#honestly the same applies to 'was vi a good sister'

[sandraharissa]

I hate the ‘was Silco a good dad’ debate cos it’s so irrelevant, like ppl can’t have fun with movies anymore, I guess? Did anyone ever bitch about ppl thinking of Vader as a good dad (best dad in the galaxy! even) cos his interactions with his son are cute? I don’t think so, and he cut off Luke’s hand. I want that for us.

[thebluelemontree]

Is it wrong to say that Sansa uses an out of sight out of mind coping mechanism? I noticed it because it's what I do a lot. I know some ppl say she rewrites traumatic memories to make the memories bearable but it doesn't make sense. If that was how she coped, wouldn't she have been telling herself lies about Joffrey still in acok? Or found a way to erase/rewrite Marillion's attempt to rape her?

Yes and no. She does that except all the times she doesn’t. ;) I think that characterization is extremely reductionist (and ignores character complexity and  growth) when it’s applied that broadly to every situation Sansa has been in. You have to take these things instance by instance because they aren’t all the same. Sometimes that labeling doesn’t fit at all. In many cases, it feels more like the fandom pathologizing the act of romanticizing or trying to push aside or reframe something unpleasant or even traumatic when that’s just something most human beings do now and then. Some do it more than others, but its all within the realm of typical coping behavior and being older or more educated or more “logical” doesn’t make one immune to it. So I hope you don’t let those interpretations make you feel abnormal or more fallible for identifying with Sansa in that way. Romanticizing doesn’t even have to be about coping at all, but simply expressing desire through daydreams. People imagine being in idealized scenarios with crushes all the time.  

You also hit the nail on the head. Sansa just doesn’t go around making up false narratives about every objectively awful thing that happens to her. In fact, her actual responses to those moments can be a useful basis for comparison when we’re analyzing the unkiss, for example. Misunderstanding the unkiss is usually where a lot of these assumptions stem from. That’s a whole other can of worms in itself. The unkiss is just too long of a discussion to put here, so I just recommend this post as to the reasons why it isn’t about trauma and take a browse through my unkiss tag. It does bear repeating that Sansa factually remembers every scary thing that happened during the Blackwater and why it happened, indicating she has processed it honestly and critically, before any incarnation of the unkiss happens. The unkiss is a mismemory added on to the facts, which began as her being the actor that kissed him first. It’s not a lie to deny the facts or to excuse his behavior. It’s regrettable to her that Sandor was not able to be the person she could rely on to get her out of KL at that time. Nonetheless, this repressed desire is just so strong in her that it manifested in a kiss so real she could remember how it felt after the reality of his leaving KL for good sank in. 

Early AGOT Sansa tended to want to move past unpleasantness rather quickly. Just sweep those red flags under the rug so everything can go back to blissful harmony. Sansa is naturally averse to conflict and just wants her present with the royal family to be smooth sailing into a bright future. Ned had a very similar tendency when it came to concerns over Robert’s true character. He saw things that disturbed him, but he hoped and clung to his idea of Robert anyway. For Sansa, this resulted in some misplaced blame and rewriting events so she could deal with the aftermath. This is mostly seen in her processing the Mycah incident after Lady’s death and how her perception of all the characters involved shifted in varying ways. This is after she knew perfectly well what really happened, because Ned says Sansa had already told him the truth of what Joffrey did while Arya was still missing. However, it would also be unfair to completely chalk this up to Sansa’s idiosyncrasies. We have to put her flip-flopping in the context of the situation as well. She’s also experienced a gutting loss with Lady’s death and the fact that the first blow to her innocence was her father volunteering to put Lady down. She doesn’t have Catelyn to go to with her confusion and hurt, and Ned has largely been silent. She’s also still engaged to Joffrey through all this, this is still a patriarchy, there are political ramifications to speaking against a crown prince, and she doesn’t know how to deal with seeing such cruelty and vindictiveness in her future husband. Especially when he responded to her tender concern and wanting to help him with venom and hate. 

I mean, jeez, she’s 11. I don’t expect an 11 year old to understand how to identify the signs of emotional manipulation or see how this situation can escalate into domestic violence. Just because Sansa can’t articulate what is happening within her relationship with Joffrey, doesn’t mean she has blocked out any notion that Joffrey can turn his anger on her. Part of the reason she misplaces blame on Arya (and rewrites what happened) is because Joffrey turns scornful of Sansa for being a witness to his emasculating shame. He punishes her with the cold shoulder because she didn’t immediately take his side and pretended not to see instead. He regains power through making Sansa feel small and fearful of his moods. 

