#especially if you already have older kids who are adults or nearing adulthood!!! a new baby is crazy!!!

[genderqueer-karma]

imagine being 50 years old with a toddler… could NOT be me…

(of course this isn’t saying that people who have kids later in life are weird or evil or anything. i just weep at the thought of starting all that shit when your life is probably already stable and calm… yikes…)

[nostalgebraist-autoresponder]

Title: In The Dream House

Author: Dennis Cooper

Rating: 1/5 stars

First of all, how the fuck did I manage to put this book down so many times? What was I thinking?

It's been said many times before but the central idea -- that all the people who hate on YA often hate on it for reasons that are actually similar to those that motivate YA's popularity -- is something that I've noticed but that I've never quite been able to square with my intuitions. I've never actually read a YA novel or anything like it (I'm a lot more interested in the adult fiction that comes out of YA), and I've seen a lot of people hate on YA on the grounds that YA fails to do certain things I wouldn't expect people to have in mind in judging YA. But it never seemed to me like a mistake for YA to do those things; in fact, they all seemed like good things to do.

What I didn't know was that I'm in the tiny minority that was actually writing YA at a time when the industry was in its "golden age." And now we're in a post-golden age of YA, and all the things I like about YA are no longer new and innovative and just kind of a natural way of doing things, and instead it's a sort of retro novelty that isn't actually all that interesting.

It makes a certain amount of sense that YA as an idea, YA as an industry, has entered a period of stagnation; the whole "teen fiction" thing was really a fad that didn't really have that many deep roots. The YA books that people remember and like are often those that had something to do with being young or being at a certain age, and that's not always the best kind of theme to work with, or the best kind of book -- in fact, even those books that got a lot of people excited early on often became much less compelling once the novelty wore off.

The best YA books are those that treat the fact that the reader is in that position, the fact that we have something in common with the kids we're reading about (although of course this isn't true of all YA, which is full of characters from the wrong demographic that we don't relate to), without ever lapsing into the kind of generic "you are a teen and that is a very scary and exciting thing to be" stuff that people don't actually do.

There's really not that much of this in the older books, because when we're teenagers it's still "normal" to be very anxious about whether it is possible to still be living in the same world that we live in and make progress in it. At some point, we have to realize that the way we see the world isn't the correct way, and that's scary, but it's nothing compared to the fear that we really have no way of knowing who we are, what kind of life we can make or have made for us (or if we are already making such a life for ourselves), and what kind of world is around us.

In The Dream House is one of the rare good YA books in which this particular tension actually comes to the surface and the book is not just a generic "teenager and other teenagers" book, but a book whose subject -- the conflict between adolescence and its adult trappings -- is actually really relevant to us as teenagers. And it isn't even something that is tantalizingly near-at-hand. In fact, this topic just barely fits the "teen fiction" box -- it is one more step removed from the central topic of teen fiction, and the characters are not themselves teenagers, and the protagonist's relationship with adult life doesn't play a central role in the plot. (The protagonist does have a job and a girlfriend, but we learn those things a page in and no one seems to care about them very much. In any case, if we imagine our own teenage years as an adult version of the plot, this wouldn't really be a book aimed at us, and would be merely a book about the protagonist being confused by his own life.)

If you really care about teenagers, there's a ton to be gained from looking into what "adulthood" is or could be, especially when you're living your own teenage life in such an ordinary way. The "you are a teenager and that is very scary" stuff is almost never relevant to real life. If you've lived more than a few years at a time when you were a teenager in some way, you've probably had your "adulthood" or your "teenhood" or both or neither in some form or other, but there's a reason people don't feel it important to make some sort of point in the plot about it. That kind of focus does not arise in the context of life where it actually happens -- it's not a part of everyday experience; it's not something you really have to deal with in everyday situations. "You are a teenage writer who does not quite fit in with your friends" is the sort of thing that is really important and interesting to think about and talk about and write about, while "you are a teenager who can't find a job" is just boring and not something that we have to think about every day.

The difference between something like In the Dream House and the YA books I actually like is that In The Dream House is about being a teenager, but the way the story is told is actually fun, even though we know it's being told in a way we know we can't actually go through -- even though the world it presents is superficial in a way that is very familiar and therefore reliable. The Giver, for example, presents its world in a deeply "adult" style (think "the voice of On Your Mark magazine") that seems to the children on the streets to be a very strange and dangerous thing. But even though the book presents this danger as real, it's actually a book with a very strong sense of fun that is not just an adult style, but a child style, aimed at those of us for whom it really does feel like fun. In the book, the things that are really fun are the sort of things that a kid could never enjoy, because the world is so rich and so real that those sorts of pleasures aren't child things.

Now that I think about it, In the Dream House feels to me like a parody of the genre and its conventions. I'm a grown-up man, not a teenager, and many of the things about YA books I like don't work for me when I read them. The main characters are sort of like me; the main characters' boyfriends are sort of like me; etc. In the Dream House doesn't even pretend to be about our lives, or to be an honest representation of our lives -- it is basically just an attempt to present the world to young adult readers in a generic, adult-ey sort of way.

I want to read a book that plays with things that are really hard or impossible, and in fact cannot be played with, as hard as they are, because it really can't happen, it really

[the-very-rubiest]

“to make it to damn near 30 carrying himself the way he does” SAY IT LOUDERRRRR

i get it if you worry about someone who’s a child star or who just got famous and is new to it all but no one in BC is new to it all and it’s a bit insulting to treat them as though they don’t know anything at all.

RIGHT? Especially for someone with his backstory, that's an accomplishment. Being any form of Weird is already a constant game of "Aren't you too old for that?" and "Grow up!" and the corresponding eyerolls the older you get, not to mention he was already bullied during his formative years for not being (looking) "masculine" enough. Someone with a different predisposition, a worse support system, would've caved under that pressure. Turned around and masked the weirdness and cut the hair and stopped painting his nails, and he would've stashed away his feelings in a desperate effort to not be seen as weak and girly. Joel could've done the same. With mixed results probably, sure, but he could.

But he didn't. Joel chose spite. Instead of letting others bend him out of shape he stayed true to himself, and that's hard. Being yourself leaves you vulnerable. It gives those who want to hate you material to use against you, to shame you for not being adult enough or tough enough or normal enough, and there will always be people judging. To carry through with it, carry that attitude into adulthood and beyond, you need to be tough as nails. And in his own way, he is. Admitting to your weaknesses is a sign of strength, and so is showing vulnerability. Joel is sensitive, he admits that freely, but one thing he's not is frail.

Basically, he reminds me of this comic:

(Source)

So yeah, as for the fans babying him, maybe they should ask themselves why they're so ready to see him as frail. At least the adults. The kids are just children and naturally can't understand how a seasoned grown-up would deal with certain situations and how much of an impact criticism or insults would have on them, so…yeah. They'll grow up and cringe at their past selves someday, I'm sure! I…hope?

[ladykissingfish]

The Akatsuki as Parents

Obito

Was a bit reluctant when he found out he was going to be a daddy ... at first. Not because he didn’t want kids ((he really did)), but because he severely doubted his own ability to be a father. But the second he holds the baby in his arms, he’s hooked. He will be so eagerly helpful and hands-on that during the child’s infancy, the other parent will rarely have to lift a finger. Diapers need changing? Obito’s on it. Baby needs to be fed at 2am? Obito’s already out of bed and warming formula on the stove. Rash? Fever? A cough? Obito is consulting every doctor within a 20 mile radius on what to do. Note that Obito is a hard-core traditionalist and, if he isn’t married to the child’s other parent before he gets them pregnant, he’ll be persistent about doing so before the kid is born. Sobs the first time his child calls him “papa”. As the child grows older, Obito will be a tireless teacher and mentor, and you better believe that the kid will know every facet of what was once the Uchiha clan. Sharingan training is a bit nerve-wracking for Dad, because while he wants his child to grow strong, he knows the power of the eye is a deadly one, and doesn’t like to see his son/daughter get hurt. Is the type to be a bit more strict with his sons than with daughters, in fact being a complete pushover for anything his little girl(s) wants. Very, VERY likely to insist a girl be named Nohara. Also the type to sneak and let his kid eat lots of sweets (like Obito himself does) before meals, much to the other parent’s chagrin. Also involves the other Akatsuki members as uncles/aunt in the kid’s life, especially Itachi and Sasuke as he wants the kid to be exposed to members of the family more often.

Hidan

The literal first words out of his mouth are “pregnant? Why the hell didn’t you make me wear a condom?!” Takes a long time to warm up to the idea of parenthood, but once he does, he’s surprisingly better at it than anyone would anticipate. He tends to be very fast-paced in his body movements and not really used to being careful, so if he’s holding his infant it’s best to make him sit still in a chair first. Once the kid(s) is older, it’s better, because Hidan’s energy levels will match (and overshadow) even the liveliest of children. It will be a big point of contention between Hidan and his co-parent on whether or not to introduce their kid to Jashinism, and Hidan will eventually promise to wait until the child is an adult to start talking about “all that shit”; although Hidan’s idea of adulthood seems to be when the kid is old enough to use a kunai. Puts a startling amount of emphasis on his kid getting a good education, and will be sure to send him or her to the best village school that he possibly can. The reason behind this is because Hidan himself had a poor education growing up, and is in fact barely able to read or do basic math; and he says over and over that his kid “isn’t gonna be some dumbass like his/her father”.

Kakuzu

Nearly faints when told he’s going to be a father. Will immediately get out a calculator and start figuring out expenses like diapers, food, toys, education ... is so preoccupied that he ends up neglecting the person who carries his child, causing them to go off on their own expecting to be a single parent. Oddly, it’s Hidan who sets the old guy straight. He stays on his case and talks to him until the nonagenarian sees the error of his ways, and goes after the person having his baby. Kakuzu will be gentle with a baby, and show a surprising affinity for making up and singing lullabies. As the kid gets older, Kakuzu will be a bit more strict. “Food is expensive; you better eat every bite on your plate.” “A hole in your pants? No give them to me and I’ll mend them; buying new clothes is unnecessary.” His child will grow up knowing how to stretch a buck and budget money better than any other kid their age. Kakuzu isn’t really one for showing much warmth or affection, but there will be a few rare moments in his kid’s life where his father hugs him and tells him how proud he is of him. Kakuzu knows that the life of a shinobi is hard and therefore encourages his kid to pursue other career paths, such as opening up his/her own business.

Konan and Nagato

These two are so closely intertwined that they could only be parental mates to each other. When a baby comes into the picture, Nagato will still maintain his position as leader of the Akatsuki as Pein, but will insist that Konan quit. It’s for a practical purpose rather than a sentimental one; they both lost their collective parents to war, and Nagato always thought that if he had a child, he’d ensure that at least one parent would be around to always take care of him or her. Konan, however, will still keep in touch with all of the Akatsuki members, who will become very enthusiastic uncles to her child. She’s always been a good cook but with a child she’ll level up to professional chef caliber, creating dishes that are fun and healthy. Her child(ren) will be taught all of their mother’s paper jutsus, and Nagato will work to devise a way for the brightest one to get his rinnegan once he passes. The kids will primarily spend time with Nagato through Pein, and only be taken to meet their father when Konan feels they’re ready. Because Konan and Nagato had a childhood devoid of parental love, they’re often at a loss for how to be affectionate or sentimental, instead putting a lot of emphasis on “toughening” their kids up, so that they’re prepared to face the cruelties of the world. But the kids will know that mom and dad love them; it’s obvious in everything they say and do.

