have other tools. Traumatic flashbacks are not necessarily a direct reliving of an event from start to finish, individuals may instead feel sudden sharp pains of old injuries, be overwhelmed by still images of traumatic scenes or loud traumatic sounds. These can be linked to triggers that bring up the traumatic incident, such as a similar sight, sound, or smell. These moments of linkage are not necessarily experienced linearly or provide a clear sequence of events from start to finish (memory rarely is unless specifically prompted), and it may be to the author’s advantage to not portray them as such in order to communicate the difficulty in mental parsing that the character may be experiencing. Others might be more intrusive, such as violently deranged nightmares that prevent sleep. The author must try to strike a balance between portraying the experience realistically and portraying it logically that audience members can understand. The important thing about these memories is that they are intrusive, unwelcome, and quite stressful, so using techniques that jar the reader, such as the sudden intrusive image of a torn body, a burning vehicle, or another piece of the traumatic incident helps communicate the disorientation. Don't rely simply on shock therapy, it's not enough just to put viscera on the page. Once it is there, the next steps, how the character reacts, is crucial to a believable response.

When the character experiences something that triggers their PTSD, start to describe the stress response, begin rapidly shortening the sentences to simulate the synaptic activity, express the fight-flight-freeze response as the character reacts, using the tools of dramatic action to heighten tension and portraying the experience as something frightful and distinctly undesirable. The triggering incident brings back the fear, such as a pile of rubble on the side of the road being a potential IED location, or a loud firework recalling the initial moments of an enemy ambush. The trauma intrudes, and the character falls deep into the stress response, and now they react. How does this character react? By taking cover? By attacking the aggressor who so reminds them of the face of their enemy? Once the initial event starts, then the character continues to respond. Do they try to get to safety? Secure the area and eliminate the enemy? Eventually, the character likely recognizes their response is inappropriate. It wasn’t a gunshot, it was a car backfiring, the smell of copper isn’t the sight of a blown-apart comrade and the rank odor of blood, it’s just a jug of musty pennies. This fear will lead to control mechanisms where the victim realizes that their response is irrational. Frequently, the fear is still there, and it still struggles with control. This could heighten a feeling a powerlessness in the character as they try and fail to put the fear under control: "Yes, I know this isn’t real and there’s nothing to be afraid of, but I’m still shaking and I am still afraid!" It’s a horrifying logical track, a fear that the victim isn’t even in control of their thoughts - the one place that they should have control - and that they might always be this way. There’s no safety since even their thoughts aren’t safe. Despair might also follow, as the victim frantically asserts to regain control. Usually with time, the fear starts to lessen as the logical centers of the brain regain control, and the fear diminishes. Some times, the victim can't even really recall the exact crippling sense of fear when attempting to recall it, only that they were afraid and that it was deeply scary and awful, but the notion that it happened remains in their mind.

Control mechanisms are also important to developing a believable PTSD victim. Most sufferers dread the PTSD response and so actively avoid objects or situations that could potentially trigger. Someone who may have had to escape from a helicopter falling into the ocean may not like to be immersed in water. Someone who was hit by a hidden IED may swerve to avoid suspicious piles in the road. Someone buried under a collapsing ceiling may become claustrophobic. Thus, many characters with PTSD will be hypervigilant almost to the point of exhaustion, avoiding setting off the undesired response. This hypervigilance is mentally taxing; the character begins to become sluggish mentally as all their energy is squeezed out, leaving them struggling for even the simplest of rational thoughts. This mental fog can be translated onto the page in dramatic effect by adding paragraph length to even simple actions, bringing the reader along into the fog, laboriously seeing the character move to perform simple actions. Then, mix in a loss of a sense of purpose. They’re adrift, not exactly sure what they’re doing and barely aware of what’s happening, although they are thinking and functioning. In the character’s daily life, they are living their life using maximum effort to avoid triggering responses; this is another aspect of control that the character can use as an attempt to claw back some semblance of power in their own lives. Even control methods that aren’t necessarily healthy such as drinking themselves to pass out every night or abusing sleeping pills in an attempt to sleep due to their nightmares, are ways to attempt to regain a sense of normalcy and function. Don’t condescend to these characters and make them pathetic, that’s just another layer of cruelty, but showing the unhealthy coping mechanisms can demonstrate the difficulty that PTSD victims are feeling. Combined with an external perspective, the author can show the damage that these unhealthy actions are doing without casting the character as weak for not taking a different path.

External perspectives focus on the other characters and how they observe and react to the individual in question. Since the internal thought process of the character is not known, sudden reactions to an unknown trigger can be quite jarring for characters unaware, which can mirror real-life experiences that individuals can have with PTSD-sufferers. In these types of stories, the character’s reaction to the victim is paramount. PTSD in real life often evokes feelings of helplessness in loved ones when they simply cannot act to help, can evoke confusion, or anger and resentment. These reactions are powerful emotions with the ability to drive character work, and so external perspectives can be useful for telling a story about what it is like for loved ones who suffer in their own fashion. External perspectives can be used not just in describing triggering episodes, but in exploring how the character established coping mechanisms and how their loved ones react to them. Some mechanisms are distinctly unhealthy, such as alcohol or prescription drug abuse, complete withdrawal, or a refusal to drive vehicles, and these create stress and a feeling of helplessness in characters or can impel them to try and take action. Others can be healthy, and a moment of inspiration and joy for an external perspective could be sharing in that mechanism, demonstrating empathy and understanding which evokes strong pathos, and hopefully to friends of those who suffer from PTSD, a feeling that they too, are not alone.

As the character progresses, successes and failures can often be one of the most realistic and most important things to include within the work, since those consumers who have PTSD will see parts of themselves in the characters, which can build empathy and cut down on the feelings of isolation that many victims of PTSD feel. A character could, over the course of the story, begin weaning themselves off of their control mechanisms, have the feelings of panic subside as their logical sides more quickly assert control, replace unhealthy coping mechanisms with healthier ones, or other elements of character progression and growth. Contrarily, a character making progress could, after experiencing significant but unrelated stressors, backslide either into unhealthy coping mechanisms or be blindsided by another attack. This is a powerful fear for the victim, since it can cause them to think ‘all my progress, all my effort, and I am not free!’ This is often a great fear for PTSD users (people with depression often have the same feeling) that find methods of coping are no longer as effective, and the struggle is perceived as one that they’re ultimately doomed to failure. This feeling of inevitable failure can lead to self-harm and suicide as their avenue of success seems to burn to ash right as it was in their hands. More than one soldier suffering from PTSD has ended up concluding: “Fuck it, I can’t live like this,” as horrible as that is. Don’t be afraid to include setbacks and backsliding, those happen in reality, and can be one of the most isolating fears in their lives; if the goal of portraying PTSD accurately is to help remove that feeling of isolation, then content creators must not avoid these experiences. Success as well as failure are essential to PTSD in characters in stories, these elements moreso than any other, I believe, will transcend the medium and form a connection, fulfilling the objective we set out to include in the beginning paragraphs.

Coming Back to the Beginning

It might be counterintuitive at first glance to say “including military PTSD will probably mean it will be a long journey full of discouraging story beats that might make readers depressed,” because that’s definitely going to discourage some readers to do that. I don’t see it that way, though. The people that want to do it should go in knowing it’s going to be hard, and let that strengthen their resolve, and put the best creation they can forward. The opposite is also true. Not every prospective author has to want to include any number of difficult subjects in their works, and that’s perfectly fine. Content creators must be free to shape the craft that they so desire without the need to be obligated to tackle every difficult issue, and so no content creator should be thought of as lesser or inferior because they opt not to include it in their works. I think that’s honestly stronger than handling an important topic poorly, or even worse, frivolously. Neither should anyone think that a content creator not including PTSD in their works means that they don’t care about those who suffer from it or for those who care about them or who simply don’t care about the subject in general. That’s just a terrible way to treat someone, and in the end, this entire excursion was about the opposite

Ultimately, this essay is a chance not only to help improve creative works involving PTSD, but to reflect on the creative process. Those who still want to proceed, by all means, do so. Hopefully this essay will help you create something that can reach someone. If every piece of work that helps portray PTSD can reach someone somewhere and make things easier, even if ever so little, well then, that’s what it’s really all about.

Hoping everyone has a peaceful Memorial Day. Be good to each to other.

SLAL

#essays on writing and worldbuilding #ptsd

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unique-facts · 3 years

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Top 10 Facts About PewDiePie

Let’s talk about the world’s most successful YouTuber. Welcome to Unique Facts and today we’re counting down our picks for The Top 10 Facts About PewDiePie.

For this list, we’re looking at some of the things that make PewDiePie unique, eccentric and occasionally controversial, because you don’t make it to the top of YouTube by being ordinary.

10: His Name Is Felix Arvid Ulf Kjellberg

Let’s start with the basics. While many people know him as Pewds or even senpai, this YouTuber’s real life name is Felix Arvid Ulf Kjelberg. It’s a bit of a mouthful but it’s actually quite common in Sweden for people to have two middle names. Felix is a Latin word that means happy and successful, which just so happens to describe PewDiePie perfectly. You may also recognize the name from the Felix Felicis potion in Harry Potter, which brings luck and success to anyone who drinks it. So maybe, just maybe, there’s a little bit of magic behind PewDiePie’s success too.

9: There IS a Meaning Behind “PewDiePie”

Unlike the name his parents gave him, the name of Felix’s channel really doesn’t have that much meaning behind it, but it does come with a bit of funny and relatable origin story. In 2006 he created the PewDie channel but had to make a new channel when he forgot the login information, thus the great PewDiePie channel was born. To break it down Pew is to represent the sound a laser makes, die is what happens when you get shot by a laser, and pie… Well Pewds just thought it sounded funny, and he’d already started saying it as a bit of a catchphrase while gaming, so… why not? Also, who doesn’t love pie?

8: He Dropped Out of College

Surely much to his parents’ delight, PewDiePie was accepted into Chalmers University of Technology for a degree in industrial economics and technology management. This was quite an accomplishment since you needed excellent grades to get in, but it just wasn’t for Pewds. Before completing his degree at Chalmers, PewDiePie dropped out to pursue his own artistic endeavors. To support himself, he worked at a hot dog stand, and he managed to sell enough of his artwork to buy his early gaming/broadcasting equipment. It just goes to show that humble beginnings and sacrifice can create a legend.