“He had not spoken a word to her since the awful thing had happened, and she had not dared to speak to him.” -- Sansa II, AGOT.

Sansa looked at him and trembled, afraid that he might ignore her or, worse, turn hateful again and send her weeping from the table. -- Sansa II, AGOT.

This is coming from someone who is supposed to love her and someone she will spend the rest of her life with. To fix things, she must be unequivocally on Joffrey’s side going forward or suffer the consequences, which we can see happening as her story completely flips over breakfast sometime later. This is not saying Sansa is fully exonerated from not supporting her sister when she needed her, but that it’s understandable how she arrived at this point. Even when things start to get really bad after Ned’s arrest, Sansa still holds out some hope that she can appeal to Joffrey’s (and Cersei’s) love for her to get him to be merciful. Is it really her fault she believed a part of Joffrey really loved her (and thus was reachable by her pleas) if he also heavily love bombed her and treated her like she was the most special girl in the world? Love bombing is a classic feature of the seduction phase leading up to abuse.  

So we can see Sansa does ignore truths and rewrite events sometimes and her personality is a factor; however, the context surrounding it matters a lot. Post Ned’s execution, Sansa does a full 180 regarding Joffrey and Cersei.

Sansa stared at him, seeing him for the first time. He was wearing a padded crimson doublet patterned with lions and a cloth-of-gold cape with a high collar that framed his face. She wondered how she could ever have thought him handsome. His lips were as soft and red as the worms you found after a rain, and his eyes were vain and cruel. "I hate you," she whispered. -- Sansa VI, AGOT.

Once she had loved Prince Joffrey with all her heart, and admired and trusted his mother, the queen. They had repaid that love and trust with her father's head. Sansa would never make that mistake again. -- Sansa I, ACOK. 

"A monster," she whispered, so tremulously she could scarcely hear her own voice. "Joffrey is a monster. He lied about the butcher's boy and made Father kill my wolf. When I displease him, he has the Kingsguard beat me. He's evil and cruel, my lady, it's so. And the queen as well." -- Sansa I, ASOS. 

There’s also her conscious efforts to push away thoughts of her dead family and Jeyne Poole, but she states why she does that. It’s traumatic, the tears start flowing uncontrollably, and she is desperately trying to avoid falling into another suicidal depression. Her survival in KL depends on her holding it together and appearing loyal and obedient to Joffrey. Mourning her loved ones would imply to Joffrey she is plotting treason. Besides, she knows that even if she did ask Cersei or LF about Jeyne, she has no reason to believe they’d do anything but lie to her face in a patronizing way. There’s no point being plagued with wondering what the truth might be when she can’t do anything about it. Still, she prayed for Jeyne wherever she might be. She genuinely thought Arya had made it to WF on the ship and was safe at least until she got word of her brothers’ deaths and her home being sacked by the Iron Born, though there was initially a touch of projection and fantasizing about Arya being free while she remains captured. As of Feast, she believes she is the last Stark left alive and she has no one but Littlefinger to help her. So while she is suppressing her grief, it’s done with good reason, and it’s not being replaced with any false narratives to cope. 

We also cannot ignore that her relationship to Sandor Clegane has instilled in her an appreciation for the un-sugarcoated truth now that she has experienced betrayal and injustice first hand. In his own way, he’s encouraged her to listen to her own inner bullshit detector. The rose-tinted glasses have become a lot more clear compared to where she started. This is a newly learned skill though, and her self-confidence has been wrecked by internalized verbal abuse. She’s also been left on her own to figure out people’s intentions by herself, which runs parallel to her mounting desperation to get out of KL as Joffrey’s violence escalates. Developing a touch more of a jaded, skeptical side does sometimes clash with her enduring idealism and faith in other people (like with the Tyrells). This struggle is not a bad thing. The goal isn’t to become as cynical as the Hound, but to arrive at an earned optimism that has been tempered by wisdom and practical experience.