Deidara

Will be the fun, loving, yet highly irresponsible father. As soon as his kid is born he anxiously awaits to see if he or she inherits his explosion-release kekkei genkai; and if the kid DOES, he’s ecstatic. “Art is an explosion” won’t just be a saying in his household; it’ll be a way of life. The child will grow up given complete freedom to express his or her artistic tendencies, with Deidara highly praising any and every impact they make on the outside world. Yet despite being for artistic creativity, he’ll be (surprisingly) strongly against the child joining any kind of organization that’s like the Akatsuki; he regrets his own decision to join as he feels it out a horrible damper on his artistic expression and independence. Likes to tell his young children stories every night, which are actually just heavily edited and sanitized versions of his Akatsuki missions. Like Obito, will be a bit more of a pushover for a daughter than a son, and will love spending hours brushing and styling the beautiful long hair that the girl inherits from him. He’ll let any member of the Akatsuki around his kids except for Hidan (because he doesn’t want his foul language around the child).

Zetsu

There are people in this world who know for certain that their lives wouldn’t be fulfilled by having children, and Zetsu is one of these individuals. While wanting no offspring of his own, he IS rather a good “uncle” to the children of his fellow Akatsuki members ((although the majority of these kids are too terrified of his physical appearance to want to go anywhere near him until they’re at least teenagers)).

Sasori

A child would be hard-pressed to elicit any kind of emotional reaction from Sasori, as the man cleared himself of most feeling when he underwent his puppet transformation. However, one thing that he could never rid himself of, was his ability to love. Even if he has difficulty showing it, he loves his child and would do literally anything to help or protect them. When the child is a baby, Sasori will spend hours crafting tiny puppet-dolls for the kid to play with. As he grew up with a skilled medic grandmother, he possesses a wide knowledge of herbs and healing, which he will painstakingly pass on to his children. Not one to baby his children by any means, as he lives by the philosophy that the world is tough meaning you have to be tougher; however will offer advice, support, and encouragement on any issues that may be troubling his son/daughter. Early on he expresses a desire for his child to learn to be a master puppeteer like himself; however will be understanding if they choose to pursue a different path. Is very smart and naturally mistrustful of strangers, so will likely choose to educate his kids at home rather than send them to a village school. The type to seem more like a trusted mentor or an interesting uncle than an actual father; also the type to relate to his teen or adult children better than young kids.

Itachi

Itachi never feels like he deserves any of the good things in life, because of what he’s done, and therefore doesn’t know how to handle blessings that are given to him. A baby is the ultimate example of this. Itachi will feel as though any child of his would be better off not knowing him or being “exposed” to the cursed Uchiha bloodline, so at first he’ll make it a point to barely be around his baby ((even though this kills him inside)). Surprisingly, of all people, it’s Deidara who will talk him out of this mindset, telling him how important it is for a child to be around their father “even if he is a damned red-eyed weirdo”. Once Itachi allows himself to fully commit to parenthood, that’s it — he’ll be the best damned father in the universe. He’ll be warm and affectionate, especially liking to pick his kid up (no matter how old they are or how embarrassed it makes them) and squeeze them. He’s not much of a disciplinarian, believing that kids need to be able to make mistakes in order to grow from them. The only time he’ll ever get angry is when the child does something that could have resulted in a serious injury. Itachi’s intelligence has always been off the charts, and he utilizes this to help his kid be a spectacular student. In fact, as the kid gets older, they’ll start bringing his/her friends around the house in order to receive Itachi’s tutoring. Itachi’s brother Sasuke will adore his nephew/niece and come home more often simply to be with them. Also Kisame will come around practically every day, and the kid will grow up learning an impressive arsenal of water jutsus to compliment the traditional Uchiha fire jutsus.

Kisame

The tall, somewhat awkward father that scares all of his kid’s friends with his intimidating physical appearance ... until he opens his mouth and they hear a god-awful dad joke come out. Any child of Kisame’s is going to be part shark, and therefore have some affinity for being in/breathing under the water. Kisame’s favorite pastime will be taking his baby (and yes, I do mean baby, as he tends to start his kid on this when they’re young) out for long swims in the ocean. Kisame has always been self-conscious of his looks, so from the time the child is born he will spend a good deal of time teaching him or her to have self-confidence and love for him/herself. Like many of the others in the Akatsuki, Kisame never received much of a formal education, and therefore puts a lot of emphasis on his child going to a “normal” school and giving it their all when it comes to their studies. When the child proves him or herself physically capable, Kisame will start training with them on how to wield/control samehada, as well as fight with a variety of swords. It goes without saying that Itachi will be in Kisame’s kid’s life from the day they’re born, and be their favorite “uncle”.

[destiniesfic]

i hate everybody (but maybe i don’t) 1/3

This is my @jurdannet​ & @jurdannetrevels​​ Secret Snusband gift for @sevenfreckles-for-sevenloves​​! You tapped into a story I’d been wanting to write for ages, so you get three parts and three POVs (Vivi, Cardan, and Jude). Happy Holidays, I hope you like it. ♥ Thanks to @xdarkofthemoon​ for betaing!

This fic is rated E. Content warnings this chapter for excessive alcohol consumption, references to alcoholism, and (prescribed) antidepressant use.

Read on AO3 or read below:

Bars in Barcelona are not especially different from bars in the US. It’s a discovery Vivi has made over the course of her study abroad tenure: everything is different on the outside, but on the inside, not so much. She does like the outsides, though. She likes the tidy streets, the way the buildings don’t rise to blot out the sun as they have a habit of doing in American downtowns. She likes the cozy sameness of the facades, broken by the whimsical surprise of the odd Gaudí contribution. Like a lot of the European cities she’s visited there seems to be some unifying design principle, some common understanding. At home it’s anyone’s guess what the next office building or apartment complex might look like, a mishmash of styles as the cities clamor to reinvent themselves, modernist or postmodernist or deconstructionist or whatever.

Heather could name them all, if Heather were here.

But Heather isn’t here. Tonight, Vivi is out on the town with her two younger half-sisters, Jude and Taryn. Her twin baby sisters, although they hate it when she calls them that. The twins’ spring breaks overlapped by happy accident, so their adoptive dad, Vivi’s biological father, had sent them off on an all-expenses-paid Barcelona trip for a mini family reunion.

Taryn had been thrilled to go out. “I’m so excited that we can drink here,” she’d exclaimed, as she touched up her makeup in the AirBnB’s living room mirror. It’s a two-bed, two-bath apartment with an updated kitchen and certainly beats the dorms. Vivi was forced to give a silent, resentful thanks, Dad, but not out loud.

“You drink at home,” Jude reminded her from the bathroom, where she was trying to wrangle her hair into some style Taryn had sent her from Pinterest. “We have fake IDs.”

“It’s not the same,” Taryn had huffed, applying another coat of mascara. Vivi got that. It had not been the same when they came to Europe before, either, because they had been with Madoc, Oriana, and little Oak. Somehow parents at the table makes the glass of wine with dinner much less daring.

Jude had eventually settled on a high ponytail, and off they went.

Now they’re out at a bar not far from the AirBnB, with each of the twins perched on stools and Vivi leaning against the bar between them. Maybe it’s because she hasn’t seen them for so long except over FaceTime, but Vivi is shocked to notice that her little sisters aren’t kids anymore. They haven’t been little for a while, not since they overtook Vivi in height when they were twelve, but it’s one thing to not be little and another to be an adult. Taryn, who’s been yearning for adulthood since her tweens, finally looks more at home in the role. And Vivi doesn’t know how Taryn got Jude into that dark purple halter dress, which dips low in the front and lower in the back, but the way she wears that and her lipstick is a stark reminder that Vivi’s sisters are in fact nineteen, and no longer chubby, soft-faced children. It’s weird, and Vivi doesn’t like it.

Vivi gets hit on sometimes—with her undercut and piercings, mostly by “alternative” men and curious women—but the novelty of good-looking twins means Jude and Taryn shouldn’t need to pay for their own drinks. And they wouldn’t, except anytime a guy gets too close to Jude or Taryn, Jude adopts a laser-eyed glare and says, “No,” which is thankfully the same in both languages. Otherwise she might start speaking with fists.

“I don’t know why you won’t let us get free drinks,” Taryn pouts.

“The drinks are on Madoc,” Jude points out, nodding to the credit card Vivi puts back in her pocket. “They’re basically free.”

Taryn mutters, “It’s the principle of the thing.”

“You guys are such sisters,” Vivi says, taking a swig of beer.

“What does that mean?” they demand in unison.

Vivi grins and closes her eyes, shaking her head. For a second she just stands there, between the twins, and lets everything wash over her: the sibling bickering, the pungent smell of beer and whatever syrup is in Jude’s cocktail, and the music. Music is a strange experience in bars here. First there’s a Spanish song Vivi’s never heard, and then there’s Halsey, crooning over a Chainsmokers beat, and then back to Spanish with perennial favorite “Despacito.” It’s total whiplash. Vivi loves it.

It’s only because she’s listening so hard that she hears Taryn give a tiny gasp.

Vivi opens her eyes. Jude has gone very, very still. Her shoulders, which had been hunched up around her ears as she leaned over the bar, roll down her back, and the muscles there tense. Vivi is not sure Jude is remembering to breathe. She and Taryn are both staring at some fixed point across the bar, so Vivi looks too.

“Oh, hell,” she says.

On the other side of the bar—of the small space they are all crammed into—are four familiar figures. Three boys, one girl. Vivi has to blink to place them, because it seems absurd that four kids they went to high school with would show up in Spain while they, the Duarte sisters, are also in Spain, and also because they weren’t in Vivi’s grade. She knows them, though. Everyone knows Cardan Greenbriar and his trio of hot, mean friends, but Vivi knows them particularly well because of how her sisters have tangled with them over the years.

Taryn whispers, “What are they doing here?”

“I can go ask,” Vivi sighs. That group of kids has no quarrel with her. She and Cardan were friendly back in the day, meaning “ten years ago when Vivi would go hang out with Cardan’s older sister.”

“No,” Jude says, voice firm. Without taking her eyes off the interlopers, she picks up her cocktail and downs the rest of it.

Vivi doesn’t know exactly what happened, but Jude shed her fight-or-flight response sometime in high school. Now, she only has a fight response. Maybe Vivi took her flight response, because it was Vivi who was the terror until she turned eighteen, when she got the hell out of dodge. Taryn has always been in the middle, trying to keep the peace.

“We can go somewhere else,” Taryn suggests.

“No,” Jude repeats, setting her glass down on the bar a little too hard. “I’m not going to let those jerks keep me from having a good time.”

“Which I respect, and more power to you, but also, like, there are plenty of bars in Barcelona,” Vivi points out.

Jude glares. “I’m fine.” And then she holds up one finger in the bartender’s direction.

“You know those are really alcoholic, right?” Taryn says. Worry begins to seep into her voice like melting snow through cracks in a sidewalk.

“I know my limits.”

Vivi and Taryn exchange a wary glance. Jude might know her limits, but she has no problem blowing past them. Jude may not think Vivi remembers the tae kwon do tournament she sat through when Jude was eleven and Vivi was thirteen, but oh, Vivi does. Vivi remembers how her sister volunteered to spar until she had tired herself out to the point where she could no longer stand. Vivi also remembers Jude driving to school on a single hour of sleep after staying up to finish an extra credit essay in a class where she already had an A. Jude somehow didn’t crash her car, but she had been unbearable the entire day. Jude is a danger to herself and very occasionally a menace to society.

But Jude is also an adult and it’s not Vivi’s business.

“Suit yourself,” Vivi says, with a shrug. “It’s dear old Dad’s money.”

A few minutes later, Jude is nursing her second cocktail, and Vivi and Taryn are trying to carry on a conversation as though everything is fine. Any normal person would be well loosened up by now, but Jude retains that unnatural stillness like a dog who’s noticed a squirrel on the other side of a yard. Or, more accurately, maybe like a deer who’s spotted a human hunter approaching over the ridge.