7: He Has Two Licensed Video Games

It had always been a dream of Pewds’ to create his own video games and in 2015 that dream came true with the release of “PewDiePie: Legend of the Brofist.” The game takes you on an epic 2D adventure where you save Bros - i.e. PewDiePie’s fans - from the evil barrel army. In 2016 he released “PewDiePie’s Tuber Simulator”, which is a community game where you create your own YouTuber. You work to upgrade your office and become number one on YouTube. Both games have done extremely well, receiving high ratings and positive reviews.

6: He’s Very Charitable

PewDiePie has actually used his internet powers and substantial influence for good by raising money for charity. He has quite a few charities he’s passionate about like WWF, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, Save the Children, and Product Red. In fact, in 2012 he won the title of "Gaming King of the Web" and donated his cash prize to the World Wildlife Fund. In 2014 Pewds made a video announcing that his channel, with the help of the Bro Army, had raised 1 million dollars for charity, and that number has only continued to grow.

5: He’s a Published Author

He’s a poet and you didn’t even know it. Well maybe not a poet… but he is hilarious and published! On October 15, 2015 PewDiePie released the magnum opus that is “This Book Loves You.” It has 240 pages of inspirational quotes and advice, which are paired with creative visuals. Well, technically the book is a satire on other inspirational books, but it has some fun words of wisdom like “Don't be yourself, be a pizza. Everyone loves pizza.” Truer words have never been put to paper. The book even made it to the #1 spot on the New York Times’ best seller list for young adult paperbacks.

4: He Met His Girlfriend When She Sent a Fan E-Mail

Theirs is a true modern romance if there ever was one. Back in 2011 Marzia Bisognin’s best friend innocently sent her a link to Felix’s videos. Marzia thought he was hilarious so she decided to write him and he wrote back. The two started talking through Facebook until Felix saved up enough money to visit her in Italy. They had to travel a lot to see each other but now they are a YouTube power-couple happily living in the UK. Marzia has over 7 million subscribers on her YouTube channel and she even has her own fashion line!

3: He’s Had to Move Because of His Fans

Jake Paul isn’t the only one having problems with fans at his place. Though at least, unlike Paul, Pewds didn’t share his home address publicly. The Bro Army is often a force for good, especially when it comes to charity drives, but other times their devotion to PewDiePie can go a little too far. There have been multiple instances of fans hunting down his address, and then showing up at his house. You shouldn’t show up to a friend’s place uninvited, let alone someone who doesn’t know you. Pewds has had to move more than once because of this. He’s even made a video telling fans to leave him alone, which, quite frankly, should’ve gone without saying.

2: He Increases Video Game Sales

If Pewds plays it… people buy it! This is especially evident when he decides to play indie-games. Pewds has been known to crash sites when the Bro Army flocks to a game that isn’t designed to handle so much traffic. You can thank him for putting a lot of games on the map like “Surgeon Simulator” and the addictive game “Flappy Bird”, may it rest in peace. We aren’t talking about a few dollars of increased sales either; when he played “Crypt of the NecroDancer” it experienced an increase in sales to the tune of 60 thousand big ones!

Before we reveal out top pick here are a few honorable mentions.

- He Hates Barrels

- He Has a LOT of Subscribers

- His First PewDiePie Video Was About Minecraft

#1: Controversial Content Cost Him Lucrative Deals

If you’ve ever watched a PewDiePie video, then you know that he’s got a habit of pushing the limits. It has gotten him into trouble in the past, like in 2016 when he was accused of anti-Semitism after posting a number of videos that either alluded to or invoked Nazi and anti-Semitic imagery and messages. While Felix made an apology video, the offending content cost him his deal with Disney, as well as his YouTube Red series. In 2017, he used a racial slur in a livestream of PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, which led game developer Campo Santo to issue a DMCA takedown of videos featuring Pewds playing their game Firewatch.

#PewDiePie #subscribe to pewdipie #tenfacts #10facts #10 facts #writing #writers on tumblr #reading #unique Facts #unique

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clonewarsarchives · 3 years

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Inside 'Star Wars: The Clone Wars'

By: Gerri Miller (original article link on howstuffworks)

Sources

George Lucas interviewed August 4, 2008

Dave Filoni interviewed September 11, 2008

The sci-fi phenomenon that began more than 30 years ago with a movie about a galaxy long ago and far, far away has expanded exponentially ever since with sequels, prequels, books, games and animated spinoffs. Although the animated "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" movie, released this summer, has to date grossed a less than stellar $34 million, it was an offshoot of creator George Lucas' mission to create a TV series, and it served its purpose as a promotional tool for the weekly "Clone Wars" episodes that premiere on Cartoon Network Oct. 3, 2008.

Focused on the conflict briefly referred to in the original "Star Wars," the galactic civil war takes place in the period between "Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones" and "Episode III: Revenge of the Sith." The Clone Wars pit the Grand Army of the Republic led by the Jedi Knights against the Separatists and their Droid Army, led by Count Dooku, a Jedi turned Sith Lord aligned with the evil Darth Sidious. Many of the characters from the "Star Wars" universe are involved, including Yoda, Obi-Wan Kenobi and young Anakin Skywalker, before he was tempted to the Dark Side and became Darth Vader.

"I was lamenting the fact that in 'Episode II,' I started the Clone Wars, and in 'Episode III,' I ended the Clone Wars, and I never actually got to do anything on the Clone Wars," says Lucas. "It's like skipping over World War II."

To remedy that omission, he tapped Dave Filoni, an animator (Nickelodeon's "Avatar: the Last Airbender" series) and passionate "Star Wars" fan, to bring "The Clone Wars" to TV.

Ensconced at Big Rock Ranch, near Lucas' Skywalker Ranch headquarters in Marin County, Cali., Filoni and his team of artists and computer animators are making 22 episodes in season one and have nearly two more seasons written.

"We're way ahead. We've been doing this ever since I finished 'Revenge of the Sith,'" says Lucas, who hopes to do at least 100 installments.

He and Filoni collaborate on everything from story to design to execution in translating the "Star Wars" universe for television. It's a daunting creative, technical and logistic task, as we'll explain in the following sections.

Building the Universe

How do you scale down an IMAX-size spectacle for television and still have it make an impact, especially on a small screen budget? That's just one of the problems Dave Filoni has to solve.

"'Star Wars' is very famous for the scale of it, and how convincing it looks. So when you're doing a weekly television series, you have to figure out how to do things on that level," he notes. "Sometimes it forces you to be creative and come up with solutions that are better than if you can shoot everything you want," he continues, preferring to consider budgetary constraints a creative incentive rather than a limitation. "The team here is challenged to come up with these giant battles. We haven't shied away from anything."

While he did some of the initial character design, subsequently, Filoni has spent most of his time supervising other artists and animators, who number around 70 in-house and another 80 or so at facilities in Singapore and Taipei.

"Everything is written here, and the story and design and editing are all done here. The animation and lighting are done overseas, and sometimes some modeling as well," he outlines.

"I meet with George to talk about the episodes and he hands out a lot of the storylines and main ideas for the stories. I'll draw while he's talking and show him the sketch," Filoni continues. "That way we communicate right off the bat about what something might look like."

At any given time, the director notes, episodes are in various stages of completion, "from designing to working on a final cut, or adding sound and color-correction. I have four episodic directors to help me, who each have an episode they're managing."

Rather than use computer animation to duplicate the live-action films' characters or continue in the very stylized vein of the 2004-2005 "Clone Wars" micro-series, "We kind of shot for the middle," says Filoni, who endeavored to blend a 2-D esthetic with 3-D technology.

"The 3-D model makers and riggers who worked on the prequels dealt with the height of realism to create convincing digital characters. I knew that we weren't going to be able to do that for the series. And we wanted it to be different than a live-action feature, to get away from photo-realism. It was a choice to simplify something in the character models, the same way we would do things in a 2-D show."

So how did Filoni stay true to the "Star Wars" legacy in this newest installment? Read on to find out.

Clone Style

Taking some inspiration from the earlier cartoon series, Filoni

approached the characters as a 2-D animator would, "but stylized the face a little more. If you look at Anakin, he has certain edges and lines in his face. I would draw an edge or a line that might be unnaturally straight or curved, and that would play into the lighting of it. I tried to sculpt in 3-D the way I would draw or sculpt an image in 2-D, with shadow and light. I wanted it to look like a painting -- you see a textured, hand-painted style on every character. I have texture artists who literally paint every single character right down to their eyeball, because I wanted that human touch on everything."

Advances in computer animation have allowed Filoni to accomplish much more than he would have been able to in traditional 2-D. "For eight years I worked just with a pencil. I never touched a computer. But working with George, we try to look at computers as an incredibly advanced pencil. The technical side helps the creative, artistic side," he says.

Battles filled with huge numbers of soldiers can be rendered faster than ever before, but they still have to be created, along with every other prop and character in an enormous universe. "'Star Wars' is so complex in that you're building a whole galaxy. We go to many different planets," Filoni reminds. "So every rock, tree, blade of grass, native vehicle -- every asset -- needs design. We had to create a whole bunch of assets for each episode, and the budget goes up for each element you have. Once you build it, you have it, but we can't go to a different planet and have the same chair there," he laughs. "On a schedule where we need those things right away, it's difficult to get it all built."

Since "The Clone Wars" is chronologically sandwiched between "Clone Wars" and "Revenge of the Sith," it has been a mandate for the creators to stay consistent with the mythology. "That's probably one of the trickiest things," admits Filoni. "We always have to keep in mind what the characters are thinking and feeling at the beginning of this and at the end. You have a lot of room to play with when you're in the middle, but you have to remember what people say in the third movie. With characters like Obi-Wan or Anakin or Padme, I have to pay very careful attention that it will hook up. And then there's the expanded universe of "Star Wars" novels and video games. I try to be aware of it all and work it in, because fans really appreciate it."

Filoni hopes to attract existing fans and create new ones, especially among the younger generation, but admits doing the latter may be easier. "One thing we have that's different from any movie that came before is we're an animated series. But there's an instant reaction to the word animation that it's for kids. How you get around that is with the stories you tell. We'll have our snow battles and we'll also have our lighter 'Return of the Jedi' moments. Some episodes lean older, some younger. But in the end it has a broad appeal," he believes.

The recent "Clone Wars" movie (out on DVD Nov. 11 ) served as a stand-alone prequel to introduce the characters at this point in time. In contrast, "The series has its small arcs and shows you the war from across a broad spectrum of episodes. It's not just Anakin Skywalker's story," Filoni underlines. "We can go left or right of that plot and deal with characters we have never seen. There's a lot of material. It's a three-year period in the history of the 'Star Wars' Universe, and there are so many stories to tell. The longer it goes, the more chance we get to tell fascinating stories in that galaxy."

