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all-things-are-nothing-to-me · 2 years

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The Incomprehensible Black Anarchist Position

Black brothers, Black sisters, i want you to know that i love you and i hope that somewhere in your hearts you have love for me. My name is Assata Shakur (slave name joanne chesimard), and i am a revolutionary. A Black revolutionary. By that i mean that i have declared war on all forces that have raped our women, castrated our men, and kept our babies empty-bellied. I have declared war on the rich who prosper on our poverty, the politicians who lie to us with smiling faces, and all the mindless, heart-less robots that protect them and their property. –Assata Shakur

I was born into the flames of slave insurrection. My first recorded ancestor was a runaway slave named Felix. In between him and me have been several butchered half lives. My grandfather, the oldest ancestor I’ve had the pleasure and privilege to interact with, was, as a young man, captured and tortured with “electro-shock therapy” for months on end as a consequence of his very material defiance and resistance to this “constitutional violence” that Wilderson describes in “the vengeance of vertigo”. As a result he was introduced to this “performative contingent violence” forever carving into our family tree the scars of his/our subjugation. In the same way that many families pass down the stories of how grandparents met and the idiosyncrasies of ancestors long past, I was passed a narrative, a framework for my own identity, of pure unflinching antagonism. I can only imagine this is part and parcel of the reason Michigan pigs pumped 40 bullets into my cousin’s chest a few months ago or why my other cousin is serving a life sentence. It’s difficult to make distinctions between Oakland and Monroe, between prison and plantation when past and present meet in these spaces and moments. What joins us, stronger than our own blood even, are the subjective and objective vertigos.

A lot happened in 1986, some fascist doctor plucked me from my mother and introduced me to violence at the same time my lungs introduced me to air. He told my mother he wanted to break my collarbone to get me out because I was too big and healthy. Assata Shakur was settling into her new home, in exile, Cuba. Mutulu Shakur had been captured and charged with helping her escape from a maximum security men’s prison. A month and a half before I was born Winnie Mandela gave a historical speech endorsing the political nature and necessity of mass guerilla resistance to the apartheid state in South Africa. “We will dismantle the apartheid state even if we only have rocks and boxes of matches”. A month after I was born, the apartheid state declared a state of emergency. In 1985, cocaine-related hospital emergencies in the US rose by 12 percent, from 23,500 to 26,300. In 1986 that figure then increased 210 percent, from 26,300 to 55,200, as the crack solution to the “panther problem” unfolded in communities that were the direct site of insurrection, like Watts and Oakland specifically, and all black neighborhoods in general. Sadly, my namesake, Kuwasi Balagoon died in December of 86 in a torture camp. His cause of death: the state… biological warfare. In Richmond, CA unguarded trains full of US military firearms and explosives were routinely left in the back of the North side neighborhood. I dodged my first bullet likely from one of those guns in 89 when I was three but that would not be the last. That was constitutional violence. When the state decides they want to assassinate or grand jury summon me for what comes next that will be contingent violence. –Hannibal Balagoon Shakur

If we are to survive this wave of repression, if Anarchy is to become a vehicle of the people, we must direct our energy to the new infrastructure. Programs that meet essential needs of the people must meet them with the explanation of why they are necessary. Programs that perpetually treat the symptoms of capitalism without feeding the mental struggle of the people must be replaced by comrades who pull no punches. We must show our friends and our neighbors that nothing can do more for them than they can do for themselves through Anarchism. We must show that “non-profits”, and NGO’s whose politics consist of liberal obscurities and multicultural tokenism, will not put more food on their table, put more homeless families in clean homes, will not put more police terrorists to an end than Anarchism.

It is beside the point whether Black, Puerto Rican, Native American and Chicano- Mexicano people endorse nationalism as a vehicle for self-determination or agree with anarchism as being the only road to self-determination. As revolutionaries we must support the will of the masses. It is not only racism but compliance with the enemy to stand outside of the social arena and permit America to continue to practice genocide against the third world captive colonies because although they resist, they don’t agree with us. If we truly know that Anarchy is the best way of life for all people, we must promote it, defend it and know that the people who are as smart as we are will accept it. To expect people to accept this, while they are being wiped out as a nation without allies ready to put out on the line what they already have on the line is crazy. –Kuwasi Balagoon

It’s a shame that now the false media image of the white Anarchists is going unchecked. It’s a shame that white “radicals” can think of only themselves when they say the word Anarchist. New Afrikans are not free. Our majorities lie within the pelican bay plantations and secret torture camps that exist throughout America. Yesterday we were slaves and today we are slaves. In the same vein that slave owners outlawed and prevented slaves of the past from written communication, slaves today find their correspondences disrupted and destroyed. As New Afrikans our political formations are completely repressed. What is popular among New Afrikan Anarchists will never find the same platform or footing as what is popular among negro capitalists and negro reformists. What we have to say, the voices that spring forth from the underworld of the plantation, will not find the same attention among white radicals as nihilist voices will. We will not find the same attention among the broader movement to end capitalism. We are written out of existence by negro nationalists who speak for “the black community” and white radicals who speak of themselves as “the Anarchists”. This dichotomy has done nothing to increase support from either side. White Anarchists want to speak for all poor people and negro nationalists want to speak for all black people. Neither formation wants to hear what we have to say. Comrades have been dealing with these contradictions for some time. Sometimes I fear those of us with our ears to the plantation are too few and far between to influence the broader, “free”, population. This is in fact the impetus for this communiqué. You say working class and think of what you perceive to be the bottom, people working all day at minimum wage to feed and house their families. This is working class but this is not the bottom.

“Elsewhere I have argued that the Black is a sentient being though not a Human being. The Black’s and the Human’s disparate relationship to violence is at the heart of this failure of incorporation and analogy. The Human suffers contingent violence, violence that kicks in when s/he resists (or is perceived to resist) the disciplinary discourse of capital and/or Oedipus. But Black peoples’ subsumption by violence is a paradigmatic necessity, not just a performative contingency. To be constituted by and disciplined by violence, to be gripped simultaneously by subjective and objective vertigo, is indicative of a political ontology which is radically different from the political ontology of a sentient being who is constituted by discourse and disciplined by violence when s/he breaks with the ruling discursive codes. When we begin to assess revolutionary armed struggle in this comparative context, we find that Human revolutionaries (workers, women, gays and lesbians, post-colonial subjects) suffer subjective vertigo when they meet the state’s disciplinary violence with the revolutionary violence of the subaltern; but they are spared objective vertigo. This is because the most disorienting aspects of their lives are induced by the struggles that arise from intra-Human conflicts over competing conceptual frameworks and disputed cognitive maps, such as the American Indian Movement’s demand for the return of Turtle Island vs. the U.S.’s desire to maintain territorial integrity, or the Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional’s (FALN) demand for Puerto Rican independence vs. the U.S.’s desire to maintain Puerto Rico as a territory. But for the Black, as for the slave, there are no cognitive maps, no conceptual frameworks of suffering and dispossession which are analogic with the myriad maps and frameworks which explain the dispossession of Human subalterns.” -Frank B wilderson III

We must put into context comrades who have already lost their children to the plantation state’s foster care system. These comrades, who are subject to sensory deprivation, beatings and electrocution torture, work for a measly few cents an hour. Not because they want to but because they will be further isolated and punished if they do not comply with the production demands of the plantation. These comrades, many of whom have taken up arms against the banks and the slave catchers, are largely invisible to us simply because we don’t see them at any events and we don’t drink with them after the demo and they don’t come to dance parties. What’s more is we have allowed, through sheer neglect, the prison to become a factory that produces sociopaths who snitch on our comrades to get freedom and then come and wreak havoc on our communities. We have allowed that by our inaction. We have allowed rape to become just another gadget on the pig’s utility belt. The brothers know this intimately. Every time we see a pig we see ourselves being raped. Current plantation trends are going largely unnoticed.

“Prison has always been the final gate in the repressive apparatus of a state. It serves the purpose of social and political control, although it manifests itself differently in different nation-states and in different political periods. Nevertheless, the prisoner is, with few exceptions, always a scapegoat and considered a deviant. Prison is not only a class weapon; it is also an instrument to control “alien” populations. In the United States, these “alien” populations are formerly colonized peoples — former slaves, Native Americans, Latin Americans, Asians, and Pacific Islanders — and they have all too often been considered the internal enemy. They are the people most needing control and are therefore the majority of those locked down in U.S. prisons. The United States is the world’s primary example of a country that deals with its social, economic, and cultural problems by incarceration. But this is its history. Prisons are the logical outcome of the country’s foundation on the genocide of Native Americans, the enslavement of Africans, and the “manifest destiny” of imperial settlerism — from sea to shining sea.” –Marilyn Buck

Do we still have the will of John Brown? Or that of Nat Turner and Harriet Tubman? Are we still committed to abolishing prisons? Where are our ties with slaves? Not individual ties but collective ties. Fundamental ties. So long as the prison exists it’s inhabitants will inevitably find themselves in a struggle to destroy it. That struggle must not be isolated from that of the outside. It must not be isolated from populist efforts. Critical infrastructure must be organized to expedite the flow of information through the walls. Collectives must be on standby to strike with direct action in retaliation for acts of repression against prisoners. Prisoners must provide networks of protection and support for anti-state guerillas that are captured. All comrades must orient themselves to the eventuality of their capture. It must be clearly understood that the struggle in no way ends when you “get caught”. It only intensifies. In the same way comrades oriented themselves to the infrastructural needs of the camp when we took Oscar Grant plaza, things like food security and medical needs, we must orient ourselves to the material needs of the broader community and prisoners as integral members of that community. A genuine effort to keep prisoners, individually and the prison population in general, up to date on all current events is required here. I’ve heard comrades speaking of the “patriarchal nature” of prisoner formations, how these things preclude radical engagement of anarchism. This, coupled with the fact that there’s no anarchist “set” at any level comparable to “nationalist sets” within the prison system, has led me in search of a clearer analysis, or at least one that fits my intended narrative that of the seldom heard often felt incomprehensible black anarchist. Anarchism like anything else finds a radical new meaning when it meets blackness. While anarchists have an endless list of critiques directed at the culture that permeates prisons, little is articulated in the way of actually changing these cultures, as if these were inherent character traits impervious to stimulation and engagement. There exists a fear even, of prisoners, of the calcifying nature of their abject conditions.

“Well, we’re all familiar with the function of the prison as an institution serving the needs of the totalitarian state. We’ve got to destroy that function; the function has to be no longer viable, in the end. It’s one of the strongest institutions supporting the totalitarian state. We have to destroy its effectiveness, and that’s what the prison movement is all about. What I’m saying is that they put us in these concentration camps here the same as they put people in tiger cages or “strategic hamlets” in Vietnam. The idea is to isolate, eliminate, and liquidate the dynamic sections of the overall movement, the protagonists of the movement. What we’ve got to do is prove this won’t work. We’ve got to organize our resistance once we’re inside, give them no peace, turn the prison into just another front of the struggle, and tear it down from the inside. Understand? A good deal of this has to do with our ability to communicate to the people on the street. The nature of the function of the prison within the police state has to be continuously explained, elucidated to the people on the street because we can’t fight alone in here. Oh Yeah, we can fight, but if we’re isolated, if the state is successful in accomplishing that, the results are usually not constructive in terms of proving our point. We fight and we die, but that’s not the point, although it may be admirable from some sort of purely moral point of view. The point is, however, in the face of what we confront, to fight and win. That’s the real objective: not just to make statements, no matter how noble, but to destroy the system that oppresses us. By any means available to us. And to do this, we must be connected, in contact and communication with those in the struggle on the outside. We must be mutually supporting because we’re all in this together. It’s one struggle at base.” -George Jackson

If we really mean class war, we need all the warrior elements of our class to be actively engaged. With the new developments of the Pelican Bay Short Corridor Collective, we are witnessing a moment that possesses great potential for the unification of our struggles. When people are subjugated and oppressed at the level we see today, psychologically and materially, we must orient ourselves to the undoing of that hegemonic hold. We must orient ourselves not to weeding out people but to weeding out of people injustice and oppression. We are, myself my close comrades and hopefully you too, endeavoring here to transform the criminal consciousness into a revolutionary consciousness and there already exists a principle basis established by comrades like George Jackson and Kuwasi Balagoon. Now is the time for us to aggressively push forward and show the world we aren’t afraid to fight the fascist, to show them we are prepared to make the same sacrifices that they already have.

It’s gonna be kill me if you can not kill me if you please!!!!

#Hannibal Balagoon Shakur #anarchism #black anarchism #black anarchy #race #racism #black history

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randomfandomnerd · 3 years

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Sunshine and Shadows- Chapter 1

Watching Nico talking to Annabeth and Percy, Will mentally slapped himself in the face. That conversation had gone about as smoothly as the surface of the moon. There was no chance of Nico ever willingly talking to him if he behaved like an overprotective mother hen, although part of him still wanted to wrap the son of Hades up in a blanket, burrito-style, and hand-feed him nutritious snacks.

“Solace!”

The harsh tone of Clarisse’s voice snapped him back to reality.

“Quit admiring Di Angelo! I know you’d be more than happy to do that all day, so I’m reminding you now! You have an appointment after lunch to give Chuck a check-up DO NOT BE LATE OR YOU’LL BE GETTING AN APPOINTMENT WITH MY SPEAR!”

On that friendly note, the newly-elected godmother stormed over to the Athena Cabin to harass the campers who had offered to weave clothes for the new-born satyr. Gods help whoever stood in the way of her warpath. She adored Chuck and was determined to make his life as perfect as possible.

Will nodded vaguely, before turning back to watch the son of Hades. He couldn’t help it. It wasn’t his fault that Nico was so gods damned attractive. Nico laughed at something Percy said, the action lighting up his face, making him truly look like the angel his name said he was. He gave Annabeth a high-five before heading back towards where Will was standing in front of the Apollo Cabin.

Will noticed a blush creeping into his cheeks and quickly turned away, mortified. A moment later he felt a prod at his shoulder and looked up to see the son of Hades regarding him questioningly.

“Will? We’d better get these 3 days over and done with then, right?”

Startled, Will let out a weird laugh that sounded like a piece of machinery made by Cabin 9, before nodding, turning round, and promptly walking into the doorframe, much to the amusement of Kayla, who was sitting inside, waxing her bowstring. Embarrassed, he quickly changed from his flip-flops into something more suitable for the infirmary before emerging again onto the porch.

✧✧✧

Nico was waiting for him on the porch, leaning against a post, drumming his fingers against the railing. When Will approached him, he stood up and gestured for the son of Apollo to lead the way. The walk to the infirmary was short, thank the gods, and Will spent the time determinedly staring forwards. A few campers were hurrying around, carrying supplies. Will nodded a hello towards Jake Mason, who was with a few other Hephaestus kids. The older boy didn’t have crutches any more, but preferred to use a cane when he had to walk around. Typical Cabin 9-style it had several cool additions, such as being able to extend into a fighting staff and, if Harley had anything to do with it, probably a flamethrower somewhere. The scarily muscular 8-year-old was chatting animatedly to his older brother, but he wasn’t at his usual bouncy self. Harley had worshipped Leo, and had been devastated by his loss. It didn’t help that now, closer to the start of school, all of his siblings, save for Nyssa, would be heading home or to college for a while. Will made a mental note to hang out with him more.

The two boys reached the doors of the infirmary and Will opened one, stepping aside to let Nico in first. Once they were inside, Will made a beeline for an empty bed at the back of the infirmary.

“We save the front beds for anyone that comes in with a really severe injury”,

he explained. He gestured for Nico to sit on the bed while he fussed around, clearing some of Austin’s sheet music away from a chair before plonking himself down on it. He’d have a word later with his brother about working on his compositions in the infirmary. Glancing up, he noticed that Nico was looking rather awkward (and adorable). He kept moving his hands around, as if he weren’t quite sure what he was doing, whilst desperately avoiding eye contact with anyone. Right. Nico wasn’t a people person, and it was currently quite busy in the surrounding area. Will stood up to draw the blue curtain around their area, before turning to address the son of Hades.

“I know this is primarily for you to get some rest, but I think I should give you a general check just to make sure nothing other than your irresponsible use of underworldy powers is a problem.”