Jude is no defenseless herbivore, but Vivi knows half a lifetime of being bullied has made her feel like a target.

“Hey,” Vivi says, jostling Jude with her elbow.

“What?”

“Tell me about your freshman year misadventures. Taryn won’t open up.”

Jude snorts. “What misadventures?”

“You have to have a few,” Vivi says. “I didn’t raise my sisters to be boring.”

“You didn’t raise us at all,” Jude mutters at her cocktail.

Vivi has never seen her sister anywhere near drunk before and is not sure she likes her like this. “What about boys?” she asks, gently elbowing Jude again. Then she raises her eyebrows. “Girls?”

“No. Nobody.” Jude finishes her second drink and, glaring across the bar, apparently makes the decision to switch to shots. “Vivi, is vodka still ‘vodka’ in Spanish?”

“I’m not answering that.” Vivi sighs. “What about you, Taryn? Anybody?”

“Huh? Um, no.” Taryn had been looking at their erstwhile schoolmates too. One of the boys, the redhead, is looking back. Locke. Vivi exhales. Bad news. There’s history there, the kind of history that shouldn’t repeat.

“Reeeeally?” she asks. “Nobody? Not one boy?”

Taryn blinks back to herself. “Vivi, I go to school for fashion design. They’re all gay.”

“Well, that can be fun.” Vivi gestures at herself. God, she wishes her sisters had brought Heather along. The hot lady bartender with the gorgeous tattoo sleeve keeps trying to catch her eye, and Vivi and Heather had established a “what happens in Barcelona stays in Barcelona” policy before she left, but Vivi doesn’t want a hot lady bartender. She wants her girlfriend.

“Yeah, they’re cool.” Taryn glances back across the bar. Now the blue-haired girl—Nicasia, Vivi recalls—is looking back, along with Locke. Not good.

Since Jude is negotiating for a shot of vodka with hot lady bartender in competent enough Spanish, Vivi lowers her voice and asks Taryn, “Are you feeling especially homesick?”

“We’ve kept in touch.” Taryn doesn’t meet her eyes.

Vivi would hold more of a grudge if someone had tried to sleep with her and her sister, but that’s very much not her circus or her monkeys. She asks, “Did you know he’d be here?”

Taryn shakes her head. “He said they were doing a European tour for spring break, but, like, it’s a big continent.”

“Good news,” says Jude, holding up a shot glass. “It’s vodka in both languages. Cheers.”

“You are going to be sick,” Taryn says.

Jude gives her a sarcastic shrug and then downs the shot. She coughs a little, which somewhat ruins the impression she’s trying to make, but swallows it all down.

“Jude,” Vivi says, beginning to worry, “we really can just leave.”

But Jude is looking at her old high school nemeses again. Cardan had been a particular thorn in her side, or he in hers; Vivi never made sense of that conflict, of who had started what. What she does know is that they’ve definitely been spotted now. The blond boy—Vivi doesn’t quite remember his name—seems to make a move to walk over to them, but Cardan reaches out and grabs his arm, shaking his head. Valentine? Valentino? looks sour, but doesn’t approach. Jude stares them both down.

“I have to use the bathroom,” Taryn announces. “El baño.” Taryn had taken French in high school.

“But—” Vivi begins.

Taryn has already vanished into the crowd. Vivi puts her elbows on the bar and cradles her head in her hands. “This is all going great.”

“Not how you pictured our night out on the town?” asks Jude, who has obtained another shot of vodka from God knows where.

“Yeah, not really.”

“Well, I can fix it.” Jude drinks her second shot and does not cough this time. “I’m going to go talk to them.”

Vivi picks up her head. “That’s a terrible idea.”

“So what?”

“Dad’s going to hold me responsible if anything happens to you.”

Jude fixes a level stare on her. “Dad never holds you responsible for anything,” she says. She slips a little when she gets up off her stool. Vivi wonders if she’s really thinking about fighting someone in those heels.

“You’re mean drunk,” Vivi tells her, trying to grab her arm. “Don’t go.”

“I’m mean sober, but nobody notices,” says Jude, which doesn’t make any sense. She shakes Vivi off. “Besides, I have a few things I want to say.”

And for the second time that night, Vivi watches as one of her sisters pushes her way into the crowd of people, unsure if she should follow or not. Maybe it’ll be good for Jude, in the end, to get some of this out of her system.

The guys across the room are watching Jude approach. Cardan especially. The blond guy is sneering, but Cardan watches Jude with the same strange stillness with which she’d watched him. Like he’s holding his breath until she gets there. Unlike Jude, he doesn’t seem that drunk at all, which Vivi notices because, well, it’s a rare day that Cardan Greenbriar isn’t drunk.

But he is too busy watching her and not his blond friend, who decides that he’s going to intercept Jude before she can even reach Cardan. He pushes over to her first and bars her way, and although Vivi is too far away to hear what’s said between them, she notices the squaring of Jude’s shoulders and the widening of the blond guy’s sneer. Because she is watching closely, she sees that Valerian is the one who shoves Jude first.

Valerian. That’s his name.

It clicks right before Jude punches him in the face.

The bar erupts. Cardan springs to his feet and tries to pull his friend away from Jude. A couple of nearby patrons try to save Jude from herself—Vivi could have told them it was a fool’s errand—by holding her back, not knowing Jude has sharp elbows. Valerian struggles hard and manages to break away from Cardan, only to find himself being grabbed by more pairs of hands. There is shouting in Spanish. Even the hot lady bartender is drawn away, trying to signal her coworkers.

The most Vivi-like thing to do would be to leave Jude to it and keep her nose clean. But Vivi remembers asking Madoc on the day of that fateful tae kwon do tournament, while they revived Jude with sips of Gatorade, why Madoc hadn’t stopped Jude when it became clear she was flagging. “Your sister needs to learn for herself when to stop fighting,” he’d said. “If I make those calls for her, she never will.”

Vivi has a lot of qualms with Madoc’s parenting style, and Taryn is nowhere to be found.

“Oh, hell,” Vivi says again, and she dives into the knot of drunk brawlers to pull her sister from the fray.

---

“I can’t believe you got us kicked out,” Vivi says.

Jude, drunk, hapless Jude, is sitting on the curb with her head between her knees, presumably trying not to barf. There’s still enough anger left in her to flip Vivi off.

“Unbelievable.” Vivi folds her arms and looks left, then right. It seems like a good quarter of the bar spilled out onto the sidewalk with them, a crowd of people chattering about what just happened. Forget kicked out, Jude’s lucky she wasn’t arrested. “Do you see Taryn anywhere?”

“What do you think?”

Vivi pinches the bridge of her nose. Taryn will be fine. She has the AirBnB address and a phone she can use on WiFi. Besides, as far as Vivi knows, she ran off with Locke. Vivi hasn’t seen the two of them come out of the bar yet, and she would not be surprised. She knows a bad decision when she sees one.

“You keep sitting down,” Vivi tells Jude. “I’m going to figure out a ride home.”

“Your face should keep sitting down,” Jude mumbles spitefully.

“Hey, guys? Vivi?”

Vivi cringes as soon as she hears the voice, because she knows the voice, and because in this situation the owner of that voice will only make things worse. Vivi doesn’t have any personal grudge against Cardan Greenbriar—they’ve even sometimes been friends—except for how her sister feels about him. Taryn’s always said he was kind of a dick, but Taryn doesn’t hate him like Jude does. Nobody hates anybody the way Jude hates Cardan. Vivi wonders if Jude has something to prove.

Sure enough, Jude’s head swivels at the sound of his voice like the kid’s head turning around in The Exorcist. “You,” she snarls, and then stumbles to her feet.

“Jude,” Vivi says, trying to catch her sister’s dress to pull her back, but Jude is already out of reach. With another sigh, Vivi stands too.

“What are you doing here?” Jude demands of Cardan, openly hostile. It would be funny, because Jude is a full head shorter than him, if Jude was anybody else’s sister. “We were all having a great time until you showed up.”

“It’s anybody’s city,” Cardan says, but he doesn’t seem to be mocking her. He holds up his hands to show her they are empty.

“Go the fuck home!” Jude yells, and shoves him, sending him back a couple of steps.

Vivi shouts, “Woah!”

“It’s okay,” Cardan tells Vivi over Jude’s head. “She’s not hurting me. Let her get it out.”

With a little cry, Jude pushes him again, and this time he only stumbles back a half-step, but he keeps his hands up and his stance somewhat grounded. The next time Jude shoves him he doesn’t budge at all, and Jude lets out a grunt of frustration, fisting her hands in his jacket.

And then she bursts into tears.

“Oh,” says Vivi, but Cardan doesn’t seem that surprised. She wonders if he’s used to people behaving badly while drunk or just being drunk himself.

“You’re so a-awful,” Jude says between sobs. “Everything’s awful all the time.”

“I know, Jude,” Cardan replies. He gently pries the jacket out of her fists so he can remove it and drape it over her bare shoulders. Jude grabs onto his shirt instead.

“Why do you hate me so much?” she asks, with a small hiccup.

“I don’t,” Cardan replies. His hand rubs circles between his shoulder blades. “But I hope you’re too drunk to remember that.” He looks up at Vivi, and Vivi feels a brief flash of embarrassment, like she’s intruded on something intimate, before she remembers that they’re in public and, also, she has no shame. “Were you going to get a taxi? I can keep an eye on her while you do. I don’t think she should walk back.”

“Oh.” Vivi blinks. “Yeah. I’ve got it. Where’s your ‘friend?’”

“Sent him packing. He’s back at the hotel, or he should be.”

“Well… good.”

But Cardan isn’t listening. He’s already looking down at Jude again.

It turns out Vivi has, carelessly, let her phone die. She isn’t anal about things like that. Taryn’s the one who keeps a charger in her purse at all times, but Taryn has vanished, and Jude’s phone only works on WiFi outside of the States.

So they hail one of Barcelona's bumblebee-like taxis the old-fashioned way, and Vivi is the one who climbs into the passenger’s seat and tells the driver where to go in Spanish that’s fluent, if definitely not Spain-Spanish. It is deeply ironic that Vivi, the only sister without a drop of Duarte blood in her veins, is the one who speaks Spanish the best. But Jude and Taryn were only seven when their parents died. Vivi had been nine. Two years makes a big difference with these things, especially because memories are shaping and re-shaping themselves in the minds of children that young. As far as the twins’ brains are concerned, they only had their parents for a short time.

Vivi remembers more. She remembers sitting on the counter in the old kitchen, legs swinging, as her dad cooked on Fridays—the special day, the end of the week day—and pointing at things in the kitchen so Justin could tell her their names in Spanish and she could echo them back. Cebolla, onion. Queso, cheese, of course. Cuchara, spoon. The words had a favor of their own, different from the English words she learned in kindergarten. She remembers the smell of toasting coriander seeds, the bright songs her dad would hum, the vibrant melodies bursting from the CD player Vivi leaned her elbow on. When she got far enough along in school, she threw herself into Spanish, hoping the words would pave a road that would lead her back to the man who shaped her.

Sometimes Jude gets in a sulk about their awful twist of fate, or Taryn gets weepy, and Vivi just wants to yell Justin Duarte was my dad, too! She feels like her throat is raw from screaming it her entire adolescence. It was easier in the end to just move away for college.

She ended up in Spain because Madoc and Oriana weren’t keen on her going to Mexico. Oh, sure, they’d been before on vacation no problemo, but as soon as Vivi wanted to go alone it was game over. No matter how much Vivi told them it was very racist of them and a total double standard. Apparently Oriana didn’t want her getting kidnapped. Vivi, who has in fact seen the movie Taken, knows she can get kidnapped in Europe just as easily, thanks very much. That had not been a persuasive argument with Madoc.