Character Study

"The Clone Wars" shows a different side of some of the film franchise's most iconic characters. "In a series, you can do a whole episode about a character and learn more about what they were like, which makes what happens to them a lot more poignant," explains Filoni. "We know Yoda is powerful, but how does that power develop? How does he use it? We get to go into more detail that you just couldn't do in the live action films, because they're mainly focused on Anakin."

While few of the actors from the live action movies agreed to reprise their roles in voice over for "The Clone Wars," Anthony Daniels, the original C-3PO, is the exception. "One of the special moments for me was hearing Anthony on the telephone, discussing C-3PO with me and his experiences. That really helps us round out the characters," says the director, who enjoyed similar input from Rob Coleman, the animation supervisor who worked on Yoda on the prequels.

Of the new characters not seen in the live action series, there's the alluring but venomous Asajj Ventress, a disciple of Count Dooku. "She is, of course, a villain, and fits into the structure of the Sith," Filoni elaborates. "Darth Sidious -- Senator Palpatine -- is the main bad guy, and his apprentice is Count Dooku. Dooku is training Ventress in the Dark Side. She's getting more powerful. I wanted to make her intelligent, deceptive and also kind of sexual. She's kind of a forbidden fruit -- Jedi are not supposed to get involved with the more lustful aspects of life. She adds another dynamic to the series."

On the other side of the good/evil coin is newcomer Ahsoka Tano, Anakin's teenage padawan, or apprentice. "She's Anakin's student and helps us see him as more of a hero," says Filoni. "Once he gets over his initial reaction, he takes pride in her. He's unpredictable and the Jedi know that, but he has compassion and that is used against him and it later brings him to the Dark Side."

Ahsoka was created, says Lucas, "Because I needed to mature Anakin. The best way to get somebody to become responsible and mature is to have them become a parent or a teacher. You have to think about what you're doing and set an example. You look at your behavior and the way you do things much differently. The idea was to use her to make Anakin become more mature. We've made her a more extreme version of what Anakin was- - a little out there, independent, vital and full of life, but even more so. He gets a little dose of his own medicine."

"She's been a really fun character to develop," adds Filoni, who likes Ahsoka but admits that his character tastes tend to run a bit more obscure -- his favorite is Plo Koon, "a bizarre Jedi Master. It's been fun to develop him and show his personality beyond the fact that he's bizarre looking and carries a lightsaber."

Fan Fare

Just three years ago, Filoni dressed up as Plo Koon to see an opening night showing of "Revenge of the Sith," so it's not surprising that the 34-year-old fan is still pinching himself that he has this job. "It's a very creative atmosphere," he says of Big Rock Ranch, where the lakeside setting is "meant to inspire us artistically and definitely does. A lot of the people I work with grew up with 'Star Wars,' so we have a great time. It's hard, intense work, but George is very engaged in what we're doing. What more could you ask for? I have the guy who created the 'Star Wars' universe excited and interested in what we're doing. We couldn't be happier about that."

Asked why he thinks "Star Wars" remains a fan favorite today, three decades later, Lucas says diversification is the key. "We were always able to deal with different aspects of the story in various forms and I think that keeps it alive. It is a lot of fun and it's a universe that has been created to inspire young people to exercise their imagination and inspire them to be creative, and I think that always works."

"The original 'Star Wars' had broad appeal to everybody, and it holds up so well," adds Filoni. "I think there's a timelessness to it, even though Luke looks like a kid from the '70s with that haircut. Luke is a farmer boy and Han is a cowboy. Jedi Knights are like the samurai of Japan or the knights of Europe. Those archetypes work the globe over. It's a world phenomenon that speaks to everyone. There will always be a character you can relate to."

#interview #crew #George Lucas #Dave Filoni #the first part is useless read the stuff about design and characters under cut #highlights bit for own reference

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caffeinatedowlbear · 2 years

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Wrote My Way Out, the 2021 Edition - aka Last Year's Creative Work, Summarized

Disclaimer: this is a more quantitative than qualitative summary, and when it comes to creative work, numbers mean very little at the end of the day. I'm absolutely eschewing any external numbers in this post: even though there are some reader stats that felt like a milestone and made me smile, they're ultimately something out of my control, and not something I'd like to focus on.

I did, however, choose to include two figures I did have a reasonable degree of control over: my total written word count (for prose), and total hours I put into creative work in 2021. And sure, even these numbers are just that. The word count itself says nothing about the meaning and value of the stories formed of those words. The total number of hours poured into that work doesn't show the moments of despair or triumph, the days I was on a roll, or working my way out of a rut, or writing through personal tragedies. However, the total number of hours is meaningful to me because it is a testament (from me, for me) to the importance of my creative work in my life. And my year's word count, which someone might consider impressive, and someone else, deeply middling, helps me visualize the amount of writing I've done. Both figures are under the "read more" and can be easily avoided if you, like me, are prone to Compare and Despair Syndrome.

In terms of creative work, my 2021 turned out to be almost as prolific as 2020 (which was a bit of a personal writing renaissance, so an outlier, really). Not only did I write a lot, but I also ventured into two new creative mediums: planning and hosting a tabletop RPG campaign, and writing+coding interactive fiction.

I also experimented with adding some accountability to my creative process, by hosting writing streams and attending virtual coworking sessions. Both were a pretty freaking brave step out of my comfort zone (historically, I'm the kind of writer who works best alone and doesn't show anything but the finished work to the world), but both proved useful for me.

Lessons learned? The biggest one was probably that I have a fairly fixed number of hours I can put into creative work per year without running myself into the ground. As seen by the fact that I did a similar amount of creative work in a year with fairly regular freelance paid gigs as in a year featuring a six-month sabbatical from work. Fair's fair.

Stuff I Did: a List

Writing (prose): it's all Rhack fic, y'all

Completed fics:

Hey, Handsome - let's talk about Jack's trauma re: Vault scar

Meet Me Halfway - Christmas fluff wrapped in corporate espionage

Belonging - Fallout AU fluff

Get Me Home - AI Jack POV during Tales from the Borderlands

Fair Turnabout (started in 2020, completed in 2021) - smut

Works in progress:

Lost and Found (chapters 18-34) - post-Tales fix-it with tons of character

Shadows (chapter 1) - an unexpected Don't Starve Rhack AU

Other creative work:

Tabletop RPG planning for an ongoing campaign set in a setting inspired by The Long Dark, played to the (heavily homebrewed) Monster of the Week rule set

Teaching myself how to write and code interactive fiction: produced a practice game, started on a longer project

Stats and charts because I'm a nerd:

Total wordcount of the prose writing c. 122,000

Hours poured into creative endeavors in total (not counting hosting tabletop sessions): 325

#2021 in writing #2021 in review #fanfic #rhack #writing #creative writing

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cinematicnomad · 3 years

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1, 7, 25 for the fanfic end of year ask :)

001. favorite fic you wrote this year i have a soft spot for take my hand (take my everything) which was the first fic i wrote this year! and kind of the first step back into writing creatively on something new that wasn’t the 7 year monster sterek fic. also my first foray into 9-1-1 fic and was just a lot of fun!

007. longest completed fic you wrote this year the longest fic i wrote was my second for the year! so show me (family) wound up being around 16k+ for 9-1-1 which kind of burst out of me over the course of one 48 hour window unlike take my hand which took a few weeks to crank out.

025. a fic you read this year you would recommend everyone read SO MANY FICS DUDE!!! i’m gonna rec a couple, some that i re-read this year and some that i discovered for the first time, all from a variety of fandoms. BUT heads up, you didn’t specify a fandom so it’s gonna be a little scattered. also someone else sent me this same question but specified 9-1-1, so i’m gonna reserve those recs for that ask. GET READY!!

and this, your living kiss by opal_bullets (7/7 | 84k+ | M) destiel; AU: college/university; john winchester’s A+ parenting; angst with a happy ending

only a very few people in the world know that the celebrated and reclusive poet jack allen is just kansas mechanic dean winchester, a high school dropout with a few bucks to his name. not that it matters anymore; life has left him so wrung out he never wants to pick up another pen.

until, that is, a string of coincidences leads dean to auditing a poetry course with one dr. castiel novak. the professor is wildly intelligent, devastatingly handsome...and just so happens to be academia’s foremost expert on the poetry of jack allen.

note: i discovered this fic back in the pre-pandemic times of feb 2020 and i’ve read this fic TWICE since, leaving a lengthy comment each time. the poetry in the fic itself is stunningly gorgeous and i have a habit of reading it out loud to myself while reading bc it begs to be heard. this fic is seriously beautiful and makes me want to read all the poet!dean au’s out there in the world. unfortunately there aren’t that many so i just keep coming back to this well. i don’t think i can express enough how much i love this fic.

lost time by ARCurren (105/105 | 350k+ | T) bransonxsybil; AU: canon divergent; outsider POVs; original characters; slow burn

the story of a free spirit who was asked to give up the man she loved for a system she didn’t believe in and what happened next. AU after 3.04.

note: did i think, when i stumbled across this fic years ago, that it would wind up being one of my all time favorites that i return to time and again to re-read? never. did i re-read it for like the dozenth time this year?? 110%. this fic is everything i want from fanfiction—it’s beautifully written, expands on canon, and shows me all the hidden moments the cameras never did (not to mention it’s historically accurate and delves deep into irish politics of the time). the first third or so of this fic is all about tom and sybil’s slow burn romance at downton, but the fic really bursts into its own when we follow the two to dublin and get introduced to all of the author’s deliciously detailed oc’s. heads up warning: this fic was never officially completed, though the final chapter is a beautifully written summary of the final arc of the fic. even so, it’s fucking worth it.

misfire by mothlights & unpossible (6/6 | 28k+ | T) sterek; time travel; angst with a happy ending; alive hale family; magic; alternating POV

“the debt must be repaid,” she says, and it has the weight of a vow. the words resonate through him, ringing through his ribcage and the bones of his jaw, and stiles loses his breath and maybe his grip on reality because she draws herself upright and where there had once stood a supermodel-level MILK now there is galadriel’s much hotter older sister, a presence of unmistakable power in their ordinary, smells-vaguely-of-thai-takeout hallway.