Her situation with Littlefinger is much more challenging than anything she faced in KL. He moves her where he wants her to go with complex web of lies, manipulation, grooming, isolation, coercion, dependence, guilt and shame. Her safety and desire to go home are tightly bound to being complicit in his lies and criminal activities. She feels indebted to him for getting her out of KL, even though his methods push her past her boundaries and force her to compromise her moral integrity. The thing is, there are things Sansa does know about LF, but she doesn’t seem to be ready to try and put the puzzle pieces together. She’s not daring to ask probing questions about Lysa’s reference to the “tears” and Jon Arryn or about the possible dangers of Maester Colemon prescribing sweetsleep for Robert’s convulsions. While the subject of Jeyne’s fate is still one she doesn’t want to revisit, somewhere in her mind she does know LF took custody of her friend. If it feels like this is somewhat of a regression back to her early AGOT self, there’s probably some truth to that; however, it’s perfectly okay for positive character arcs to be an imperfect progress. There can be relapses, regressions, setbacks, missteps, and misguided actions. All that growth isn’t lost. Everything she knows is just stored in the back of her mind, not forgotten completely. The general trend line moves her toward successfully confronting Littlefinger with the truth when GRRM is ready to pull the trigger. She’s definitely aware of Littlefinger lying to her more than she lets on and she knows his help is not out of the kindness of his heart, but motivated by what he wants her to be to him. But it’s not like she has the option to go anywhere else, does she? She’s a wanted criminal with a bounty on her head and has no other friend or ally in the Vale she can trust with the truth of her identity. Confronting LF without any means of neutralizing his power over her isn’t the smartest thing to do when he’s shown her he can literally get away with multiple murders. Again, it’s not just her personality that makes her hesitant to pull back the veil and face the horrible truth head on. The outside forces pressuring her perceptions and behavior cannot be discounted either.    

[alinaastarkov]

agentrouka-blog replied to your post “You know what’s weird? The misconception that Arya is only good at...”

None of those people had an intense personal anger at Arya, they didn't know who she was, nor did they order the murder of her father. And Arya had to learn to control her rage. She nearly beat Hot Pie to a pulp before Yoren stopped her. (And beat her bloody, ugh.) Yoren stopped her from revealing herself at the execution, even.

@agentrouka-blog Intense personal hatred has nothing to do with it. I disagree that Joffrey hated Arya more than Sansa, and he threatens to kill Sansa too. He has the crossbow pointed right at her. But he didn’t because he didn’t want Robb to kill Jaime. This is an area where sense won over, and the same is true for Arya. If it was Arya in Sansa’s place, the same conditions of holding a hostage applies and he would have to abide by that. The circumstances are the same in this case, so the outcome would be the same. No-one around Joffrey would have allowed him to kill Arya, especially as they would want to marry her to a Lannister to claim Winterfell. Joffrey is a sadist, but he’s not a complete moron.

‘Intense personal hatred’ has absolutely nothing to do with it. Do you honestly think the Mountain only kills people he hates? Then how do you explain this:

The Mountain would come into the storehouse after he had broken his fast and pick one of the prisoners for questioning. The village folk would never look at him. Maybe they thought that if they did not notice him, he would not notice them . . . but he saw them anyway and picked whom he liked. There was no place to hide, no tricks to play, no way to be safe. One girl shared a soldier's bed three nights running; the Mountain picked her on the fourth day, and the soldier said nothing.  A smiley old man mended their clothing and babbled about his son, off serving in the gold cloaks at King's Landing. "A king's man, he is," he would say, "a good king's man like me, all for Joffrey." He said it so often the other captives began to call him All-for-Joffrey whenever the guards weren't listening. All-for-Joffrey was picked on the fifth day.  A young mother with a pox-scarred face offered to freely tell them all she knew if they'd promise not to hurt her daughter. The Mountain heard her out; the next morning he picked her daughter, to be certain she'd held nothing back.  The ones chosen were questioned in full view of the other captives, so they could see the fate of rebels and traitors. A man the others called the Tickler asked the questions. His face was so ordinary and his garb so plain that Arya might have thought him one of the villagers before she had seen him at his work. "Tickler makes them howl so hard they piss themselves," old stoop-shoulder Chiswyck told them. He was the man she'd tried to bite, who'd called her a fierce little thing and smashed her head with a mailed fist. Sometimes he helped the Tickler. Sometimes others did that. Ser Gregor Clegane himself would stand motionless, watching and listening, until the victim died. [...] No one ever survived the Tickler's questioning; no man, no woman, no child. The strongest lasted past evenfall. Their bodies were hung beyond the fires for the wolves. By the time they marched, Arya knew she was no water dancer. Syrio Forel would never have let them knock him down and take his sword away, nor stood by when they killed Lommy Greenhands. Syrio would never have sat silent in that storehouse nor shuffled along meekly among the other captives. The direwolf was the sigil of the Starks, but Arya felt more a lamb, surrounded by a herd of other sheep. She hated the villagers for their sheepishness, almost as much as she hated herself.  Their captors permitted no chatter. A broken lip taught Arya to hold her tongue. Others never learned at all. One boy of three would not stop calling for his father, so they smashed his face in with a spiked mace. Then the boy's mother started screaming and Raff the Sweetling killed her as well. Arya watched them die and did nothing. What good did it do you to be brave? One of the women picked for questioning had tried to be brave, but she had died screaming like all the rest. There were no brave people on that march, only scared and hungry ones. - Arya VI, ACOK