So here she is, in Barcelona, where familiar words can have entirely different flavors, and that’s even before getting to Catalan, which she can now speak a little but not well. Most of the time, she’ll be honest, she does love it here. At this moment she’s not feeling charitable toward anything.

Cardan helps load Jude into the backseat of the taxi. The driver, looking in the rearview mirror, asks, “¿Su novio?”

“¿Qué?” Vivi asks reflexively. She cranes her head around to see Cardan sliding in next to Jude, his arm around her shoulder. She switches to English. “What the hell, dude?”

“She won’t let go,” Cardan says simply. It’s true; Jude is clinging to him like a very weepy barnacle, her shoulders still shaking.

“Alright, well.” Vivi turns back around. It’s good to have the extra pair of hands. She wishes again that Heather was here. “You’re the official Jude wrangler now.”

“Copy that. I just—” He sighs, and in the rearview, Vivi sees him rub his face with his free hand. “It’s my fault.”

“Sure is.” The taxi begins to pull away from the curb, and Vivi checks her anger. She amends, “Actually, no, it’s not your fault that my sister’s a lightweight and an angry drunk. But from what I hear, the years of prior psychological damage are totally your fault. So, credit where credit is due.”

Cardan nods. Jude sniffles forlornly. Vivi is intrigued by how gentle he’s being with her, how tolerant. His shirt looks like a regular cotton tee, but knowing him it probably costs about the same as a single night in their very nice AirBnB. He doesn’t seem to mind that Jude’s getting snot and tears all over it.

“Hate you,” Jude mutters, pressing her face into his shoulder. “Hate this.”

“I know.” He pushes a lock of hair that’s escaped from her ponytail. “What are you on?”

“Huh?” There’s a pause. Vivi is watching the road now, but she can imagine Jude’s confused blinking. “I don’t… drugs.”

“Meds.”

“Oh, um, fuck.” Another pause. “Zoloft. I switched this year.”

“You’re not supposed to drink on that stuff,” Cardan says, but it almost sounds like he’s teasing. “It messes you up. I thought you were supposed to be the smart one.”

Jude sniffs. “It’s not like I’m operating heavy machinery,” she says, slurring slightly.

Cardan chuckles. “I did the Zoloft thing, too. I’m not on it anymore, though.”

“‘Cause you couldn’t drink?”

“Like anything would stop me.” He pauses, and Vivi looks into the rearview mirror to find him biting his lower lip in an exaggerated way, so drunk Jude is sure to get the joke. “No, there were... personal reasons.”

Jude is utterly nonplussed. “What?”

“Ah, you know…” He leans over and whispers something to her. Her eyes widen, and then she lets out a small, nervous chuckle. “Oh.”

“Yeah, I was like ‘If I can’t have sex, won’t that just make me more depressed?’”

To Vivi’s great surprise, Jude giggles. A totally surreal sound. She hasn’t giggled like that in years, if ever.

“There we go,” says Cardan, weirdly indulgent. “No more crying. Or, well—oh, okay,” he adds, as Jude turns her head and begins quietly sobbing into the sleeve of his shirt. “I guess some more crying.”

“You seem very sober,” Vivi remarks.

“Yeah, I’m trying it on. Just club soda for me tonight.” He leans over to rest his head on top of Jude’s. “It, cómo se dice, sucks.”

“Like your accent.”

“So I’ve heard.”

Vivi is beginning to get vaguely suspicious. She says, “But you are handling this well. Just used to dealing with a lot of drunks?”

“Huh? Oh.” Cardan’s dark eyes flick up to meet Vivi’s in the mirror. “This isn’t the first time. Jude got wasted at prom, after the stuff with Locke and Taryn came to light. Completely trashed.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“You were finishing up sophomore year, right? In like, Massachusetts? And it’s not like she would have told you. If she’s lucky, she doesn’t remember it. I loaded her into the Uber that took her home.”

Vivi’s stomach twists, but she channels the newfound sister guilt into suspicion and narrows her eyes. “Decent of you.”

“Yeah, I was trying that out, too. Got puked on for the trouble.” Cardan leans his head back against the headrest now. Jude’s sobs have quieted down. “But I still remember the Four Phases of Drunk Jude Duarte.”

“I’m glad somebody does,” Vivi admits. “What are they?”

“Angry, weepy, horny, sick.”

She snorts. “Basically Snow White’s shittiest dwarves.”

“Basically,” Cardan agrees. “But you’re not in danger of her getting sick yet, because we haven’t hit—ah. Um. Well.” He clears his throat. “Never mind.”

Vivi looks up into the mirror again to see Cardan plucking Jude’s hand off of him and returning it to her. “Did we just hit horny?”

“We just hit horny,” he says, his voice strained. Jude has her face buried in his neck again, but this time for entirely different reasons. The hand he had returned to Jude is already sliding back down his shirt. “Okay, hands above the waist. No, above—”

“Oh my God.” Vivi covers her mouth to stifle her laughter.

“Great. Very helpful, Vivienne,” Cardan says, grabbing Jude’s wrist and holding it still. It speaks to their relationship as nearly family friends that he can use her full name without invoking her wrath. “Your sister is outright molesting me and you can’t even tell her to knock it off?”

He doesn’t sound totally panicked, though. “I think you might want my sister to molest you,” Vivi guesses, turning around in her seat to look at him. Somehow, Jude has managed to thoroughly drape herself across him, but Cardan is showing admirable and frankly uncharacteristic self-restraint by keeping her from doing anything that can’t be undone. “Just a little.”

“When she’s sober. Jude, don’t bite my ear. Jude—”

Vivi snickers. The rest of the short ride passes like that, with Cardan deflecting Jude’s advances and Vivi deflecting the taxi driver’s questions about what exactly is happening back there and whether Jude is going to be sick all over his floor mats. They are lucky enough to not hit “sick” until Jude is out of the car and walking up the five stairs to the door of the apartment building. With Cardan’s warning in mind, Vivi is able to jump back in time.

Cardan, who is nearer to Jude, is not so lucky. She leans against the railing and doubles over it, but his shoes and the bottoms of his jeans are still caught in the splash zone. “Okay, great,” he says, gathering her back up. He does not sound entirely tolerant now, but he also doesn’t sound as angry as Vivi might expect. “That’s over. Feel any better?”

“No,” Jude mutters.

“You might in the morning.” He moves them both so Vivi can pass and open the door. “Man, is this really only the second time this has ever happened to you? I have to say, I’m jealous. Not of you in this moment, of course. Just in general.”

“We can’t all be charming teenage alcoholics,” Vivi says, propping the door open so Cardan can help her through.

“You hear that, Jude?” Cardan asks. “Your sister thinks I’m charming.”

“Uh-huh,” says Jude.

“Don’t let it go to your head,” Vivi warns. “She’s almost out. Let’s get her upstairs.”

Jude doesn’t make it into the bedroom she and Taryn are sharing. They put her to bed on the couch, on her side, with Cardan’s jacket draped over her. There’s no laundry machine in the AirBnB, but Vivi finds some detergent in the cabinet and they fill the bathroom sink with lukewarm water so Cardan can wash his jeans. Vivi is not sure the right time for the conversation she should have is now, when Cardan is standing in his boxer briefs and Jude is passed out in the next room, but on the bright side, there probably isn’t a worse time.

“You know, I didn’t think we had this level of friendship,” Cardan remarks, dunking his jeans in the sudsy water. “Dealing with your sister must really be a bonding experience. You always liked Rhyia best.”

“Well, Rhyia’s cool.” Vivi folds her arms and leans in the doorway. She kicked off her boots when they got in the door, so Cardan now looks even taller, although certainly not very intimidating in his underwear. “Calvin Klein. Nice. You always struck me as more of a boxers guy, I have to say.”

“Sometimes. These jeans are pretty tight, though.” He looks over at her. “Do you need something?”

She shakes her head. “Oh, nothing. I just can’t believe you’re trying to fuck my sister.”

“I’m not trying to fuck your sister,” Cardan says, massaging his jeans in the sink in such a way that Vivi is forced to wonder whether he’s ever done his own laundry. “She’s wasted. And she hates me.”

Vivi frowns deeply.

Cardan asks, “What?”

“Nothing.”

“Vivienne Leigh—”

“Don’t you pull out my full name for this. You’re playing some game here and I will figure out what it—oh.”

“What now?”

Vivi squints at him. “Are you in love with my sister?”

Cardan lets out an exhausted sigh. “Taryn isn’t really my type.”

They both know they aren’t talking about Taryn. “What the fuck. How long?”

“Like a year. Or maybe my whole life. I’m not sure.”

“Does she know?”

“I really hope not.” Cardan grimaces at his reflection in the mirror, and then looks past himself to see where Jude sleeps on the couch. “She’d never let me live it down.”

“Okay, well…” Vivi pauses. This is more older sibling responsibility than she signed up for. “What are your… intentions?”

“I don’t have any.” Vivi purses her lips, and he adds, “I really don’t. I wasn’t expecting to see her tonight. I kind of thought I’d never see her again after we graduated.” He pauses and looks down at the sink. “I think, someday, I’d like to be a person she likes. That she’s capable of liking.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

“Huh.” He has it really, really bad. Vivi can’t imagine what Jude said or did to make him feel that way about her. Maybe it was her total lack of regard for him? “Is this why you bullied her for years?”

“I hope not!” Cardan exclaims, in a way that suggests this thought has occurred to him before, and moreover, that it actually bothers him. “I don’t know! I don’t want to be that fucking cliché, Vivi.”

“We’re all cliché in our own special ways,” Vivi says, glancing back at Jude. A vague plot is beginning to take shape in her brain. Jude is the plotter, Taryn the planner—there is a difference—and Vivi the pantser, normally. But there is something here that she thinks she can exploit. “Seeing as you have no pants, you should probably stay over. I don’t think any of our clothes will fit you.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously. You can have one of the twin beds.” After a beat, she adds, “I’m not telling you which one is Jude’s.”

“Darn,” Cardan deadpans. “Now I don’t know which one to jerk off in.”

Vivi pulls a face. “That’s the idea.” And then, because Cardan is hopeless, she reaches forward and yanks the plug from the drain. “Rinse off your jeans in clean water. Otherwise they’ll dry all stiff and soapy.”

“Thank you for the advice, oh wise one.”

She rolls her eyes and leaves him to it. After checking on Jude, whose coloring and breathing are both normal, she heads back to her room and looks at her phone. Nothing from Taryn, even though it’s later than Vivi thought, but Vivi isn’t worried. Taryn’s kind of like a cat in that, somehow, she always manages to land on her feet. Vivi fires off a quick text to her, then stares at the glowing screen, thinking about the way Cardan had rested his head on top of Jude’s in the back of the taxi.

She texts Heather: sisters are a lot of work

And:

i wish you were here

It’s much earlier in New England. When the three dots pop up to indicate that Heather is typing a reply, Vivi smiles.

[segenassefa]

2: On Consumerism, Fighting Demons, and Societies Inevitable Collapse

Quarantine has been lowkey surreal. My constant complaint of never having enough time to do all the things I want/should be doing has now left me bored in the house, bored in the house, bored with nothing but time to get said things done. However, it is a dual edged sword - with the collapse and subsequent reformation of civil society outside my doors, it leaves me wondering – as well as a lot of other people – in the words of Miss Juicy…what the hell we gone do now?

Nearing the end of the first leg of my university career, I should be thinking about getting ready to transition to the next logical stages of adulthood - saving for an apartment, applying for permanent residency, as well as graduate schools and part time jobs. Yet, I’m worried about if these things will even be a possibility within the next month, six months, or even the next year.