Nico scowled at him but didn’t argue, instead opting for a curt nod. Will continued,

“I’ll start by looking under that bandage on your arm”

He reached out to Nico’s arm

“Is this ok?”,

he asked. Nico paused slightly, before nodding again. As gently as he could, Will raised Nico’s arm and began to slowly unwind the bandage, revealing several nasty-looking red claw-marks gouged into his skin.

“Werewolf claws”,

mumbled Nico. Will frowned.

“These are definitely infected. I’ll check for a fever and get some ambrosia for you. I reckon these will leave scars.”

He hesitated, then leaned in and brushed Nico’s raven-black hair from his forehead. It felt soft and, to his dismay, Will found his cheeks turning pink again. Holding the back of his hand against Nico’s pale forehead, he noticed how warm the son of Hades was.

“Nico, you’re burning up!”,

he announced before rummaging around in a nearby cupboard for some ambrosia and anything else he could use to treat the wound. He noticed a rather sad-looking Aloe Vera plant. Didn’t his siblings know that Aloe Vera should be placed in direct sunlight and not at the back of supply cupboards? He placed the poor plant in the windowsill, before taking a washcloth and some antibacterial ointment from the cupboard, along with the promised ambrosia. After thoroughly washing his hands, he handed the ambrosia to Nico, who began to delicately take small bites out of it, while he wet the cloth under the tap and started to carefully clean the wound. Nico winced slightly when the cloth made contact with the infected area, but had a slightly dopey faraway expression whilst he ate the ambrosia. Will wondered what Nico tasted when he consumed ambrosia. When Will ate it he tasted the sweet lemonade his grandma made whenever he returned home to visit. He tended to remain at camp most of the time, due to his mum always travelling for work and his insistence not to attend any sort of boarding school, but every now and again, he would fly over with a satyr protector to stay at his grandparent’s house with her. When he left, he would spend most of his time wondering when, or if, he’d ever get to go back. Especially after having 2 big wars in the space of a few years. Of course, his problems were all miniscule compared to what Nico had had to go through. He’d had to face the death of his sister, being alone with only a ghost for company, knowing about Camp Jupiter and not being able to tell anyone, being kidnapped and locked in a jar by crazy giants, and then on top of all of that had to deal with everyone at camp avoiding him, because they thought that he wasn’t normal. It all made Will so angry at the world, for allowing some people so many good things, when Nico could probably count the number of times he’d been happy since coming to camp on one hand, and still have fingers left over to spare.

Nico cleared his throat, and Will realised to his embarrassment, that he was staring again. He sheepishly placed the cloth in the sink, before lightly spreading a thin layer of the antibacterial ointment over the claw marks and murmuring a prayer to his father, while wondering if it would even work, seeing as Apollo was probably at that moment in time in the middle of a long lecture from his father, Zeus, concerning Octavian, the evil stuffed-toy destroyer (Percy had treated the whole camp to a story at the campfire of how his panda pillow pet had been brutally slaughtered).

He then covered the wound with a gauze pad, finishing by gently wrapping a length of bandage around, to prevent further infection.

He turned round to clean up while giving Nico strict instructions,

“I’ll talk to Chiron and explain that you are under no circumstances to partake in any sort of training exercises. You should spend most of your time here, getting some much needed sleep, however I think it’s a good idea for you to attend 1 meal a day at the pavilion, which will also allow you to have some healthy time outdoors. The rest of the time I will provide food for you.”

Even though he was facing away, he could imagine the son of Hades glaring daggers at him.

“I can get food myself. There’s a McDonalds near enough that the shadow travel shouldn’t hurt me.”

Will sighed in exasperation, running a hand through his hair and turning around to face his stubborn patient.

“Really? What part of ‘you can’t even summon a wishbone without melting into a puddle of darkness’ do you not get? I’m not even going to start on the ridiculous lack of proper nutrients in a McDonalds meal. What can they offer you that camp doesn’t?”

Nico raised his chin in a show of defiance

“Does Camp Half-Blood offer snazzy boxes? No I thought not. It also has an over-bearing mamma bear watching my every move. When I agreed to this, I expected gentle rest, not a prison sentence.”

He dramatically flopped back on the bed, his head on the pillow.

“I’m not even tired! Not one bit!”

Fixing his glare at the ceiling he mumbled

“This is a nice pillow. Soft and squishy.”

On that note, he fell asleep, still muttering about how fully awake he was. Amused, Will shook his head and stepped out of the curtained area into the main area of the infirmary to see Cecil and Austin chuckling in his direction. Austin was in the process of checking Cecil’s strained calf muscle and met Will’s eyes with an amused look.

“Why William my dear brother, I do believe that you have met your match. He’s just as headstrong as you are!”

Disgruntled, the senior counsellor of the Apollo cabin went to the storage closet to reorganise the medical supplies.

#heroes of olympus #rick riordan #trials of apollo #riordanverse #nico di angelo #will solace #solangelo #camp half blood

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ryik-the-writer · 3 years

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The Audacious Storybrooke Mirror Advice Columnist (Wednesday Paper Edition)

In which Lacey French is a smutty advice columnist for the Storybrooke Mirror.

Ch. 1: Lacey is challenged at work and discovers she has an admirer.

Based off a prompt I saw eons ago. Will be plot driven for the first few chapters but I hope to just wing it the rest of the way.

A03

-.-.-.-.-.

“FRENCH!”

Lacey smirked around her cherry sucker as the echo of Glass’s feet boomed closer, her eyes never leaving the screen of her ancient but well-maintained computer.

She hummed when she heard him stop behind him and didn’t even flinch when a rolled up newspaper hit her desk.

“Wanna explain this?” he seethed, hands on his hips like he actually could intimidate her.

Lacey held up one finger as she continued to read her email, knowing her “boss” was getting more annoyed by the minute.

“French,” he growled in warning. Lacey chuckled, and turned to him.

“Yes?” she inquired, fluttering her eyelashes.

Glass held the paper to her face, causing Lacey to lean back.

“I read this morning’s paper, thanks,” she said.

Glass’s finger slapped at a section of the paper. “I’m referring to this trash you put in my paper!”

“Trash that the night editor had no problem with,” Lacey waved him off.

“I’ve talked to Cruella, but she’s as perverted as you are.”

“So, this is my problem how?” Lacy inquired with a flick of her wrist.

Glass’s eye twitched. This was it. Lacey French was going to be give him an aneurism in the middle of his office.

“This,” he began to explain quietly for the thousandth time. “Is a community newspaper, and you just told a member of that community to…to…”

Lacey bit her lip as Glass sputtered through the answer Lacey gave in her most recent advice column.

Well, to be completely fair, “advice” was putting it mildly.

Lacey gave a guide to pleasure, for one’s self or for them and their partner, which ever they were seeking.

“Racy Lacey” as she was penned in a small, one-fourth sized space each Wednesday on the back of the Storybrooke Mirror’s sports page, gave relationship, intimacy or any sort of general tips that dealt with one’s sexual life. A twist on “Dear Abby,” so to speak.

Yes, shocking in a small community newspaper, but hell, it made the Wednesday paper the most popular one each week.

She knew this from the hundreds of emails—good and bad—she got each week, depending on just how “degrading” the column was that week.

The process was simple: someone would send her an email with their problem (sex wasn’t good anymore, she doesn’t know I exist, he doesn’t know I exist, something like that) and Lacey would write back with a suggestion. A handful of the emails (usually the most sexual one) would go in the Wednesday’s paper, and Belle would spend the rest of the day going through the flood of emails that either bashed her for her “sinful” ways or wanted advice for their own conundrums.

This week was no different.

With a smirk, she snatched the paper from Glass’s hands when he could find the words to describe her latest round of advice.

“Dear Racy Lacey,” she began, dodging Glass’s grab.

“I haven’t slept with my husband in nearly five months! And I’m starting to worry he’s no longer attractive to me!”

“French!”

Lacey jumped on the desk of another journalist, a true feet in her heels.

“We’ve been so busy with our jobs and children, we’re so tired during the week, so last weekend I sent the kids to their grandparent’s house, put on something flattering, and thought we were set, but he just went straight to bed! What’s happening to us?”

Signed: Bland Bedroom

Just as Glass was ready to take a stapler to her ankle, Lacey jumped down and began zagging through desks to keep away.

“Dear Bland Bedroom, my advice is to put on your sexiest high heels—”

“French!”

“Put one on his chest—”

“I’m warning you!”

“And ride him until he’s spent.”

Lacey threw herself back in Glass’s chair, lightly panting as Glass struggled for his breath at her.

“Remind him that you are a goddess among worshipers and he should be worshipping you, every night on his knees, preferably.”

Lacey met Glass’s heated glare and causally handed the paper back to him.

“Best luck to you, Racy Lacy.”

Glass snatched the paper back, kicking his office door closed from all spectators.

“You’re evil.”

Lacey shrugged. “I prefer imaginative.”

Glass took in a deep breath. Lacey could practically see his blood pressure slowly drop down to normal.

“You’re fired.”

Lacey waved him off as she spun in his chair. “No I’m not.”

“Yes you are.”

“No, I’m not.” Lacey pushed with a chuckle. “People like what they’re reading, and they like it more when it gets a little…sultry.”

Glass groaned, a second away from busting a blood vessel.

He knew good and well Lacey’s M-rated columns helped keep subscribers sending in those monthly checks, but he couldn’t help it if some of those subscribers happened to be a bit more persuasive of what should and shouldn’t go into their community paper.

“The truth is Lace…Regina called again.”

Lacey’s smirk melted into a scowl.

“So what?” Lacey shrugged, trying to hide the uneasiness bubbling in her gut. “Hasn’t her majesty ever heard of first amendment rights?”

“Easy,” Glass warned, more than certain that the walls had ears that led straight to Mayor Mills.

“No,” Lacey scoffed. “I’m not going to let her dictate what I write, and neither should you!”

“That woman has the ability to sway this town any direction she chooses, and she might just persuade them to chase you out of town.”

“Oh please,” Lacey spat, though she wasn’t foolish not to take such a threat lightly.

Glass groaned, exhausted already. Dealing with the mayor and then one of his most hard-headed employees would put anyone out, but he needed to find a solution to appease both sides.

Lacey was talented. Sultry, yes, but she had skills befitting a feature writer.

The advice columns were easy income for the paper, but a target for mockery for Storybrooke’s more conservative residents.

It would seem the mayor was only getting involved to settle them, her biggest supporters and the ones who primarily funded her mayoral campaign each year.

“Look,” Glass said. “For modesty’s sake, can you try to write something nice for next week? Why not just a simple advice piece on…anything!”

“If people wanted advice, they’d go to Hopper,” Lacey pouted, leaning her head back in the chair.

“Just…try, please?”

Lacey glanced at the man who was technically her boss. She’d always thought he looked like a bulldog, expressionless and kind of dumb, but loveable.

“I’m not publishing any fluff,” Lacey affirmed.

“That’s not your call,” Glass replied with a dry smile. “Just keep it PG and we might live to see another edition.”

“If by PG you mean post-coital gratification than—“

“French!”

Lacey snickered before sliding out of his chair. “I’ll…attempt to be civil,” her smiled faded for a moment, her eyes going dark, “But no promises.”

Glass sighed, knowing that was as good as he was going to get for now.

“Have something on my desk by Monday,” he said as he began to leave his office. “And get your boots off the desk.”

Lacey dropped one boot, keeping the other firmly stacked on yesterday’s paper in defiance.

This was ridiculous! Who the hell was the mayor, telling her what she could and could not write!

“Probably the closest thing to sex she ever gets,” Lacey snorted to herself.

With an exaggerated groan, she heaved herself upright, lazily logging into her work email from Glass’s computer (he’d be pissed later but so be it).

She scrolled through the dozens of emails she received from Storybrooke’s secretly lewd citizens, as well as the ones condoning what she did for a living (including a particularly lengthy one from Mother Superior.)

Of course, they signed their letter with a penname or a name surrounding their problem, such as “No Longer Interested” or “Spice it up or Give it up?”

She went through a few of them, but had to decline writing on them. They were sex-related, and already tempting her to screw what Glass or Regina or anyone else said and reply to them.

“Ugh,” she moaned, sorrowfully scrolling past the deliciously sinful emails.

Just as she was ready to shut down the computer, a few choice words at the subject line of the email.

Alone in Storybrooke wrote:

Dear Racy Lacey,

Your mind is brilliant, in both your columns and in your day to day life.

I see you time to time in town, and I’m instantly drawn in, like a month to a flame.

Your courage to stand up to this town is admirable, as brilliant as a warrior on a battlefield.

Your outer beauty as well isn’t without comment.

Brown hair, beautiful blue eyes and an unforgettable accent…and legs for days I may add.

Reading your columns every week is equivalent to sampling the finest of erotica the world has ever known, I hope to enjoy them…and perhaps one day you…in the future.

Lacey blinked, the twinge of pink that had spread over her cheeks heating her entire face.

It would seem she had an admirer, well another one that is.

She had her fair share of fan mail, some of which cusped on downright creepy, and there had been a time or two she had left a tip on Sheriff Graham’s desk.

Yet this was more…flattering. Abet, a bit strange, but still worthy of a hearty reply.

She cracked her knuckles, ready to reply to this fellow. Her current task could wait.

As she highlighted the name of the penname, her eyes caught the email address, which looked terrifying familiar.

[email protected].

Lacey’s stomach lurched.

“No way…”

She hovered her mouse over the email address and her worst fear was confirmed.

Mr. Augustine Gold. The beast of Storybrooke who owned every piece of property within the town line.

And her landlord.

“Oh Shit.”

#rumbelle fic #rumbelle #golden lace #lacey frenc #rumplestiltskin #mr. gold #ouat #ouat fic #once upon a time #ryik's fics

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polarishq · 4 years

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Meet AMARYLLIS “Mary” NJOO. They are FIFTY-THREE years old and hail from SAN FRANCISCO, CA. Mary embodies the constellation, SAGITTA. They use she/her pronouns. Their faceclaim is BRIANNE TJU.

Sagitta reminds me of hands covered in thorn scratches, strawberry milkshakes at 2am, flowers blooming through sidewalk cracks, messy buns secured with a dozen bobby pins, rose colored blush paired with heavy mascara, sunflowers in a glass acting as a makeshift vase, racing heart rates, a face too much like her mother’s, dirt caked underneath fingernails, childhood nostalgia, and the chirping of birds after a storm. .

BIOGRAPHY

Mary has spent her entire life knowing she was never meant to be born. The Njoo family come from a long line of magic user, highly respected within their own social circles and spread to all four corners of the globe, so when Lillian Njoo became pregnant at the young age (by human and witch standards) of 19, it was a massive scandal. It was made worse given the fact that it had been through a one night stand with a man whose name and face she didn’t care to memorize. But the Njoo family was also based deep in traditional views, especially given the time period of the late 60s. Lillian was given no choice but to have the child, but it was clear early on that she never had much affection for her daughter. Instead, Amaryllis was shuttled around from one relative to another every few months. While most of the Njoo family valued strength and offensive magic, everyone soon realized that Amaryllis was inclined otherwise. Rather than being fascinated by the prickly thorns and poison leaves most of their family specialized in, she could often be found picking flowers to braid into her dolls’ hair. She was a gentle child, and in their family, that was seen as undesirable. They did their part in housing her here and there when need be, but in terms of actually bonding with her, that was not an option to them.

Amaryllis didn’t have a stable home environment until just after her fifth birthday, when she was taken in by her uncle Perry — technically her great-uncle, but semantics. Perry himself was always seen as something of an outside within his family, both for his demeanor and the fact that rather than an earth element, his magic was water based. He specialized in healing, giving him a strong sense of empathy as well, so when a young Amaryllis was thrust on his doorstep without a second though from any other relatives, taking her in was a no-brainer. The first thing he did was give her the nickname Mary, because what the fuck kind of child wants to introduce herself as Amaryllis. The second thing he did was plant a flower bed in the backyard, after he learned how much she loved to watch things grow. At first it was weird for Mary, to have someone willing to give as much love as she did. It was easy for her to adjust in that sort of environment, and even easier for her to thrive and grow. Perry learned as much as he could about plants and earth magic to teach his niece, and finally, Mary had someone who actually felt like family.