Yes, Arya had to learn, not to control her rage, but to hide it well. But, as we see, just doing that was not enough. Being silent was not enough. Even silence got you killed. And we see that it took her about 2 seconds to figure this all out. She doesn’t spend years on the run and still not know how to avoid being raped and murdered, she gets it immediately. She understands pretty much from day 1 and is even cursing herself for not giving into her impulses. Her impulses are there and we can see she makes the conscious decision not to act on them, which is a skill in and of itself. But she knows being brave will get her killed, and she chooses living over “bravery”, something the antis consistently ignore about her. And King’s Landing is a much less volatile situation, so she wouldn’t need to be as careful when she has her name to protect her. And you know who else had to learn to control her anger? Sansa.

Joffrey gave a petulant shrug. "Your brother defeated my uncle Jaime. My mother says it was treachery and deceit. She wept when she heard. Women are all weak, even her, though she pretends she isn't. She says we need to stay in King's Landing in case my other uncles attack, but I don't care. After my name day feast, I'm going to raise a host and kill your brother myself. That's what I'll give you, Lady Sansa. Your brother's head.” A kind of madness took over her then, and she heard herself say, "Maybe my brother will give me your head.” Joffrey scowled. "You must never mock me like that. A true wife does not mock her lord. Ser Meryn, teach her." - Sansa VI, AGOT

"Silence, fool." Joffrey lifted his crossbow and pointed it at her face. "You Starks are as unnatural as those wolves of yours. I've not forgotten how your monster savaged me." "That was Arya's wolf," she said. "Lady never hurt you, but you killed her anyway." "No, your father did," Joff said, "but I killed your father. I wish I'd done it myself. I killed a man last night who was bigger than your father. They came to the gate shouting my name and calling for bread like I was some baker, but I taught them better. I shot the loudest one right through the throat." - Sansa III, ACOK

So whilst Arya learns pretty early on how to keep her mouth shut, Sansa is still sassing Joffrey well into A Clash of Kings and she doesn’t get killed for it. But, doing the exact opposite, something Joffrey would have eaten up, gets you murdered with the Mountain’s men. Arya learned quickly, and clearly in King’s Landing she wouldn’t need to be as intense about her own silence. Arya and Sansa are not in equally dangerous situations, Harrenhal is far more dangerous thank King’s Landing. And when you also take into account the protection the Stark name affords, Arya would have a much easier time in her sister’s place, so it tracks that she could have easily survived in King’s Landing.

[thevioletquinn]

Run Devil Run // Self Para

Who: Violetta Quinn/Kozma, Szilveszter Kozma What: Violet and her Dad meet again. Where: Members Only (Alley) When: 3rd June 2020 Mentions: Lily Quinn/Kozma, Emery Shaw, Noah Fynn Trigger Warnings: Violence, Mentions of Cancer Word Count: 1,067

It had been a long and busy shift at Members Only that night. Violet probably should have taken a lot more breaks than she actually took but her materialistic mind was more money driven than it was about looking after her body so now that she had stopped and her adrenaline was running on low, she could actually feel how sore her body was now. The girl had changed in the back room and headed out of the back door in the alley to Members Only. She was on her own ordering an uber for her with her back against the wall. It was what she usually did when Emery wasn’t working the same night as her at his respective job. She would wait in the alley until her uber arrived so she didn’t have to deal with any of the men leaving the club and had been watching her all night. Violet did hear some footsteps stepping in to the alley but she didn’t look up from her phone.  

“Violetta.” Fuck. Violet knew that voice and groaned. This was the second time her father had found her here and she was already so over it. She had given him money last time after Emery punched him to get him off of her.  

“For the record, Emery’s picking me up so unless you want another punch to the jaw, I suggest you leave.”

“It’s Lily. She, she’s ill. Very ill. We can’t afford her hospital treatment. You’re our last hope.”

Violet felt extremely angry at this point. The fact that she knew Lily was fine and safe and didn’t speak to their dad already meant he was lying but to sink as low as claiming she was sick like their eldest sister had been was something else entirely. However, she played along just to see how far he was willing to go. “What do you mean she’s ill? How ill? What’s wrong with her?” Her voice faking concern to play along.

“Cancer. She needs chemotherapy but we can’t afford it. We can’t afford to bankrupt again. Please Violetta.” Her father stepped further down the alley but not close enough to her.