“oh shit,” stiles says.

note: this fic is the first in the misfire ‘verse and i need you to understand that it literally broke me when i binge read these fics a month or so ago. i am a sucker for a solid time travel fic especially bc there are such few good ones in fandom. but this gets at the heart of it all by exploring the idea of stiles getting the chance to save derek’s family and taking it...after he and derek are romantically together in his true timeline and then actually dealing with the ramifications of how that alters everything and how stiles survives in this new present where he and derek are virtual strangers. everyone should definitely read this, but you should also know that i fucking sobbed while reading the sequel (which also has a happy ending, but really digs deep into the nitty gritty angst of the repercussions).

map of the world by seperis (11/11 | 154k+ | M) destiel; end!verse; alternate universe; canon divergent; original characters; slow burn

the world’s already over and they’re already dead. all they’re doing now is marking time until the end.

note: look, if you don’t know about down to agincourt by @seperis, what are you doing with your life?? the series is over 1M+ words so far, the fic author is on book 4 out of a planned 8, and it’s fucking phenomenal. i know i’ve tagged a couple of these recs as slow burn but...this is the slowest slow burn to ever burn. canon!dean travels back into the end!verse timeline just as lucifer kills dean and somehow cas made it out alive and has to keep dean safe while he learns to become his end!verse counterpoint. the world building in this series is intense and i cannot recommend it enough. i’m still in the midst of my re-read bc it’s SUCH an endeavor but i highly recommend it to everybody.

invictus by ellanasan (116/116 | 355+ | M) hayffie; au: alive abernathy family; pre-hunger games; canon prostitution; slow burn

“so then, before i can even think about doing something stupid like trying to stab him with his fucking golden paperknife, he gives me a choice, see?” haymitch continued, almost detached. “either i play nice like all the other victors or he’ll kill my family. i could either become his puppet—greatest punishment he could give me, according to him—or i could become the example.”

AU in which haymitch’s family lives.

note: hello, have you ever wondered what the hunger games series would be like if haymitch’s family were alive? i fucking hadn’t until 2 years ago when i stumbled across this fic and fell head over heels in love with this ship. @ellanainthetardis is my go to hunger games fic writer for anything exploring canon and i’m obsessed with anything she writes about the OG victors pre-canon (finnick, joanna, chaff, etc). this fic is just 300k+ exploring that world and all the intricate details of how cruel the games could really be. HIGHLY recommend. i definitely re-read it this fall when i needed a pick me up.

don’t know what i’m supposed to do (haunted by the ghost of you) by crazyassmurdererwall (1/1 | 30k+ | T) sterek; canon divergent; angst with a happy ending; ghosts; stiles POV

stiles sees dead people. yep. seriously.

(he’s got this. he’s totally got this. so what if one of them is derek’s mom?)

note: did you know that @crazyassmurdererwall is one of my all time favorite people? and that she’s wicked talented? and that in our spare time she’ll send me a billion fic ideas that are amazing and i get to hear all the intricate details of her plot bunnies? but i digress. this fic is one of my all time fave sterek fics i’ve re-read it sooo many times. there’s just something about the heartache and stiles’ insecurity and the way he tries to shoulder it all on his own. and then there’s alli’s brilliant writing, the way she weaves through a scene and paints a picture just so and manages to tug at your heart strings with her precise word choice. there’s some amazing world building in this fic as it explores this other facet of the supernatural that canon teen wolf never touched upon, and i’m so grateful for that bc alli is the only one who should be allowed to write about ghosts and teen wolf together.

lagavulin and guinness by snarfle (10/10 | 163k+ | explicit) hartwin; slow burn; PTSD; suicidal thoughts; graphic depictions of violence; domestic abuse

plenty of people had looked down on eggsy throughout his life. he had gotten fairly used to it. didn’t mean it was fair, but he knew how these things worked. what really sucked was that the new arthur was worse than the old one.

“eggsy grimaced. he didn’t know how to explain to harry—who seemed like he hadn’t been discriminated against a day in his life—that the new arthur kept giving him what amounted to suicide missions, and that he was currently bleeding out in a warehouse because of the deliberately bad intel she had given him.”

also featuring: dean is harder to get rid of than eggsy thought, his mum is going off the deep end, there are way too many nefarious plots in play, and eggsy is really beginning to wish that harry would stop holding his hand and kiss him instead.

note: look, i know i recced this literally less than a week ago but i ALSO stayed up til 5AM re-reading this last night and it was a-m-a-z-i-n-g. i was on a bit of a kingsman kick earlier this year, so i’ve actually re-read this fic TWICE so far in 2020. i will give you a serious warning in that this fic delves deep into domestic abuse through the lens of a variety of different relationships. it also explores the potential for abuse in hartwin, bc this fic is one of the few that actually commits to the fact that they’re literal spies who murder people. actively. a lot. but seriously, this fic is one of my fave in the fandom and i STRONGLY recommend it.

waste of breath by bryrosea (1/1 | 22k+ | M) loganxveronica; canon compliant; missing scenes; navy; past child abuse

logan echolls, the nine years, and the navy.

note: bryrosea has an obscene number of amazing logan and veronica fics (her canon divergent series stay with me is another i re-read this year), but i’ve found myself returning to this fic a lot over the years. i’m a sucker for canon compliant fics that explore the missing scenes in between canon and this fic hits all the right buttons by diving deep into how logan echolls went from being a trash fire at hearst college at the end of s3 to being a decorated navy pilot by the movie. it explores logan seeking out therapy and making a life for himself that he can be proud of, all while pining after the girl who got away. and bc this author is amazing, she followed it up with a sequel from veronica’s point of view in the series done by only me.

the law of equivalent exchange by awed_frog (8/8 | 60k+ | M) destiel; POV castiel; pre-canon; post-canon; canon compliant; immortality; reincarnation

“and what’s the point of it?”

“of love? there isn’t one. loving is its own purpose.”

note: i mean??? i don’t really know what to say except that this is one of the truly most beautiful fics i have ever read. it follows castiel through time as he meets different reincarnations of sam and dean across history and falls ever more deeply in love. it is achingly tender and so ecstatically written that i die just thinking about it. and that summary? i mean. holy fuck break my heart why don’t you? i don’t know how i missed out on this fic for so long since it was published in 2015 but i only learned about it for the first time back in july and it was. life changing?? when the fic finally reaches the canon timeline and he meets THIS dean it’s peak yearning. 10/10 will read again.

ahead in the count by elisela (17/17 | 50k+ | E) sterek; AU: sports; pitcher!stiles; teacher!derek; long distance relationship; getting together

“yankee fan,” derek says, laughing when stiles makes a disgusted face. “the bronx bombers, stiles, you can’t be a new yorker and—”

“stop talking right now,” stiles sighs, shaking his head. “i can’t believe i still want to kiss you after that,” he says, pulling derek in by his coat. “this is making me rethink everything.”

“i’ll never watch them again,” derek promises, and stiles laughs against his mouth.

or: stiles is a starting pitcher for the NY mets when he meets and falls in love with derek. derek doesn’t know.

note: i read SO MANY of @elisela’s 911 fics this summer, which i loved, and then she got into teen wolf and started writing sterek and i just about died. this fic is amazing, one of my fave sterek AU’s that i’ve read in years. it’s just the right amount of drama and angst and fluff filled with all the joys of miscommunication and character relationships that makes reading sterek such a joy. reading this fic and finding out eli needed fic recs pushed me to dive back in to reading sterek fics for a bit this fall so i can say with the utmost authority that this is one of the best i’ve read in a long time.

i used to think one day we’d tell the story of us by notequitegucci (2/2 | 32k+ | M) gendrya; alternate universe—modern setting; outsider POV; friends to lovers; friends to lovers

9 times a stark encounters gendry + 1 time he meets the starks.

note: again, this is the first in a 2 part series titled love me like you do that explores arya and gendry’s dynamics together through the point of view of her family. game of thrones ended last year with a whimper but i keep returning to the gendrya tag on ao3 to seek out new, amazing content and also to re-read some old favorites. i can’t remember if i came across this for the first time last year or this one, but i’ve read it and re-read it more times than i can count since and i love it more than i can describe. i’m a total sucker for outsider POV fics and my biggest pet peeve in canon is the fact that none of the stark’s ever found out that arya and gendry had a history together. this modern au fic almost makes up for it by giving me a gendry encounter with every family member and then the big reveal. it’s peak content.

theeeeeeese recs got a little away from me. i wasn’t originally intending on adding lengthy notes to each entry but ... oh well!! these are all amazing so please enjoy.

fanfic end of the year asks

#lilolilyr #ask #if i knew an authors tumblr i tried to tag them in this #seriously my reclist got away from me for a bit #also if you're looking for 911 recs #like i said they will be in another ask where someone specified!!#fic rec #about kat writes

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matrixaffiliate · 4 years

Text

Endeavor

Chapter Update! FFN and AO3

I want to promise you right now that this story is a happy story and has a happy ending...just stick with me. ;) Next chapter goes up on Friday, August 21st.

Chapter 4

Ted made it back to his flat and forced himself to plug his phone in next to his bed so he would stop checking it again and again. She said she would text him. He just had to trust that.

He tried to distract himself by tidying up his room a bit, but his mind kept going back to how amazing the night had been. Being there with Vic felt right, it felt easy, it felt like everything he wanted things between them to be.

He was kicking himself over that feeling for the hundredth time when his phone buzzed on his night table.

Unknown: Did you make it home alright?

Ted let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding and saved the number.

Ted: Who is this? How do I know you aren't a predator?

He grinned and laid back in his bed, propping himself up against his pillow.

Vic: I'm totally a predator. My victims are always white males in their mid-twenties.

Ted laughed out loud.

Ted: That seems fair. I guess I can talk to you until my coworker decides to get back to me. She was supposed to text me tonight.

Ted watched her typing icon with what he was sure was a stupid grin on his face.

Vic: As fun as that sounds, I really was looking forward to guessing your name, so can we drop this game and pick up that one?

Ted: Such a killjoy.

Vic: You promised me clues, Ted…

Ted: How do I know you're really Vic and not an impersonator?

Vic: Because your wolf figurine is sitting on my desk next to my laptop dock, and you knocked half your chips on the floor tonight when Jamie said that it was probably time you found a girlfriend.

Ted groaned. That had, unfortunately, happened. Jamie had asked if Ted would start dating now that he was done with university and only had the one job. Ted had been so flustered that he tipped his basket up and knocked some of his chips on the floor.

Ted: So cruel...why would I give you any information about my full name now?