For their part, most of the Njoo family brushed Perry and Mary off. Out of sight, out of mind, right? Lillian would call every few months to make sure her kid wasn’t dead, but that was about the extent of her role. It wasn’t until Mary was around 16 in human years that her mark finally appeared. She only told her uncle about it in her excitement, not even thinking about telling the rest of their family until a few months later at their annual Christmas gathering. It was really the only time of the year where they all got together, and Mary and Perry went just for the sake of appearances. Mary began speaking to Lilian just to swap niceties, and casually mentioned her constellation mark had appeared. Then, Lillian lost her shit. She was furious that she had not been informed of this, and what resulted was a heated argument between Perry and virtually every other member of the Njoo family. His screams that she had no claim to anything regarding Mary fell on death ears, and soon enough, he was dragging Mary out of the banquet hall in order to keep her safe. It wouldn’t last though.

Within a week, Lilian came to their home along with two other head members of their family, stating that Perry had done his work as caretaker but it was now time for Mary to begin training with a competent instructor. Not wanting to start another screaming match, Mary went into her mother’s care. What followed was seven years of anger and resentment that made the initial argument look like child’s play. When Mary agreed to go with her mother, she assumed she would be able to return to Perry as soon as they realized that Mary wasn’t going to be a fighter like the rest of them. No matter her powers, Mary was kind and gentle by nature and that was that. Instead of conceding defeat, Lillian took it as an act of defiance that they could get rid of with the right force. And, with the years of abandonment and the feeling of being ripped out of her home finally pushing her over the edge, Mary fought back. While she could never find it in her to strike her mother when she struck her, Mary did actively engage in intense verbal fights that often left her voice scratchy and the ground shaking from the Njoo women’s combined strength. It was miserable for both of them, and finally after seven years, Mary took the first opportunity she had and ran home.

Her and her uncle both cried when she returned, and she apologized again and again for ever going with them in the first place. Perry, in all his kindness, assured her there was no need to apologize. They spent days, weeks, months even, waiting for members of their family to show up and drag her away, punish her for leaving, but no such occurrence ever came. What did come was a note, three months later, written in Lillian’s handwriting to say that neither her daughter nor Perry were members of the Njoo family anymore. It was meant to be painful, but Mary and Perry celebrated instead. They had both suffered at their family’s hands, but now they were truly free to live their own lives. Although well into his third hundred year, Perry took the disinheritance as his chance to finally be his authentic self, and within the next decade, Mary was the only Njoo invited to the wedding between her uncle Perry and her now-uncle Thad. And Mary, still kind and optimistic in spite of her mother’s best attempts, has never been happier.

For decades, Mary was content to learn magic from her uncles. They were the only ones she really trusted; the idea of “training” makes her physically nauseous thanks to Lillian. Mary associates the entire concept with hurt and anger rather than something that could be constructive. Perry and Thad, a fire user, were happy to do what they could, but as time went on, they had to admit to themselves that Mary’s earth magic needed a special education that they could not give. When they first brought up the idea of Polaris to Mary, she outright refused. She knew of the school — it was the alma mater for most of the Njoo family living in America. This was the place that had taught her uncles, but also her mother. Her grandparents. Everyone who had so coldly turned their back to her and hurt her. She didn’t want it. It took Perry and Thad finally being upfront with her to make her realize that even if she didn’t want it, she needed it. So, after their insistence and fear of upsetting them further, Mary finally agreed.

She’s been at Polaris for a few years now but despite that, she’s still not sure if it’s where she’s meant to be. She purposefully avoids anything related to combative or offensive magic, even though her inclinations align with that sort of training. She’d much rather spend her time in one of the school greenhouses, or tending to the flowerbeds she keeps right outside her dormitory window. There is still a lot of anger within her left from her mother, and it can result in Mary assuming the defensive even when its not called for. And despite the resentment she feels towards Lillian, Mary also has a lot of abandonment problems that she is not yet willing to face. That’s her little secret though. Bigger than that is her determination to spread love and positivity, to the point of sometimes coming off as disillusioned from the realities of the world. She’s not, though. Mary is very well aware of what people are capable of; she just chooses to focus on the reverse.

INCLINATION

Sagitta, the arrow, often sponsors people who are in need of direction and focus in their lives. Its a bit ironic, considering the destructive abilities it possesses. Those with the powers of Sagitta are capable of tectonic plate manipulation and, with the proper training, can create mountains or strengthen the foundation of continents. Sagitta is also volatile, though. Without the right level of control, their powers can overwhelm them. This may lead to catastrophic disasters, including earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, or tsunamis. These are, of course, worse case scenarios, but it does mandate that witches and wizards in control of Sagitta need to be on their guard always.

CONNECTIONS

Filling the role of Julian Moore’s calm companion.

Garden Club: Mary really, really fucking likes flowers. These folks also really, really fucking like flowers. Or vegetable gardens. Or shrubbery. OR anything really, the gardening club is here for all your plant-based needs. Their a group of students that help tend to the greenhouses on campus in addition to beautifying the already stunning grounds.

Polar Opposite Besties: Ms. Njoo here loves pretty much everything. This character hates a lot of things, but somehow Mary was persistent enough to win them over and now happily calls them her best friend. They have definitely received a BFF necklace from her on at least one occasion. Think of them as the ultimate Hufflepuff/Slytherin dynamic.

Family Member (fc should be either part Indonesian or part Chinese): Another member of the Njoo family currently at Polaris, probably some sort of cousin or what-have-you. Unlike Mary they would have been raised from birth within the family and brought up under the same rigorous training and ideas of superiority. They would also most likely be completely separated from Mary after she was essentially disowned. Whether or not you want them to share the family’s mindset, or if you want them to be more in-line with Mary and their uncle, is up to you!

Penned by Jeanne ★

#sagitta.#earth.#jeanne.#taken.#student.

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kashmiresims · 6 years

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Hart to Hart

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Nick was musing. He mused about the phrase ‘Nick of time’—the first reason being that his name was in it. The second reason was because he had accrued enough real simoleons to cover the tuition he owed if he were to stay a student at Sim State, on the last day he had left to pay it. ‘Nick of time’ indeed.

Fight nights kept growing, both in crowd and fighter roster size and now was collectively referred to as the Nest of Vipers on account of all the fighters taking on snake aliases. He’d even met high rolling gamblers interested in betting on winners and bringing in more money. They had yet to implement a process but it looked, for lack of a better adjective—hella promising. It all was going in the direction Cain had predicted, ever since the first night. Nick still had a worry though, that if it grew too big and too fast that the law would get involved and shut it down. More than that, shut him down. Then where would he be? Jail, most likely.

“Nicholas?”

He stopped musing and noticed his mother was crossing his path. How random?

“Mom?”

She looked puzzled to see him but he was even more puzzled—what was she doing on campus? Why was she heading toward where he just came from?

“It’s good to see you, sweetheart,” she smiled and stepped forward to hug him but he evaded it and put on a frown. He was on guard—suddenly suspicious, because she usually took his father’s side in arguments and that meant that she had agreed to let Elm take away the means for Nick’s higher education.

Her resulting expression of hurt at him avoiding her embrace stung him more than he would have thought but he pushed past it, “What are you doing here?”

She sighed and pulled out a piece of paper from her purse; a check. “It’s payment for your tuition. I was going over some of our financial records the other night and saw—well it doesn’t matter what I saw—I’m fixing this.”

She moved forward, presumedly to go pay the university but Nick held out his arm to halt her and said quietly, “Don’t worry about it.”

“But—”

He took the check out of her hand and looked at it. Plumbobs, college was expensive. He found it ironic that one of his father’s campaign promises was to make college education more affordable when he tried using money to influence Nick’s choice about college—to either become a lawyer or don’t go at all.

Now, Nick could do what he wanted.

His mother gasped as he abruptly tore the check into shreds, leaving him with a fist full of paper bits.

“Nicholas!”

He threw them into a nearby trash bin along the walking path, “I appreciate what you tried to do Mom, but I can take care of myself.”

She seemed absolutely shocked and bewildered by her son’s behavior. He had torn up a check for no insignificant amount of money. She could only stare at him as though he were crazy and to both their surprise, tears began to leak into her eyes.

Of course, he wasn’t a complete monster—and made a move to comfort her immediately. Unlike him, she accepted a hug without question. He surmised she was sad because she believed he was throwing away his future and he didn’t know how he could tell her that he wasn’t, without the fact of how he had managed to come up with the money.

“It’s okay,” he heard himself say and hugged her tighter as she cried into his shoulder, her purse dropping from her hand as it dangled hopelessly, “It will be all right, Mom.”

He didn’t expect her to get so worked up over this. Harmony Calhoun, the Steel-faced woman—that’s what the media called her as they took pictures of her standing by Elm’s side—not with a fake smile of a politician’s wife but a sullen, strict look that cooled everyone around her. She had been a public educator for many years, eventually securing a spot as the school’s principal, so had to develop that tough exterior. She was firm but she wasn’t unfeeling.

She shook her head, unconvinced of his words. It was unspoken but then he knew, he just knew his father had done something to wear down her resolve. How she could stand being married to such an asshole for so many years was something he often wondered about.

“Let’s get something to eat?” Nick suggested, pulling away and looking her over. When did threads of silver start appearing in her hair? When did that crinkle around her golden eyes become so deep and prominent?

He hadn’t visited home in a long while, he didn’t like going back there and always found an excuse to stay away. It’d be different if his grandparents were still alive—but they had passed in recent years, and he didn’t like going back, knowing they weren’t there to greet him with smiles and hugs.

But then it struck him, that while his father didn’t care about Nick’s absence, other members of his family might miss him just as much as he missed Kimmy and Matthew Hart.

His mother nodded in agreement about getting food and wiped away any loose tears remaining, then reached down to collect her purse.

Nick lead the way down the sidewalk, keeping his silence measured for he didn’t want to say anything more to upset her. In fact, he wouldn’t know what to say anymore--he probably stopped confiding in her about the time he was in high school, when he kept getting grounded for stupid things by his father and she didn’t stand up for Nick—just went along with it to avoid more confrontation.

They entered Joe's Diner. It was one of those university establishments that had been around for a generation at least. The door jingled when a customer entered, greeted by a soda counter and a row of double seated booths against a bright red wall with silver paneling. Very retro with sense of nostalgia though many now had never experienced it before coming to college. Since it was open past midnight, many students could be found there studying in the early dark hours, cramming for an exam while cramming a burger down their mouth.

Nick and his mother were seated, and Nick ordered two burgers. Hamburgers were Joe's s specialty. His mother didn't object. He didn't like the silence, not with her—had he been away so long they had forgotten how to talk to each other?

“Mom, I gotta say, I'm digging your hairstyle today. Buns are where it's at."

She looked mildly perplexed at his statement, as if no one had complimented her on her hair in years or rather, she had worn it that way for years and wondered why it earned her a compliment now. Despite her puzzlement she smiled and said, "Thank you, sweetheart.”

But then with a quick flip of his head, as if to present himself—it was made evident it was a compliment more to Nick himself as his long hair was bundled up in its usual hair tie.

He knew she didn’t prefer the look, but she smiled at his quip nonetheless and repeated a sentiment she had been saying since he was in high school, "Your hair is out of control, Nicholas."

"It is not," he disagreed and smoothed his hand over the top of his head to check, it was all pulled back tight, no strands popping out haphazardly. He had noticed though, as he grew it out, that he used more and more shampoo every time he showered. He bet that the next words out of her mouth were for him to go get a haircut. He could almost see the thought form in her head as her brow crinkled.

"You could do with a haircut," she suggested and he mentally patted himself on the back for correctly guessing, but thankful he didn't owe himself money for both simultaneously losing and winning the bet he made with himself.

He smirked with defiance, "Why? women really like my long hair.”

“Oh really?” she arched a brow and he immediately regretted bringing up that subject because she followed up with, “And when are you going to bring any of these so called ‘women who like your long hair’ over so I can meet any of them?

He let out a nervous laugh, waving away her question, “They aren’t the type one takes home to meet one’s parents but I promise they exist!”

His mother pressed her lips in disapproval, which he knew she would do. She was at the age where she would like to see her sons to be on the path toward steady relationships. With Kit being only fifteen years old—he wasn’t ready for commitment. Shane was about as emotionally intelligent as the robots he built, so there was hardly a chance for him to catch anyone’s fancy. That left Nick being the only son to land a significant other and while he had plenty of fish in the sea to choose from, he wasn’t all thrilled at the idea of getting into a serious relationship; college was the time for fun and he had the rest of his life to live—to find that ‘special someone’ if they even existed.

He jolted forward suddenly reminded of something he was supposed to ask his mother about, “Hey, Mom—do you think you could ask Dad about something for me?”

She seemed surprised at the urgency of his request and asked, “Is everything all right?”

“I’m fine but I wanted to show some of my art at the Harvest Gala. Dad could probably make that happen...”

Their burgers arrived then and he had to put a hold on that thought while they ate. The burger was damn good—juicy and had a charbroil taste, smothered in ketchup, mustard, and topped with tomato. It was an early dinner for him but he had a light lunch and was feeling hungry anyway. He hoped food would make his mom feel better, it always made him feel better.

He glanced up and saw her eating eagerly as he was and nearly laughed. He'd never seen her eat like that before. She was usually careful about what she ate—he’d seen her with granola, salads, and other healthy foods that she chewed precisely after every bite. He realized, he probably hardly knew her real character, locked away behind that steel-faced persona she had maintained, even at home.

Why did she hide?

“You, uh...really like that burger, huh?” he swallowed a bite and said with amusement.

“Are you kidding? I love Joe's burgers,” she said and took another happy, sloppy, bite.

“Since when do you eat here?”

“I too, went to Sim State, once upon a time—” she swiveled her head from side to side, looking at the walls with her hamburger in hand, "and I'm amazed that this diner looks the same—it's like stepping back in time."

"Really?"

"Yes, your father and I came here often. We'd get dinner, drink a few beers and talk about everything from philosophy to politics—and I hung on every word," she smiled wistfully but it faded a moment later, "He was very charming back then."

Nick restrained his eyes from rolling, but ended up frowning slightly, "So, he's not anymore?"

"I didn't say that," she snapped, matching his frown until it wavered and dissolved into melancholy.

His expression lifted and turned to concern, "Something happened, didn't it? Something with Dad?"

She didn't answer right away, seeming to weigh her words as she focused somewhere else than Nick. Finally, she answered, "We had a fight—and he thought it was best if I didn't accompany him to a fundraising function tonight."

Nick had never seen his parents fight before, never even heard of it—thought it was pretty much impossible from the way they stood united all those years. To hear his mother admit that such a fight happened was as rare as seeing a unicorn. He honestly didn’t know what to say after such a truth.

“Sounds like...you could use a drink,” Nick waved over the waitress and promptly ordered two beers despite the shocked look on his mother’s face at that suggestion. He knew she drank, he’d seen the empty wine bottles as a kid—and the full ones stashed up in the cabinets out of his reach.

The beers were uncapped and set before them; Nick picked his up and held it out to her as if he were toasting. She hesitantly picked it up and did the same.

“To Joe’s,” he grinned and clinked his bottle against hers, which caused her to laugh, “May it exist another 30 years.”

“To Joe’s,” she repeated with a smile and took a swig at the same time he did. If he had somehow managed to time travel and told his eighteen-year-old self that one day he would be drinking beer with his mother, his teenage self would have called him crazy and a liar. But there he was, twenty-two years old and drinking beer with his mother.

“Oh wow, I don’t know how long it’s been since I’ve had a beer,” she said immediately after tasting it and looked at the back of the label.

“Probably since you went here,” Nick joked, recalling her words from earlier.

She rolled her eyes and took another drink.

As she drank, she became more and more forthcoming—talking about her college days, her job and all the snotty pre-teens she had to deal with, her annoyance at how the media portrayed her now that her husband was running for public office—and it amazed Nick to see his mother so candid about life for once.

They had been there so long, chatting and ordering beers that it was now evening.

“What did you and dad fight about?” Nick finally let his curiosity get the best of him and asked. He was done with his third drink, and had set the beer bottle on the table top. Funnily enough, he was barely feeling it, college had done wonders for his tolerance.

“Your tuition.”

It was a good thing Nick was done with his beer for if he would have had any in his mouth he would have spit it out in utter surprise. His mind was blown.

While it was rare to see a unicorn, it was rarer yet to know of a fight between his parents that pertained to their eldest son. He thought they had always been on the same page concerning him—his hair was too long, his eyebrow piercing looked unprofessional, art was not a valid career path, he would make a better lawyer with his smartass mouth, and he deserved to be grounded for tricking his uncle into reading Marilyn Manson lyrics at his Grams’ funeral. Okay, but assessing that situation now, that he agreed he definitely deserved to be grounded for it. His eighteen-year-old self would have called him a traitor, that is, if he managed to go back in time somehow. He really liked musing on that hypothetical.