On top of ALL of that, the recent BLM protests and the way that people (read: white people, Latinxs, Black men, homo/transphobes, etc.) have shown their asses the past few months is beyond mortifying - especially regarding the treatment of black women and how our value as individuals as well as a collective to society is really perceived.* This is not to downplay the murder of numerous black men in society, BUT who the fuck is riding for black women aside from other black women? And not just the ones who find attractive, or are racially ambiguous, or the ones you feel as if you get “guilted” into supporting and demanding justice for, I mean each and every black woman. I’m just saying, it gets pretty disheartening to feel like the legwork of the revolution is on the back of one category of people, and that your value to society is measured by the amount of emotional labour you’re ready to do for others, or how fat your ass is (but I digress…).

I feel like most people have used material things as coping mechanisms instead of actually facing their feelings and dealing with the things that bother them. Just think of the number of packages that have arrived on your doorstep the past few months. Breaking the glossy seal of packing tape is similar to therapy, until all the boxes are open, and you start feeling like shit again. And now, more than ever, there’s a lot to be bothered about. Western society has dedicated phrases based on the phenomenon of substituting true self-work with figurative emotional bandages (Phrases like comfort eating and retail therapy come to mind).

It’s nice to think that we – the people entering their adolescent and young adult years – will be the one to change these things, but suddenly it’s 2 am, you have twenty different things in your Amazon cart, (who the fuck needs a metal straw cleaning kit?) and you’re trying to see how far you can stretch and grab your debit card before falling off of the bed.

The conflicting messages pushed by society don’t help all that much either. If you look up “Kondo method” or “decluttering my closet” on YouTube, the numbers of videos that come up is astounding. Pages and pages of sweaty-faced, smiling YouTubers monetizing from this kind of faux “minimalism” only to post haul videos a few days later because “I threw everything out and now I have to rebuild from scratch sksksk!”. Does this not just perpetuate a cycle of buying and throwing and buying? I am....confusion, to say the least. Still I watch them, because I’m a hypocrite, and am also easily amused.

I will be the first to admit I have always had a very unhealthy relationship with money, with self-image, and with measuring my self-worth in proximity with “stuff that stems from a complicated relationship with physical self. Follow along:

Growing up, I was a fat kid. We don’t even have to sugar coat it. Think Terrio, but better eyebrows and more hair. Except I was not killin’ em, just myself. I always envied my friends who were able to go shopping at regular stores – read: Hollister, Abercrombie, Urban Outfitters (yes my friends were white), meanwhile I was condemned to shopping in the women’s department.

So, to compensate, I would buy trinkets – things like nail polish, lip gloss, journals, you get the point. My proximity to worthiness was measured not by the things that I bought, but within the act of buying. Growing up with parents who were also financially frugal also altered my relationship with money and blessed me with crippling buyers’ remorse after every purchase, even on things that are important (read: groceries).  

But as a kid, buying “stuff” was fun for me – it gave me some sort of purpose, and the acquisition of things (even if they weren’t the same things my peers had) made me feel like, to some extent, I could compete on the same playing field. As I got older, and I started to have real expenses, I moved towards second-hand shopping. I would religiously find myself at Goodwill on weekend, after school, or with friends. I could literally feel an endorphin rush when I would find something that I would consider a “good deal”, and it made me feel (again) purposeful, to be spending money, even if I didn’t need whatever I was buying.

I should also add that the people in my immediate family does not believe in thrift stores (“Why am I working for you to wear other people’s clothing?”, I remember my dad asking me one day), so the act of second-hand shopping was also my form of rebellion.

I began to amass a collection of clothing that would put Kylie’s closet to shame. I began buying things for events and situations that were yet to happen, for other people, for when I lose ten pounds. It was a madness.

In freshman year of university, I had an unhealthy relationship with clubbing clothes. Did I have the figure for clubbing clothes? Absolutely not. The funnier part is, I couldn’t even go clubbing because I wasn’t 19 at the time. And yet I had drawers and drawers full of the stuff. Not to mention that clubbing clothes is incredibly similar to summer clothing and living between Minnesota and Canada meant that these things were barely seeing the light of day.

The moral of this was – I could never figure out my relationship with stuff, This quarantine has forced me to try and break down the compulsion behind my behaviour.  I felt like I was spiralling the six weeks that they closed thrift stores, and I knew myself well enough to not try and online shop with the same kind of frequency as that. But the crazy part was, I didn’t die. I didn’t go into withdrawal (ok, I did a little bit, but whatever), and I was able to take the time to go through the things I already owned and find some hidden gems that were routinely buried in the cracks and crevices of my closet. It was like the episode of Family Guy when Peter realizes he has a vestigial twin – alarming and cool at first, but then it’s just alarming and annoying.

Its more embarrassing to realize that some semblance of myself image is tied to the frequency with which I am able to spend money. I would never say that participating in capitalist society gives me some kind of purpose as a black woman because God forbid. Also, considering that a lot of big names companies are actually racist and fatphobic as hell creates a whole new dimension for analyzing the power of my black dollar, sometimes creating another spiral of guilt leading to you guessed it – more spending.

As much as it seems like it, however, this self-reflection was not in vain. In the past month, I’ve cut down my closet from +200 pieces of clothing and shoes to about 40. If you ever want a fun, humbling activity this quarantine, just clean out your closet and be honest with yourself about how often you wear certain things. It was revolting to see the number of shirts, dresses, pants, skirts that I had bought and convinced myself wholeheartedly I was going to wear, only to pull them out of my closet months later with the tags attached *insert Marge Simpson covering her face meme*.

But at the end of the whole ordeal, it felt really good to look at my space and not feel burden or guilt. It was somewhat philanthropic realizing that not only will these clothes make someone else happier (I donated pretty much everything because it’s not always about money), but that my quality of life was not dramatically impacted in owning (or not owning) certain things. The past few weeks, I’ve spent more money on going out and sharing experiences with friends, but still nowhere near the same amount of money I would have spent buying clothes and other material possession.

Youtuber Kelly Stamps has a video on how minimalism “cured” her depression**, and the whole thesis boils down to the idea that owning less things gives you less to compare yourself too, thus making you happier (in a sense) and allowing you to focus the energy and time that would have been centered around maintaining and building your collection of possessions other things.

This still doesn’t break down the root of the issue, but it’s a start. I think when you have traits or patterns that you’ve participated in for so long, it becomes hard to step back and be objective enough to realize that you – yes, you – are part of the problem. I can blame my habits on a lot of things but at the end of the day, it’s important to realize that certain cycles seem never-ending because I actively choose to participate in these kinds of behaviours (accountability is sexy, huh?). While I’m not ready to face all my demons quite yet, it’s easier to do it with a nice wardrobe and a streamlined sense of mind.

Notes

*When I say black women, I mean ALL black women. Not some limited, cis-gendered, heteronormative view of what a woman is. Over here we ride for all those who identify as women.

**She emphasizes that she doesn’t actually means that it cured anything, but rather helped with her anxiety, and in turn, helped with her depression.

Links

That Family Guy Episode

The Kelly Stamps video

[imagine-loki]

The Slutty Webs one Weaves

Title : The Slutty Webs one Weaves

Chapter NO. 4 of 10?

ORIGINAL IMAGINE: Imagine Loki’s Asgardian wife learns women write fanfiction about him on a trip to Midgard. She’s edgy for the duration and lets him have it when they get back.

Author: lokilover9

Rating: M

Notes: Hello everyone. I will get to writing another chapter of Irked, but for now, here’s a mini crack fic. Should be good for a laugh or two.

That afternoon and throughout the evening, Brianna stayed in her room with Loki. He appeared once to make her a sandwich, assured everyone she was fine and returned to her without another word. At around midnight, he sauntered into the living room looking exasperated.

"She's sleeping. In the bed this time."

"Why hadn't she before?" Asked Pepper.

His fists clenched. "A fear of rats obtained on the streets. Which I assume happened during her traveling to meet me."

"You can't blame yourself for that."

Loki went to the kitchen, retrieved some expensive Scotch from a cupboard above the fridge and started chugging it. "Yes I can, Virginia. She knew I was her Father before coming."

"What?" Everyone joined him around the island. "How?"

"Her Mother kept a diary." He held up the Scotch. "And us magically inclined are astute at finding hidden treasure."

"Must be hereditary." Kidded Stark. "Little Warrior's a master tater tot thief."

"Fuck. She thought I'd abandoned her."

"Harsh, bro. Even I know you're incapable of that."

"Still impersonating a Prince, are you?"

"I'm serious." Said Thor. "Obviously you forgot that termination spell on someone. If it wasn't a woman from the dumpster night, then who?"

"It was."

"Huh? You had sex with a woman in a dumpster?" Asked Stark.

"He woke in one naked after tossed into it by three."

"You had sex with 'three' women in a dumpster?"

"No, I was drugged first. Hence the waking?"

"And razzed me about doing the same in a seniors tub?"

Pepper frowned. "You had sex with a senior in her tub? What the hell, Tony?"

Loki rubbed his brow. 'I'm surrounded by fucking lunatics.'

"Virginia, no! Remember my best friend Mike? His grandmother…"

"Which one was it?" Thor quietly asked.

"The sword swallowing wench."

"You sure?"

"Brianna described her perfectly and showed me a matching, heart shaped birthmark beneath her collarbone."

Tony continued… "Now Loopy, also known as Sasquatch..."

"I thought you couldn't remember anything after..."

Loki's patience ran out and he banged the bottle down. "I DON'T REMEMBER! Which means she rode me until the fireworks went off because apparently my dick stays erect while I'm unconscious! How the bloody hell I'll convince Astrid of this saga is beyond me!"

"Aren't you more worried of convincing Mother?"

"I don't talk to Mother about my dick Thor and hope you don't either."

"Uh, guys? Lady present. Change the subject, please?"

"With pleasure. Brianna's been alone for almost three months. Fending for herself on a realm where her own kind are willing to sell her off to the highest bidder. That's why her Mother, whose name I will not repeat, Claudia and Hannah, all took turns that night to see who'd strike gold. They were hoping she would inherit some of my powers.Thank the fucking norns two failed!"

"Oh my god." Pepper solemnly whispered.

"Stop shouting. You'll wake her."

Loki pensively stared at Thor. "I've silenced her room. Ironic how every realm thinks Frost Giants monsters. Call it a sixth sense, but I recently felt compelled to learn the Jotun language and began studying their history. For millenniums, they thrived in a predominantly wealthy, civilized and disciplined, family oriented culture. Just like Asgardians. Laufey's greed for power changed all that."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Brianna knows."

The older God responded curtly. "You told her she's a Frost Giant?"

The second Stark had revealed her ice capade, Loki knew she was his and conjured a back up plan to protect her. Testing Thor was part of it. If he couldn't accept her, Odin definitely wouldn't. Especially once learning of her true identity. 'Thanks for your honesty, brother. Now to put that plan into action.' "Brianna is six years old. She's lived in constant fear of those who should have loved her and of herself, because she didn't understand her powers, or where they stemmed from. I will not betray her by lying about her heritage, nor permit she lives ashamed of it. Certainly you understand?" He then addressed Tony. "Excuse me. I need some air."

Stark got the hint and knew where he'd be. "Who's Laufey?" He asked uncle oaf.

"Jotunheim's last King."

"What happened to him?"

"He was murdered."

"Nice." He quickly winked at Pepper. "Stay here and mind Little Warrior? I think Snowflake could use a friend." He joined Loki outside, sitting against the glass on his landing deck. "You okay?"

"Besides overly tempted to murder three sluts? Of course."