She sent him a GIF of a baby about to cry, and Ted started laughing. He started to type a snarky reply but stopped himself when a dangerous thought crossed his mind.

What if he called her? Heaven knew he wanted to.

He deleted what he already wrote and started again.

Ted: Don't do that, don't pull on my heartstrings. I'll make you a deal, call me so I know it's you and then I won't hang up until you know my name.

Ted hit send and held his breath. He was beyond screwed at this point. He was certain she was going to play this off, tell him she was tired and they could pick up this twisted game on Monday.

Then his phone rang and Teddy's heart exploded in his chest.

"You waste no time, Weasley, do you?"

"Oh, shut up," Vic laughed and Ted tried to let his relieved sigh out slowly.

"No more stalling, Ted, I want my clues."

Ted grinned, "But of course, I'm a man of my word.

"Clues, Ted, clues!"

Ted laughed. "First clue, a few of my predecessors have been our country's monarch, while another abdicated the throne."

"Ha!" She shouted, and Ted laughed as he moved his phone to his other ear.

"I knew you were an Edward," she laughed. "You're too down to earth to be a Theodore."

"What does that even mean?"

"Doesn't matter, all that matters is I was right!"

Ted couldn't stop smiling. "Are you satisfied with being right enough to not care about my last name, then?"

"In your dreams, Edward."

Ted swallowed. Maybe this was a bad idea, but he was already in this deep, too late to back out now.

"Alright, do an internet search for the scientific name of wolves."

It was quiet for a moment before Vic spoke.

"Canis Lupus?"

"Right," Ted smirked, "and this is probably the part where you decide you hate me. Because next, you take those letters and rearrange them into my last name. You'll only need five of them though."

Vic groaned. "Ted that is an awful clue!"

"I don't know, it stretches your mind and gets your brain thinking. Those are things that are supposed to help stop Alzheimer's. So really, I'm helping you, Weasley, I'm preserving your brain for your future self."

"You're so full of it," Vic laughed. "Come on, Ted, give me more than a word scramble."

Ted could feel the smile stretching across his face.

"Please, Ted." Vic's voice went soft and Ted felt himself falling.

"Alright, one last clue," he looked over at his desk and the picture of him and his mum when he was ten, a bouquet of flowers in her hands. "There's a flower, it's my last name. It's usually purple, but they come in pink and blue and orange too."

"You should send me a picture of the flower."

Ted rolled his eyes. "I have to make you work for something Weasley."

"Fine," she laughed, "I'm turning on my laptop."

"You're going to try and search for it? What is your search even going to be?"

"Wouldn't you like to know?" She teased.

"I would actually," Ted chuckled. "That way the next time someone wants to guess my name I can make it harder."

"I can't believe it! It worked!"

"What's my last name then, Weasley?"

"Lupin!"

Ted laughed. "What the hell did you search?!"

"Canis Lupus flower."

"Well done, Vic," Ted picked at one of the stray threads on his blanket.

"Why thank you, Edward Lupin."

His name felt like a song when she said it.

"Not a bad name, eh?"

"I've heard worse," Vic's voice was soft again. "But you still haven't told me your middle name."

"No way, Weasley," he laughed, "I don't know that about you, so I'm not giving you that information about me."

"If I tell you my middle name will you tell me yours?"

Ted felt his heart rate increase

"Yeah, I think that's fair."

It was quiet a moment before Vic made her decision. "It's Gabrielle, it's my aunt's name."

"Victoire Gabrielle Weasley," Teddy tried it out and it felt like honey on his tongue.

Vic cleared her throat, "Alright, your turn, what's your middle name?"

"Remus, after my dad," Ted answered without hesitation, "And Edward is after my grandfather."

"Edward Remus Lupin, that has a nice flow to it."

Ted smiled. "I've always been fond of my name."

It was contentedly quiet between them and then Ted got up the courage to ask something he'd been thinking about since Jamie said Vic had him reading a rough draft of a book she wrote.

"So, you're writing a book?"

Vic was silent a while longer before she answered. "Yeah, I, er, I've been working on it since uni."

"And you got a communications degree instead of focusing on creative writing because…?" Ted held his breath, worried that Vic would shut down this conversation.

"Well, I thought a communications degree would pay the bills, you know?"

"Authors do tend to have day jobs," Ted chuckled. "So, what's this story about? From someone as brilliant as you are, I'm sure it's a best-seller waiting to break all the records."

"Well, it's a fantasy epic," Vic started but then she went silent. "Oh, Sean is calling, you alright if we call it a night?"

Ted leaned his head back into the wall and closed his eyes. "Sure, I'll see you Monday."

"Thanks, Ted. See you Monday."

Teddy tossed his phone back on his night table. He might as well find something to distract himself from how much it sucked to be falling for a girl that was so far out of his reach. He changed into his P.J.s and then decided he would see if Kalil was in the mood for some late-night Mario Kart or something, but his phone buzzed against his table.

Vic: What is it with people deciding they have to call other people when they're drunk?

Ted sighed; he shouldn't do this. He should act like he fell asleep and text her in the morning.

Vic: He's singing me the song playing at the pub. It's Jamie's Got A Gun.

Ted laughed and gave in.

Ted: Maybe it's code ;)

Vic: That would be the worst way to tell me he was in trouble!

Ted grinned.

Ted: But think of the possibilities! You could send all sorts of messages with songs!

He watched Vic's typing icon and laughed when her message came through.

Vic: You mean like Viva la Vida?

Ted: You fancy yourself a disgraced king?

Vic: I'm full of surprises.

Ted: That you are Weasley.

Ted smiled as he watched Vic's typing icon blink on his screen.

Vic: I finally convinced him to go home and get some water. I'll see you on Monday, Edward Remus Lupin. ;)

Vic: Goodnight, Victoire Gabrielle Weasley.

He set his phone back down on his night table and flipped the lamp off.

Monday couldn't get here fast enough.

OoOoOoOoO

Ted laughed when he walked into the office Monday morning. His wolf figurine sat in the center of his desk with a fence built out of paperclips around it.

"Afraid he'll run back to you?"

"I just want him to understand that he has to stay with you." Vic grinned.

Ted moved his wolf out of the corral and set him down closer to Vic's desk.

"There, now he won't feel like you've abandoned him."

"What about my fence?" Vic teased.

"Oh, I think I'll see what I can get for it on eBay. There's bound to be someone out there who wants a paperclip fence."

"Start the bidding at ten quid. I'll accept nothing less for my artwork."

"Maybe we should paint it, raise its value." Ted laughed at the face Vic made.

"You want to ruin it? How dare you suggest such things!"

"I'm just saying," Ted laughed, "Why settle for less when we could maybe get twelve quid for it instead of ten?"

"You mean settle for eight quid because you had to ruin it with paint." She shot back with a laugh.

"Color makes everything better."

"Of course, you think that," Vic grinned and gestured to his hair.

Ted ruffled his hair, "Well, you told me you liked it that first day, so I think you just proved my point."

Vic smiled and looked down at her hands. "So, did you, did you really want to know about my book?"

"Of course, I do," Ted felt like she'd just offered him fifty pounds. "Is it YA or NA or YMCA?"

Vic laughed and started to give him the sparsest of details.

"That's all you're going to tell me?" Ted threw his hands up. "Come on, you can't expect me to believe you only want to tell me the basics. You've been working on this epic for more than three years!"

"Well, I mean, Sean doesn't really like to hear about it, and I just thought…"

"I'm not Sean, Vic," Ted rolled his eyes. "I want to know everything, so let's get to it."

Vic gave him a shy smile, "If you're sure?"

"I asked, didn't I?"

She smiled and before Ted knew it, they'd lost the first hour of the workday.

"Ok, let's get some work done, and then you can tell me the rest." Ted laughed. "I haven't even logged in yet."

"You're sure you want to hear how it ends?" Vic teased him.

"So torturous," Ted grinned at her.

Vic went to respond but her desk phone rang and for a moment she looked torn before turning her chair back to her desk and answering the call.

Ted grinned to himself as he went back to getting set up for the day. Things were going well, they were having fun, and he was settling happily into not just the position, but also the goal of growing their department into the first branch of Bread & Butter to break off and stand on its own.

But it wasn't so great when Sean showed up at lunch and took Vic for the rest of the day. She texted him an hour after they'd left and asked that he cover for her in the case that Ron showed up, and she asked Ted to forward her desk phone to her cell phone. Ted did so, and then spent the rest of the day feeling like an idiot.

And things continued to go up and down as they moved into winter and approached Christmas.

It only made things harder when Ted realized that he wasn't hiding his attraction to Vic well from anyone, except maybe Vic.

"Why are you looking at stuffed toys that look like wolves?" Kalil sat down next to him on the sofa and leant in to see his laptop screen a bit more than a week before Christmas.

"I was thinking of giving it as a present," Ted defended.

"Right, but for whom?" Kalil gave him a pointed stare and Ted rolled his eyes.

"I don't see how that's relevant."

"Ted! You're buying a present for your coworker who is in a relationship!"

"I never said it was for Vic!" Ted shut his laptop.

"You didn't have to," Kalil shook his head. "Look, Ted, I'm worried about you. You're obsessed with Vic and she's off-limits. You need to get out of your head. Come to the pub with me and Maira tonight. I'm sure she can get a few people to come too. You need to remember that there are more women in this city than just your coworker."

"Kalil," Ted ran his hands over his face.

"What would you do if she married Sean?"

Ted felt like Kalil had just punched him in the stomach. He couldn't breathe for a moment and his chest felt like it was collapsing.

"See," Kalil put a hand on his shoulder, "I can see it in your face, Ted, you're falling for her. Stop it! Get out and find someone just as great. Come to the pub tonight."

Ted let out a long breath, and he couldn't help but think that maybe, maybe Kalil was right. Vic seemed to like to goof around with him, but she'd shown no signs of leaving Sean for him. No matter how many times Sean let her down, no matter how many times he did something that she didn't like, she stayed. And the nearly five months of working with her had been full of huge highs and incredible lows. He'd loved the moments where he felt like it was just the two of them, but walking out after work on the days Sean picked her up to find he hadn't waited long enough after she'd left as he got a full view of Sean's tongue down her throat left him feeling like a loser.

"Alright," Ted nodded, "I'll come tonight."

Kalil squeezed his shoulder, "Good on you, mate. You'll see, this will be a good thing."

Ted nodded, but a part of him wondered if it really was.

Even with his misgivings, Ted was ready to head out when Maira showed up at their flat.