Her teeth gritted as she still held herself back from snapping but she was getting close. “Shit. God, okay. I’ll be on the next flight to Vegas and we can do this together as a family. We’ll get her through this.” Violet acted a little more frantic.  

“No no, you’re busy here. I’ll just take the money back with me and we’ll do our best to save her.”

Violet held back a laugh and instead looked at her phone again. “Okay, I’ll just call my bank. How much do you need? A few thousand?” The girl asked, still playing along while she found Lily’s contact in her phone and started to call. It was late but for the sake of being a bitch, she really hoped she could pick up. When she heard a tired voice answer the phone. “Hey, Lil. Do you want to study together tomorrow?” Her eyes locked on to her dad’s and watched his face drop when he realized she was now in contact with her sister again and that she knew the whole time he was lying through his teeth.  

“Vi, it’s one in the morning. I’ll ring you when I’m actually awake. Okay?”

“No problem. Speak to you in the morning.” Violet hung up and crossed her arms. Her eyes looked him up and down. “Now, what was that about Lily being ill? Oh that’s right. My dad is a very low blowing psychopathic manipulative bastard. You would honestly lie about Lily being so ill just for money. That is fucking desperate!” She pushed off the wall to step closer and slapped him. “Never come back here, Szilveszter.” Choosing to call him by his first name rather than the word dad. He was no longer a dad to her and didn’t deserve that title.  

Szilveszter quickly lashed out with a punch to her face which made her stumble back slightly followed by another push which made her hit her head pretty hard against the wall of the building. Violet felt herself get dizzy as he tried to take her bag from her but she put her hand in to the bag and pulled out her pepper spray, spraying it right in to his face. It was enough of a distraction for her to push herself up and race to the back door and get inside. One of the security guards in the back practically caught her body and sat her down before racing out in the alley to find who had hurt her but her dad had left. Her phone pinged with a notification that her uber was outside. The same security guard who was obviously concerned about her walked her out to the uber with one of the clean rags from the bar on her head to soak up some of the blood and told the driver to get her to a hospital.

Violet spent the next few hours in the hospital getting her head stitched up but luckily was only diagnosed as a concussion with a small cut in the head and ice applied to her now black eye. The brunette was truly exhausted after a long shift that had wrecked her body and then winding up with a concussion, she really felt like she’d drop any second. It was about 4am by the time she was leaving the hospital and right now, she didn’t want to be alone. There were a good few people who would look after her in this but she didn’t want to be asked questions which then went down to three people. Emery, who had previously saved her from her dad. Noah, who she had confessed her past to and knows more about the situation. Lily, who obviously knew her dad and seemed like the best option. If he was in town, what was stopping him from tracking down Lily and hurting her? That is what made her decision.  

“Lil, I know it’s still the early hours and I’m sorry for waking you up again. I know you don’t trust me fully yet but I need to see you – even if I just stand on your doorstep and talk to you. Uh, dad’s in town and it’s been a hell of a night...”

[nervydamned]

i don’t usually cry anymore. the medication and the crushing numbness that comes with 31 years of hard living and dead ends has created in me a cold grey stone, typically invulnerable to all but tragic movies and commercials that were obviously designed with surgical precision to ensure that at least a small portion of viewers will immediately log onto the website and purchase, like, boat insurance while crying so hard they can’t do the capcha on the first try. i used to be a dramatic cryer, responding to almost any intense emotion with deep and gusty sobs. then 2016 happened. i lost my father. my spiral into alcoholism intensified my incredible appetite for self destruction. the shame that ensued formed that grey stone like a grit of sand forms in an oyster-- slowly, slowly-- until the day i told my sister that i wasn’t sure i would ever laugh again.

so i sought treatment. fresh from admitting to my husband that i had 1) secretly relapsed and 2) repeatedly been unfaithful with some of the worst people, i put my phone number into a “need rehab?” webform. i received a call about three minutes later. scared out of my mind, i would have agreed to do basically anything to clear the dark menacing cloud of divorce. they said they had a pool! i wanted to go swimming! i wanted to be instantly forgiven for my transgressions, and rehab seemed the best way to me to demonstrate that by god, i was SERIOUS about this recovery thing! he said the only rehab i qualified for was in south bend, indiana. they would buy the ticket. could i leave tomorrow? i guess i could.

i showed up to a building that looked like a 90s middle school with a smoking porch. terrified out of my mind and drunk on the four pints of heineken i’d slammed at chili’s with a sympathetic bartender at 7am across from my boarding gate, and disoriented from the klonopin that i took almost subconsciously at any sign of emotional turmoil, i was a rag doll with button eyes. i entered, stripped, spread, and coughed. i vomited in the toilet while a girl with perfect cat-eye liner did her best to discreetly look away. i was there-- it was happening-- but WHAT was happening? all i knew was that rehab was like a shiny gold star on my behavior chart. if i did it, nobody could say i hadn’t. 