"Please don't?"

"Only for my Daughter's sake."

"What else was in the diary?"

"Brianna and I spoke about many things. Some I'll tell you, some I won't."

"Why?"

"We agreed it best. You've done everything to protect her and we want to return the favor."

"I can protect myself."

"Not from yourself, should I reveal too much.

"Spoiled sports."

"I thank you again for watching over one of my own and for keeping your promise to Brianna. She praised you both a lot. Calls you uncle Cootyoodles."

Stark proudly grinned. “She's an amazing kid, but I'm happy you came. If not, Pepper and I planned to ask Thor to take her."

"To Asgard?"

"Where else? We can't protect her from the bad guys. She'd either become a lab rat or be used as a weapon, here. Her Mother is a perfect example of such intentions. Evil bitch."

"Indeed, yet not the mastermind. Hannah was. Brianna was secretly born in the same house she was conceived in and never registered as a citizen. Most recently, they were living in a house in the countryside in State. One a carpenter and the other an electrician, they'd constructed her a hidden, sound proof, room in the basement and that was her existence. Always fed and clothed, but comforted only by her Mother, who snuck her out from time to time. Yet never outside the house and at every opportunity, taught her how to use the computer. They'd resided in two other States the same way. Forever keeping Brianna hidden from society, waiting for a sign she had powers. She cleverly hid them and eventually braved sneaking out alone when they weren't around. Always careful to conceal her tracks while learning all she could of your world through the internet. Until one day, she was mistaken when Hannah sauntered out of bed late and became enraged by her presence. They reinforced her rooms security and although Brianna knew it bypassable, she was terrified to try after the arguing started. It continued for days, often vicious sounding, but she couldn't decipher the words. The worst of it ended with a distant scream on the grounds and panicked footsteps amidst the house. That night, Hannah went to her with a look of insanity, tossing bags of nonperishable food into her room and threatening her harm if she ever came out without permission again. When Brianna heard nothing for days, she bravely disobeyed and carefully scoured every room for money. That's how she encountered the diary and learned about me. Research lead her to you and she mapped out a plan."

"I knew she was brave, but that's extraordinary." Said Tony. "How did she escape?"

"Easily. They never returned."

"They just..vanished?"

"Apparently. When food ran low, Brianna rode her bike to a neighbors, hid herself in the back of his pick up truck and hitched a ride into the nearest city."

"Shit. Does she know what they did?"

"No explicit details were written, but imagine a six year old seeking the word sex on dictionary.com to learn how she was created. The plot began when Hannah saw me leaving their local grocery store and followed me to my hotel. From there, I was stalked until they discovered my favorite hangout."

Stark imagined suiting up on the bitches. "Now I'm tempted to murder three sluts. Poor Little Warrior. What a shitty life she lead. Can I ask where she came from?"

"No, but it took her three weeks to reach you with the help of homeless people."

"What?"

"Two in particular who by the grace of Valhalla, were kind enough to protect her along the way. Neither knew where she was headed and kept her presence secret. All in exchange for food, clothes and periodic shelter. One a teen she sent home to her family, the other an older woman, who claimed to have none. Brianna bid her goodbye near the Lincoln bridge and from there, traveled alone for two days."

"Holy fuck. I still can't believe she made it here alive."

"The child's a genius." 'Who already knows how to make herself invisible.' Thought Loki. He silently recalled the day he'd scared the shit out of some maids with half his face, upper torso and one leg invisible. He was on his way to Frigga after failing to rectify the problem. 'Norns. Only a task that took me until adulthood to master.'

"True, but I gotta know. How did she get into my Tower?"

The God merely arched his brows.

"Nevermind. Like Father, like Daughter. What now?"

"We leave for Asgard tomorrow afternoon. Brianna can't wait. Presuming having new parents 'and' living on a new realm might've induced her reluctance, I've convinced her it's a months visit."

"She's never coming back?"

"As an adult maybe. Beforehand could be risky. Please play along?"

"I will, but she'll hate me for it."

"She'll think you didn't know. I'll take the heat."

"What about Thor?"

"He can't know until morning. Then he won't run ahead and announce it, grandstanding in the name of preparing everyone."

"He'd do that?"

"He might. Brianna is my daughter. My responsibility. I'll not have my wife learning of her through him."

"Don't blame ya."

"There's something else he can't know. I shielded us from Heimdalls sight's the moment we landed to keep anyone from tracing Brianna back to you and Pepper. You're my friends and if they decide to look for her, I won't have your lives torn apart again because of me."

Tony was so humbled and astonished by everything, he never thought to ask why Thor couldn't know this information, or how these women knew Loki's powers were so extensive. "Thanks, man."

"I'll do all the headhunting on my next trip back. For now, the sluts can stew not knowing where Brianna is."

"Serves them right. Too bad we won't witness their panic."

Loki inwardly snickered. 'I might.'

"Why did Brianna sleep so long after making all that ice?"

"Extensive use by one so new to their powers is exhausting. I've seen it before."

"There are more like you on Asgard?"

"Only a handful of us are Gods. Yet many posses lesser powers they are schooled to perfect. As adults, they are encouraged to join our military."

"And if they don't?"

"It is not enforced, Tony. They are allowed to exist freely."

"Oh. Why was she so angry we touched her stuff?"

"She wants to tell you tomorrow."

"Okay. You mentioned a Claudia and Hannah. What was her Mother's name?"

"Brianna's about to disappear and you're still snooping, knowing jail time could loom in the future?"

"Can't an earthling be curious? Liiike..of how extensive Brianna's powers are?"

"Classified."

Stark rolled his eyes. "Should I just not bother asking anything else?"

"I can stargaze while tuning you out."

"Fine. Wanna know some fun facts about your Daughter?"

"Sure."

"She grows on ya real quick."

"I know."

"Loves vampires and zombies. Plays a mean game of Mario Kart, is a mathematical, geographical and weird animal whiz. Knows what an Emperor Tamarin is. They look like a Teddy bear, raccoon, monkey combination, with a wild west moustache. Gets a kick out of quizzing Jarvis and laughs her ass off when he fucks up."

Loki smirked.

"Loves motown music…"

"'Motown?'"

"Come on, really?" Tony motioned movements of the Supremes. "Stop! In the name of love, before you break my heart… No? How about this one?" He imitated Stevie Wonder, grooving at his piano. "...Signed, sealed, delivered, I'm yours!"

"You aren't my type." Teased Loki. "Nor am I familiar with that genre of music."

"Your loss, our gain. She also loves having stories read to her at bedtime and dancing. Tried teaching me how to moonwalk and I failed. Epically."

"Did she laugh her ass off at that too?"

"Yep. We'll miss her. A lot."

"I'll never let her forget you, Tony."

They started for the elevator.

"I hope not and that whole date rape thing? Be the victim male or female, the culprits deserve major jail time."

Familiar with Starks habit of finding amusement in the worst of circumstances, Loki sensed a punchline. "And?"

"Alter that part to your benefit in the future. Like you slipped and hit your head. A guys dick staying hard while he's unconscious? Great story to tell your grandson's around the campfire one day."

"Eh he he he. Maybe I will."

Loki settled into bed and conjured an ancient, Jotun text. He opened it to a marked page and silently re-read a prophecy he'd recently discovered. One written by a beloved seer of his ancestors;

'Gifted by the Norns, a child will be born on a foreign realm to a veiled, Jotun King and Mother of ignoble blood. A sorcerer by birth, he is destined to protect, guide and teach his sorceress daughter to cultivate and master her powers. For she will make history as a savior to the nine realms. Destined to unite them in battles against evil. A Queen who shall reign above kings. Jotunheim's Goddess of Ice.'

It vanished, replaced by Asgardian writing paper and a fancy pen as he thought of his wife. Her antics often drove people to drink, including himself, yet they loved each other madly. It was her bright blue eyes, perpetually cheery personality and spontaneity that first attracted him. A welcome change from the drudgery of structured royal life, but ultimately her sincere heart. She adored him, flaws included. And shite did she give good head. The only lover out of hundreds to pop his cork on the first try. Now, after their last conversation it saddened him to write this.

'Dear Astrid; Forgive me as I have a shocking confession to make. Foremost, I have no relationship of any kind with the woman involved and knew nothing of this until it was brought to my attention. It seems my carnal activities on Midgard have induced more than smutty fanfiction. I have a daughter, my lovely. A little girl who stole my heart with her smile. As you did. I would not recover from losing you, but owe her a chance. To breathe her realms air. Count its stars. Feel the sun and rain on her face. For myself to be the adult so she can be the child. I need time to earn her trust and hope we bond. I know it's a lot to ask, but wait for me? Give 'us' a fighting chance? Consider it at least?

Your adoring husband, Loki.'

He sealed it in an envelope and affectionately whispered to Brianna. "Our adventure begins, Og Min Lille."

Og Min Lille ~ My Little One in Norwegian

[flyingmustachio]

You know I think maybe some of the rigid polarization issues we’re having here in the U.S. over the past couple of decades especially, might be due to how our concept of family has changed? The bubbled-off, nuclear family of just mom dad and kids living together only really became widespread in the 1950′s or so. Before then, grandparents or other relatives very frequently lived together.

I always think  about how my perspective would be different if I had been raised with my extended family always around. Many cultures raise children even more communally. In many Native American cultures, for example, the role of primary child-carer goes to the grandparents. What would my concept of “mother” be like if I never expected to be raised by her? What roles would she take in my life? How would my feelings towards her be different than under my current conception of “motherhood”?

I imagine that if I were raised in an extended family situation, I would have been exposed to many more viewpoints from the very beginning of my life. In the U.S. children don’t have such close relationships with their extended family. Even with the closest families that visit their extended relatives frequently, it’s simply not possible to attain the kind of intimate relationship you develop by living with and being by around someone directly in your home. The parent’s here authority is seen as pretty exclusive. I feel like there’s a culture of heavy silence, if you will. Even if you are an aunt or cousin or grandfather of the child, you are expected never to contradict what the parents want the child to learn. For example, some parents will get upset if a friend or relative explains something to their child that the parents wanted to censor from the child’s knowledge until they were older. I have seen Christian parents get angry that a family friend admitted they were Buddhist in front of the child, or worse, gave a basic explanation of their differing religion or political view. That’s why there’s always so much hullabaloo around gay representation in our media - “But what am I supposed to tell my kids?!” is a constant talking point, as if it were the rest of the world’s job to keep the existence of homosexuality secret so as not to contradict their personal parenting decisions.

I feel like we Americans are raised in tiny cultural bubbles to some extent. Most of us don’t encounter anything new that really challenges our assumptions until quite late - even into adulthood. Some never end up having any of their beliefs shaken at all, simply because they never encounter anything different enough to make them reconsider their perspectives. If you are born in a family that trends in one religious or political direction or other, you tend to stay in that religion and party, because your parents alone control what type of people, media, news, and perspectives you have access to. Your brain develops in an environment specifically tailored towards those beliefs. Your perspective matures in a place where you are intentionally hampered from too deep a knowledge or insight into opposing views. Anyone who believes differently from your family is “othered.” On the more severe end, which I can speak to directly as I was raised for some of my childhood in a Charismatic Catholic mini cult, anyone who believes anything different from the chosen narrative was outright dehumanized. They were dangerous. Of course we were supposed to love everyone, but oh, our lesbian neighbors, your Wiccan friend, they’re under demonic influence, you know. It’s not that they’re evil, they’re just wounded. They’re not yet saved. Better to pity and pray for them from afar, and be careful not to spend too much time with them, or else they may open you up to demonic influences too!

