#i have a terrible memory but i remember it in such exacting detail

[msmargaretmurry]

ooh becky msmargaretmurry i have to ask about your rnh thoughts here because while i have never been in the oiler trenches and do not (Do Not!!!) intend to start now, i have been watching on the sidelines since the hall and eberle days and i LOVE to hear your opinions

oh thank you for asking anon!! for context i started watching the oilers on purpose in like 2010ish (i had a friend who was super into hall/eberle and i was NOT immune to that) — i do not claim to be an expert on any of this at all, this is just based on my own experiences and thoughts and ponderings. also for the record i think rnh is great. he is an oiler i am extremely fond of, and i'm glad he seems to have found a solid role there that he's content with and has found success in.

so to me the ryan nugent-hopkins of it all goes something like this:

when the oilers drafted taylor hall first overall in 2010, HE was supposed to be the savior of the franchise. the oilers had lost in the scf in 2006 and then immediately not made the playoffs for four straight years and no one was happy. they drafted taylor, hyped him up SO hard — this era was kind of the the advent of current Online Content era and they were making little videos of him arriving in edmonton, showing him around, fans recognizing him on the street. i feel like nowadays thall's stock as a player is like "good but not GREAT" but you must understand that when he was drafted first overall they were expecting him to be GREAT. him, plus hot young swedes linus omark and magnus pääjärvi, plus canadian world juniors hero jordan eberle had the oilers faithful (and the oilers front office) CONVINCED they were going to be turning things around. people were making t-shirts that said

HALL Omark Paajarvi Eberle

— HOPE, you see???

anyway obviously that season did not actually go that great. they finished last in the league. i think they won something like 25 games all season. and they wound up with another first overall pick, which was our boy, the nuge.

and the thing is, ryan was expected to be very good, but he was NOT expected to be the savior of the franchise. that was already taylor hall's job. there was a lot of concern his rookie season about him being too skinny and not strong enough to really make an impact at the nhl level yet (and to be fair, he DID look like a baby deer out there). the people and the powers that be were very much like, we're glad to have him, we think he'll be a great piece of this rebuild, but there was much more willingness to be like, okay well he might need a few years to finish baking.

rnh's rookie season was better than the season before, but it was still not good. they did not come close to making the playoffs. they were still very bad. the blue jackets were also very bad, and a friend and i drove to columbus and got seats on the glass for oilers/jackets for like $50. extremely funny experience, 10/10, do recommend.

(not relevant to this narrative but a very fun fact imo is that despite the oilers but godawful that season, 2011–12 had two of my favorite oilers games i ever watched: sam gagner's 8-point night against chicago, and a 9-2 win ALSO against chicago, who was one of the best teams in the league at the time. as a bl*ckhawks hater then and now, watching this clown car oilers team run roughshod over chicago brought me immeasurable joy.)

however, the only one of the young stars who was REALLY living up to expectations at this point was jordan eberle? iirc he lead the team in goals AND assists that year. the masses were starting to get impatient with the performances of the other young stars, especially first overall franchise savior taylor hall.

and the oilers won another draft lottery. (you can imagine at this point the rest of the league was already pretty sick of the oilers winning draft lotteries.) they drafted nail yakupov first overall. i am not going to dive deeply into the yakupov saga, because we would be here all night, but suffice to say that, no, he did not live up to first overall expectations, but also, yes, he was very much punished for Being Russian In Edmonton, and those two things cannot be untangled from each other. however, in the context of the nuge of it all, this leaves rnh in an interesting and particular spot: he is still not expected to be taylor hall, and wow he looks like such a nice pick compared to yakupov. rnh is playing pretty well! not all-star numbers or anything, but again, he's not the cornerstone of the franchise rebuild. he is an important brick, but not the foundation.

not like the rebuild is working anyway. with their arsenal of three straight first overall draft picks (and canadian world juniors hero jordan eberle), edmonton misses the playoffs for the seventh straight season. and then they miss them again. and then they miss them again. and it's not even like assigned franchise savior taylor hall is playing poorly — other than one slump of a season he is consistently putting up 50+ point seasons, including one 80 point season! but the oilers as a team are still a laughingstock in the league. it's not just that they're missing the playoffs. they are consistently near the bottom of the league.

to be clear, i don't think this was the fault of the players. i think the oilers were (are) pretty shit at management and were (are) pretty shit at prospect development. i think that when you have a team with that many decent-to-good players and you can't get out of the basement that the problem is systemic. but god forbid the front office take a good long look inward to diagnose the problem within themselves. no, the problem was that assigned franchise savior taylor hall was not doing his job (saving the franchise).

not that there wasn't any frustration toward other players, including rnh. there was frustration toward the team as a whole, but hall often bore the brunt of it. omark and pääjärvi were gone by around 2014. eberle was still well-liked but it was kind of accepted that he wasn't going to change the fate of the organization. the idea that the oilers needed to ship hall out becaue HE was the problem was in the air before the 2015 draft lottery.

and then the oilers won the 2015 draft lottery, and with it, connor mcdavid. people were not happy. (please click on this link it's so funny.) the oilers were so bad at this point that it was just generally accepted that connor going to the oilers meant the prime of his generational-talent career would be wasted by an incompetent team. honestly not really feeling like we've been proven wrong at this exact point in time!

however: connor mcdavid? brand new savior! way better savior than taylor hall ever would have been! the last five years of rebuild weren't REALLY a rebuild, the real rebuild was going to start with mcdavid!

and where is the nuge in all this? he has been pretty quietly plugging away, turning into a very good and reliable nhl player. a consistent 40–50 ish point player, not bad! fast forward a few seasons into the mcdavid era and he's putting up 80 points, 100 points! he's the longest-tenured oiler. the edmonton people and powers that be seem to really value him! which is really awesome.

this is not to say that there was never any "nuge should be better" discourse or any frustration with him when the team was doing so badly, because there was absolutely frustration with the whole team, including him. i do distinctly remember hearing the phrase "the oilers need more from ryan nugent-hopkins" more than once on the broadcasts. nuge finding his role on the team and the notable success he's had in more recent seasons has been a process, even though he hasn't ever been ~bad at the nhl level. however, imo, his positioning between noted disappointments hall and yakupov and also assigned saviors hall and mcdavid did put him in a unique position where people had a little more patience with him and blamed him less for the team's struggles than his fellow first overalls.

i do still miss the kid line sometimes though.