"I'm so glad you're coming with us!" Maira hugged him. "I've asked a friend to meet us there, I think you'll have fun!"

Ted rubbed the back of his neck, "Thanks, Maira, I appreciate it."

"Let's head out then," Kalil took Maira's hand and led them out into the cold.

Ted realized after they'd been out for a bit, just the three of them, that this was a good idea. He hadn't gone out much at all since before finals in May. Getting to laugh and talk with friends felt freeing.

"Oh, there's Nicki!" Maira jumped up and waved her friend over to their table.

Ted turned around to see a woman who could have been described as Vic's opposite. She had black hair with lime green highlights and it was cut in choppy layers, the longest barely touching her shoulders. And while Vic tended to wear conservatively colored clothes, at least at work and the one Saturday Ted had seen her, Nicki was wearing a bright pink blouse with teal trousers; her orange coat draped over her arm.

"Nicki this is Kalil's roommate, Ted Lupin. Ted this is my friend Nicki Choi."

"It's nice to meet you, and I love your hair!" She shook his hand across the table as she sat down.

"Thanks, I like yours as well." Ted smiled. Nicki wasn't Vic, but she definitely put out the vibe that she liked to have a good time.

And she did. Nicki was loud and fun and not afraid of anything. She tried anything she was put up to. She laughed loudly. She defended her opinions with passion, even if he flat out told her she was wrong. Nicki reminded Ted a bit of the stories he had heard about his mum when she was his age.

Ted was having fun, and so when Nicki scooted closer to him, he didn't think about it when he draped his arm across her shoulders. And when she rested her head on his shoulder, he let her. A small part of him pushed back, but Ted told that part of him that if Vic could snog Sean in the car park, then he could let a cool woman rest her head on his shoulder.

"I'm calling it a night," Nicki moved to hug Maira at about half eleven. Then she turned to Ted. "Will you wait with me out front for my Uber?"

"Sure thing," Ted nodded and moved to follow her. He tried to ignore the way Kalil grinned at him.

"This was fun," Nicki smiled up at him and pulled her orange coat closer around her.

"Yeah," Ted nodded, "yeah it was."

"So, who broke your heart?"

Ted blinked. "What?"

"You have 'heartbroken' written all over your face. I figured that was why Maira called me." She smiled sympathetically at him.

"I, er, it's complicated." Ted shook his head and rubbed his hand over his eyes.

"Did you have fun tonight?"

"Yeah," Ted chuckled, "yeah, I actually had a lot of fun."

"We could keep having fun. I don't expect you to move into another relationship with me, but we could just have fun, spend some time reminding you that hearts heal."

Ted hesitated. He didn't know why, but he did. Nicki was amazing. He'd be an idiot to turn her down.

"Here," Nicki pulled out a gum wrapper and pen from her clutch and wrote on it. "This is my number. Think about it, Ted, I think we could have a lot of fun together."

Ted nodded as he took the gum wrapper. "Thanks, I, er, I'll think about it, alright?"

Nicki smiled and then nodded a few cars down from the curb. "There's my Uber. Thanks, Ted."

She stepped forward and kissed his cheek, her cold lips managing to warm just the skin they touched.

Ted stood in the cold and watched her wave once before climbing into the Uber. He waved back and then the car pulled away.

He took a moment before he went back inside. Gum wrapper still clasped in his hand. He'd had fun with Nicki, and she obviously had fun with him. She was fun and beautiful and he admired her spunk and attitude.

So why was he hesitating?

Ted slipped the wrapper into his wallet and went back inside.

"That took some time," Kalil smirked at him.

"Er, yeah, I, we talked," Ted took a swig from his drink.

"Nicki is amazing, Ted," Maira smiled.

"Yeah, yeah she's, she's really cool, I, er, she gave me her number."

"You're going to call her, right?" Kalil asked.

"I, er, I think I might, yeah."

Kalil stared at him like he was stupid and Ted sighed.

"I think I'm done for tonight, mates. I'll catch an Uber home, let you two enjoy the rest of your night." Ted didn't wait for a response. He forced a smile and moved to the door. The pub wasn't all that far from their flat, and so Ted decided to walk it instead of requesting the ride.

The cold was bitter, but it helped to clear his head, though not enough to figure out what he should do. He wanted to hope that maybe Vic would suddenly return his feelings and dump Sean and be with him. But even with all the problems he could see she was having with Sean, Vic still stayed. A part of Ted feared she always would.

OoOoOoOoOoO

Monday morning rolled around and Ted was trying to figure out if he was looking forward or not to seeing Vic as he drove into work. He'd spent Sunday more or less holed up in his room, and Kalil seemed content to let Ted work through this one on his own. That didn't mean Ted was any surer one way or the other, though.

But when Ted walked into the office, he paused.

Vic hadn't made it in yet.

That felt weird. Ted was never late, but Vic was always early. He tried to shrug it off and get himself settled in for the day. She'd probably hit traffic was all. But even as he kept telling himself that, Ted kept trying to see around the corner of the building out the window into the car park.

Finally, he heard the door push open and Ted spun in his chair, ready to razz her for being late. But his eyes fell on her hand as she pulled off her glove with her teeth.

"You've got to be kidding me." He'd said it before he could stop himself.

"I know!" Vic smiled down at her ring. "I would have thought he would have waited for Christmas or New Year's, but he asked last night!"

"That's," Ted forced a smile, "wow. I, er, congratulations."

"Thanks," Vic smiled at the ring again and then started getting settled into her desk.

Ted thought he might vomit. He needed to get out. He couldn't be here, not with her, not now, now that she'd chosen Sean permanently.

He picked up his desk phone and forwarded it to his cell. Then he shut down his laptop.

"Are you going somewhere?" Vic looked over as he packed up.

"I have a few sales calls I'm going on today."

"Oh, well, are we still good for dinner?"

Ted paused. He'd forgotten all about their Monday and Wednesday meetings over dinner. Those evenings that he looked forward to every week. The moments that he felt connected to her in a way that felt real to him.

"I actually have something tonight. I'm sorry I should have remembered to tell you on Friday." He zipped up his backpack and grabbed his coat.

"I'll see you tomorrow, and congrats again, it's brilliant."

"Thanks," Vic frowned, "I'll see you tomorrow then."

"Right," Ted nodded and left without a second glance.

He was grateful that she wouldn't be able to see him from the window as he stepped into the car park. How could he have been so stupid? Of course, she chose Sean. Ted had wanted her to like him so much he'd blinded himself to the fact that she was in love with her boyfriend, tosser that he was.

Ted drove home and set up at his desk in his room to get back to work. He tossed his wallet on his dresser and paused. He pulled out the gum wrapper and called Nicki.

It went straight to voicemail, and Ted almost hung up, almost gave into that part of him that hoped Vic would choose him, but he pushed that aside and left a message.

"Hey, Nicki, it's Ted. I was calling to see if you wanted to grab a drink or something. I, er, I hope to hear back from you. Bye."

He set his phone down on the desk and powered on his laptop. Then his phone buzzed.

Nicki: Hey Ted, it's Nicki, I'm in a meeting, but would you like to meet for lunch today?

Ted didn't let himself hesitate this time.

Ted: Sounds great, send me an address and time. I'll meet you there.

#Endeavor #tedoire #tedoire fanfic #tedoire fanfiction #tedoire au #teddy x victoire #teddy x vic #ted x vic #teddy lupin x victoire weasley #teddy lupin #victoire weasley #muggle au #tedoire muggle au #everyone lives muggle au #coworkers romance #fluff #romance #harry potter fanfiction

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mercury-minded · 5 years

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What’s in your Future - 5 Years from Now ~ Pick-A-Card 🔮

What a doozy! This one took me a little longer to do, and I wanted to thank @astrologicallygracie for the suggestion! I utilized the angel number 555 with this spread (5 years, 5 groups, 5 cards) because I wanted to bring about large, positive change! So use your intuition and pick a card (left to right: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5) and find out what 5 years from now has in store for you!

Group 1

Wow Group 1, this is one bright spread! Something that stood out to me right away here was the prevalence of “cup” symbolism, and all the 2’s!! This really tells me that in 5 years, I’d expect you to have found emotional balance and peace of mind. This whole spread speaks to achieving union between your conscious and subconscious worlds. I’m also getting a strong feeling of children…now, this could mean literal children, or it may be referring to you reconnecting with your inner child. Love, honesty, and authenticity are major themes here. I’m sensing a lot of Leo energy as well. If you don’t have any major leo placements, then this is definitely referring to a person who’s going to be a major fixture in your life around this time. They may exude a lot of fire energy and optimism. Friendships are definitely expanding and you may become part of some different groups. Your existing relationships are also strengthened. It’s like your inner confidence has leaked out and is touching multiple aspects of your life. Your practice of self-love is allowing you to love others more as well! One thing to look out for is someone who potentially may try to come between you and someone else (whether that’s a friend or a romantic interest) - they appear to act kind towards you but there’s some jealousy and resentment in them…they seem to want what you have. Honestly, though there is so much joy and positivity here - it feels like your patience and hard work has been paying off in regards to making your dreams a reality. It may feel like a slow, uphill battle right now, but sticking to your morals, your ideals, and perseverance is going to take you to a much better place in 5 years!

Group 2

In 5 years, there appears to be some confusion that needs to be cleared up. You’re definitely going to be embarking on something new: a new relationship, a new career, new habits, etc. There’s almost a “fake it til you make it” vibe here. Like perhaps the relationship wasn’t meant to be long term - I’m sensing a friends-with-benefits situation turned into commitment and monogamy, or it started out as something purely physical and then feelings developed. It may also be a bit messy, and you both aren’t sure of the other's intentions at first. Regardless of whether it’s a new relationship or a new job opportunity, it does seem to be for the better. Your confusion isn’t long-lived, and it does work out. There’s a definite boost in your self-confidence and independence as a result. I’m getting: “this is your life now. You worked for this, you earned this. No one helped you - you did it yourself”. You seemed to have veered off course previously, and you’ve been redirected back to your intended path. The mercurial energy is so strong in this spread, I’d expect you to have some gemini or virgo personal placements. If you don’t, there’s going to be someone with one (or both) of those placements playing a big role in your life in 5 years. Another thing I’m really picking up on are consequences, and I think this actually plays into some of your confusion. It’s as if these new opportunities are the results of some unexpected consequences to your words (especially) and actions. I don’t know if you currently consider yourself shy, but in 5 years, you really don’t seem to have any trouble expressing yourself! Your throat chakra has no problems helping you speak your mind, but I’d also be wary of it becoming overactive. In 5 years, this group is really turning over a brand new, blank page - hello fresh start!