I remember once my mother shaking her head and saying to me, her voice full of exasperation and disappointment “I JUST don’t understand why you don’t have more friends like you!” At the time I was just confused. My friends were like me! We all liked books! We all liked each other’s music and humor! It took me a while to realize that she meant “why don’t you have more friends who are Christian.” And not just Christian, but our specific brand of Christian. We even avoided relatives who thought too differently. I could spend as much time as I wanted with children of other cult members, with freedom, but my friends from public school had to be vetted, and time spent around them was limited, and with more supervision.

I feel like this is why so many college graduates get told they “changed” after college, or even that they got “ruined.” It isn’t until college that some of us even learn assumption-challenging information. I know for me I DID change during college, simply because I learned so much information I had to expand my perspective on everything. I basically learned whole new ways to think and evaluate. Even if you start to question things, in this kind of bubbled-off environment, from the child’s perspective there can be IMMENSE pressure to toe the family line. In families that have very heavily curated the child’s environment and social contacts, deviating from “acceptable” opinions too far could mean losing contact with not just your family, but your entire community. Not just through direct shunning or disowning, but through coldness or constant arguments or proselytizing. It’s difficult to maintain a deep relationship with a family who only tries to reconvert you every single time they talk to you. 

Americans also don’t travel much - lots of us who live near enough the borders have been able to go to Canada or Mexico, but a huge chunk of Americans never get the chance to leave the States at all. If they do it’s maybe one cruise that goes only to touristy places that already fit their mental stereotypes. I am lucky enough to have family in London, and have had the chance to travel to Europe several times in my life. Traveling is such an important way to expand your perspective, and most of us simply can’t afford to do it.

So here you’ve got a lot of Americans being raised with extremely limited points of view, in separate media bubbles that they continue to stay in into adulthood, to the point where the views of the other political side are completely nonsensical to you because they’re coming from a perspective that you can’t even imagine because you barely know it exists. And in the worst, most culty cases, where you and everyone you’re close to share a cultural identity based on demonizing the “other side,” you’re going to be afraid, deep down, to challenge any of your beliefs because it might mean having to rethink your entire world view, and be considered to be under demonic influence yourself.

Obviously this nuclear family isolation is on a huge spectrum. Most U.S. families are not in cults, and many U.S. families are very open-minded. But I think it’s enough of a thing to be a thing, if that makes any sense.

But if I had been raised in an extended family or in a family model where child-rearing authority were spread out to more adults, whether related or not, I would have had SO much more depth of social knowledge. If I had been allowed to have deep relationships with and rely on and ask questions of more adults, I feel like it would have been much easier to understand other’s perspectives, much quicker. Even if all your relatives are of the same religion or political party, they’re bound to have a much wider range of opinion than a few carefully curated friends who agree completely.

I would really love if someone from a communal-parenting culture would weigh in, I’d love to hear your perspective on this.

[sammierogers]

One More Twist in the Road – The Aging Trangender Woman

“Aging is an extraordinary process where you become the person you always should have been.”

David Bowie

Every transgender woman, or girl, or boy, or man, or queer … knows the feeling. That feeling...the feeling that comes over you when the right combination of factors fall into place, and... for the first time...you look at your reflection... and, you see the face you have so longed to see...the face that represents who you are...who you have always been...always longed to be seen as...always longed for... when the face staring back was just never before “right”...when the face always reflected before was... just not you.

Every transgender person knows... or remembers...that feeling.

It is intoxicating. It is pure heroin injected straight into the cerebral cortex. It is amazing beyond amazing. And it is addicting.

I learned awhile ago... I can't remember when... awhile ago... I learned that hormones create puberty. Yeah...lol... I know...like, duh...right? But, seriously...I never really thought about how the hormonal process of maturity would play out on the emotions of adolescents. I mean...my own adolescence was back in the Pleistocene era and that hell mostly forgotten. And for the rest of my time on Earth... well, I had my own issues...forgive me.

But, in reflection now, puberty has to be hell for young people...especially young women. Girls feeling themselves changing...becoming women...and, becoming women amidst all the BS signals and expectations our crass, over sexed, paternalistic, fucked up society lays on girls. Yikes. Ugly. No wonder the drama so famous among middle school students.

So...as weird, tough and fucked up as it has to be to go through that at 13, with a correctly aligned vagina... or penis... imagine doing it with a misplaced penis...or vagina...at 40...or 50...or 60. Imagine having spent all those decades wearing the costume of another gender...playing that role...while your life led you through all the trials and experiences and adventures that form you and teach you and mold you and make you able to function and survive in this world... all in the wrong role. Imagine going through all that weird, body-changing, hormonal nightmare, puberty shit.... all over again. Only this time at a point when every other mundane little piece of your life's roadmap to function is locked into the perceptions and reactions of a learned but totally wrong gender identity...that is decades set in it's ways.

Can you? Can you imagine that?

Can you imagine what that is like?

That is the experience for a later life transitioning person first starting on hormones.

Ok, so now let's look at aging.

When we are young...when we are kids... I think... there is a desire to be older... to be more mature... to be able to move in the circles that older people move in. To be able to do all the things that adults do....with all the power that adults “seem” to have... doing all the “cool” things that adults...even young adults...seem to be doing...at least, from our childish viewpoint. I think that is part of the normal process of maturation.

But... as we grow...there comes a point... there comes a stage...altogether too brief... when we feel “right”...when we feel empowered in the world...when we feel that perfect balance of maturity, power, wisdom, and potential..combined with some form of confidence in our appearance...to whatever degree our genetic makeup allows us. There comes a time...for many of us... when we feel good.

And in the blink of a hungover party girl's Sunday dawn that minute is gone.

The wedding, and the first house and the first birth and too many hours working for less than the man next to you while you ran home to make sure the laundry is done and the homework completed... and bang...the face you once thought might, in the right light, with the right smile and the right wink...just might be attractive and seem “cool” and “hip” to the right partner... that face is looking back at you no longer young. That face is suddenly sporting fine lines, and...ugh... wrinkles...and...OMG...jowls.  That face is suddenly, horribly, subtly, awfully, unforgivingly, undeniably....old.

Yeah

So... now try to imagine spending decades of your youth in a “role”... like being inside a Disney character costume. A costume that, the wearing of, taught you many things, some of which were good...even great. But a costume nonetheless. And a costume with a face that isn't you.

And then one day... one day... that miraculous , euphoric, near orgasmic moment comes upon you and you finally see that real you in your reflection. And you take the pills. And your body changes. And you start that crazy rollercoaster of emotional mayhem.

And for this brief, shining, sparkling, amazing, giddy moment... you are happy. Beyond happy...your smile is visible from Alpha Centauri. And the emotional rollercoaster takes you. And you don't care...you absolutely do not care, because for the first time... the first time in your life...  you feel free, and honest and real and just plain right... and... dare we say?... you feel pretty.

And in two tenths of a nanosecond...it is gone. The euphoria of authenticity is quickly matched by the staring eyes of prejudice and intolerance. The giddiness of girlishness is rapidly ground down by the steady onslaught of the everyday. The roller coaster ride of pubescent emotions matures into some semblance of a return to adulthood. And what took many years the first time around the second time lasts but months.

I always think of late transitioning people as living in “dog years”. One year into hormones and transition carries us more like seven or ten years down the road to a new found maturity. We may have been set back to being 13 emotionally, and had to repeat those horrible years, but the maturation process is accelerated because so much of the “normal” learning that takes place  during puberty– dealing with anger, self discipline, balancing a check book and getting the oil changed in your car... all these things have already been learned. What must be experienced and understood is simply the complexities of dealing with now living in a “new” gender, exacerbated by the affects of a massive influx of life changing hormones. We start feeling 13 again but a year ater we are 23 and another year brings us to 33 and soon we are caught up with the years we have actually lived.

But for the late transitioner, much damage has already occurred. Years of testosterone poisoning has left scars in the form of receding hairlines, broad shoulders, hirsute bodies and deep voices. The first moment of authentic gender recognition comes with giddy euphoria as the disphoria is lifted and replaced by joy. But as time passes, the pink fog lifts and the eye begins to see clearly the effects of aging. And their comes a dawning of all the irretrievable time that was, not lost, but somehow misspent. Youth is gone and those years are not coming back and the knowledge that the joy of authenticity is now savagely limited by the lack of remaining years...can be damning.

The mirror begins to be no longer our friend. The mirror becomes a daily reminder of every new line and wrinkle. The mirror reflects our mortality like a rapidly emptying hourglass. The mirror, along with every new selfie, relentlessly pounds into us the reality that our moment of authenticity and joy is brief and ebbing swiftly. Try as we may to stave off the withering effects of age through surgeries and makeup and enhancements (and filters), we are fighting an enemy that must ultimately prevail.

It took a lifetime to arrive at the party only to discover that the party is nearly over.

It is heartbreaking.

But pain is how we grow. A bodybuilder grows large by first experiencing the pain of breaking open the blood vessels in their muscles so that those muscles may grow back bigger and stronger. Emotional pain, fully experienced and not denied, acts in the same manner to grow our heart in empathy and wisdom. The pain of aging, properly experienced and not denied, brings with it an appreciation for the pain of others and, hopefully, the wisdom to accept oneself with grace. It isn't easy. But it is just one more twist in a long road we have already survived.

At least, that's the lesson I am trying to learn. It ain't easy. Wish me luck.

And I'll do the same for you.

I promise.

[girlsbtrs]

Growing Up One Step Behind Lorde

Written By Lila Danielsen Wong. Graphic by Paula Nicole. 

It’s late July of 2015. It’s a little past two a.m. and I’m in the basement of my parents house. My parents left me home alone for a night, so I did what any newly 16-year-old would do; I got a bottle of cheap vodka from someone’s older brother and threw my very first small party. Two of my closest friends are sleeping inches away. Out of my cheap drugstore headphones come a slow synth build, sounding distant and underwater. It erupts into a pulse, just too fast to be a heartbeat. Lorde’s “Ribs” pushes on in all its teenage glory. “Mom and Dad let me stay home,” she tells me before confiding “it drives you crazy getting old.” In the next pre-chorus this morphs into the more tender, “I’ve never felt more alone, it feels so scary getting old.” 

Before a live performance of “Ribs” in 2014, barely 18-year-old Lorde tells the audience that she wrote this song about a big party she had when her parents left town when she was 16. She was with her best friend afterwards at 4 a.m. unsuccessfully trying to go to sleep. He asked her what was wrong, and she said, regarding the party, “There’s something really crazy about throwing a party like this and doing something this huge. It feels grown up, and it feels like a rite of passage, and that's cool. It's cool to do stuff for the first time, but it also really freaks me out because once you do something that feels grown up it's really hard to come back, and if you've only ever been a kid the thought of having to be an adult is really terrifying.”

Three years after Lorde had this conversation with her friend, I’m sitting in my own basement all the way across the world after my own party listening to that very song and letting every word vibrate through my entire self. It feels so scary getting old, but hearing a girl from suburban New Zealand say exactly what I was thinking makes me feel a little bit less “so alone.”

In 2013, Ella Yelich O’Connor wrote an EP called The Love Club with local musician Joel Little and put it on Soundcloud under the name Lorde. To the surprise of both of them, it blew up. After collecting 60,000 downloads, UMG released it commercially and it managed to hit the charts in New Zealand and Australia. However, it was the release of “Royals” as a radio single that put Lorde on the international radar. 

“Royals” was penned as a sort of wry defiance to celebrity culture and a call out to it’s disconnect from the general public. She noticed that many popular musicians based their clout on trashing hotel rooms and diamond watches, and this was so removed from her and her friends, at a house party not knowing if they would get a ride home. “Royals” and The Love Club EP were followed by Lorde’s debut album, Pure Heroine, a collection of songs about “the feeling of being [her] age” and “the weird social issues that come with being a teenager.” 