[girlmartok]

rightful heir is insane for the Implications. okay so there's this guy who was cloned from leftover DNA of the real kahless (with you so far) but also he's got fuzzy memories of being the real kahless implanted into his brain (?? okay...?) and he was just woken up/brought into existence at the exact moment the priest guys needed him to appear (when worf shows up, the main character of klingons) so this is really his first moment of being a person and he's In It, he's ready to GO right away. no learning how to walk, no confusion, no "hey guys what's been going on since i died", and he's ready to overthrow the current government DAY ONE. nope don't tell him anything, he already knows your chancellor sucks and the klingon spirit is corrupted. and he knows about worf's childhood moses moment where he/kahless appeared to worf to tell him to sparkle on it's worf wednesday my dude (very specific memory) but he can't remember details of his famous stories (are we saying his worf-related memories are real because worf really was the believer who brought his spirit back? mixed in with some good old fashioned priest cloning)

BUT he's a shit fighter. i mean he's not terrible but he's not mythical godlike warrior levels, so he does have some physical adjustment stumbling, but only when pressed. his weakness should have been like. learning how to digest solid food. not advanced combat. i mean don't get me wrong that's a very klingon weakness but it still raises a lot of questions. and kahless 2 has ZERO questions about this whole scheme until he loses to gowron in a fight. if we go with the Implications and assume this is the spirit of the real kahless dropped into his clone's body, the rest of this guy's whole deal is wild!!! he's just vibing! he's having spiritual awakenings certain human religious figures could only dream of achieving. even if we DON'T buy into the true reincarnation aspect, he's still the genetic clone of the klingon people's greatest hero with all the knowledge of the klingon religion in his head. like a factory made condensed klingon heritage all in one guy. which has gotta be a fun time for him (not really). his personality is Honor and his occupation is Faith. and he is technically a BABY.

and then worf is like "look idk if i believe in reincarnation (maybe haha) but i do believe in causing problems, let's see where he's going with this" and makes him a figurehead emperor. and of course by this point 2 fast 2 kahless is starting his "maybe i really am a fake" journey (which should've happened when he first heard someone sneeze and freaked out) so he just goes along with it. anyway. maybe the real kahless was the Implications we didn't fully explore along the way.

[the-daiz]

First of all I hope you have a nice day! I was wondering if you could HxH hc Killua x Reader Gon, where the reader turns into a chimera ant (like Palm)? You don't have if you want, thank you 💙💙💙💙

Killua and Gon's reaction to the reader turning into a chimera ant

Genre: kinda angsty, fluff (at the end)

Pairing: platonic! Killua x reader x Gon

Warning(s): mention of death

Hello Anon! Thank you for the request! I actually really like this request, though I did have trouble while trying to figure out the exact timeline and if i wouldn't it to be detailed or not, i ended up making it a bit overly detailed, glad it worked out in the end tho. By how lengthy this is, Im guessing you can tell how much i enjoyed myself writing this :)

Posted on: 7/ August/ 2022

When you didn't come back from the exploration you were assigned by Morel, Gon and Killua immediately knew something was wrong. Something terrible happened to you, they could just feel it.

The chimera ants had already spread throughout the forest and cities, claiming them as their own. Kite had fallen victim to their sinister snapping jaws and a new chimera king has been founded.

Now the three of you were in the hands of Morel and knov, ready to take the risks of putting an end to the invasive species. You were meant to clear out the passage they were taking to sneak into the city the chemira ants had invaded, a simple task considering it was surrounded by mere lower grade ants and you were well versed when it came to combat.

The task was supposed to take a day or less to complete, however, when you didn't return after 3 days and you were no where to be found, panic started to arise in their chests.

When you went missing, the first thing the two did was go looking for you, or any sign of you for that matter.

But they couldn't find anything, nothing that led to you, not even a stray strand of hair. There were a relatively less amount of Ants that roamed the area now which meant you had been here.

Painfully so, Knov had to pull them back to reality when they wouldn't stop looking for you.

Gon was distraught, he was so out of it for a few days

Killua on the other hand tried to keep his composure, but he couldn't, he couldn't hide how hurt he was by your supposed 'death'.

After sulking for a few days, they lifted up their heads and continued hunting down the lethal creatures. Your dissapearance (or death, as they think) played a major role in their infinite feul of motivation to put an end to them once and for all.

It was when they were investigating a few towns, which had unfortunately been massacred by 'the national celebration', that they encountered you.

Well, not completely you, your mutated form. You didn't look the same but you were recognisable.

Its safe to say that they were both speechless and utterly stunned.

You remembered them, your memories were still intact however your emotions weren't the same.

Gon was happy when he finally realised what he was looking at, so you weren't dead after all. He was about to run towards you and envelope you into a hug but before he could, Killua stopped him.

Being the rational one of the two he quickly picked up on your odd behaviour and expressionless face.

Unannounced, you pounced at them, with full intentions to kill, as pouf had ordered you to.

Taken aback, they leaped away from you and continued to dodge your continues attacks, sometimes mistepping and getting hit by one of your many blows.

"What are you doing?! (Y/n) stop it! Don't you remember us?! You're our friend!!" Gon desperately yelled, trying to snap you out of whatever stupor you were in.

"I'm not your friend, I came here merely to kill you two. Sorry but your friend is gone." You responded nonchalantly.

Gon didn't have the heart to fight back despite you actively trying to get rid of him, but Killua knew better, even though it hurt to see you in such a state.

Eventually, he was able to trap you with the strings of his yo-yos and started to try and talk you out of your mindlessness.

"I am not the (Y/n) you once knew, Killua. Your holding on to a false hope. Now quit being so pethatic."

Of course he continued trying, which was all in vain.