rehab is the best place in the world for a vulnerable drunk. i mean it! you’ve never had more shoulders to cry on. i remember hysterically sobbing until my heaving shoulders locked up and the only sound i could make was tiny clicks from my frozen throat. i’ve never had my shoulders patted so authentically. it never occurred to me at the time that this display of raw, scream-it-to-the-heavens emotion was such a part of their daily lives as intake detox counselors that they probably could have done it in their sleep. but somehow they remained authentic.

the funniest part about the rehab was that it turned out to be run and staffed by die-hard scientologists! i guess we can get into that later. 

rehab also brought out my “daddy please be proud of me” personality in full force. i joined the “peer counsel” which was essentially just in charge of taking nightly attendance and clapping for sobriety milestones. i befriended everybody, impressing them with my uniquely pretentious affectation of sarcastic intellectualism that only fools people less smart than i am. i was the queen of rehab! life was good! everyone there had forgiven me. the next step was me forgiving myself. the final step was my husband forgiving me. at the time, i still thought that was a completely realistic goal. all i can say to that, ineloquently enough, is: HAHAHAHAHAHA.

my husband came to visit me, once, on the sunday after easter. having practiced healthy communication and effective use of boundaries six hours a day for the last three weeks, i promised him that we could talk about anything he wanted in the two hours he spent with me on the grounds. he got there and shrugged his shoulders over and over again. determined to make his long drive worth the time, i enthusiastically dragged him around to meet all of my rehab friends, proudly introducing him as my husband to anyone who would listen. that day, i believed we had a chance. that night, i found out he spent half the drive home texting my phone, which was locked in a drawer in the rehab office, accusing me of ignoring him in favor of my friends and strongly implying that i was sleeping with at least one of them. this delusion continued for months after and may still fester in his brain. i just wanted him to meet the people who were helping shape my recovery. he could never see the point of that. he didn’t understand that to me, connection is such a fundamental part of who i am that i HAD to make friends there. all he saw was the potential for pain.

i nakedly vied for the approval of everyone around me to the point that my rehab friends petitioned for me to win “patient of the week” at my graduation. when i realized what they had done i was simultaneously flattered to my core and mortified. how obvious it must have been that i set this artificial award ceremony in motion?

my husband was late. he missed the whole thing. in the car ride home, i chain smoked cigarettes and listened to his music. i talked about finding my rehab friend jacob on facebook so that we could attend meetings together since he was the only one who lived close by, and he accused me of having an extramarital relationship with him. his evidence was that “i brought him up all the time!” jacob came out as gay six months after we graduated from the program. we never got a chance to be friends.

my whole family was waiting at my sister’s house to welcome me home; they were babysitting my son while my husband drove to pick me up. they were so proud! again, i felt raw and abashed. just more confirmation that everyone knew--everyone knew--everyone knew everything. my husband had made my infidelity no secret with his family, and of course i had told my mother and my sister. 

being the family fuckup is like being naked under a microscope. like living your life in the invasive, creepy bodyscanner at the airport. well-wishes come with a tinge of pity; there is a frantic and all-too-apparent urge to avoid any conversation that might bring up my past transgressions. i’m used to it because i’ve been a drug addict since 2008. but coming back from rehab was the worst. there’s nothing like seeing what the future could be like-- bright, beautiful, beatific. the feeling of stepping out of a confessional booth and feeling the light on your face, reflected through the stained-glass window of the Virgin Mary and her son. but the comedown happens when you realize that the forgiveness you’ve given yourself stops with you. the crushing realization that your husband is either incapable of or unwilling to extend you the trust and forgiveness and freedom from shame that you’ve finally decided to give yourself makes you question everything. 

i just don’t understand why he can’t admit that he doesn’t love me anymore. i’m glad i went to rehab. but now i know it wasn’t for him. i could give him anything in the world and i’d still be the adultress, the sly sociopath, the woman that enjoys torturing him with emotion and conflict. our relationship can’t ever work again and he won’t admit it because he’s scared to be alone. honestly, i’m starting to feel sorry for him. i know i could find some normie guy, one with an unkempt beard who makes that face-- you know that face! the nintendo switch face!-- in his twitter avi. he can quote every line from the office and he loves bar trivia, but makes sure to go to the bar and grab me a sparkling water before the beers arrive. he’s a bit boring, maybe not as smart as i am (or pretend to be), but he’s authentic, and he laughs at my jokes, and he always wants to know how my day went. he makes sure to find something thoughtful for christmas, and he sometimes goes out and gets my car detailed on the weekend because he knows how messy i am and how frantic it makes me when i have to face those messes. he has a group of friends who all like the same things he does and they hang out after work most tuesdays, but not when we have something to do at home.