Now he felt a little bad for assuming his mother had allowed his father take away that money for tuition without a fight—but to be fair she’d never give him reason to believe anything else. “Speaking of...“ her voice turned a bit harder, “how did you manage to get the money to pay it?”

Nick cringed inwardly, because he was dreading that question. He had thought of an answer though, “I sold all my art.”

Now it was her turned to look like her mind was blown, and honestly if someone really had bought his art for that amount, it would have blown his mind too.

“If you sold all your art...then what are you showing at the Harvest Gala?” she asked slowly while her amazement turned into a puzzled frown. Damn, nothing got past her even when she was buzzed.

“I...” he started but picked up his bottle and shook it to hear nothing but drops left, trying to stall as he thought of how to reply, “I'm working on new paintings that I’ll have done by the time the Gala rolls around. I figured it would be good exposure. That’s why I need you to ask dad.”

He’d finally gotten around to bringing that up again.

She put her finger to her lips thoughtfully, “How about you come home this weekend and ask him yourself?”

“Mom,” Nick groaned and placed his head into his hand, trying his best to give her pleading eyes, “You have to talk him into it, you know he won’t go for it otherwise. He likes to undermine me.”

“I’d say like father, like son in that respect,” she mumbled before taking another drink and it made Nick furious. He did not appreciate being likened to his father. He’d done so much to try and distance himself, and distinguish himself as the opposite of Elm Calhoun—even going so far as using her maiden name to hide the relation from anyone he introduced himself to.

She noticed his expression and explained, “You push his buttons every chance you get. You quit the Greek Society—and while taking away your tuition was a bit extreme—he pulled a bunch of strings to get you at the top of the waiting list for his legacy fraternity. You don’t show him any respect—”

Nick didn’t want to listen to this. The night was suddenly soured with this talk of his father. His father ruined everything, and now she was taking his side again. He jumped up and quickly paid the dining bill at the front, leaving his mother behind—too angry to offer to walk her back to her car.

He heard the quick clicking of her heels behind him, and then a shrill shout of “Nicholas Alexander Calhoun, stop walking away from me this instant!”

If anyone was out and about, they heard it. He’d bet everyone inside Joe’s could hear it as well. He did stop but he didn’t face her.

“I didn’t quit the frat to annoy him,” Nick sighed, trying to control his growing rage just remembering that last phone conversation with the man. He knew his mother was just behind him as there were no more clicking sounds. “I bet he didn’t tell you the reason.”

“Enlighten me,” he heard her demand in that same hard tone.

He turned around to face her with a scowl, “The frat's president was drugging the drinks at parties, women’s drinks, and when I called him out on it, he gave no indication he was going to stop. He still does it, I've seen him do it out at the bars—”

Nick had to swallow another bout of rage, remembering how Illyana was affected and how scared he had been for her. It wasn’t right at all, “So I could not, in good conscious, stay in the Geek Society, especially after I explained this to Dad and he told me to accept it and get over it.”

Nick had to grit his teeth as he quoted his father, forcing those skeevy words out between his lips. He noticed his mother was matching his scowl, coming to the same realization.

Now could she understand why Nick couldn’t respect his father? How could he when his father thought something like that was acceptable behavior? His mother didn’t say anything in response, but she looked angry...and now very tired as well as she mulled over his words.

“I’ll have a word with him. I’ll tell him about your art and the Harvest Gala but in return for that favor, I want you to come home—we’re having an election party this weekend. It would be nice if we could all be together again.”

“Mom...please—”

“Kit misses you, I miss you. So, don’t come for him—do it for us. Please, sweetheart?”

A tight ball of some kind of anxiety formed in his chest as he pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to think. It wasn’t often his mother begged anything of him and he did owe her if she was to put in a word for him to show his art at the Gala. It was fair, but he didn’t look forward to it at all.

“Fine,” he sighed with an air of defeat, “I’ll come home this weekend.”

#ts2 #sims 2 #nov arc #kashmiresims #sims 2 story #my shots

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enixamyram · 6 years

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OUAT ReWrite: 7x22 - Part 8

I don’t know about you guys, but this is the chapter I was most looking forward to fixing. This is the scene, out of all others, that pissed me off the most and I am happy to do it right. Most things are open for interpretation but this is the one and only thing that I cannot meet halfway on. It was complete lazily written trash and needs to be treated as such.

... So, after taking a breathing and calming myself down, I bring you the latest chapter. We’re very near the end and, so far, I’m pretty happy with the way it’s turned out but who knows. You guys tell me.

Chapter Eight: Everyone Vs WishRumple & WishHenry

Even though he tried to hide it from them, Alice could tell Rumple had been crying. It wasn’t obvious but Alice probably knew him best out of everyone in the room, including his own grandson, and she could spot the signs almost as soon as he turned to face them when they entered the room. Alice bit the inside of her lip, wandering with Robin to the other side of the table as her father stormed ahead. She wanted to say something to him, but she also knew well enough to know it wouldn’t help.

Nothing would help now that the power of the Guardian was gone.

“Please tell me you have something,” Killian all but begged.

“We may be in luck.” Rumple explained, walking across the room. “As I did, this Dark One-” He reached for his spinning wheel, lifting off the end and revealing a small vial of a dust like substance tucked away inside. “-hid some magic for a rainy day.”

The others watched in silence as he poured the strange dust over his hand, rolling his wrist in order to cover the back of his fingers as well as the front of his palm. Immediately his skin began to glow a stunning golden colour, brightly enough to make Robin squint and temporarily look away while Alice found herself strangely transfixed with the sight of it. She could sense what kind of magic that was. After all, she had used it herself, but only once before when Rumplestiltskin was testing her to find out if she was really the Guardian…

Another pang of guilt hit her at the knowledge that the power was truly forever gone. She forced herself to look up, to pay attention to Rumple and her papa instead of her own worries. After all, if Rumplestiltskin could put those thoughts behind him while they dealt with his alter ego, then so could she.

“All I have to do now is get close enough to that…” He paused, looking at Killian and giving a small smile. “Crocodile, to rip his heart out. And this whole thing will be over.”

“Too late, dearie,” Came an all too familiar voice. Everyone turned sharply to find WishRumple standing patiently in front of the fireplace, grinning as he took a step forward, looking at Henry. “Already have it. An author. With a darkened heart.”

O*U*A*T

At the same time elsewhere, deep in the forest, WishHenry stormed furiously down the open path with two remaining loyal guards by his side. He had no idea how Regina had done it, but she had escaped his castle dungeons and taken over with her little team, including the alternative version of himself. They had even taken most of his guards with them somehow, though none of those who had returned to WishHenry’s side had explained how. All they knew was that they had been overpowered by a sudden new set of arrivals who charged in to save the Evil Queen from them.

“Split up.” He told his guards, pointing them off in separate directions with the two swords he held in either hand. “She couldn’t have gotten far.”

He came to a pause as they disappeared from his sight; turning into a slow circle and watching them go. He was positively fuming, knowing he might have been cheated out of his revenge after all this time. The more he thought about it, the angrier he came. No doubt it was powering WishRumple’s new little spell but WishHenry didn’t care. He didn’t care about any of those people. All he cared about was hunting down the woman who ruined his life and making her pay.

“No need for the cavalry.”

WishHenry turned sharply to find Regina walking towards him. She was still dressed in those silly clothes he found her in, hiding the true evil he knew was beneath that meek and mild little expression she wore. It was pathetic. And it just succeeded in making him all the more angry with her for daring to pretend she was anything other than what she really was. A monster.

“I’m here.” Regina said, waving at herself.

“Turning yourself in?” WishHenry asked, then sneered. “Or are you here to mother me some more?”

“I know you might find this hard to believe, but there are people out there… A good, kind version of your family that can help you heal.” Regina explained, unable to help trying one last attempt to get through to him before it was too late. “Just as they helped me.”

“The only way I’m going to heal,” Henry said, advancing on her sharply and raising the sword to point at her throat. “Is by killing you!” He snarled, staring into her face. It annoyed him how unafraid she was. She just looked sad for him, and that was infuriating. She had no right to feel sad for him, not when she was the cause for all his pain. He paused, taking a step back and digging the second sword into the ground by her feet. “But I’ll give you a chance to defend yourself. ‘Cause I’m better than you.”

“Henry, I won’t fight you.” Regina said, feeling a crushing weight push down on her at the very idea of it.

“As long as you die, I don’t really care.” WishHenry said coldly.

Regina had been prepared to stand there in defiance, but then she hadn’t expected WishHenry to actually attack her. When she saw him moving in, she had no choice but to grab the sword in order to defend herself. Lifting it up just in time, she blocked the blow he threw down on her, stepping forward and pushing him back.

O*U*A*T

The others didn’t have much chance to consider what WishRumple meant, when suddenly the armour in the room began to shake and the wind around them picked up, knocking some of the more lighter objects from the shelves and onto the floor at their feet. They could all feel the magic building up and pulling at them, wiping at their bodies just as WishRumple waved his hand through the air gently in front of him. Suddenly all the books they had brought with them sitting on the table began to flip open in front of them, spinning through the pages without ever coming to a stop, and at the same time a series of dark portals appeared around the room behind each of them.

“What’s happening?!” Robin cried, looking around before she caught sight of the black abyss twisting behind her. She shrieked in surprised and moved forward at the same time as Henry ran back for her, grabbing her arms and pulling her to the table secured in the middle of the room.

The four of them reached out, grabbing onto the tables edge and clinging on as the force of the wind picked up around them and began pulling at their bodies. They all felt the magic trying to drag them back to their separate portals, so fierce and intense that it felt like nothing any of them had experienced before. They could almost feel the lonely threats that were hovering behind them. The promise of never having a happy moment ever again. And all the while knowing what lay in store which somehow made it worse as they fought against the future WishRumple was attempting to force onto them.

O*U*A*T

Regina wasn’t as skilled a swordsman as this version of WishHenry was, but desperation could take you a surprisingly far amount of way when you needed it to and she was able to duck down and spin around some of his worst blows that would have surely ended her. She lifted the sword to protect herself against his swings, trying to hold him back and struggling to keep up with the younger boy at the same time. All the while her heart felt like it was shattering with every attack he launched. She once again had to remind herself that this was not the son she had raised, nor the son who loved her. This was a new boy. A boy whom she had destroyed when she killed his grandparents and ran away with his mother. This was all her fault…

Regina forced those thoughts away. Robin from her dream had been right. She couldn’t change the past and she couldn’t wallow in self pity at her mistakes. All she could do now was try and make up for them here and now. To fix the bad she had done by bringing the good back into the world, starting with her son. The feather he had given her was safely tucked into her bra, right over where her heart beat rapidly in her chest. Regina took strength from the soft tickle against her skin and pushed on.

“Henry.” She said desperately. “This isn’t the way.”

“You don’t get to decide that!” WishHenry snarled, pulling his sword back and swinging at her again.

O*U*A*T

Rumplestiltskin wished he had magic back. Now more than ever before. He was so weak and helpless and couldn’t even do anything to help the others to get away. At this point he no longer cared what happened to him – he had already lost out for his chance of happiness – but the others – Alice, Robin, Henry, even Hook – didn’t deserve any of this. Unfortunately, without his powers, there was nothing he could. In fact he was left to do what he always did best; focus on his own survival. Like a true coward.

Henry reached across the table desperately as the wind picked his feet up right from the ground. He shut his eyes, thinking of Lucy and Ella out in the world, hoping they weren’t suffering a similar experience. Hoping they were somewhere safe with his grandparents and the others. As he focused on his family, pushing out the thoughts that this was all happening because of him, he found the strength tighten his hold on the table, but already his arms were beginning to ache and he knew he couldn’t last long.

At the sound of her love’s screaming, Robin glanced up. She was strong, but the magic behind her was stronger and she could barely hold on even with all her concentration and strength, but she couldn’t resist checking on Alice when she heard her cry. With the wind slapping her hair into the face and almost blinding her, Robin caught sight of Alice being lifted far higher than everyone else. Was it just Robin’s imagination, or was the magic pulling onto Alice harder than it was anyone else?

“Alice, hold on!” Robin shrieked, watching the magic pull at Alice so her fingers slid along the wood of the table.

It wasn’t her imagination. She could tell now, WishRumple was putting more magic into Alice’s portal. Maybe because she was The Guardian, or maybe because he knew she meant a lot to the RealRumple, or maybe just because he was going to pick them out one by one and happen to start with her. Whatever the reason, Robin couldn’t bare to let Alice slip into that portal and be alone. But she couldn’t let go of the table to help her either. All she could do was continue to yell encouragement and hope they found a way out of this nightmare before it was too late.

“Alice! No! Hold on!” Robin screamed over the roaring of the wind, trying not to look to where WishRumple was clapping his hands like a giddy child in front of them.

Alice was doing everything she could. She squeezed her fingers down hard but the magic wind was ripping at her body with such intensity, she could barely breath. She tried to will her own magic to work but she couldn’t concentrate enough. Not on holding on and using magic at the same time. She should have trained more. Should have worked harder at becoming a better Guardian. Instead she ran to live a happy normal life and now everyone was going to suffer for it.

By her side, Killian had his hook locked around the other side of the table, making it easier for him to hold on but even that began to strain against the pressure. He glanced towards where his daughter was screaming by his side, her legs lifted high into the air and her fingers visibly slipping. She wouldn’t be able to hold on for much longer and there was no saying when this torment would end.

Knowing what was at stake and the only way to keep her safe, Killian ignored the steadily growing ache in his chest and began to shuffle down the table towards her. This was what he had been preparing for. Somehow he knew it would come down to this. His life had been an endless stream of revenge and misery, either for him or for others. If he was going to end it, he was going to end it protecting the one perfect thing he had ever created in his life. His daughter.

O*U*A*T

Their battle continued.

Regina was gradually losing the strength in her arms and her defence became weaker and weaker. It wasn’t just a physical toll, but an emotional one as well that weighed her down and made her sluggish. Even if he wasn’t her son, he looked the part and that alone was enough to feel like a real stab to her heart.

And then WishHenry was rushing at her, and Regina was barely getting her sword up in time. Their blades clanged together loudly and Henry suddenly caught her off guard as he twisted the pair of sword around against one another. With a firm flick of his wrist like a true pro marksman, suddenly Regina’s grip on the sword broke and it flew from her fingers, landing on the dirt away from them, out of her reach. It skidded across the ground and Regina immediately made to dive after it, only to stop when WishHenry’s sword lifted up and stretched out between them, forcing her to back up.

Then WishHenry was grabbing the front of her coat in his fist. He pushed her back against the tree so she was pinned and lifted the sword, pointing it at her face. Regina could have used magic, either to beat him or simply escape his hold but she wouldn’t do that. That was what she did when she murdered WishSnow and WishDavid. She ran away and left him with his misery and it was that misery that consumed and twisted him and led him to the man he was now.

Regina would not run away. Not this time.

“Henry… I’m so sorry.” Because what else was there left to say?

“You knew I wouldn’t listen to you! So why did you come here?!” WishHenry demanded angrily.

“I had to!” Regina insisted.

“No you didn’t! What do you want from me?!” WishHenry shouted, his voice breaking slightly in his desperation for answers. It was just a slim sign that there was still some good in him but it gave Regina a great bound of hope.

“I just want you to know that you aren’t alone.” Regina said. “Because I know what that’s like too.”

“You deserve to be alone. And that’s how you’re going to die!” WishHenry snarled.

“I know-” Regina began, ready to give her last plea to the boy who looked like son. Her last plea for WishHenry’s soul.

“SHUT UP!” WishHenry shouted, pulling her from the tree and slamming her back again, winding and silencing her all at once. “I am done listening to you. You stole everyone I cared about, ruined countless of lives, and now you are going to finally pay for all of them. I don’t just do this for me. I do this for all the people you’ve hurt in your own selfish desires!”

Regina wanted to try again, but her back was bruised as she was struggling to catch her breath. And in that moment, she saw the look in his eye and knew it was over. This wasn’t her Henry. This was someone new. A young boy that was lost to her forever.

As WishHenry pulled back his sword for one last final swing – to give her the finishing blow… Regina tearfully shut her eyes.