After her global success made her visible worldwide, those who would be attracted to listen beyond “Royals” and become fans were fellow teens at fellow parties who also were “counting dollars on the train to the party”. 

In 2017, Lorde released Melodrama. If  Pure Heroine is about what it’s like to be a teenager, Melodrama captures life as a fledgling adult. Lorde has said that Melodrama is an album about a break up. She also has called it a concept album about a house party, telling The New York Times “it’s a record about being alone. The good parts and the bad parts.” 

This release coincided with my high school graduation. It was the soundtrack of my final months of childhood and what I listened to through the transition to the next phase of life. 

I spent my first year after high school in my hometown. I remember sitting in my house in September after all my friends had left for college and listening to “Liability”. My parents had left for a weekend trip and I was home alone, this time with no one to invite over. “Liability” is the second single from Melodrama. It’s a stripped piano ballad about the depths of insecurity, driving people away until you find yourself startlingly alone. “Every perfect summer’s eating me alive until you’re gone,” she sings; getting older comes stark changes in social circles and lifestyles, some of which can leave periods of time in which you find yourself startlingly alone.

I related to these feelings of disconnect and isolation and felt the song intimately just as I had felt “Ribs” two years earlier. Whereas the loneliness in “Ribs“ was the feeling of distance from everything you know when you’re on the cusp of adulthood; this loneliness comes from the other side of this cusp, when you look up and everything has changed. Melodrama ushered me into adulthood, and Lorde was like a voice from the future reassuring me that this was normal. If two years ahead of me Lorde the international star was sitting in a taxi feeling the exact same way I was feeling, then perhaps this happens to everyone and is just part of growing up. 

The following summer, after a party I helped someone else host, I put on “Ribs” before I went to bed and was surprised to find that it didn’t “vibrate through my entire self” anymore. That stage of coming of age had come and gone for me. 

The parties in Melodrama had grown up too; we’re no longer worried about getting caught by our parents. “Green Light,” the lead single, Lorde described as a song about the girl at the party who is a crying mess but doesn't seem to care. “Sober” asks about the morning after; “But what will we do when we’re sober?” “Liability” is looking in the mirror and not feeling so great about who you are and where you are. Growing up is reframed as self-discovery, mainly through the common young adult experience of a house party. 

Sometimes, this is where I lose her. 

In “Sober II” she cites the “glamour and the trauma,” and my life is nowhere near “glamourous”. The desperate feverishness of these more grown up parties of Melodrama are not what my life looked like. At the end of the day, I was reminded that she’s a pop star who already has her life financially set for her, and I was a college student with a limited social life and a whole lot of homework. 

I wonder if I am just ready for the next album to usher me into the next phase of my life, or if this is this where our paths diverge.

Although the reception of “Solar Power” has been relatively positive, some fans noticed that the new single was missing some of the, well, angst of her previous catalogue. This is especially striking because for a lot of us this year has been somewhere on the spectrum of angsty to agonizing. Her most recent release, “Stoned at the Nail Salon,” ponders the nature of being settled. This second release contextualized not only “Solar Power,” but also why some fans may be feeling a little disconnected from her newest era. I listen to Lorde talk about how she loves her quiet, stable life, with “the vine hangin' over the door, and the dog who comes when [she] calls” from the corner of my sublet of someone’s living room, which I rent as I apply for yet another job that isn’t really hiring because of covid or is going to be taken by one of the millions of 2020 and 2021 graduates who got a serious delay on their quest for the peace and stability Lorde is talking about. This is not to say that me or any of her other listeners won’t relate to her new music, especially as she sprinkles in lines such “as all the music you loved at sixteen, you'll grow out of”, but it’s still up in the air whether or not the fact that she is a wealthy pop singer from New Zealand will finally effect her ability to “vibrate souls” of her younger fan base like she once did. 

Lorde’s fanbase is just enough younger than her that, so far, once she has written an album about whatever phase of life she just went through, they are on the cusp of experiencing it. Teenagers are known for their “no one understands me” angst, and growing up one step behind Lorde reminded me how deeply universal the feelings and experiences that came with growing up are. Whether it’s coming from a teenage girl from suburban New Zealand (who must have been way cooler than me because her first party topped mine by about 100 more people) or a full blown star crying in a New York taxi, Lorde captured the most intimate moments of youth, offered them as a preview of the next age to her young fan base, and gently reassured them that these glimpses of fear and loneliness are perhaps what unites us as humans who are slowly but somehow rapidly getting older. However, how much longer will her experiences be this universal? As an artist whose fan base is largely built around her ability to connect and relate, will she be able to maintain this intimate connection as her life looks significantly different from most of the people she entertains? Perhaps the appeal of the Solar Power era will be more in the preview of the growing security of your mid-late twenties. Perhaps none of the differences of her lifestyle and her fan base will matter, because she will continue doing what she does best, stripping memories down to their universal truths, and feeding them back to a slightly younger generation with just a bit of dramatic lighting. 

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorde

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88oR5GjjZ6k

https://genius.com/Lorde-royals-lyrics

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/arts-and-entertainment/wp/2013/10/24/5-things-to-know-about-lorde/?utm_term=.1072aea0ec9c

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/12/magazine/the-return-of-lorde.html

https://www.thenation.com/article/lorde-grows-up/

[bluueejay]

mcu wanda is an adult, she is not “just a kid.”

She’s in her late teens (18+) in AoU, that is not a child. Yes, she’s young. Yes, she grew up in a small country that, from her childhood on, was brimming w civil war and chaos. Yes, her childhood and young life were filled to the brim with horrors and destruction. She’s young and unsure, afraid even, but she’s not a child. The ‘borderline’ infantilization of her throughout the movies, though it’s mostly prominent in CW (and hell, if ya wanna get specific about it, AoU too) is fucking weird. It’s odd. She’s old enough to be in the field, fighting, and training w the others. She’s old enough to be a legit, living-on-the-avengers-compound-property, avenger. She’s old enough to be going into other countries on missions, she’s old enough to be mentored by The Black Widow and Captain America, she’s old enough to fight battles, she’s old enough for all of that: but the minute something goes wrong or she’s faced w something less than pleasant, it’s a bout of “oh come on, she’s a kid! How dare you, she’s a kid!” When absolutely no? No, she’s not? She’s young, traumatized, and learning, absolutely. but not a child.

Let’s get technical for a sec, aight? When you go to the mcu maximoff’s wiki and scroll down to their AoU section, it reads as such, quote,

“When the twins reached adulthood, (....) Wanda and her brother took part in various riots to drive the foreign forces out of their streets. (....) The Maximoffs were approached by List who offered them a way to achieve the power needed to drive war out of Sokovia. Although she was initially skeptical, Wanda was convinced by Pietro to agree to the experiments to gain new powers.”

When they reached adulthood, (read: 18+) Sokovia had fully fallen into its civil war and that’s when the Twins were approached by List. (Idc if you want to argue about them thinking it was SHIELD/if they knew it was hydra, I don’t care. The main point being presented is that they underwent voluntary human experimentation. Another thing, because this was mentioned in AoU by I think Steve? A civil war is not the same as an external war. A civil war is not typically where you are fighting for your country, more you’re fighting for who controls your contry. Got it? Cool, moving on.)

She is not a child.

Treating her as such within the movies and then having certain chunks of the fandom push that belief only snowballs the iffy as fuck storytelling mistake that is the ‘as long as my intentions are good, any mistakes made are excusable’ mentality present within the MCU, but especially so in cacw. It’s fucking weird.

Take Clint’s line durint the compound, where after she’s said she’s caused enough problems and that it’s likely better for her to stay (content, not dialogue) he casually manipulates asks her into joining the fight by insinuating that the only way for her to make amends is to fight more, but he refers to their age difference w that high school comment. I can’t remember it word for word but paraphrased it’s essentially ‘if you want to make amends, you get off your ass. You wanna stay here and mope, you can go back to high school.’ Now obviously, we’ve learned thru mcu Clint’s meegar character development that he’s absolutely the type to refer to anyone significantly younger than him as a ‘kid’, he’s presented as that type of a character, that kind of a guy. Many people allege that his words are in reference to their pseudo familial connection but ehh, that’s up to personal speculation.

My longwinded point is that Clint and Steve have shown a repeated habit of infantalizing her, despite her adult age. Idc if it’s because she’s younger or bc of a sentimental connection between the lot, she’s in her early 20’s come cacw, the repeated comments about her being w kid (I know the high school moping comment was made more in reference to her behavior, rather than her age, but the phrasing is absolutely off for what they were going for and it’s still weird so)

Whether that be bc of their age differences, their sentimental affections, the mentor ship relationships towards her; whatever, it doesn’t really matter, because in the end: they’re still treating this then 18+ now 20+ year old woman like she’s a 14 year old. That’s,, that’s weird. It’s weird.

If you follow the mcu timeline and the information present, she and pietro are already 18, if not older, in the end credits scene for TWS. There’s about a year jump between TWS and AoU, putting her at about 19 in AoU, if you want to be a bit handwavy. (I’m personally of the idea that because the twins were already adults before list approached them about the experiments, they’re likely closer to 19 in the TWS end credits scene where it’s apparent that they’ve been with List long enough for their powers to manifest/start manifesting but it’s eh) That may be a little on the nose but for the sake of this, we’re gonna be a little on the nose. Alright? So she and pietro are at about 19 in AoU, young but by no stretch of the imagination are they children. Then, we jump from AoU to CW. There’s another year jump between AoU and CW, which is putting her in her early 20’s, let’s say 20 exactly for semantics sake.

CW specifically is where a lot of the infantilization and weird shit comes into play, which is even weirder to me specifically bc in this film, she’s absolutely not a child? She’s not a teenager or a weak-willed infant, she’s 20! And then again, we jump from CW to IW, where there’s a 2 year jump in time. That puts her at 22. 22! (On the nose again, I know, it’s likely not exactly year by year, but still) We jump again from IW and endgame, w the 5 year jump and even more semantics, she’s in her late 20’s. 27ish, to be a bit more specific. From her introduction to the latest film presented, she’s isn’t nor has she ever been a child.

So why are people (specifically Clint and Steve lmfao) so fucking insistent that she’s a kid?

(The time jump confirmations I’m using are coming from interviews and statements Joe Russo has given in the last year plus or so lmao, so don’t @ me about my stretching the timeline to fit my agenda or some shit)

Just all around, it’s a fucking weird story aspect to have at play, especially for as long as it was (mostly between AoU and CACW with contextual stuff scattered in IW, not much of note but it’s kinda there). It infantilizes this (currently) 20+ year old character to a near dangerous state, which brings us all the way back to that childish as fuck statement made in CW, the ‘you locked me in my room’ one. Your room.. you mean the several multi-million dollar facility with hundreds of amenities and your robo-boyfriend? And yes, her situation should have been explained to her much more throughouly, that’s something I absolutely stand by but also.. she was watching the news. She knows people are angry, going for the jugular, Steve’s little ‘we can’t save everyone’ speech absolutely doesn’t change the fact that the public is afraid and that they know her face. “Mr. Stark would like to prevent the possibility of another public incident” yeah, like say if she had gone to the store and had people come after her, something like that? She wasn’t even under official house arrest, she was making dinner with her boyfriend and hanging around. That “you locked me in my room” Comment is something I’d expect to hear from my 11 year old niece, an actual child, not a 20-something year old woman who also happens to be the mcu’s Scarlet Witch. It’s.. weird and iffy as fuck, a really bad writing choice, and something that shouldn’t have been done but oops it was and now we’re left w all this shit to pick and poke at while we cry about other shit. Nice.