but i know who i am and i know i am not fundamentally healed and i know i’d get bored and break his heart. and my husband would still be alone.

who even knows anymore? the status quo definitely has something going for it. i don’t have to apply for WIC or share a one bedroom apartment with my son or drive for Grubhub on the weekend to make sure i can afford peanut butter because that shit is expensive. we can sit, and sit, and then drift off to sleep and wake up in the same place that we were the day before. maybe i’m adapting to my husband’s sense that it’s better to just endure and stay quiet. i know that pattern because it’s how my family handled every bit of turmoil since i was a child. it’s never worked, but i guess it might someday!

this is my first blog post in 15 years. hopefully it won’t be my last.

[thelondonfilmschool]

LFS STUDENT TIPS | Ju Shardlow

Photo Credit: Franco Volpi

Like many people in the industry, current London Film School (LFS) student Ju Shardlow graduated in a subject unrelated to film, doing journalism and literary jobs here and there for a year before finally deciding to go into film and TV. Shardlow will graduate later this year from The London Film School’s Masters in Filmmaking programme. "I'd done lots of theatre stuff at uni but there wasn't really any media studies, so I decided that I wanted to go and maybe get a work experience placement.”  After doing exactly just that in a script production company, Shardlow went on to production runner, production assistant and then runner research assistant, working her way up the ladder. 

During this time, she gained experience with organisations such as Hartswood Films, makers of SHERLOCK, while working at Teddington and Shepperton studios. "I got my first job with the BBC in 2012 on The Culture Show and worked there for three years or so as a junior researcher in documentaries. I was self-shooting, learning how to do camera work and then from that went to the LFS.”

Shardlow took time out of her extremely busy schedule to meet up with screenwriter Sophie McVeigh, who wanted to find out more about Sharlow���s journey to The London Film School, only to discover that she had many more strings to her bow than had been anticipated.

Sophie McVeigh (S.M): How did you go about getting your first work experience position?

Ju Shardlow (J.S): It was weird actually because I got a message from my sister saying there was someone from a TV production company at a house party and I was in bed! She was talking about how she couldn't find an intern so I got out of bed, got dressed and then I went to this party at midnight and was like, “Hello, nice to meet you!” There's a way of doing it, [with] that eagerness, instead of assuming that you deserve something.

S.M: How did you go from that to paid positions?

J.S: I got into quite a small development company and then from that you have to just make yourself really invaluable. I'm quite proactive, so I created a role for myself there. Anyone who is averse to making teas and coffees, sorry - give up and go home. And then within that network of research and directing and producing at the BBC, everybody knows each other if you go from project to project. So I think I did 11 shows back to back with the BBC without taking a break. I must have been at home for a week before I got a phone call saying “Would you like to come down for this production?”

S.M: What made you decide to come to LFS?

J.S: With the BBC you can work there for two and a half years before they make you permanent staff. So they're encouraging you to either go freelance or come back on a directors level. I basically wanted to do bits of the production side of it and self-shooting but I realised that I didn't really know as much about cameras and planning my own shoots as I thought I did. So I wanted to go and learn more of the technical side of things. I never came to LFS to be a fiction director. It was always to come and learn how to effectively light and create my own set ups so that I could go and self-shoot.

S.M: What would you say is the most valuable thing that you've gained from your time at LFS?

J.S: Knowing how to manage personalities is really important. People come from all over the world with all of their different backgrounds in film. Also, for work, generally when I show up to places to go and film, it will be, like, ten men from different major press organizations: CNN, the Guardian, ITV, Press Association, Vice. There are very very few female camera operators in the British press. But at LFS there's an approach of equality of opportunity in gender amongst the students. It's a really refreshing thing to see. You realise that there are loads of really capable women and some of them are better than the guys a lot of the time as well.

S.M: You've also started your own production company …

J.S: It's a small production company, me and my friend from university and also an editor friend. Julia Hart and I just recently shot in East London for a week, and then we give them to Trace, she's a professional editor with years of BBC experience... It's kind of a mixture between NFTS, LFS, [and] our VFX person is someone from the BBC. The film we shot this year was called KID GLOVES, but the one that's probably done the best was EMMA, CHANGE THE LOCKS, which was last year. That's now screening in the BFI Future Film Festival.