Unfortunately for him, while he was going on about the hunter exam and how you met you managed to snap the strings of his weapons. Without a moment to spare you sprinted full speed his way, ready to finally shut him up for good.

Killua didn't have anytime to react, and only gawked at you in the few milliseconds he was given. Gon let out a helpless cry to his vulnerable friend but that was all he could really do

You paused right before him, your face mere inches away from his when all of a sudden the wall built inside your head to block your inner emotions had finally broken down.

Hppy ending! (Yay!)

Gon JUMPED on you, al most suffocated you (literally) with how hard he had his arm wrapped around your chest.

He kept crying about how much he missed you and how he never believed you were dead (partially lying)

And when you were done having your moment with your green haired friend, killua started yelling at you???

Well you weren't sure if he was angry at you or was just really happy that you're alive, but you suppose it was a mix of both.

After he was done yelling at you and gulping back down whatever emotions had managed to break theew his chambers, he engaged in a very awkward side hug with you, which was good enough for him.

Alas, the infamous trio was back and better than ever! They march towards the setting sun, ready to end the chemira species, together!

[notnights]

Random fun acetate ribbun fact? Good fic!!!!

As in this is your fun fact, or you're asking me for a fun fact? (Either way thanks hehe.)

Uh lets see fun fact. I mentioned this the other day but deleted it because I don't like giving away too much about a story though it's technically not spoilers either but like people to figure out the beats themselves. But ehh uhhh:

Its about Kinger and Queenie being the original hanahaki case in the in the story. I dropped a few hints about it, but I don't know how well it came across. It's hard to know what a reader's view might be compared to yours when you know all the twist and turns you put in ya know?

Since we know nothing about those two yet, I kind of threw them under the narrative bus in the sense I used them in whatever way I wanted to help with the story lol. One day we're gonna find out what their deal was, and my fic will be outdated as it possibly depicts them as completely inaccurate. (Imagine they're divorced.)

I was originally going to leave just a single hint in chapter one as a solo; Kinger mentioning he was vomiting up affection. As well as him explaining how yellow camellias symbolize longing; fitting for them in the Digital Circus. They long for an escape; it's their default flower. And then him gifting camellias to Queenie, was meant to imply he was also vomiting up those same flowers.

I however ended up adding more hints in chapter 3 and 4 though. I'll leave those as a surprise to reread for unless folks can't find them and want me to point them out.

This was meant to be evident to the audience, but not to the characters. As every time the couple come up I also have Gangle look at them as a frame of reference. She admires this love they had, that she never saw herself. How nice it must have been compared to this horrible love story she's experiencing now. But she is blissfully ignorant that Kinger and Queenie also had a rough start.

Admittedly NOT as rough of a start as Gangle and Jax did of course. I like to imagine Caine gave them the same prescription but, Queenie was neutral about Kinger before then, unlike Gangle who already resented Jax. And Kinger was kind to Queenie prior to his illness unlike Jax who's been nothing by terrible to Gangle even after falling for her.

So we can assume our King and Queen chess piece had a more typical hanahaki story. A bit reluctant at first, but ultimately became a loving couple. That the second Digital Circus hanahaki couple puts on a pedestal to compare themselves to, without even knowing they also suffered from similar (but less intense) problems.

I also like to think Kinger forgot the details of this event himself. He remembers being sick, Queenie nursing him back to health, him being very affectionate, namely in giving her a lot of flowers. But he doesn't specifically remember the case itself. Maybe doesn't even remember these being connected.

He has vague recallings, such as Caine taping up the door, Gangle showing him rare colored flowers then mentioning Jax is sick, but sadly it's not enough to bring the memory back in full. Just thoughts of "huh this seems familiar..."

Likewise, if Caine forgot, you know poor Kinger did, as I imagine Caine's memory is a lot sturdier than Kinger's. My excuse for Caine forgetting is that, if he's an AI, he still has limitations due to the computer he's attached to. Could be fantasy digital with endless memory and infinite terabytes, but for this lets say he only has so much memory to work with.

So finer unneeded details get deleted to ensure he continues to have space for new ones. Recognizes what hanahaki is, but doesn't have the specific name or exact reference for it until he looks it up again. Doesn't remember who was involved in the original case, or how exactly it was resolved. Just that "we had this before; this fixed it! Somehow!" He didn't delete the memory completely because, what if this happened again! Needs to hold onto a piece of it just in case.

So uh anyways there's the implied and hidden Kinger and Queenie lore in my fic.

And you also may be wondering how exactly was Kinger capable of throwing up you may be wondering? ???? ????

????? ?????? ?? ?? ???

[emmys-grimoire]

I love Solomon. But when he told us that we mustn't talk about the future, to avoid a kind of butterfly effect...yeah. It's makes sense.

But- He's doing more "changing future acts" than us 🙃 Like, the sole fact he introduce us as his apprentice is as itself can cause many paradox. He also meets most of the brothers centuries -even millenials- before he did it in our present, like Asmo for example. At this point I think the timeline is already twisted enough without us...

I'm also questioning what's happen to the original "Past Solomon". Did he fuse with Present Solomon like MC in lesson 16 of the first game ? In that case, if he did not have some mysterious scheme when he came and told us the truth about everything, didn't he took something like, a big risky decision...? He told us he don't even remember why Barbatos have a grudge against him at this time, because he lived a long time. What if he did some something in the human world after the Celestial War he don't remember doing and change the future ?

And, if the Past and Present Solomon didn't fuse to avoid this "I didn't do what I did in the past because I forgot I did it", we actually have two Solomon in the timeline. So. Past Solomon learning is the human world he is in the Devildom with his non-existent apprentice is a whole comedy in my head.

Well. Time travel and paradox are hard topics and can depends on what kind of time rule the creator made. I know I bothering with things that can be explain by "You going to far in the reflection" but like travel offer so much possibility that I can't help myself. (And, I would love to tease Solomon about this. "Yeah. I must not risk to change the timeline to the point I wouldn't even being born. But what are you doing ?")

Aaaand. Everything could be explained with a little time loop in these events and some erased memories .