Group 3

Wow this is such an uplifting spread! In 5 years, this group seems to be in a very important, influential relationship. There feels like an immediate, known connection, and you are able to freely be yourself and speak your mind. This is really feeling like a transformative bond - like a possible soulmate or twin flame scenario. This is a union between the sensitive, emotional, boundless King of Cups and the strong-willed, charming, intuitive Queen of Wands. Both are spiritual, wise beings but they also help to balance each other out - they make up for what the other lacks. The connection here really is quite powerful, you two have been placed together to teach and encourage one another. One is the “soul” and the other is the “heart”. Keep in mind, neither is the “head”, so this relationship may struggle to feel grounded and secure sometimes. There is quite of bit of pisces and aries influence in this spread. You may have some placements with these signs, or the other individual might. Usually, I would warn that these intense-type relationships can sometimes be a bit bumpy, but I’m really not getting any indication of that. There is just so much insight, understanding, and love to be experienced here. The level of attraction is really powerful too - when you encounter this person, you’re likely to just “know”. They’re going to recognize and appreciate you on a deeper, more spiritual level. This is not someone to play “games” with, to beat around the bush with, or sit on the fence about. This is a genuine, well-intentioned person and they’ll see through any fronts you may put up. In 5 years, it may feel as if you’ve found your other half or missing piece!

Group 4

This group is taking a huge step forward in 5 years. Detachment and letting go are really big themes here. It feels like there was this very authoritative, domineering, “mature”, masculine energy that has made you feel like less than you are. They may have been manipulative and selfish, and made you question and doubt yourself. In 5 years I see you fully stepping out of this shadow, getting out of your head, and following your heart. You’ve discovered wisdom from your trials and harsh experiences and can now finally “exhale” as you take comfort in this newfound stability. There will still be spells of nostalgia that you go through, but looking back on those harder times won’t be as triggering or upsetting - you’ve overcome those and have found strength in your new endeavors. Speaking of which - I am really getting this “coming out of your shell” imagery! Whether it was this individual that was holding you back or your own insecurities, in 5 years you appear to be traveling, exploring new ideas, and expanding your horizons. I feel you embracing all the unique characteristics of yourself and really pursuing your own interests. If there was a career or major that you felt you needed to have because you “should” or it was expected…I don’t see that working out haha. I’m sensing this wake-up call of sorts, where you recognize that you can no longer live your life for other people and their expectations, that you need to pursue what calls to you. I’m really seeing this energy of peace, it’s like you’ve discovered where you really belong. This group really seems to have accomplished a lot of growth and recovery in 5 years!

Group 5

There is a new relationship for this group in 5 years! It could be platonic, but I am leaning more towards romantic for some of you. This is someone who comes across as very capable, very put-together - ambitious and level-headed. They exude quite an earthy energy! When you’re with them, it’s like you don’t have to worry as much…this person’s practicality gives you a sense of security, and what’s more: they love providing that for you! The water imagery shows me how emotional this connection will be for you, it’s like you’ve found a safe-haven in a person! You could have some trust issues in the beginning…I’m feeling as though you had/could have a problematic relationship, where perhaps the other person misled you, lied to you, kept secrets from you, etc. Regardless, it was sudden and caught you very off-guard. You may carry the wounds from that, but this new person is not someone you need to worry about! Life is anything but predictable, and this new relationship may shock you just as much, but for the better. In 5 years, you are really going to be feeling beautiful and loved. As much as this other person is going to be contributing to that, I think it’s important to harness that confidence and feel it ourselves - don’t just rely on them to lift you up/elevate your ego. Yes, you’ll have this amazing partner/friend, but don’t forget that you are powerful and desirable all on your own too! The flirty and youthful energy is very prominent here, it really feels like puppy-love to me. This energy seems to carry over into your hobbies and creative pursuits, as you’re feeling more inspired, motivated, and supported. In 5 years, this group seems to have rediscovered their joy, enthusiasm, and pride.

Thank you so much for letting me read for you! Please keep in mind this is a very broad and general reading - so not all aspects may resonate with you. If you’d like a personalized spread, my tarot services can be found here xx

If you’d like to support me and what I do, please consider buying me a coffee ☕️💕

#mine #pick a card #tarot #oracle #witch #witchblr #astrology #divination

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openlyandfreely · 4 years

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Post for ...racial formations?

Following Aly’s question in class, I wanted to consider how the contributions of black studies might be inserted into other disciplines in order to unveil fundamental contradictions at the heart of various fields of knowledge. But I realized this was something that would have to come in my own time—I was too struck by the necessity of her question and why it shook me so.

In part, I was taken by the need to attempt to summarize and clarify a number of arguments for myself, because of I am always mindful of how easily black feminist studies can be treated “not like a discipline with a history and a body of rigorous scholarship and distinguished scholars underpinning it, but like an anybody-can-play-pick-up game performed on a wide-open untrammeled field” (Ann duCille, 1994). Moreover, I am trying to seriously heed the fact that “more and more of our scholarship is becoming trendy” (Hortense Spillers, 2007 Callaloo interview). At Frank Wilderson’s talk several weeks ago it became a point of discussion: what happens to Afro-Pessimism when/as it becomes trendy for white scholars?

As was discussed in class, the academy loves the insights of black scholars and loves black people at objects for study, but simultaneously the academy loathes the black scholar who resists the status quo and hates the methodologies that threaten to pull the rug out from underneath the University-as-intellectual-metropole. In class Freud’s conception of “splitting” was raised as were Lacan’s four discourses of master, university, hysteric, and analyst, to describe this kind of love-hate fixation. But as Dusty put it a few weeks ago, modernity needs blackness and thus of course critical scholarship has a parasitic relationship with blackness. Nevertheless, I was inspired by Fred Moten’s quotation of Adrian Piper, who spoke of:

“we consider what we see but are prevented from voicing. We take it into ourselves, we muse on it and analyze, we scrutinize, extract its meaning and lesson, and record it for future reference. Our unspoken or unacknowledged contributions to discourse infuse our mental lives with conceptual subtlety. We become deep, perceptive, alert, and resourceful…I am not, after all, entitled simply to externalize my creative impulses in unreflective actions or products…[because] it would be “permanently garbled, censored, ridiculed, or ignored, were it not for a critical and discursive matrix that I—with effort—eventually supply.”

Here, I am reminded of a quotation I scribbled down watching the 20th anniversary of Scenes of Subjection festivities. After a myriad of scholars spoke of how Saidiya Hartman’s work had influenced them, Hartman spoke:

Decades earlier she had vowed never to lose sight of the work, never to be distracted by the business of it (the petty rivalries, the schools, the hierarchy, the administration, the protocols that deadened thought), never be embittered by the bullshit, the obstacles, the assault, and the fundamental disregard of this project—her project, our project. So she trained herself not to desire recognition, not need the praise of others to nurture the endeavor... She knew the longing for recognition and affirmation had destroyed many Negroes, ruined so many minds. She tried to live like a cactus, and survive on so very little. So the feast was unexpected. The words she cobbled together could not even convey the joy, the enormity of endowment, the sense of disbelief as others described what she had done—what she had made possible. Had she achieved what they had said? Was not more proof required to establish that she deserved it? Was the grand celebration a mistake or premature? Didn’t she need to work even harder to prove she deserved it all? So she consulted the tattered outline of a plan for black female genius always at hand when she was writing, which was really just a how-to guide to survive in hostile conditions. Item #4 stated clearly: ‘Want nothing. Never care what they say about you.’ And now here she was at the podium, biting her lip, and trying to hold back tears to embrace it all, to find her place in this great company, to accept that she, too, had contributed something to this venture. But she started to choke up—so, she just said, ‘Thank you. Thank you.’”

And so how do we do our work mindful of the pressures and conditions that try to strip our work away from us, disfigure it, disabuse it, make it something it was never intended to be and have that making take place in stern disrespect of our names? How do we to write in ways that require misreading if persons with other purposes want to mangle our names? How do we write with clarity and precision such that we can take part in a project, if our goal is to produce scholarship that is part of a project?

For me, as I wrote last week, I constantly must bring myself back to the project—why am I here, what is this work for, who is this work for, what is it trying to achieve, how is it situated in a world that I consider untenable and know is unjust? Even though my rent payment for being on the planet has been paid a thousand times over, how can I pay forward what has been entrusted in me—with this skin, with blackness as a charge, with a commitment to the project loving black people can provide which is one that we can only imagine as it is not-yet-here, but I trust blooms in the same soil queer, anti-colonial, disabled, communist, feminist visions of liberation have taken root. For me, I try to return to the particularities of the project which opens out into mysteries that I am trying to love as if they are my own because they are or I am theirs moreso. I belong to them.

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queroze · 4 years

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Another fandom staple

My sides

Psychologists have created different personality lenses (Jung, Freud, Myers-Briggs, Maslow, Allport, etc) the culture at large has as well, (Harry Potter houses, element bending, love languages, etc). Looking at ones personality can be an effective way of getting to know yourself better. It is very interesting to look at one's own personality thru these different lenses.

The question I asked myself was this: Do I have different sides of my personality, and what are they? Using Sanders Sides as a guide I determined that I do not have anything resembling Creativity. After much thought my own personal “Personality Sides Theory'' was born. I created this about a year ago, and it has been interesting to see recent content reflective of how I determined my personality works.

Without further adieu, my own “Personality Sides Theory”:

-cuz i can’t draw it’s just a bunch of words-

I do not have “dark sides'' or “light sides” I have 5 sides who each have a “healthy” and “unhealthy” mode. If one were to be dramatic about it one could call the “unhealthy” a twisted version, or perhaps “out of control.'' Each unhealthy aspect has a tool that is indicative of its function. I will be denoting each sides titles like the following : healthy/unhealthy.

Curiosity/Obsessiveness: This is the workhorse of my personality. This is also where my “creative endeavors” stem from. (This whole thing started as a question. “what are my sides?”) This trait is healthy when asking many different questions about a variety of topics. It becomes unhealthy when it gets focused into a single question or topic. I am very driven to find answers to my questions. (and I have a lot of questions.) This trait flips into unhealthy like a light-switch, and is very difficult to flip back.