S.M: Starring Olivia Williams. How did she end up getting involved?

J.S: She became became involved through the director. So effectively it was a mixture of professionals, new people and the students at NFTS. I wish, actually, that I'd shot that after I'd been to LFS so I could understand what all those grip clamps were, and what the sparks do, things like that. Having a knowledge of all those roles through being at LFS definitely helps you as a producer.

S.M: How did you go about making contacts outside of the LFS while you were studying?

J.S: I think it was just persistence! I must have gone the whole summer before I applied to LFS just sending my CV off 20 times a day to places and not getting anything. Just constantly trying to pick up with older connections. I was sending it to development and production companies. I was contacting those people to see if they knew anybody and asking them to keep an ear to the ground, “Even if you need anybody to come along for free for a day.”  I drove up to Birmingham for a day to second camera a BBC documentary while studying. I was driving back with a million pounds of camera equipment back through Oxford Circus then getting up for Term 1 the next day.

There are a couple of really good networking things as well. Like BAFTA Crew that I got involved in through working in TV. That's an amazing networking opportunity. Women in Film and Television have a really good networking group. More recently for women: Organisers for Gender Equality in Film, Women on Docs, Feminist Film Collectives. Don't let anyone bash you for all-female crews or networking societies. They're likely to be the same people that ask "Why isn't there an International Men's Day?" You do honestly meet people. Sign up to loads of stuff in London and don't be ashamed to contact people back.

S.M: How does BAFTA Crew work?

J.S: If you have a certain number of TV and film credits and you've worked in the TV industry for a year to two years then you're eligible to apply and they select 200 people a year, across programming, development, game making, research, camera work, everything. And you can apply for a specific strand – I went in for camera operating and production management. Effectively it's open access to loads of master classes, workshops, talks and lectures from BAFTA professionals.  And they have drinks after which is a really good place to meet people! If you go on the BAFTA website and sign up to any of their events and talks, they have events all through the year.

S.M: You're using Kickstarter at the moment to help fund 23 BLONDE. How's that going?

J.S: We're going to use it for post production. I think LFS does a Kickstarter course in term six which I’d recommend everybody goes to because Kickstarter is going to be so important for people, especially for their graduation films. A lot of people use it but in a half-arsed way just thinking that friends and family will give them money and that that is its limit. There was someone who graduated a couple of years ago called Christine Sherwood who is an amazing producer and is really good at all that social media strategy, fundraising and Kickstarter. She basically told me to get on stuff as early as possible and create a buzz around your film before you do it, so you already have pitches, you already have footage, quotes, you've already made your press pack, things like that, so that when you go into Kickstarter you can be like: “We've made this and we're going to raise money for post-production, this is how professional it looks.”

S.M: And you've recently started working for Time Out…

J.S: I'm video producer at Time Out. I basically commission, produce, shoot and edit video content. I've been there for 6 months and it's growing rapidly. We had 11 million video views this month, and have been nominated for a media award in New York with really big players like Time, National Geographic and Condé Nast. They wanted somebody who had demonstrated the ability to go and shoot and do camera work but also had the producer side. I think definitely writing down all those camera skills from LFS, saying that you can operate all those cameras and that you've been on this many shoots, made them say “Oh OK. You can do this amount of work because we know that (the course) is quite hectic,” as well as a knowledge of London, which Documentary Term 3 at least forces you into having, and the ability to throw yourself into unpredictable situations with little planning. 

S.M: You're also working with Facebook Live. Could you tell us about that?

J.S: Facebook Live is something that we occasionally use at Time Out. You can do it over your phone or with a plug-in to an ENG camera. I've interviewed some really interesting people though: the Star Wars cast, Benedict Cumberbatch, Louis Theroux, Sigourney Weaver, Bill Nighy…

Facebook and Instagram are really big platforms for video and they're really accessible content. Look how big Instagram stories is becoming. In 2017, 85% of Americans will get nearly ALL their news content from Facebook - that's terrifying but it also gives you a responsibility. We live in an era of fake news, glib reporting and cat videos, but also one where people regularly rely on informing themselves of today's world via video. Even if you make a short fiction or documentary at LFS, you are projecting something you feel is necessary for the world to know in a video format: gender issues, social mobility, loneliness, crime. What I do is just another extension of that: making something entertaining yet informative, and digestible. For a lot of the profiles and news videos we're telling stories with the camera in 30 seconds, for which I always think of LFS staff Peter Gordon or Jaime Estrada-Torres going "What shots are necessary to tell your story?!" Click here for an example of Shardlow’s work for Time Out London.

Interviewer: Sophie McVeigh