At least she’d finally be reunited with Robin.

Maybe this was her happy ending after all.

Peace.

O*U*AT

Alice let out one last scream as her hand finally slipped and he grip on the table broke. She cried out loudly as she felt her body lift completely up and fly backwards, a cold fear holding so tightly onto her as she realised what was going to happen, and she didn’t know how she would survive it a second time round. But then, at the last moment, she felt something suddenly grab onto her hand, pulling her to a stop. Her shrieking died down in relief and surprise, only to rise back up again as she saw what it was that had caught her. A familiar bright green glow shone in her face as she looked towards where her father had moved up just enough to reach out and grab her hand in time. His hook was still locked around the table, holding them both on, but now his face was twisted in agony as he gripped her hand so tightly, it felt like her fingers might snap.

“Papa, let go!” Alice shouted, not having to think twice about it. She couldn’t bare the thought of him dying, even if it meant giving up her happiness and returning to the loneliness of the tower.

In return, her papa didn’t need to think twice about his answer either. “Never!” He shouted, with such conviction Alice knew there was no point arguing. Even as the pain began to spread from his heart through to the rest of his body, he gripped her hand like there was nothing else in the wood, even while his hook pulling fiercely on the end of the table. It scratched and swung against the magic, but thankfully did not break and remained firmly locked down.

But even that wasn’t enough. He could feel Alice’s fingers slipping out of his grasp, no matter how tightly he clung on. Both of them were sweating hard and that mixed with the magic winds made it near impossible for them to keep their grip. Alice was going to slip free and then he would lose her forever to a fate worse than death.

O*U*A*T

“Henry, stop!”

WishHenry froze just before he could strike and Regina’s eyes snapped open. She looked up and nearly burst into relieved tears and two familiar figures broke through the clear and stepped into the wide space around them. As they did, WishHenry released her, taking a stunned step back and staring at the two of them like he had seen a ghost.

“Grandma… Grandpa…” WishHenry croaked.

“Henry,” Snow smiled sadly at him, sounding very out of breath. “You don’t want to do this.”

WishHenry blinked at her before shaking his head. “No. You’re not my grandparents.” He rounded on Regina, snarling and pointing the sword back at her throat. “You’re from her world! That other place!”

“That’s right!” David said quickly, holding out a hand and slowly walking around him, they had both put their weapons away on their quick approach and had no intention of drawing them again. “We’re not your actual grandparents… But we are a version of them.”

“And we’re here to stop you from doing something very foolish.” Snow said, walking around the other side, stepping closer than David dared and smiling softly at the young boy.

“Foolish?” WishHenry frowned, not taking his eyes off of Regina.

“Yes. Because it would truly be foolish, to darken your heart for the sake of revenge.” Snow said, reaching for him but stopping short when he moved slightly closer to Regina, the blade now pressing against the side of her neck.

“Why should I listen to you? You’re not my family!” WishHenry snapped. “She took my family! And now she has to pay! She killed everyone I cared about and ruined my life! And she’s ruined countless other lives as well!”

“Yes. Yes, she has.” Snow said quickly. “Regina has made more mistakes than anyone else. And she has suffered for all of them. She had taken people from their children, and then she had to live without her own son. And she has murdered loved ones and broken hearts. And in return she lost her own love.” Snow moved closer towards him. “Henry, Regina has paid more times over for her sins than anyone else.”

WishHenry wavered, glancing at her weakly. He couldn’t help it. When he looked at her, he saw his own loving grandmother. Though she was much younger, she had the same kind eyes and soft smile in the way that she looked at him.

“Put the sword down, Henry.” David said. He too, looked exactly like his real family. So much like the man who had taught him everything he knew about being a noble knight.

A noble knight who would never make them proud. Because these people weren’t his family. They were fakes. His real family was gone.

“Not until I kill her!” WishHenry snapped, rounding back on Regina who was frozen to the spot. She knew her life, and Henry’s, was relying completely on the Charming's.

“And then what?” Snow pressed, moving even closer until she could have touched him if she wanted. But she held herself back. She waited for the right time to close the gap between them. “And then what, Henry? What comes next?” She stressed the words slowly. When WishHenry didn’t answer, she went on. “Henry. If you kill Regina, then you get your revenge. But revenge wouldn’t make you happy. It won’t bring back your grandparents and it won’t fix the pain that is filling you up inside. It will only make it grow because without Regina, you won’t know what to do. Revenge is foolish but powerful and it can keep someone going until the end of time but once it’s gone, there’s nothing.”

WishHenry swallowed. He was shaking so hard, Regina was afraid he was going to cut her by mistake. “Then what do I do?!” He demanded.

“You heal, Henry.” Snow reached up, finally placing a hand on his shoulder. “The greatest revenge is to get your own happiness and you can only do that by letting go of the pain and allowing yourself to heal. I know things seem dark right now, and it feels like the pain will never go away and the world will never stop just throwing more misery down on top of you. But I promise you, that feeling is temporary. The world keeps turning, even while you suffer, and if you let yourself turn with it, then that pain will get easier to manage.” Snow squeezed his shoulder. “And once you heal, you can be happy, Henry. You can start your life a fresh. Do things right. Show Regina, and all other villains in the world, that their evil ways won’t affect you and they won’t stop you from living your life as a true and noble knight.”

Noble knight. That was what he was always meant to be. Noble.

Yet here he was, threatening to cut Regina down… But she deserved it! She took away his family!

“I lost my mother,” Snow said suddenly, drawing his attention back to her. “When I was just a child. Even younger than you. And then later my father and David lost both his parents too. We know the pain you’re in Henry. We understand how it feels and, trust me; I know what it is like to seek revenge. But it does not make you happy. It will never make you happy. The only thing that can is by being who you were always meant to be.” She stepped until she was right beside him. “A hero. One who does the right thing. Even if it doesn’t always feel like it.”

Tears had filled WishHenry’s eyes and he glanced at the woman by his side. She didn’t just look like his grandmother, but sounded and acted like her to, making it impossible for him to ignore her. “What if I can’t be a hero?” He asked, shakily.

“I know you can. Being a hero doesn’t always mean slaying the dragon.” Snow said quietly. “Sometimes it’s a simple… As setting an example.” She looked to Regina and smiled. “Sometimes it can simply be showing mercy. And forgiving those who wronged us most.” She looked back at WishHenry. “Be a hero, Henry.”

David moved up the other side of him, taking his free hand in his own. “We’re not worried about you, Henry. We both know you will do the right thing. We’re just here to let you know that you don’t have to do it alone. We may not be your real grandparents, but we are here for you.”

Tears were now flooding free, streaming down he cheeks as he looked between his grandparents, openly sobbing. There was a tense moment between the four of them as they all held still and waited before WishHenry finally slackened, dropping the sword down by his side without a second glance. Then he turned to the two grandparents he had lost and threw himself at them, bursting into tears against their comforting and familiar shoulders.

Regina felt herself relax and smiled at Snow over WishHenry’s shoulder. She watched grandparents embrace and comfort their alternative grandson. And even though Regina had been unable to get through to him… She was just glad someone had.

O*U*A*T

With one final scream building in Alice throat as she prepared for the inevitable, she knew what was coming next. Looking to her papa once more, Alice felt the tears fill her eyes, wishing she could say everything she was feeling… Instead, she could say nothing as she finally lost her grip, their hands breaking free…

Only for the portals to die down at the exact same time.

To Be Continued...

So the usual adding detail and thought but let's get to main change! The one I have wanted to do since I started this story. Fixing that complete and utter trash of a scene between Wish Henry and Regina.

Now, if they had Regina get through to Henry by talking him down, I might not have minded so much. However I refuse to accept the way they did it, which included WishHenry hugging her the woman who destroyed his life. But more than that, it seemed almost logical to have Snow and David be the ones to get through to him. Even Regina's line "but there are people out there… A good, kind version of your family that can help you heal" made it sound like it was foreshadowing Snowing showing up and saving the day. That just made the most damn sense to me! Have the grandparents Henry lost convince him to do the right thing... I am generally annoyed they decided to go with the fanservicy option of having Regina save the day even though it made no logical sense.

So I fixed it. I had Snowing come in and talk Henry down by reminding him of the man he could be and the grandparents they were to him. And I replaced that god awful WishRegalBeliever hug with a proper WishSnowingBeliever hug instead.

#once upon a time #OUAT Fanfiction #OUAT 7x22 Rewrite

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deepintoforestwego · 6 years

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Pros and cons of two hearts and other peculiarities: A personal account

For @slavicafire, a urban fantasy story based on lore of strzyga. Sorry it took so long and is so short. Hope you (and others) like it.

1# early childhood

Your father was a folklorist. Your mother was witch.

What that meant was, that when you were born, with two sets of teeth (one, to be fair, smaller then other) and monitor picking up two heartbeats, they almost immediately knew what was up.

Which also meant your mother got in trouble for casting several rather harsh illusion and memory altering spells. Which are complicated and iffy on their own, and much less when witch in question is only half conscious and just went through labor. Your grandparents are still giving her earful about that.

Point is, anyway, that sometimes children like you were abandoned. it is rarer in this new, smarter, thankfully less superstitious age (though some, as always, would argue it is worse), but in centuries before such children, or those suspected for no good, true reason, were abandoned in woods, or at best, chased away after certain age when community couldn’t stand them.

Your parents, however, were reasonable, caring and good people who wouldn’t allow such tiny thing to get in way of loving and appreciating their daughter(s). They didn’t call attention to your strange behaviors, or try to forget them-loving whole of you.

Even if it made feeding time very awkward.

2# Being wonder child

Most kids like you do not actually display any abilities before certain age, or in case of accident, which of course requires you to lose one half of your being. Thankfully, you didn’t have to go through that traumatic experience, as well as devastating mental consequences it contained when one half of your mind/life/best friend forever is lost.

However, training and keeping those powers secret, when you live in a village (which, whether because such is nature of small communities, or because your people are like that, means deaf grandma of your mom’s hated neighbor knows what you ate for breakfast) was rather hard and embarrassing.

But you learn on mistakes. And at least your dad’s best friend’s annoying cousin never comes over again. It was worth lecture and denied chocolate.

3# Smelling blood

A fantastic nose capable of smelling, discerning and categorizing blood. Useful for detecting sickness, knowing which blood group you need when making transfusion (other nurses turn blind eye to that) and discerning whether meal is fresh.

It is also not good pick-up line, small talk and way to greet grandma.

4# Shapeshifting

Do you know what wonder it is, to have your whole body just-change and become something else? For mass to shrink and cells to rearrange, in direct defiance to laws of nature, for you to become animal but still think like human, to rise and soar through air, wind and moonlight caressing your feathers.

Plus owl are amazing. Even if it hurts at first to transform in one.

5# Detecting life

This is how a strzyga hunts:her soul senses and feels life around her sensing it’s different shades and forms. Life of doe and rose tastes very differently for example.

And even dead carry feelings of it, shadows and memories. To taste death is to taste cold ash upon tongue, and murky, freezing river traveling through your bowels, a sound of laments echoing through your head.

But it can be so damaging, so painful, to sense it all. You need to learn to numb it, make it weaker, ignore it, even as you earn to taste it all. Some strzygas, old and powerful enough, can even feel microbes, which is why they generally go mad.

6# Two minds

Having another person up there with you is an amazing, wonderful feeling.You are never alone, and it feels like having best friend who always understands, a sister you never truly had. Plus, it is extremely helpful when you are at university and swamped with work.

Downsides:appearing to forget some appointment because your other half didn’t remember to tell you what they promised, conflicting crushes, fashion tastes (gothic for human, pastel and cute for demon) and some contrasting lifestyle choices ( we do not talk about week your human half decided to go vegan).

Anyway, you invest in lot of stick-it notes.

7# Trance

That is how you decided to call feeling your other side feels enters when it isn’t in control. A half dream, blind and deaf, yet getting emotions and hearing thoughts of dominant half, and whispering advices like some crazy, unstoppable conscience that also happen to have no idea what it is doing.

8# Meeting your girlfriend

You are floored and confused and completely non responsive (general state of strzyga, who, as strzygons are rather rare, are in your experience mostly feeling preference for other woman).

she is beautiful, but that hits you last, and her AB positive blood group comes close to it. What hits you first is sense of her life, of power within her. Energy within her swirls and twists, coils like a snake around you, with force of tempest about to unleash it’s fury, like thousand spring flowers waiting to bloom.

‘‘Are you okay?’‘ She asks, and syringe meant to take her blood for her blood test misses and hits you in forearm.

9# First date

It is an awkward, busy mess both of times. Two souls inside of you both scream and panic, while she seems so relaxed and confident (you will learn, later, that you two together were both more collected then she was). Fact that she is witch and actually remembers each of your names, favorite foods and music tastes just adds to it.

You make awkward joke she rolls over on floor, makes waiter blush and old people look funny at you thrice, break two dishes and spill wine twice. In your defense she overshares five times,and once accidentally makes lightbulb break.

You find common taste in tv shows, get in discussion which animals best (hedgehog, toad for two of you, snake for her) and dance on cobblestones in rain.

10# Family dinner

Your parents already accepted you. It is however quite wonder when you are invited for Easter to spend time with hers.

Anxiety fills you up, when you see her hundred and counting rich cousins, meet her awesome mothers, both accomplished sorceresses ( genetic scientist and mechanic also), her spinster singer and model aunt (who has no makeup, yet looks exactly as she does on photos, too many illusions and glamour magics) and actually get involved in fight about her fourth aunt not coming over despite not knowing how it happened.

There is same power in them all, but different from hers, a great weight of life and energy that struggles as if their bodies are to small for it, tasting of hundred different species, hundred different demons, their energies sluggish and thick and bitter and hurting you from intensity, even as she squeezes your arm and asks if you need to go outside.

Her smirk when you insult her loud, angry uncle by showing him both of your teeth sets is worth it all though.

11# Lifetime

‘‘Are you sure it will work?’‘ You ask, for now there are both of you, brought by her magic, her will, awake at same time.

‘‘Of course my dears. One of you is already undead, it will be no trouble to make others so.’‘ She says with quick kiss, magic sparkling like electrical charge at lips.

‘‘But how will it work is completely other question.’‘ Voice calls out from behind, dark and low, and you almost jump, because for first time in your life you feel nothing at all.

You turn, and from shadows steps a woman, tiny and upper end of middle ages, dressed in modest , elegant skirt and button up shirt, eyes obscured by netlike veil hanging off small cute hat covering her bun.

You close your eyes, breathe deep and sharp, and take step back. This woman is blind spot in your otherworldly vision, a presence you cannot find and identify, world silent and empty around her, as if she was never alive at all.

‘‘Auntie, please don’t lecture me.’‘ Your love groans, and you wonder if she knows how her aunt ( madwoman witch monster demon dirty blood teen pregnancy bastard stain upon family unfortunate choice widow foreigner not ours criminal you remember, remember what they told about her) does that, how can she wrap herself behind so much magic you cannot even feel she exists and not choke on it, and wonder if your love will learn that someday too.

‘‘I will if I have reason to. Binding human to demon side is easy. Making yourself live on after what you were afforded isn’t. It requires blood.’‘ She says, and in step crosses over, like winter wind.Your love looks down on her.

‘‘I know. I know the price, and for her- for our sake, I will pay it.’‘ Her power blazes, a bonfire and storm and earthquake, and you delight in it, in her strength and magic and stubborness.

‘‘Of course you will. It is love, after all.’‘ Her aunt moves lace covered hand and puts on her cheek.

‘‘When you do ritual-be sure that sacrifice is somebody deserving. The Cold Lady’s ire will be earned either way, but by this it will be appeased for some time, instead of invoking Her wrath. Be smart.’‘ She says, and in tradition of all aunts across Balkan, shoves money in your love’s palm, and spends next fifteen minutes arguing whether it is appropriate gift (your love snatches it away finally, acceptable loss).

‘‘As for you... Love her well, and that will be good enough. Otherwise...’‘ And before disappearing in shadows she smiles, and you are sure her teeth are sharp and white, kind that can feast upon bones.

‘‘And that trouble is gone too...Now let us get on track, shall we?’‘ She asks, before you start playing with her hair.

12# Lifegoals

So, what should strzyga, her artificial vampire sister/other half and their quasi-immortal witch girlfriend do with rest of their long lives.

Well, love, explore, do whatever they want, and curse those that get in way of it, of course.