Mc time travel to OBN -> Doing our stuff in OBN and be back at our time -> Our existence is erased from memories -> The bros and everyone of the past live their life like if we didn't meet -> Mc coming to the exchange program and living OB events -> Mc time travel to OBN

So it would mean that everything we do in Nightbringer was already did. And the bros of the future just forgot.

The erased memories trump card is useful when dealing with immortal beings and time travel.

(Perhaps this had an answer in the lesson-A after lesson 7. I'm still debloking them-)

Yeah Obey Me! does a terrible job keeping their time travel rules consistent, which is why I'm not a fan of them using it again. They established in Lesson 16 that Barbatos can literally just eliminate and merge timelines as he likes so any time paradoxes are trivial at best. They made him way too OP for this universe and that'll be hard to roll back or justify retroactively changing.

I don't think Barbatos did any memory altering. That's not in his wheelhouse.

But I don't think there's been any merging yet, either. There are two Solomons running around as far as I know, but the past Solomon just simply isn't in the Devildom at this point in time. I wouldn't be surprised if Solomon knows exactly what he did to Barbatos in the past -- even if the exact details are foggy -- and he's just not terribly forthcoming to us about it. If he was merged with his past self, those memories would be more fresh, not less.

I do wonder what happens when/if past Solomon tries to summon Barbatos now, though, or if he suddenly has a pact with Asmodeus now that he can't explain. It's clear that Solomon expects what we may do here could alter the present timeline -- and it's dumb for him to expect there to be no changes -- but he should know he has Barbatos in his back pocket, too.

Honestly I don't think I'm going to even try keeping track of it all...

[aroacesigma]

limbus company is ! a mobile game. made by project moon who also did lobotomy corporation and library of runia (i have played neither but both are fascinating games) and limbus company is set. i think AFTER lobotomy corp but im not really sure tbh. you don't have to play those other games you can just play limbus but im sure there's references and stuff that'll miss but who cares abt those dsjgs (also u can play limbus on pc too its on steam. also there's apparently crossplay so u can have the same account on mobile and pc)

anyway ! its a gacha (of course) and you got these like... 8? i think? lil dudes that you collect alternate forms of called "identity"s and tbh i don't get it but yanno. at least you only got 8 people so its easier to choose who to focus on ksdjghsd. the only ones i remember the names of are Faust, Don Quixote, Sinclair, and uhh Ryoshu? i think is her name? i literally don't even remmeber the name of one of the people that is my faves. rip. its not ryoshu btw its a different guy.

ANYWAY. the game is kinda. brutal? a little disturbing in a manner of speaking? like the first event in the game is you waking up with memory loss and your head's been replaced with a clock, and you can rewind time to revive your 8 little guys but it causes the mc immense, agonizing pain that is described in Detail the first few times :) (its not that bad tbh) and also ur stupid little guys like to kill each other. its mean. my least favorite dude killed sinclair just bc he was trying to make them stop fighting and i will never forgive him (sinclair is my fave btw hes wet and pathetic) but dw they're all fine.

uhh as far as i've gotten it really isn't that bad beyond like. some disturbing descriptions/imagery (mostly just. blood. also your car eats people.) so its not tooooooo bad? but still smth to be aware of and im sure there's other stuff i just haven't hit yet.

its fun. has a neat combat system. the story is also really nice bc you get these little bite-sized bits of story, then get to do a battle, then get a lil more story, which really works for my adhd brain bc im not forced to just sit there and read..... also i'll find u the card of my other fave dude that i got yesterday. i got lucky and got the exact card i wanted lmao

^ there he is. hong lu :) in the background is yi sang (black hair) and rodion (brown)

also here r some sinclairs (i WISH i had that second card... i wonder if i can get it somehow... btw thats don quixote beside him wearing the silly lil hat)

also i probably explained everything terribly but its fun i promise

DAMNNNN omfg that sounds so fun ... i love it :D

[thesweetnessofsalt]

Process Blog #2

To the person who left this comment like, two years ago:

You were so on the nose, you didn’t even know. But I knew. I KNEW!!!

Process Blog #2 covers pages 6 through 9 of Chapter 3.

Man, this was the sequence from hell. I’ve been having some computer troubles, and in my attempts to fix the issue, I ended up losing a lot of my files for Chapter 3. It’s fine - I ended up recovering almost everything, and I’m using a cloud service going forward. But the issue still persists and my computer just shuts down at random. Some days it doesn’t happen at all, but on others, it’ll happen continuously.

(You can also file this under ‘reasons why Michelle can’t manage to keep a stream schedule’, btw…sorry.)

Nevertheless, I’ve been looking forward to making these pages for a while, and they are juicy. So let's get into it!!

Historical Inspiration & Stylism

Sha’s memory is kind of hazy - it’s why she, say, rounds to 2,000 years instead of providing an exact date; see also the ‘egg incident’ - and her recounting of her past is similarly lacking in detail. That being said, I do want to imply something about when and where this occurs, and have tried to do so through the visuals. 

The compositions and figures themselves are inspired mostly by red-figure pottery, while the eyes and decorative details are inspired by Minoan frescoes.

Panels are made up of Greek meanders - those decorative borders. I know it's not what the Greeks were going for, but it looks very comic-like to me and I'm here for it.

Aphrodite

Aphrodite’s domain was love, passion, and beauty, but she was also associated with fertility and marriage. I’ve peppered a few of her symbols throughout this sequence - sparrows, myrtle (those leafy branches) - but the main one are shells. 

Aphrodite was often depicted with scallop shells, alluding to her birth by the sea. Oh, hey - we’ve seen shells like this in TSOS before!

Well, have you caught it? Have you figured out that we’re drawing parallels between Sha and Aphrodite? What if we were both girls…and we were both born from the ocean…

The (Ex-) Husband

Divorce was a viable option for couples in Ancient Greece, so his threat isn’t completely out of left field - neither is the implication that he’d hold Sha responsible for their troubles. Infertility was seen as a women’s issue, and was perfectly reasonable grounds for divorce.

Yes, this guy comes off like a complete asshole to us, but to Sha, this would have been normalized (though still awful).