Curiosity is why I am a research hound. My creative projects come from asking questions like “what happens if i put these two things together?” or “how would i feel in this situation?” or “why would a character do this?” or “how can my make this easier/simpler/better?”

Obsessiveness is why I can only play a single game, be into a single piece of media, and focus on tasks really well. (since being in this fandom I have heard the terms “hyper-focus” and “special interest”. These terms would apply here.) The obsessiveness’ tool is a shovel, digging down and obscuring everything else but a single pursuit. There are certain questions that flip into Obsessiveness very easy: “what happens next?” is the most common.

Kindness/Insecurity: This is the most quiet, but most present part of my personality: a factor in nearly all of my decision making, but never in an overbearing way. The core of this trait is empathy, and is most similar to Patton in this way. The guiding principle being “each person is a person and contains a whole inner life”. This traits slips into unhealthy slowly, unnoticed, and by small degrees, like a sunset.

Kindness is why every online interaction I have is positive, and I will not get into online arguments. it is my drive to help people. It’s guiding idea being “help the most people most effectively.” (the implication being at the cost of myself.)

Insecurity is flipping the egalitarian principle of empathy on its head. “everyone is important...except me.” (actually posting this is fighting this very impulse: “Why would anyone care about me?”) Insecurity’s Tool is a blanket, hiding everything vulnerable. Hiding my interests, my opinions, and my achievements from any potential ridicule. I’m quite bad at taking a complement for these reasons.

Excitement/ Anxiety: The only trait that shares a name with it’s Sanders Sides counterpart. This trait is the loudest and most powerful when it gets involved. It is the fuel for anything I do. This trait is the most concerned with future events.This trait will pair with other traits the easiest. Both Excitement and Anxiety have the capability to turn other traits into their unhealthy forms. This trait switches between healthy and unhealthy subtly, feeling very similar, right up until the extreme ends of the spectrum.

Excitement is a Pull. Looking forward to holidays, events and vacations. I experienced excitement more when I was younger, Anxiety being more and more present in what drives me as I age.

Anxiety is a Push. It has me making lists, arriving 30 minutes early and practicing packing my bag for a big trip. Anxiety’s tool is a Cowbell, loud, alarming and persistent.

Practical/Pragmatic: The De Facto Leader of my decision making until very recently. Is most Similar to Logan, in the dry approach to the world. This trait will turn unhealthy like an impostor, only being detected after being called out by an outside source. Because of this aspect I do not have a lot of care for aesthetics in general.

Practical is always finding the use in things. If it is useful, or will be useful it is kept. If is not useful it is discarded. This aspect also concerns itself with being efficient.

Pragmatic will reduce the world to numbers, outcomes, and biology. It’s Tool is a box, compartmentalizing everything. People go into the box, feelings go into the box, relationships go into the box. And if the things in the box become too messy? The box gets put away.

Wisdom/Hubris: The oldest, but the most recently matured. This aspect was misidentified as “instinct” for the first half of my life. Once more fully matured, has taken over as Leader of decision making. It is the ability to learn from experience, my own or others. It is understanding that sometimes even when you don’t understand why someone is saying something, they are saying it for a reason. Wisdom changes into hubris like a balloon, slowly inflating until it pops.

Wisdom is knowing you don’t know. And being ready for the lessons

Hubris is thinking you know it all already, because you know something about it. Hubris’ tool is currently unknown. As Wisdom is recently matured, Hubris’ has not come into force as of yet.

#sanders sides #my sides #oh sure why not #i spent way too long on this

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fireflysummers · 6 years

Text

Delta Rune: Addendum

People have asked me if my opinions have shifted at all in light of Toby Fox’s FAQ.

The answer is yes and no.

Also, I’ve gotten a fair amount of...unasked for feedback on my other post, which was mostly just my own musings and opinion? So I might as well just kinda...address a bunch of things here, based on a couple observations over the last 48 hours.

What People Didn’t Like (And Why)

The Repetition of Plot Elements from Undertale in the Dark World

This one’s pretty common, and very justified given that, when the demo first launched, we had no idea that it was a demo. For all we knew, it was some kind of finished product.

Although I didn’t want to believe that this is the case, it’s not uncommon for creators to accidentally fall into a sophomore slump of sorts, where under the pressure of measuring up to their freshman fame, they end up creating something dull and uninspired.

Despite that, there wasn’t any level of self-awareness that indicated that the Dark World was supposed to be a cheaper version of Undertale. And then it ended by falling into the “it was just a dream” trope (not entirely, but close enough), which is one of my least favorite tropes, so I was just turned off altogether.

The Battle System

I didn’t really enjoy the new combat system (that’s definitely a personal thing though...turn-based jrpg games have always been a struggle for me, and I straight up don’t have the time for the strategy that it often takes). That aside, Fox himself admits that the system is rough and really unbalanced.

Also, I get the sense that he wants to bring home that theme of your choices mean nothing, but isn’t exactly sure how to do that yet, which explains a lot of the issues with ACTing in the demo.

Even after he gets it fixed up, I’m not sure I’m really going to enjoy the battle system, although I do commend him for his creativity and the attempt to integrate Undertale’s bullet hell into a turn-based game style.

Underdeveloped Characters

This one I can forgive almost entirely, by nature of it being a demo rather than a finished piece of work. I can relax my criticism of the Dark World NPCs as a result.

That said, I still failed to really feel anything other than aww...cute a couple of times (usually as Ralsei)

Oh, that and a shit ton of existential horror at Undyne and Alphys not knowing each other, the world being generally indifferent to whatever made Susie the way she is, and that everybody is turning a blind eye or actively punishing Asgore for some unknown crime.

But I’ll talk about that a bit more in the next section.

The Vague Relation to Undertale and the Re-Use of Characters

Okay so like. I understand that Toby Fox insists that it’s Not Undertale.

Except that like.

I don’t buy that for a second.

Like, it’s Not Undertale only in the sense that it’s not related to the pacifist ending, but doesn’t disqualify it from being a follow-up to the genocide run (and therefore a direct sequel of sorts).

That aside, if it truly was Not Undertale, then he wouldn’t have named it Delta Rune, brought Gaster into it, and drawn visual and flavor text metaphors to the original game. It’s related, it might be an AU, but that doesn’t make the OOC meanness of the familiar faces easy to swallow.

It could easily interpreted as “unsettling and OOC to show the player that their expectations will be subverted and that there is something Seriously Wrong with this world,” and a lot of people have interpreted it that way! I’m on the fence there myself, but you gotta understand that not everybody shares that interpretation.

For others, including myself to some extent, the message was:

In the absence of dire circumstances, the characters that you were led to believe cared deeply about each other and you, are indifferent, apathetic, and downright mean.

I mean, even if Kris on their own is a total dick? That doesn’t justify the way that the other characters treat each other.

And that lack of warmth in the story was felt like a gut-punch to a small number of people.

On top of that, the weird twist ending didn’t do much to subvert that message. It gave no sense of whether or not the entire thing indicated a fundamentally sick world, or disprove that sense of they only cared about you and others out of a mutual need.

And if you can put yourself in that mindset, you can understand how that could be painful.

What People Didn’t Like About Me (And Others) Not Liking It

You’re Complaining Because it’s Not Undertale

No, I’m complaining because it’s Too Much Undertale. Because my personal prerogative is that Undertale is perfect the way it is and any additional content would only detract value from the original.

I was sincerely hoping for a totally new game, with maybe cameos or nods to Undertale, because I didn’t want to risk that horrible sequel syndrome.

And while we, as fans, can opt to ignore horrible sequels (see: the entirety of the Harry Potter fandom), at the same time...sometimes you can’t unsee what you’ve seen. Sometimes sequels are enough to mar your affections and feelings for characters, especially because it comes from The Voice of God Dog.

You’re Can’t Complain that Things are OOC When It’s an AU!

-rubs forehead-

Look. I don’t know if you know this, but I adore AUs. Not every AU, of course, but I loved the concept and how the community came together to create some kind of semi-cohesive multiverse.

I mean, I literally drew over 100 different AUs: SET 1 || SET 2 || SET 3 || SET 4 || SET 5 || SET 6 || SET 7 || SET 8 ||

But there’s a difference between fandom AUs and canon AUs--namely in that fandom AUs can be as out of character as they want, because it’s a fan creation.

There are multiple series that play with that multiverse theory as well, within their own canons, starting with the entire body of Osamu Tezuka, but also including the works of CLAMP (most notably XxxHolic and Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicles), Adventure Time, the Final Fantasy series, and so on.

And the key to making an effective multiverse? The thing that makes it work?

Keeping the characters in-character. There has to be that kind of consistency, otherwise it doesn’t function on a narrative level. You’re just reusing character designs and assigning new personalities, because you’re too lazy to design new characters.

Or worse, you’re baiting in previous players on a sense of nostalgia which is a trick I do not appreciate.

You Shouldn’t Rely on Fictional Works to Aid Your Mental Health

Screw you.

Everybody has Real Issues in their lives. Sometimes we need a hand from something or somebody else to keep moving.

Fine, But There’s No Reason To Be Publicly Upset by DR

It’s okay to dislike additional material, for whatever reason, so long as you’re not attacking others for liking it. It’s okay to be upset by something, even if it’s not rational, and you don’t need to force others to like what you like, nor should you feel guilty that somebody else doesn’t ‘get it.’

Will You Play Chapter 2?

I will purchase it to support Toby Fox on his endeavors.

But you gotta understand, I straight up don’t play video games most of the time. Don’t have the time or the energy.

I only played Undertale after I’d had the whole thing spoiled to me, and knew it was worth the investment of my time. I should’ve waited on this one too, but I was too eager, and instead lost 4-5 hours of critical time for my graduate coursework (which definitely contributed to my annoyance).

TL;DR

You guys realize it’s okay for people to dislike deltarune? It’s okay for them to have been hurt by the characterization in deltarune? And people don’t have to write an essay in order to hold those opinions?

And that you don’t have to aggressively convert people to it like you’re some kind of church missionaries?

-sighs- At any rate, beginning to feel a bit more optimistic overall, and after that interview I can feel Toby Fox’s enthusiasm (he had something cool and he couldn’t wait to show it off!!), and I can get excited for him and others, even if as a whole the entire game experience fell flat.

Some day, I might even warm up to the game well enough to draw some stuff some time. I’ve got some fun ideas and theories, but still refuse to be hopeful that it’ll actually shape up.

Because I am made of salt.

#undertale #undertale spoilers #deltarune #deltarune spoilers #delta rune #delta rune spoilers #text #long post

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