#slavic folklore #urban fantasy #writeblr #vampires #wlw

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icephas · 3 years

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Dysfunction at Home - Choosing a New Direction

Sunday, August 1

Joseph knew about dysfunctional families. It had already started with his great-grandparents, Abraham and Sarah. When Sarah realized that she was barren, she had convinced Abraham to go to her servant Hagar. As soon as Hagar was pregnant, the rivalry began. Growing up in this atmosphere, Ishmael and Isaac took the tension into their own families. Isaac made a point of favoring Esau, and Jacob spent his life trying to earn his father’s love and respect. Later on, Jacob was tricked into marrying two sisters who did not get along and competed with each other through a childbearing race, even enlisting their maids to bear Jacob’s children.

Review the incident detailed in Genesis 34. What kind of emotional and relational impact would all this incident have had on the family as a whole and on young Joseph, as well?

The rivalry between the mothers obviously spilled over to the children, who grew up ready to pick a fight. As young adults, Joseph’s older brothers already had massacred all the males in the town of Shechem. The oldest brother Reuben displayed dominance and defiance to his aging father by sleeping with Bilhah, Rachel’s maid and the mother of several of Jacob’s children (Genesis 35:22). Meanwhile, Joseph’s brother Judah mistook his widowed daughter-in-law for a prostitute and ended up having twins with her (Genesis 38).

Jacob added fuel to the fire of all this family tension by his obvious favoritism toward Joseph in giving him an expensive colorful coat (Genesis 37:3). If ever there was a dysfunctional family, the patriarch’s family could have competed with it.

Why do you think that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are all listed as faith heroes in Hebrews 11:17-22 when you consider their messy family relationships?

God’s faith champions often fall short of their own and God’s expectations. These men are listed in Hebrews 11 not because of their messy family relationships but in spite of them. They learned — often the hard way — about faith, love, and trust in God as they wrestled with these family issues.

What family dysfunction have you inherited? How can surrendering yourself to the Lord and His ways help break that pattern, at least for the future?

Monday, August 2

Joseph takes pain, complicated relationships, and anxiety with him as he travels to Egypt, where he is to be sold as a slave. This was not a restful trip as he fought back the tears.

“Meanwhile, Joseph with his captors was on the way to Egypt. As the caravan journeyed southward toward the borders of Canaan, the boy could discern in the distance the hills among which lay his father’s tents. Bitterly he wept at the thought of that loving father in his loneliness and affliction. Again the scene at Dothan came up before him. He saw his angry brothers and felt their fierce glances bent upon him. The stinging, insulting words that had met his agonized entreaties were ringing in his ears. With a trembling heart he looked forward to the future. What a change in situation — from the tenderly cherished son to the despised and helpless slave! Alone and friendless, what would be his lot in the strange land to which he was going? For a time Joseph gave himself up to uncontrolled grief and terror. …

Then his thoughts turned to his father’s God. In his childhood he had been taught to love and fear Him. Often in his father’s tent he had listened to the story of the vision that Jacob saw as he fled from his home an exile and a fugitive. … Now all these precious lessons came vividly before him. Joseph believed that the God of his fathers would be his God. He then and there gave himself fully to the Lord, and he prayed that the Keeper of Israel would be with him in the land of his exile.” Ellen G. White, Patriarchs and Prophets, pp. 213, 214

Some cultures emphasize the role of the community over the individual, while other cultures are inclined to emphasize the role of the individual over the community. While we find a balance between these two in Scripture, there is clearly a call to personal as well as corporate commitment to God. Joseph begins to find rest in his relationships by making a personal decision to follow God.

What do the following verses teach us about personal commitment? (Deuteronomy 4:29, Joshua 24:15, 1 Chronicles 16:11, Psalms 14:2, Proverbs 8:10, Isaiah 55:6).

To find rest, we each must make a personal decision to follow God. Even if our ancestors were spiritual giants, this faith and spirituality aren’t transmitted genetically. Remember, God has only children, no grandchildren.

Why is it important every day, even every moment of every day, to choose to commit yourself to God? What happens when you don’t?

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gabriel-berry · 3 years

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𝓖𝓪𝓫𝓻𝓲𝓮𝓵 𝓑𝓮𝓻𝓻𝔂

NAME: Gabriel Luke Berry AGE & BIRTHDAY: 20 years old. 18th September. FACE CLAIM: Matt Cornett. HOMETOWN: Lima, Ohio. CURRENT CITY: New York City. SEXUAL ORIENTATION & GENDER: Cismale. Bi-curious.

Sometimes I can be: Energetic, Curious and Devoted. Othertimes I can be: Un-trusting, Self-critical and Shy.

Gabriel is something you should never call him, unless you’re his Mom and even then she’ll get a scowl in response. Gabe has lived an unsettled life but it’s all he knows. Whether it be having to move house at five because a “bad man broke in” and then living at his Grandparent’s. He’s spent a lot of time at his Grandparent’s house while growing up. Not that he minded too much, he was always spoiled by them and he could see his Mom was busy.

Moving to their own house was a dream, it was their house. He ran around the house three times with excitement upon arriving and was astonished to hear he had his own room. It meant a lot for the boy to feel some normality.

The break-in left him unsettled and Gabe often demanded his Mom to check all of the windows and the doors countless times before he went to sleep. Upon learning of her new job as a Police Officer, his fears soon settled and their house became a safe space, one which Gabe is rather protective over.

As the years went by and he got older, he began to recognise how little of his mother he saw. Going through Middle School and having to wait for his Grandparent’s or a family friend to collect him became tiresome. Not knowing if she’d be home for dinner or if he could ask her to come to his basketball game started to take it’s toll. That all changed after blowing up at his Grandma.

In a fit of tears, he let out the bottled up emotions, claiming he wished she was home more and why did she have to go out and help everyone else but she wasn’t there to help with his homework. He argued the point about her keeping him safe, yelling that he’d rather her be here than be safe. After a long conversation with his Grandma, he came to realise a new perspective.

Besides mixed feelings, Gabe adores his mother. She’s his world and the only reason he ever feels upset with her is because he’s missing her. He loves getting her attention and if it was just them against the world for the rest of his life, he would be happy with that. That ended up changing when his Mom met someone and Gabe immediately became apprehensive.

Gabe has a huge love for technology. He can fix your iPhone screen in a matter of minutes and knows his way around computers and software, like he speaks the coding language. His room is littered with dismantled cameras and pieces of junk he’s found at the thrift store. Looking through a lens is where he discovered his love of storytelling. He’s created a few animation films and chose to persue that world when taking his next step in life towards University.

After a year and a half at University of Ohio, Gabe knew his heart wasn’t in his degree. His Moms had moved to New York and although he had his Uncles, Gabe couldn’t help but feel some seperation anxiety. That and the burden of running out of money was stressing him to no ends. Who knew text books and computer softwares could be so expensive?

A transfer to NYU was arranged and he’s moved back in with his parents for the weekends and stays on campus during the week. He’s excited for the Directing and Animation course he’s enrolled on and a little nervous for the basketball try-outs coming up but he feels more settled, when the city isn’t being too overwhelming.Though he’s got his Moms to put the world right when needed!

𝓟𝓮𝓸𝓹𝓵𝓮 𝓘𝓷 𝓜𝔂 𝓦𝓸𝓻𝓵𝓭

BREEZE BERRY-ROSE (Mother):

Gabriel adores his mother. How could he not? She’s his entire world. He knows her too well, often talking in a series of grumbles whenever the time is anything before noon. When moving out, he was reassured from regular Facetimes and back and forth texts of ridiculous memes. He does worry about her in her line of work but he chooses to ignore that. Seeing her happy is his comfort place and after Iris moved in, he’s noticed the smile very rarely disappears. They’re definitely the Three Musketeers.

IRIS ROSE-BERRY (Step-Mother):

Hearing of someone else joining the two of them came with immediate defiance. He was eight and definitely not fond of the idea of sharing his Mom. With the constant unrest, he only met Iris with evil stares and silence. To him, she was first percieved as a threat, someone to take his Mom away from him. How wrong he was. Iris is now his ride or die, she’s his best friend and more importantly, she’s his Mom. He won’t ever forget the day he asked Breeze if he was allowed to bring the question to Iris. Asking her to be his step-mom was a moment he holds dearly. She’s the constant he needs in his life and she grounds both him and his mother in different ways.

UNAMED (Father):

As he’s grown and become more aware of the world, Gabe has come to realise he does have a father out there. Not that he would ever give him the right to own that title, Gabe had hoped if he was interested in him then he would have reached out. Sometimes he blames himself and becomes overly critical, claiming he’s not good enough at things, stemming back to the idea that he wasn’t worth a hello. He remains curious and questions whether he wants to see him but quickly cuts that idea short. That man doesn’t deserve him or a look-in on the little family they have.

#biography

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nigiyakapepper · 6 years

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magic | voltron; allurance

For Allurance Week 2017 Day 1 - AU: Modern w/ Magic

Summary/Excerpt: “Hey baby, if I were an enzyme, I’d be a DNA helicase so I could unzip your genes.”

That was Lance McClain, obnoxious flirt, with unfairly pretty handwriting and meticulous notes, never without hand cream and a glass bottle of gourmet-looking tea, whose best friend made the. best. cookies in the entire world.

magic | ao3

“Have a nice day, Mrs. Reyes!”

“You too, dear!”

The door closes with a merry jingle and Allura sighs, a small bemused smile playing on her lips. She looks around the shop—at its shelves of homemade tea, candles, oils, dried herbs, jars of spices and powdered roots, crystals, glass eyes to ward off evil and hammered gold amulets to protect the wearer from various things, and thinks, This is my life now.

She supposes she remembers how this started. She was a nervous freshman in college, about to embark on the treacherous, glorious road to becoming a surgeon just like her father. A boy had waltzed into her bio class, stopped dead when he saw her, beamed like a kid on Christmas, sat beside her and delivered the most awful pick-up line in the history of pick-up lines.

“Hey baby, if I were an enzyme, I’d be a DNA helicase so I could unzip your genes.”

(She was also wearing a skirt that day.)

Somewhere in between the professor pairing them up for the final requirement of the semester, spending endless hours in the library, enduring the cheesiest pick-up lines with increasingly fond exasperation, and arguing over a lot of things from the cohesion of a paper to whether or not sugar scrubs were really good for your skin, Allura fell in love.

It wasn’t anything monumental, only a realization that built up in moments and made itself known in the quiet afternoons they spent together.

“Lance, you’ve already read this week’s chapter?” “I have to. I’m bad at studying. It takes a while for me to understand things.”

“Hey, Princess!” “Ugh…kill me.” “Nope. Nu-uh. Eat this turkey and cheese. Get through Wednesday’s report then ask me again, okay?”

“Hunk wants to change majors?” “Oh yeah. But he’s on scholarship so he has to stay in Engineering for at least a year.” “Why is he taking Biology with us?” “Because he’s crazy? Who takes this course for fun? Apparently him!” “He knows you need his madeleines.” “God yes, we need his madeleines.”

“Good morning, Princess! Are you today’s date? Because you’re ten outta ten!” “Aaaand it has been zero days since our last pick-up line.” That’d been Hunk. “I’m surprised you didn’t use that for tomorrow. Eleven out of ten,” she’d replied, more amused now than annoyed. “And miss the chance to tell you you’re beautiful today? I would never.” Hunk laughed as she rolled her eyes.

“'Llura, why did you decide to be a surgeon?” “Well…it’s always been something I thought I’d head towards. There aren’t a lot of women in surgery, you know?” A pause, where Lance had waited for her to go on. “I know it sounds silly, wanting to follow in my father’s footsteps, but wanting to break new ground. I won’t be surprised if my connections get me places, because I know that’s how it is in medicine. But…but I want to make it on my own too.” Lance had smiled at her, when she looked up from her hands that she couldn’t keep from fidgeting. “Nothin’ less from our Princess.”

“What about you, Lance? Why do you want to be a nurse?” “I wanna take care of my grandparents, then my parents, when they get old.” “Your grandparents are still alive, aren’t they?” “Mmhmm, both sides. After I get my license, I’m gonna go back home and take care of them.” Allura had made a noise of confusion, to which Lance followed up with, “Grandpa on my mom’s side owns a shop. I want to help him run it.” “What kind of shop?” “…a magical shop.” Allura had looked at him, and Lance made a strange face that was sheepish, defensive, and proud. “We sell magic.” A pause. “What?” “Nothing. It kind of makes sense.” “What does?” “With the tea. And your energy.” “You believe me?” “Sure.” Allura was familiar with some traditional doctors because of her father’s work. “I’ve been with you on days we get an hour of sleep and you clearly aren’t human.” Lance had waggled his eyebrows at her. “Now that might just be talent—oof!” “Your liver is going to pay in thirty years,” she said, her palm on his face.

“Going home for the weekend, Lance?” “M’thinkin’ about it. My brothers are taking the bar exam soon and I’d rather not be home.” “You’re that kind of youngest child?” “The ‘you’re our seventh offspring, go do whatever you want’ kind? Yeah. I was thinkin’ of going with Hunk but his nieces are over.” “I could stay with you.” He stared and Allura flushed. “I mean not go home either. Stay at my own dorm, but keep you company. So the long weekend won’t be too boring.” She tried to ignore the way her heart squeezed when Lance smiled like the sun.

Small gestures followed that. Lance brought her tea along with his own, and sometimes enchanted coffee. They literally burned midnight oil when they needed to—a soothing, energizing blend of eucalyptus, lavender, lemon, and rosemary while cramming for Finals Week. When she was stuck on a paper for History, he placed a gorgeous oval of Tiger’s Eye on her laptop keyboard, “For focus,” he said brightly.

“This question might offend you,” Allura told him one day over lunch. “Hmm?” Lance was in mid-bite. “Have you ever thought…well, have you ever thought of magic not working?” “Oh, loads of times.” He swallowed before continuing. “Grandpa explained it to me once, like, he’d do the rituals, brew those teas, and make all sorts of stuff not because he believed them, y’know? But because they worked. Like sometimes he’d do things to prove they wouldn’t work but they do. So he keeps doing them.” Allura smiled.

Somehow, like that, four years pass. They spend even more time together after Hunk shifts to Food Science, despite the increasing number of classes they don’t share. Lance invites her over to his house for lunch one weekend thinking nothing of it, until his mother asks, “Are you two dating?”

And before Lance could sputter out his embarrassed denial, Allura took hold of his hand, looked at him and said, “Why not?”

He sputtered anyway. “I mean…are you sure?”

“I’m sure, you silly. Even if I don’t know why myself.”

His chin had scrunched up in the most adorable way and he stared at her in some sort of weird defiance she didn’t understand until she heard his next words, “Allura, I swear I’d never ever put a love spell on you. Pipo, tell me you didn’t.”

Lance’s grandfather laughed a hearty belly laugh that warmed up the dining room. “You don’t leave matters of the heart to magic, mijo. Though I get why you think I would.”

“Hey!”

Allura herself had taken Lance to meet her own parents the weekend after that. Her father was already alright with him but pretended to be intimidating anyway, because it was fun.

She smiles at the memories. And here she is now, supposedly studying for med school, but the shop is peaceful, the air heavy with summer heat, earthy scents, and something else she’s becoming increasingly aware of since she’s met Lance—a pleasant thrum of energy that can be directed into anything from sleepy to electric.

She moves from the counter to peek into the office, where she knows Lance is working on some spell jars. She has mind to tell him to take a break, when she stops and watches.

Lance’s eyes are closed. He is surrounded by candles and his body sways to the easy beat of Wang Chung’s Dance Hall Days. He was never one for sitting still in anything. He meditates in movement, and going into a trance is no different. Allura’s breath catches when he opens his eyes. They’re unfocused yet a brighter blue in the glow of candlelight. His face is relaxed, lines smoothed out and cut in sharp shadows. His whole self is seemingly charged enough to vibrate out of his skin, body barely containing raw energy waiting to be directed. He starts singing a little, more loose and free.

It looks like a whole lot of nothing, but Allura feels drawn to him, like a stray thread of light’s hooked into her navel and tugs her forward. She smiles as her heart swells, feeling a bit like she’s too big for her body too.

“What about you?” “What about me?” “Do you believe in magic? And don’t say what I know you want to say—” she said, catching Lance’s smirk a little too late. “—If the universe has allowed me to meet you, then yes I do.” “Dear god…” “You walked right into that one, Princess.”