Not much else to say about the dude. He was a fisherman,  though that detail ended up really only coming through here:

Shop Talk

For all the troubles I had with research, stylizing, and tone, the actual making of these pages was pretty quick (thank god…I had to make up that time somewhere!). I really tried not to fuss too much on the execution of these, given that I was working on them in such sporadic sections and lost my original files partway through.

I didn’t really do a sketch pass, instead jumping right into the lineart so it’d look stiffer and less refined than the usual style. I gave the lines a little oomph by adding a duplicating lineart underneath, blurring the heck out of it, and changing it to red. This just gave them some warmth and helped distinguish them better from the screentones.

I chose this screentone for its resemblance to tiny mosaic tiles, with some slight hue shifts for variety and a gaussian blur to soften up those harsh anti aliased dots.

Closing Arguments

Well, now you know the terrible truth: TSOS is not very historically accurate or specific.

Instead of sharing her story through facts and events, I wanted it to be shared in Sha's own words, supported by visuals that could be interpreted freely.

Sha doesn't remember where she lived, or when she died. Even if she did, those things would be counted and named differently today, and those facts wouldn't add anything to her character or the story. What Sha does remember is the loneliness and desperation that got her to where she is now.

It's not the most forthcoming, I know, but hey - neither is Sha!

This flashback continues for another two pages, but they start to break from this ancient style as we fade back to present day, so that's all for now!

As always, if you have any questions about the making of TSOS, leave them in the comments and I’ll answer them in the next!

Process Blog #2 was originally published September 21, 2023 on Ko-fi. Supporters get early access to TSOS pages and process blogs!

[that-vexaholic-cryptid]

One thing I will always admire about BOTW is how the storytelling is subtle. The game outright tells you very little, just the wide context, and suggests at everything else. It’s environmental, it requires a little bit of imagination to work. You go to an area, and it’s features captivate you while the little details fall into place.

You see the memory of Fort Hateno, and you visit it, and now you’re just like Link, remembering how it was compared to what you see now. The very first place Link is told to go requires him to pass thru the exact place he died, and you can’t realize this until Zelda and Impa think you’re ready. These people care about him deeply. And you go back, you see where soldiers have driven their swords into the ground as memorial to him. And if you’re really paying attention, you pick up on that the Bolsons were demolishing a house that was abandoned 100 years ago… The implication that it may have been Link’s in the first place. Meaning, not only did he die in the line of duty, but he was defending his own home.

And the characters work the same way - you get little snippets of them, barely more than outlines, and the wider context and details suddenly can give you empathy for them. Your impressions of them might even change depending on what memory you saw first. You see Zelda snap at Link, you think she’s terrible. You see her burst with excitement at a frog or a flower, and then you realize that if she weren’t so shamed by her father and burdened with responsibility, that if she’d been allowed the chance to research and learn and truly love in the first place, her power would have presented years ago.

The story isn’t about a hero saving a princess, it’s about learning how to find yourself, for both Link and Zelda. The only way to do it was to release the burdens and, like the flower, thrive in the wild. If this was the intention of the storytellers and I’m not just being weird, and this is what is meant when people say the Zelda games are about imagination and creativity, I am super impressed.

[austronauts]

I'm curious as to how you got mitched. Was it gradual or did you just wake up one day with an all consuming urge to gently cradle this hamster of a man in your palms and deposit him into your pocket

oh it was not gradual at all let me tell you. it descended upon me faster than the leafs concede 2-0 leads. it descended upon me SO SWIFTLY i'm still reeling and trying to understand WHAT HAPPENED and how this little twink got me SO BAD.

so, the chronology of events and the Epic Tale of The Fall of Troy (me) to The Twink was as follows:

me happily existing as a pens fan who - after a long hiatus of not following hockey closely - just started getting back into the penguins because a casual conversation with my friends about hockey awakened my dormant penguins sicko memories and instincts like mount vesuvius erupting all over pompeii and herculaneum

me happily joining hockey tumblr and frolicking around in the pensblr fandom. i'd seen a couple of leafs games and knew that "that kid marner" was really good and played VERY pretty hockey but I honestly did not think about him at all! he was just some tiktoker lookin ass dude and i was busy tending to my geriatric birds (although i will say - as i started watching more and more hockey, leafs immediately endeared themselves to me for reasons i can't quite articulate. they just had good vibes. the contrast between the INCREDIBLE hypnotizingly beautiful hockey they played + the utterly boneheaded indefensibly bad mistakes and losses to bottom feeder teams? relatable queens!)

and then one day i found "jack campbell cat dad" content on here and became intrigued by auston matthews' massive mountainous body and jawline and looked up toronto maple leafs content on youtube. THIS, DEAR READER, WAS MY FIRST FATAL MISTAKE. you see - the toronto maple leafs' social media team HANDS DOWN makes the best content, because they FUNDAMENTALLY realize hockey teams and kpop groups are the same thing, especially when it comes to gaining new fans.

ANYWAY, i still remember the EXACT video that made me go - "my god, what is this silly little twink all about. why does he have eyelashes like that. i would like to both squash him into a viscous glittery paste i rub on my eyelids like eyeshadow AND cradle him in my fannypack while feeding him little nuts and pieces of asiago cheese." IT WAS THIS VIDEO - tHE LEAFS CALLING EACH OTHER OUT . THE INFAMOUS VIDEO WHERE MITCH DOESNT KNOW HOW TO SAY ENCYCLOPEDIA. i love a dumb little boy!

MY SECOND FATAL MISTAKE was dragging a fellow friend into hockey with me because im incapable of obsessing over something by myself. i always need to get someone else into it too. SO. I started showing my friend leafs content and SHE was like "have u noticed that this little fruit won't stop talking about auston matthews every chance he gets" (EXHIBIT A: THIS VIDEO where mitch mentions how good auston looks in EVERYTHING every 20 seconds. baby girl, enough. ENOUGH. just say you're dickmatized and go)

and then alas. ALAS. my third and final fatal mistake was going down the mitch marner tag on tumblr and unfortunately being exposed to all the ways in which! he is just! AN IDIOT MANIC PIXIE DREAM TWINK with 2 braincells (one of which is a sour skittle), daddy issues and tragic lore, and irresponsibly long eyelashes who loves physically glomming onto every teammate like a baby koalabear, adopting himself into older teammates' families as their part-time son and part-time dog, wearing terrible outfits and dancing in them, generally being a needy sweetheart that loves to chirp his teammates (poorly) but loves gassing them up even more, drawing smiley faces on his gloves to remind himself that hockey is supposed to be fun (this detail kills me every day), and making weird little faces on the bench because he has the zoomies? god, i am not your strongest soldier! i was not BUILT to be able to resist little sugary sweet morsels like this!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! if MATTHEW MARTIN, one of nhl's TOP LEADERS IN HITS, caved into mitchell marner heart body and soul....what the fuck am I supposed to do? not give him the love and headpats and neck scritches he wants? not root for his little happiness and well-being? i'm an idiot but not a MONSTER

anyway, that's why i am here typing up this monstrous screed on all the ways in which i was personally victimized by mitchell marner i guess.

okay wait i WILL add one thing - so long before i was a hockey fan i was a soccer fan, and have always always loved undersized creative playmakers who can seemingly weave magic from thin air while effortlessly eluding opponents as if they're made from pixie dust themselves. i have no doubt if mitch grew up in a country where soccer was THE sport, he would be a world class playmaking midfielder right now. and in that sense i do think my adoption of mitch marner as my little hamster was inevitable tbh.

[macestro]

he's sharp enough to pick up the sound of cards falling to the ground, even amidst the rambling voices of the rest of the task force. his gaze, out of the corners of his eyes, lands on A with accurate precision. the connection isn't entirely clear in his mind, yet, but one of the names said during this conversation must have struck a chord with her ... &, considering the name they all had been talking about just before her sudden shock, it doesn't take a lot of insight to reach his conclusion.

"are you alright?" he asks, worried, his expression soft & concerned as he crosses his arms over the table in front of him. inside, however, kira fights back a smirk. don't you see his justice? don't you see how he fights to get rid of people like that? kira remembers that name, however vaguely, from the times he flipped through the pages of the book & looked over the many, many punished sinners.

a car crash. a dead father. a mother that didn't leave the hospital. now, isn't that all too fitting for someone with no name, no identity, just a letter & an alias?

"it's ... it's terrible that kira is still killing people, isn't it?" or, would you rather express your gratitude to him, ace?

It's only been a couple of minutes in the real world where the rest of the task force is still carrying on their conversation, however for A, it feels like she has been standing in this spot for hours. The sounds of their voices has long since drowned out in the background, replaced by nothing but the screeching halt of rubber on pavement and metal collapsing upon itself in its ruined state with only the lightest groans coming from her mother as well as herself.

❝P-Papa...? Ma... mama?❞ spoke a quiet little voice, crimson making it impossible to see out of one of her eyes. To this day, she still can't recall the exact details of all that happened on that fateful day, but what she does remember is everything that happened after it that led her to become who she is today. She is no longer her past self, but instead Ace, the first success story to ensure that there would always be an L in the world.

Yet, in this moment, she still feels like the wounded little girl she did back then. It doesn't even register to her that she is, in fact, crying—perhaps out of relief that the bastard who took her parents from her at such a young age is finally dead or that the memories she's fought to keep under lock and key have risen to the surface all at once, giving her far too much stimulation.

It isn't until she vaguely notices that Light has asked her a question that she feels the shackles to the past loosen their hold on her form, allowing her to numbly blink a couple of times in response (not an unusual response from her in the slightest), but she can't quite hide that tear stain on her cheek.

❝H-Huh...? I'm sorry... What did you say? I must have been out of it...❞ Didn't she just have her deck of cards in her hand? Why are they on the floor beneath her—?

[andhaveapleasanttomorrow]

fleet foxes self-titled cd sleeve text below

my first memory has always been of me and my mom on a cold grey day down at some beach in washington, along the puget sound somewhere near seattle. I would be around two or three years old and we're with a friend of mine from the neighborhood and his mom, walking around among the driftwood looking for crabs. even now, I can remember the smell and temperature of the air, the feeling of the sand and the swaying tall grass. I can even remember looking over at my friend and how his face looked when he smiled back at me. another memory that I'll sometimes recall as my first memory is dressing up in the dead of winter as jack london, with tennis rackets on my feet and wearing my dad's hiking pack, in the middle of summer after seeing disney's (terrible) version of white fang. or there's the memory of stealing my neighbor's big wheel and riding it halfway down the block before getting caught and having to turn around defeated, or of wearing a fireman's outfit while washing my parents' car, or eating an orange popsicle from the ice cream truck.

these are and have always been some of my most distinct and persistent memories of childhood, so it came as a disappointment to me when, one day as a teenager, I opened up a photo album and found pictures of each and every one of those memories. I didn't have a single memory that didn't belong to or somehow grow from pictures my parents had taken of me when I was growing up. even the scenes I remember so clearly in my head are from the same angles as those photographs and I don't really know what to make of it. I'm going to guess that I'd seen all these photographs at some point, forgotten they were just photographs, and over time made them into my most tangible memories. that's scary to me in a way.

this leads me to something weird about the power that music has, its transportive ability. any time I hear a song or record that meant a lot to me at a certain moment or I was listening to at a distinct time, I'm instantly taken back to that place in full detail. whenever I hear "feel flows" by the beach boys, I'm taken straight to the back of my parents' car on the way to my grandparents' place, fourteen with surf's up in my walkman and the cascade mountains going by in the window. any song off radiohead's kid a brings back the sounds and atmosphere of the airport near seattle, from when we were on the way to colorado for a wedding and kid a was the only record I brought or wanted to bring. "crayon angels" by judee sill is the whole winter of last year, and brian wilson's solo version of surf's up will take me back to driving my parents' car around town alone at the age of 16 with the windows down at night.