END

#voltron #voltron legendary defender #vld #allurance #allura #lance #allurance week #allurance2k17 #alluranceweek2k17 #i need a fic tag

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tometender · 5 years

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A Touch of Forever

Written by: Jo Goodman

Series: The Cowboys of Colorado (Book 3)

Mass Market Paperback: 416 pages

Publisher: Berkley (June 4, 2019)

ISBN-10: 0440000645

ISBN-13: 978-0440000648

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Touch-Forever-...

Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/a-to...

Itunes: https://books.apple.com/us/book/a-tou...

A marriage of convenience turns into a sweetly seductive love-off-the-rails romance in the latest Cowboys of Colorado novel from USA Today bestselling author Jo Goodman. Lily Salt has sworn off men. After finally gaining her independence, the last thing she needs is another man telling her what to do. But the handsome railroad engineer from New York isn't at all what she expected. He's kind, gentle...and tempting enough to make her wonder what a second chance at love might be worth. A self-acknowledged black sheep, Roen Shepard knows what it means to feel alone. Recognizing a kindred spirit in the reserved widow whose fascinating blue-green eyes have seen too much, and charmed by the warmth of her ready-made family, the two begin an unlikely friendship. When a complication from his past follows him to Frost Falls, Roen proposes a mad scheme to protect the new life he's built and keep close the stubborn woman he's accidentally fallen for--a marriage of convenience. But Lily has secrets of her own, and the closer he gets to uncovering them, the more he comes to realize that the only truth that matters is the secret to unlocking her heart.

A Touch of Forever by Jo Goodman The story was nothing like I expected from the blurb but became so much more as it developed. Written back when the railroad was blazing trails across the country a single mother, leery of men meets a railroad surveyor-construction engineer. Slow building with lots of chemistry. A Touch of Forever provides a great, heartfelt romance, family, friendship, betrayal and even a murder mystery. I received this ARC copy of A Touch of Forever from Berkley Publishing Group. This is my honest and voluntary review. A Touch of Forever is set for publication June 4, 2019. Excerpt Back in New York, they called him the black sheep. Not to his face. Or rarely to his face. But he’d heard it whispered in a pitying sort of way in the free-spirited Bohemian circles where his family was revered. Roen Shepard didn’t mind particularly. Depending on one’s view, he supposed it might even be true. It was certainly his family’s view; although the appellation was couched in humor, not pity. They were dreamers. He was not. He’d been stewed in creative juices since birth. Musicians. Painters. Poets. Novelists. Surrounded by so much talent and imaginative genius, something should have inspired him. Nothing had. He’d never been afraid to try, and so, encouraged by his parents and grandparents, by his siblings and cousins, by his tutors and teachers, he tried his hand at every sort of artistic endeavor. He was fair to middlin’ on the piano if there weren’t too many sharps or flats, and if he wasn’t required to sing at the same time. For a while, he thought painting might be his forte. He could put a still life on canvas that looked exactly like the bowl of fruit on the table in front of him. It was politely pointed out to him that he represented the fruit too accurately. A photograph would do just as well, his mother said, and that would not do at all. He wrote bad poetry and even worse prose. He’d once revised the first chapter of a proposed novel sixteen times before his father kindly took the pages and burned them. The differences between him and his family were not only artistic ones. There were physical differences as well, so many of them, in fact, that his brother and sisters teased him mercilessly that he was a foundling adopted by their parents in one of the impulsive, magnanimous gestures they were known for. Thinking about it now, Roen smiled to himself. He was still a fish out of water at family affairs, but as an adult, he’d come into his own. He could joke, before his family did, that he had physical stature if not an artistic one. He could also have pointed out that he was not possessed of the same fiery temperament as the rest of the Shepards, but they would have said he lacked their passion and wouldn’t have understood that he was thankful for it. Roen studied the drawing he had made in his sketch pad, reviewed the calculations, checking and rechecking his work on the elevations, and, once satisfied, closed the book with a pleasant thump. It was only then that he became aware that he was not alone, and he guessed that he hadn’t been for some time. Roen could acknowledge that upon occasion he had an extraordinary eye for detail while being oblivious to the whole. This was one of those occasions. He looked up from his sketch pad and turned his head in the direction of his visitor. He merely raised an inquiring eyebrow. A lesser man might have flinched at being caught out, perhaps even been unseated from his hunkered position on the rocky outcropping where he was perched like a bird of prey, but Clay Salt didn’t twitch. Roen estimated the boy was eleven, maybe twelve, so that explained both his curiosity and his lack of embarrassment. “Are you done now, mister? Seems like you might be. Didn’t want to disturb you none while you was working, so I just settled down to watch. I never seen the like before, what you were doing. That much fascinated I was.” Roen had no recollection of anyone ever being fascinated by what he did, and he looked for mischief in young Clay’s eyes. What he saw were a pair of dark brown eyes, earnest in their direct gaze and without a shred of guile. “Did you follow me up here, Clay?” Now Clay flinched. “You know who I am?” “Uh-huh. Why does that surprise you?” “Well, you’re new to town. You’ve hardly been here more than a minute.” “Three weeks. People are friendly, and I’ve been to your church twice. Saw you there with your mother and your brother and sisters. Between the minister and Mrs. Springer, I believe I was introduced to every parishioner.” “Yeah? Not us.” “No, that’s true. I misspoke. I’m pleased to make your acquaintance now.” “Are you? Ma said I should leave you be, that your work is too important to suffer the children.” Roen’s cocked an eyebrow again, this time with a challenging curve. “Suffer the children? Did she say that?” Clay shrugged, unabashed. “Something like that.” “I see. So you are in defiance of your mother’s wishes right now.” “Not really. You didn’t know I was here until you were done so you didn’t have to suffer me at all.”

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networkingdefinition · 4 years

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Hamsters Quotes

Official Website: Hamsters Quotes

• A squat cannot be performed on a Smith machine any more than it can be performed in a small closet with a hamster. – Mark Rippetoe • Adrenaline kicks you in when you’re starving. That’s what nobody understands. Except for being hungry and cold, most of the time I feel like I can do anything. It gives me superhuman powers of smell and hearing. I can see what people are thinking, stay two steps ahead of them. I do enough homework to stay off the radar. Every night I climb thousands of steps into the sky to make me so exhausted that when I fall into bed, I don’t notice Cassie. Then suddenly it’s morning and I leap on the hamster wheel and it starts all over again. – Laurie Halse Anderson • And then the turbines generate electricity that goes into the whole town.” “You mean they aren’t powered by giant hamsters on wheels? I was misinformed. – Michael Grant • At school, our classroom had a small rodent zoo consisting of two rabbits, three hamsters, a litter of baby gerbils and a guinea pig. At first, I’d thought the teacher was raising snack food, which impressed me, being the first sign of intelligence she’d shown. Soon, though, I’d figured out the animals’ true purpose and left them alone, though I would never understand the appeal of petting and coddling perfectly good food. – Kelley Armstrong

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'Hamster', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '68', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_hamster').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_hamster img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

• But I just felt at one point that I was on a hamster wheel, you know? Just doing movie after movie and thinking so much about career related things and I think missing out on hanging with my friends and family as much I needed to. – Woody Harrelson • DNS is kind of the hamster under the hood that drives the Internet. – David Ulevitch • Even as a child I was fascinated by death, not in a spiritual sense, but in an aesthetic one. A hamster or guinea pig would pass away, and, after burying the body, I’d dig it back up: over and over, until all that remained was a shoddy pelt. It earned me a certain reputation, especially when I moved on to other people’s pets. “Igor,” they called me. “Wicked, spooky.” But I think my interest was actually fairly common, at least among adolescent boys. At that age, death is something that happens only to animals and grandparents, and studying it is like a science project. – David Sedaris • Girls were nice to me in the same way that they would be nice to a hamster. I fantasized about wild encounters with females but knew they’d never happen unless my own involvement could somehow go undetected. – Joel Achenbach • Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the Styrofoam cup-they all die. So do we. – Robert Fulghum • Have you noticed how the Republicans and Democrats try to copy each other at their conventions. Like at the Democratic convention John Kerry’s daughter told a story about how he once gave CPR to her hamster. At the Republican convention the Bush girls are going to tell a story about how when their hamster was bad, their dad built them a little electric chair. – Jay Leno • Haven’t had your fill of interesting events?” “Never. They are the spice of life.” She held up her half-finished hat. “How do you like it?” “It’s nice. The blue is pretty. But what do the runes say?” “Raxacori-Oh, never mind. It wouldn’t mean a thing to you anyway. Safe travels to you and Saphira, Eragon. And remember to watch out for earwigs and wild hamsters. Ferocious things, wild hamsters.” – Christopher Paolini • He was not used to the smell of dragon breath, which is best described as a combination of the stench of burning rubber and the stink of old socks, with overtones of a hamster cage in dire need of a cleaning. – Angie Sage • I always find cardio the most monotonous. Running on a treadmill shows me why hamsters are so crazy. – Luke Evans • I always see to the dogs first and leave the cats and the occasional birds and rabbits and hamsters for later. It isn’t that I play favorites, it’s just that dogs are needier than other pets. Leave a dog alone for very long and it’ll start going a little nuts. Cats, on the other hand, try to give you the impression that they didn’t even notice you were gone. Oh, were you out? they’ll say, I didn’t notice. Then they’ll raise their tails to show you their little puckered anuses and walk away.- Blaize Clement • I can’t shut my brain off. It’s like a hamster wheel.” ~ Justin – Richelle Mead • I could keep trying to do the same kind of comedies. You know how it’s going to go, and you can get an audience with it, but then I feel like a hamster on a wheel. – Vince Vaughn • I do not mean to be the slightest bit critical of TV newspeople, who do a superb job, considering that they operate under severe time constraints and have the intellectual depth of hamsters. But TV news can only present the “bare bones” of a story; it takes a newspaper, with its capability to present vast amounts of information, to render the story truly boring. – Dave Barry • I don’t believe in happy endings. Children have got to face death sooner or later. Granny and Grandpa die, dogs die, cats die, gerbils and those frightful things – what are they called? – hamsters: all die like flies. So there’s no point avoiding it. – Raymond Briggs • I don’t believe in reincarnation, and I didn’t believe in it when I was a hamster. – Shane Richie • I don’t want to talk to you no more, you empty headed animal food trough wiper. I fart in your general direction. Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries. – Graham Chapman • I feel so agitated all the time, like a hamster in search of a wheel. – Carrie Fisher • I got ham but I’m not a Hamster – Bill Bailey • I know what the intimidation level of high school is. You’re on a hamster wheel, running, running, running, trying so hard to fit in. It’s all about how you deal with what you’re given, feeling OK with being the odd man out before you’re finally successful. – Drew Barrymore • I love running cross-country…You come up a hill and see two deer going, ‘What the hell is he doing?’ On a track I feel like a hamster. – Robin Williams • I love watching him think,” Maeve told Lily. “You can almost hear that poor little hamster running and running on its wheel. – Jim Butcher • I voted against Gerald Nabarro in my first general election, but my defiance made no difference. If you had put a Conservative rosette on a mustachioed hamster, it would have been elected. – Jeremy Paxman • If anybody felt worse than I did, it was Amos. I had just enough magic to turn myself into a falcon and him into a hamster (hey, I was rushed!) – Rick Riordan • If the sun were made of hamsters, the earth would be incinerated. – Michael Schumacher • I’m done with men. I have a hamster. That’s all I need. – Janet Evanovich • It’s fine to be on the hamster wheel, running and running, trying to grab the brass ring or whatever you define as success, but your relationships, that’s really all that matters when it’s all said and done. – Katie Couric • It’s for the hamster that I’m gonna buy! This is so perfect! (after opening a hamster wheel at Christmas) – Gerard Way • I’ve lived here … my whole life. It’s where I lost all my baby teeth. Where tiny hamster, gerbil, and bird skeletons lie in rotted-out cardboard coffins beneath the oak tree in our backyard. Also where, if some future archaeologist goes digging, they’ll find the remains of a plush toy: a gray terrier named Toto I buried after the accident. – Jennifer McMahon • Lissa knelt down, compassion on her face. I wasn’t surprised, since she’d always had a thing for animals. She’d lectured me for days after I’d instigated the infamous hamster-and-hermit-crab fight. I’d viewed the fight as a testing of worthy opponents. She’d seen it as animal cruelty. – Richelle Mead • Most of us are animal lovers. We insist that we love all animals equally – the hamster, the weasel, and the zebra – but if pressed, we will admit to being either a cat person or a dog person. – Nicole Hollander • New Rule: Gay marriage won’t lead to dog marriage. It is not a slippery slope to rampant inter-species coupling. When women got the right to vote, it didn’t lead to hamsters voting. No court has extended the equal protection clause to salmon. And for the record, all marriages are “same sex” marriages. You get married, and every night, it’s the same sex. – Bill Maher • No matter if you’re a man, woman, cat, hamster, you will get lost in Matt Bomer’s eyes. I don’t know what they are made of outside of dreams and rainbows and amazingness but it truly doesn’t matter. And when he sings. It’s like God gave with both hands and then grew a third hand and graced him with more. – Channing Tatum • One of my producers said this business is like a hamster on that little wheel thing that goes around and around. You may have a great day and get great ratings, but then you’ve got another show to do – whatever moment of success or happiness you have you’ve got to keep grinding it out for the next day. – Sean Hannity • Privately, I consider religion to be a load of bollocks, but when you have a sobbing five year old wanting to know what happened to her hamster, you develop an instant belief in anything that dissolves some of the heartbreak off her face. – Tana French • Some of my best friends are Venture Capitalists, but let’s face it, a hamster with Alzheimer’s could make those kind of numbers. It’s great work if you can get it. – Scott Adams • Some Poor grad student pressing on the flanks of a hamster and out comes a doctorate on the other side – Robert M. Sapolsky • Sung to the tune of O Christmas Tree O woe is me, O woe is me, I used to have a hamster tree, But it was eaten by a newt, And now I have no cuddly fruit, O woe is me, O woe is me, I used to have a hamster tree! – Clive Barker • The hamster called. He wants his home back. – James Patterson • The Hamsters really kick ass – Slim is one of your greatest guitar players – Walter Trout • The kid makes you sick. He looks the part, he walks the part, he is the part. He’s six-foot something, fit as a flea, good-looking – he’s got to have something wrong with him….Hopefully he’s hung like a hamster! That would make us all feel better! – Cristiano Ronaldo • The real slums are another matter. The bad parts of Tondo are as bad as any place I’ve seen, ancient, filthy houses swarmed with the poor and stinking of sewage and trash. But there are worse parts – squatter areas where people live under cardboard, in shipping crates, behind tacked-up newspapers. Dad would march you straight to the basement with a hairbrush in his hand if he caught you keeping your hamster cage like this. – P. J. O’Rourke • The thing is, we have to let go of all blame, all attacking, all judging, to free our inner selves to attract what we say we want. Until we do, we are hamsters in a cage chasing our own tails and wondering why we aren’t getting the results we seek. – Joe Vitale • The wheels are turning, but the hamsters are all dead. Make it idiot-proof and someone will make a better idiot. I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig, you get dirty; and besides, the pig likes it. – George Bernard Shaw • The world’s tragedy is that men love women, women love children, and children love hamsters. – Joanna Trollope • We sometimes feel like hamsters on a wheel, covering the same musical ground we did 20 or more years ago. – Bent Saether • Well, I’m an uncle now … don’t know if I’m a good one. My nephew asked me the difference between a hamster and a gerbil and I told him I thought there was more dark meat on a gerbil. – Bobcat Goldthwait • What if hamsters fought in the American Revolution? – Colin Mochrie • While I liked hamsters, too, the Habitrail cage was expensive. Even I could see that the interconnecting boxes, tubes, and spheres could easily bankrupt a family and lead to addiction later in life. Because, how would you know when to stop? How could you stop? An entire city could be built with a Habitrail. – Augusten Burroughs • Why shouldn’t it be that way for the rest of us? Why not just go with it? Just walk the dog and send the tweets and eat the scones and play with the hamsters and ride the bicycles and watch the sunsets and stream the movies and never worry about any of it? I didn’t know it could be that easy. I didn’t know that until just now. That sounds good to me. – Joshua Ferris • With boys you always know where you stand. Right in the path of a hurricane. It’s all there. The fruit flies hovering over their waste can, the hamster trying to escape to cleaner air, the bedrooms decorated in Early Bus Station Restroom. – Erma Bombeck • Wondering where Ranger was now, when I needed him. Why wasn’t he here, insisting on locking me up in a safe house? Now that my hamster’s cage was clean, I’d be happy to oblige. – Janet Evanovich • Yeah, well, don’t worry about it. I’ve never met a Daimon yet I couldn’t take. (Wulf) Guess again, little brother. You just met one, and trust me, he’s not like any you’ve ever met before. He makes Desiderius look like a pet hamster. (Acheron) – Sherrilyn Kenyon • You ignorant little slug!” the Trunchbull bellowed. “You witless weed! You empty-headed hamster! You stupid glob of glue! – Roald Dahl • Your Mother was A Hamster and you Father Smelled of elder berries. – John Cleese