I can ascribe exact memories to songs by the microphones, joni mitchell, built to spill, dungen, harry nilsson, and so many others, and it's a form of recall that I can actually trust. there's no visual element to complicate things, no chance of a planted memory that wasn't actually supposed to be there and that is reassuring to me. maybe I should be concerned that I'm alone in almost all these memories, but I guess I was just a private kid and music was a private experience for me. I can even remember the certain kind of darkness my room would have when I was in there alone listening to records. I can read a good book cover to cover and never once forget I'm sitting in the middle of four slabs of drywall on a spring mattress in seattle- same with movies and tv and anything else. I can listen to music and instantly be anywhere that song is trying to take me. music activates a certain mental freedom in a way that nothing else can, and that is so empowering. you can call it escapism if you like, but I see it as connecting to a deeper human feeling than found in the day-to-day world.

thank you for listening to our band. we've made some mistakes and we'll continue to do so, but we are happy to be making songs and would love the opportunity to continue to grow and change as the years pass by. it took us a long eight months of recording ourselves at home, recording piecemeal in studios, scrapping dozens of songs and starting over, and borrowing money and rooms from friends and family to make this record and its accompanying ep and we hope you enjoy it. music is a weird and cosmic thing, its own strange religion for nonbelievers, and what a joy it is to make, in any form. also, don't trust your photographs.

warren gamaliel bancroft winnipeg harding chicago, illinois april 6th, 2008.

[dragons-and-yellow-roses]

Anyway just had a weird experience called "I have a terrible memory and today I was thinking about an event that happened but I couldn't remember a detail so I went back to my journal entry about it (this event was four years ago, I have an extensive journal for this exact purpose) and turns out there are so many details I forgot, and at this point it's so far gone that i can only read the details and know that it happened, but I can't remember all of it in context, if that makes sense, like I know the general premise of the event but I just have to trust that these details are true the way that I wrote them."

[skylarmoon71]

Lex Luthor (Smallville) AU - Chapter 5

There was not much Jonathan could do after you revealed your secret. So he told himself to keep an eye on Lex. Especially since this one was different from what they were used to. Lex had been spending a lot of time at the barn, much to Jonathan’s dismay. He still didn’t buy the amnesia bit. But he knew there was very little he could do to stop you from helping him.

Lex leaned at the side as you continued to stack the hay. You moved almost effortlessly. He had to remind himself that you weren’t any normal farm hand. Sporting a baggy blue plaid shirt and a pair of jeans, Lex just studied.

“So far what I’ve gathered is that nothing has changed.”

Lex covered every base of knowledge he could on Smallville. All the events that took place in his reality were perfectly reflected here. Earl’s attack on the plant. His father shutting down said plant. All the things in between. Nothing was different except for the clear gender swap. Lex had even enlisted your help. Since you were so forthcoming with all your secrets, he didn’t see the point in hiding any of his. In this place, it felt useless to have them. You had insisted that you would help him figure it out.

“You’re saying you remember everything, it’s just that a few pieces are swapped.”

“Exactly.”

“Hmm.”

You stopped for a second, brushing your hair out of your face.

“But in your memories, I’m a guy?”

“Yes.”

You just laughed.

“That’s crazy. I’m a girl.” You smiled at him, and Lex could literally see the comparison. You had the exact same smile too.

“You have no idea how crazy this is for me.” Lex said, looking down at his hands.

Somehow he thought maybe he was still in a coma, and his body was nearing the point of death. If he would indeed die, he supposed this wasn’t a bad place to be. You spotted the worried look, and you placed the tool down.

“Lex, no matter what happens. I promise I’ll do everything I can to protect you.”

There’s that earnest Kent look. He forgot how many times he’d seen it. It never got old. Looking at you so concerned for his well being was touching. He always had to remind himself to look over his shoulder in the past. That not everyone liked his name, that legacy. But here with you, any version of a Kent, there was always that need to protect. To help. Another quality he admired greatly.

“Every version of you has a hero complex.”

“I-I don’t have a hero complex!” You got defensive, and Lex laughed internally.

“It’s my turn to probe you. Aside from crazy speed and strength, what else are you packing?” The question caused you to shift.

“You really don’t remember huh.”

It was a soft musing to yourself. He caught the brief look of guilt again. Whenever you thought of his accident, it would rush to the surface. Before Lex could even say anything, you planted a smile on your face. He knew it was a defense. You didn’t want him to worry, and he didn’t want you feeling guilty every time he brought up this situation.

“I have x-ray vision, super hearing, and heat vision.”

Lex thought you were maybe pulling his leg. But the way you fidgeted, he realized that was far from it. You turned, almost like you were shielding your body, your heart from any scared reaction you thought he would give.

“It’s a lot. My father..my biological father used to say that earth’s sun is what gave me my powers. Somehow on earth, all my senses are enhanced. Any other kid would probably be ecstatic. But remember the first time they came. My first run happened when I was just a little girl. Only six…”

Lex took it all in. Every detail. Because with every part he learned, the more he felt like a terrible friend. He spent so long looking into Clark. Trying to uncover the truth behind his back. But it was clear why the Kents were always so cautious. So distrusting of him.

You swallowed, looking down at your feet.

“My mom told me nothing was wrong with me. I was just special. Her special kid. But deep down..it was frightening. There are times where I wake up and wish that I was never born, that I had never come to Smallville.”

“Don’t say that!”

Lex snapped, and you turned, jumping when he grabbed your shoulders.

“Your mother was right, you’re special. You’re so special. You’re probably the only great thing to come out of this town.” You were taken aback by his words. He was still holding you, almost pleading with you to reconsider your words.

“You don’t blame me? I-I’m the reason you’re bald you know.”

Lex couldn’t help it, he had to laugh, and your cheeks colored as you looked away.

“I think baldness is the small price to pay for the arrival of a great person.”

“I’m not great..” You murmured.

“You are great. You’re amazing (Y/N).” He sounded so sincere.

“You’re incredible.”

He insisted. You bit your lip. Although Lex was different, there were still parts of him that never seemed to change. His utter faith in you.

“(Y/N).”

The voice of Jonathan Kent pulled you both from the moment, and Lex released you, taking a step back. Jonathan’s hand folded when he stepped in.