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jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'y', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_y').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_y img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

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equitiesstocks · 4 years

Text

Hamsters Quotes

Official Website: Hamsters Quotes

• But I just felt at one point that I was on a hamster wheel, you know? Just doing movie after movie and thinking so much about career related things and I think missing out on hanging with my friends and family as much I needed to. – Woody Harrelson • DNS is kind of the hamster under the hood that drives the Internet. – David Ulevitch • Even as a child I was fascinated by death, not in a spiritual sense, but in an aesthetic one. A hamster or guinea pig would pass away, and, after burying the body, I’d dig it back up: over and over, until all that remained was a shoddy pelt. It earned me a certain reputation, especially when I moved on to other people’s pets. “Igor,” they called me. “Wicked, spooky.” But I think my interest was actually fairly common, at least among adolescent boys. At that age, death is something that happens only to animals and grandparents, and studying it is like a science project. – David Sedaris • Girls were nice to me in the same way that they would be nice to a hamster. I fantasized about wild encounters with females but knew they’d never happen unless my own involvement could somehow go undetected. – Joel Achenbach • Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the Styrofoam cup-they all die. So do we. – Robert Fulghum • Have you noticed how the Republicans and Democrats try to copy each other at their conventions. Like at the Democratic convention John Kerry’s daughter told a story about how he once gave CPR to her hamster. At the Republican convention the Bush girls are going to tell a story about how when their hamster was bad, their dad built them a little electric chair. – Jay Leno • Haven’t had your fill of interesting events?” “Never. They are the spice of life.” She held up her half-finished hat. “How do you like it?” “It’s nice. The blue is pretty. But what do the runes say?” “Raxacori-Oh, never mind. It wouldn’t mean a thing to you anyway. Safe travels to you and Saphira, Eragon. And remember to watch out for earwigs and wild hamsters. Ferocious things, wild hamsters.” – Christopher Paolini • He was not used to the smell of dragon breath, which is best described as a combination of the stench of burning rubber and the stink of old socks, with overtones of a hamster cage in dire need of a cleaning. – Angie Sage • I always find cardio the most monotonous. Running on a treadmill shows me why hamsters are so crazy. – Luke Evans • I always see to the dogs first and leave the cats and the occasional birds and rabbits and hamsters for later. It isn’t that I play favorites, it’s just that dogs are needier than other pets. Leave a dog alone for very long and it’ll start going a little nuts. Cats, on the other hand, try to give you the impression that they didn’t even notice you were gone. Oh, were you out? they’ll say, I didn’t notice. Then they’ll raise their tails to show you their little puckered anuses and walk away.- Blaize Clement • I can’t shut my brain off. It’s like a hamster wheel.” ~ Justin – Richelle Mead • I could keep trying to do the same kind of comedies. You know how it’s going to go, and you can get an audience with it, but then I feel like a hamster on a wheel. – Vince Vaughn • I do not mean to be the slightest bit critical of TV newspeople, who do a superb job, considering that they operate under severe time constraints and have the intellectual depth of hamsters. But TV news can only present the “bare bones” of a story; it takes a newspaper, with its capability to present vast amounts of information, to render the story truly boring. – Dave Barry • I don’t believe in happy endings. Children have got to face death sooner or later. Granny and Grandpa die, dogs die, cats die, gerbils and those frightful things – what are they called? – hamsters: all die like flies. So there’s no point avoiding it. – Raymond Briggs • I don’t believe in reincarnation, and I didn’t believe in it when I was a hamster. – Shane Richie • I don’t want to talk to you no more, you empty headed animal food trough wiper. I fart in your general direction. Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries. – Graham Chapman • I feel so agitated all the time, like a hamster in search of a wheel. – Carrie Fisher • I got ham but I’m not a Hamster – Bill Bailey • I know what the intimidation level of high school is. You’re on a hamster wheel, running, running, running, trying so hard to fit in. It’s all about how you deal with what you’re given, feeling OK with being the odd man out before you’re finally successful. – Drew Barrymore • I love running cross-country…You come up a hill and see two deer going, ‘What the hell is he doing?’ On a track I feel like a hamster. – Robin Williams • I love watching him think,” Maeve told Lily. “You can almost hear that poor little hamster running and running on its wheel. – Jim Butcher • I voted against Gerald Nabarro in my first general election, but my defiance made no difference. If you had put a Conservative rosette on a mustachioed hamster, it would have been elected. – Jeremy Paxman • If anybody felt worse than I did, it was Amos. I had just enough magic to turn myself into a falcon and him into a hamster (hey, I was rushed!) – Rick Riordan • If the sun were made of hamsters, the earth would be incinerated. – Michael Schumacher • I’m done with men. I have a hamster. That’s all I need. – Janet Evanovich • It’s fine to be on the hamster wheel, running and running, trying to grab the brass ring or whatever you define as success, but your relationships, that’s really all that matters when it’s all said and done. – Katie Couric • It’s for the hamster that I’m gonna buy! This is so perfect! (after opening a hamster wheel at Christmas) – Gerard Way • I’ve lived here … my whole life. It’s where I lost all my baby teeth. Where tiny hamster, gerbil, and bird skeletons lie in rotted-out cardboard coffins beneath the oak tree in our backyard. Also where, if some future archaeologist goes digging, they’ll find the remains of a plush toy: a gray terrier named Toto I buried after the accident. – Jennifer McMahon • Lissa knelt down, compassion on her face. I wasn’t surprised, since she’d always had a thing for animals. She’d lectured me for days after I’d instigated the infamous hamster-and-hermit-crab fight. I’d viewed the fight as a testing of worthy opponents. She’d seen it as animal cruelty. – Richelle Mead • Most of us are animal lovers. We insist that we love all animals equally – the hamster, the weasel, and the zebra – but if pressed, we will admit to being either a cat person or a dog person. – Nicole Hollander • New Rule: Gay marriage won’t lead to dog marriage. It is not a slippery slope to rampant inter-species coupling. When women got the right to vote, it didn’t lead to hamsters voting. No court has extended the equal protection clause to salmon. And for the record, all marriages are “same sex” marriages. You get married, and every night, it’s the same sex. – Bill Maher • No matter if you’re a man, woman, cat, hamster, you will get lost in Matt Bomer’s eyes. I don’t know what they are made of outside of dreams and rainbows and amazingness but it truly doesn’t matter. And when he sings. It’s like God gave with both hands and then grew a third hand and graced him with more. – Channing Tatum • One of my producers said this business is like a hamster on that little wheel thing that goes around and around. You may have a great day and get great ratings, but then you’ve got another show to do – whatever moment of success or happiness you have you’ve got to keep grinding it out for the next day. – Sean Hannity • Privately, I consider religion to be a load of bollocks, but when you have a sobbing five year old wanting to know what happened to her hamster, you develop an instant belief in anything that dissolves some of the heartbreak off her face. – Tana French • Some of my best friends are Venture Capitalists, but let’s face it, a hamster with Alzheimer’s could make those kind of numbers. It’s great work if you can get it. – Scott Adams • Some Poor grad student pressing on the flanks of a hamster and out comes a doctorate on the other side – Robert M. Sapolsky • Sung to the tune of O Christmas Tree O woe is me, O woe is me, I used to have a hamster tree, But it was eaten by a newt, And now I have no cuddly fruit, O woe is me, O woe is me, I used to have a hamster tree! – Clive Barker • The hamster called. He wants his home back. – James Patterson • The Hamsters really kick ass – Slim is one of your greatest guitar players – Walter Trout • The kid makes you sick. He looks the part, he walks the part, he is the part. He’s six-foot something, fit as a flea, good-looking – he’s got to have something wrong with him….Hopefully he’s hung like a hamster! That would make us all feel better! – Cristiano Ronaldo • The real slums are another matter. The bad parts of Tondo are as bad as any place I’ve seen, ancient, filthy houses swarmed with the poor and stinking of sewage and trash. But there are worse parts – squatter areas where people live under cardboard, in shipping crates, behind tacked-up newspapers. Dad would march you straight to the basement with a hairbrush in his hand if he caught you keeping your hamster cage like this. – P. J. O’Rourke • The thing is, we have to let go of all blame, all attacking, all judging, to free our inner selves to attract what we say we want. Until we do, we are hamsters in a cage chasing our own tails and wondering why we aren’t getting the results we seek. – Joe Vitale • The wheels are turning, but the hamsters are all dead. Make it idiot-proof and someone will make a better idiot. I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig, you get dirty; and besides, the pig likes it. – George Bernard Shaw �� The world’s tragedy is that men love women, women love children, and children love hamsters. – Joanna Trollope • We sometimes feel like hamsters on a wheel, covering the same musical ground we did 20 or more years ago. – Bent Saether • Well, I’m an uncle now … don’t know if I’m a good one. My nephew asked me the difference between a hamster and a gerbil and I told him I thought there was more dark meat on a gerbil. – Bobcat Goldthwait • What if hamsters fought in the American Revolution? – Colin Mochrie • While I liked hamsters, too, the Habitrail cage was expensive. Even I could see that the interconnecting boxes, tubes, and spheres could easily bankrupt a family and lead to addiction later in life. Because, how would you know when to stop? How could you stop? An entire city could be built with a Habitrail. – Augusten Burroughs • Why shouldn’t it be that way for the rest of us? Why not just go with it? Just walk the dog and send the tweets and eat the scones and play with the hamsters and ride the bicycles and watch the sunsets and stream the movies and never worry about any of it? I didn’t know it could be that easy. I didn’t know that until just now. That sounds good to me. – Joshua Ferris • With boys you always know where you stand. Right in the path of a hurricane. It’s all there. The fruit flies hovering over their waste can, the hamster trying to escape to cleaner air, the bedrooms decorated in Early Bus Station Restroom. – Erma Bombeck • Wondering where Ranger was now, when I needed him. Why wasn’t he here, insisting on locking me up in a safe house? Now that my hamster’s cage was clean, I’d be happy to oblige. – Janet Evanovich • Yeah, well, don’t worry about it. I’ve never met a Daimon yet I couldn’t take. (Wulf) Guess again, little brother. You just met one, and trust me, he’s not like any you’ve ever met before. He makes Desiderius look like a pet hamster. (Acheron) – Sherrilyn Kenyon • You ignorant little slug!” the Trunchbull bellowed. “You witless weed! You empty-headed hamster! You stupid glob of glue! – Roald Dahl • Your Mother was A Hamster and you Father Smelled of elder berries. – John Cleese

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trowelfrog4-blog · 5 years

Text

I'm From the Navajo Nation and I Want to Help My Community Get Healthy Food

In this op-ed, Parvannah Lee of Partners in Health explains the nutrition and health needs of the Diné people.

It may be hard for some people to imagine what hunger looks like, but I have a clear picture in my mind. It looks like my mother walking two miles through a snowstorm to the nearest grocery store. She was practically blind, having broken her new glasses, and didn’t have a car at the time, so she trudged through neighborhoods and across a busy street to buy food for her young family.

I consider us the lucky ones. My mother, who raised four of us by herself in the Navajo Nation, made sure we never went hungry. Even when food was short, she would make something out of nothing.

Unfortunately, not every family has a magical mother like mine. And that is what I want to talk about.

I am 24 and my mother’s eldest child, or, shall I say, the first to experience and test the abilities of my life as a Diné woman from a reservation. I have started on a path that has led me outside the reservation and back. Along the way, I learned more about myself, my heritage, and my desire to leave a mark on the world — first by helping to improve the health of my people.

As a young woman, I almost did not make it out of high school. I looked at my siblings’ moderate grades and thought, “What kind of influence am I going to be for them?” I picked up my books and graduated from high school, barely, then decided to attend our local institution, Diné College in Tsaile, Arizona. I graduated with an associate’s degree in social and behavioral sciences in 2015. I then went on to Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado, where I graduated with honors in public health in April — the first in my family to earn a college degree.

It was at our local college where I discovered who I was as a Diné woman. I took silversmithing, lived in a huge dormitory shaped as a hogan, and was surrounded by like-minded students with different stories, songs, and prayers. Like many of my peers, I learned early on about my family lines. On my maternal side, I am Tsenabahitnii, the Sleep Rock People clan, who come from generations of weavers. On my paternal side, I am born for Naaneesht’ezhi Dine’é, an old Zuni clan, some of whom were sheepherders.

Currently my immediate family resides in my great grandparents’ home in Fort Defiance. Although well-loved, the house has seen some wear and tear; the floor in our bathroom is so bad that it could cave at any moment. Yet during hard times, our family still remembers to love, remain happy, and tell our grandparents’ stories.

My family’s day-to-day reality is embedded in a place with deep history. Fort Defiance was established in 1851 and was dedicated to controlling Native Americans before the Long Walk and assimilation thereafter. Our ancestors were forced into boarding schools and to abide by strict laws on land, language, and water rights. The 1868 treaty, signed by the surviving Diné from Fort Sumner, was a negotiation for release from incarceration and for the return of the Diné to their birthplace. Our ancestors made clear the terms upon which they would sign — access to health care and education, for the security of future generations.

Sadly, though, we are still struggling to attain these terms 150 years later. Healthy foods, such as indigenous grains, corn, herbs, beans, squash, and melons, are limited or expensive on the Navajo Nation, which is roughly the size of Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont combined. Most of our people live in one of the largest food deserts in the United States, meaning they have to travel long distances to reach the nearest grocery store. There are only 13 supermarkets and 50 convenience stores available to roughly 200,000 Diné. Personally, I know many people who drive off the reservation to buy groceries, because prices are cheaper.

More than three-quarters of Navajo families don’t have enough food to eat, which is directly related to poverty and increasing health disparities. Too much of the food they do eat is highly processed, often filled with empty calories, fat, and sugar. In fact, the prevalence of obesity among children under 5 on government assistance is 19%, five points higher than the national average.

Growing up, I knew that it was hard to get fresh produce, but I hadn’t thought deeply about how that intersects with health. Only after beginning my internship as a data consultant with Community Outreach Patient Empowerment (COPE), in Gallup, New Mexico, did I realize the impact food insecurity has on the Navajo Nation. At COPE, a sister organization of the nonprofit Partners in Health, I collected and analyzed data on the Fruits and Vegetables Prescription Program, or FVRx, in which families receive a doctor’s prescription that they use to buy fresh produce at participating local convenience or grocery stores.

Part of my job included tracking the progress of participating FVRx convenience stores. Each receives an excellent, basic, or poor grade based on how many fresh fruits and vegetables they have available and the produce’s location in the store. The evaluations are sent to store managers to encourage excellent performance or inform those needing improvement. While much work remains, there has been positive progress over a short period of time. Prescriptions can now be filled in about 22 grocery stores, convenience stores, and trading posts. And 15 health clinics have adopted the FVRx program across the Navajo Nation.

My internship ends this month, and I plan to apply the skills I learned with COPE to a new position as a medical support assistant at an Indian Health Service in Eagle Butte, S.D. I look forward to this learning opportunity and chance to have a positive impact outside of my community. My siblings and I are part of a generation of change. The Navajo Nation was the first to pass a junk food tax within the continental United States, in direct response to high rates of diabetes. And we were among a rising tide of midterm voters who elected the first two Native American women to serve in Congress.

As young Diné, we must remember that we are our ancestors, and we are creating history every day. How that history is created is up to us, for the next generation. I hope some of my mother’s magic has rubbed off on me, as I grow into a leader in my own right.

Related: Food Boxes Have Already Failed for Native Communities, Why Would They Work for SNAP?

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Source: https://www.teenvogue.com/story/im-from-the-navajo-nation-and-i-want-to-help-my-community-get-healthy-food

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