“I need a hand with the tractor. “

“O-Of course dad I’ll be right there.” You walked around Lex a bit nervously, sending him a little smile as you did. One he returned. Lex’s eyes followed you all the way until you were around the corner.

Jonathan still stood there.

“If you hurt my daughter, I swear I don’t care what your last name is, I’ll come after you.”

Lex knew he meant it.

He learned a long time ago that there was nothing Jonathan Kent wouldn’t do for his child.

[smb3]

memories

It’s so hard to lose something or someone, no matter the circumstances and only be left with the memories--especially if your memory is not very good.

I worry that with time I’ll forget all the little things. I really try to be present and appreciate what I have, when I have it. I try to take the time to enjoy the good times and even the boring, good times. the little moments, to contrast it to how it was before. but I always know that there’s a good chance I won’t remember this exact moment. and I probably won’t. looking back, I know there are so many I don’t.

even if I can remember them, I can’t relive them. memories are great but I can’t touch or smell or speak again. I just have a vague recollection of what happened. and even that might be warped.

Even though I’m really bad at taking them/being in them, I’m really thankful for photos. It’s so nice to have such quick and easy access to cameras and storage of photos and videos over long periods of time. I’ve lost so many to old phones without cloud storage but with social media, terrible as it may be, some memories I’d have forgotten are immortalized, at least in some way.

I can look back and see. Maybe I just do better with visual aid but it fills in a lot of those blanks. I can see the color of the carpet, the lighting, other details about what was there that I’d have otherwise forgotten. If I had an eidetic memory, maybe I’d be better off. Or maybe, knowing how sentimental I am, I’d be worse.

I’ll cherish those memories as long as I can. And sometimes I can see things in those photos that I still have. That can be nice. I can go curl up in that blanket. I can drive past that building. I can touch that toy you used to love.

I can cry and feel a little better. I can remember how much I loved you while you were still here. How much I love you now, even when you’re gone.

I can remember.

[thejournalofveronica]

Pure random journaling (AKA oversharing)

I first fell in love when I was 12. A childishly innocent love with its own reasons and its own logic. It was a long distance relationship because we didn't see each other much and the children we were didn't have any way to communicate so our meetings would be once a year for 3 consecutive days. Did I say a relationship? It wasn't that. It wasn't a one sided love either, it was a two sided muted love because we both didn't know about it.

Anyways, the 3 days we spent with each other were probably the best times of the year.There was no physical way to keep those memories, no mobile phones, no pictures and I didn't use to write back then.

I think now, even If I could write, I wouldn't have known what to write;I wanted to preserve the whole image, the scene, the surrounding and every word.

And so, I drew.

I drew 3 pictures, that I can remember very well although I knew -even then- that they were disastrous. I hated drawing and was terrible at it. But this was the only possible way to remember the exact details I wanted, the things I liked to remember, and the things that brought me joy.

Now, I'm 10 years older, assumingly, 10 years wiser. I now write to express and to remember. I now have a phone where I can store memories in the form of pictures. Yet I am struck with this immense familiar urge to draw, to remember what you did through an image. Unfortunately, it's something I still suck at..

I'll just miss this scene replaying in my memory when it's gone.

.

[peterspaperplane]

//Renmeraki

I think I have told you how terrible my 2021 was. But maybe, maybe, I haven’t told you this one: it began on August.

I remember: farewells. Too many farewells. It’s always goodbyes that makes things harder, isn’t it? End of college means that people would eventually leave the city for their family, prolonged hometown, dreams, work. Meanwhile, I did not. It was my whimsical choice to stay. As I’m thinking of it now, what I wanted was not actually staying in the city; what I wanted was to succumb in the memories I had made in all over its body.

I did internships and took part-time jobs in places, so that I could manipulate my head into thinking that I was alive and useful—and to my parents: that I still had reasons not to come home (I could tell you how many times Mum begged me to and how many times I regret that I was not acting like a good kid and obey her instantly, but I am not writing that pathetic essay).

So, I am rewriting it here. I did internships and took part-time jobs in places, so that I could manipulate my head into thinking that I was alive and useful. But there was one particular time when I came to realize that I was not manipulating my head into thinking that I was alive—'cause I was alive. It was when Renmeraki Architect decided to let me in.

***

Don’t Wake Me Up When September Ends

I am still wondering whether or not being an architect was in my card since the beginning. All I can remember is that I aspire to be a wordsmith. I even did my final project in architecture with poems and silly doodles. It was a museum, that is one thing. But, combining it with fairytales? That is another thing. This might not be the most authentic idea, but pretty sure this was definitely the most un-architectural project ever.

Therefore, in my admission letter to Renmeraki, I also wrote ‘writer’ in the job proposal table and sent my sort-of-writing-portfolio next to the design one. There is still a part of me desiring it to come true, to be a writer.

But in Renmeraki, I saw people seemed to live for the sake of architecture.

Constantly, I witnessed Mas Ren—who always comes out with the most unimaginable things—tailoring his designs very precisely as though it was a fragile creature—while, time to time, ensuring that we had the most comfortable place to work in. I saw Teh Amel taking care of interior details as well as teaching me how to render from scratch; knee-deep in notes as well as keeping the conversations going on with clients (no matter how boring it was).

I saw Mas Indro repeatedly distressed and yet still enjoyed doing his daily structural works (please note that by structural, I mean that exact post and beam) while throwing jokes to the table—what a pure soul. I saw Tante Rani (a.k.a Roni) glittered in smiles when we visited her beautifully designed interior for an apartment in the city, only fifty meters from our hive. I saw Ayeng, heartfully assisting the same façade project again and again (Ayeng if u read this, u know what I’m talking HAHA); providing endless energy while helping everybody with anything: free Indomaret jastip (with Ajeng) and laughter. Most importantly, she always responds to my jokes, no matter how cringe it was (I know that this is un-architectural but I want to put it here anyway).

I saw Ajeng trying to catch up with this new world she stepped in as a student (she graduated now, anyway. CONGRATS, GVRL!) as well as the somehow-funny-confusion she regularly showed. Rei Hana Kireina, Teh Amel’s little sister (along with Ajeng, Ayeng, Roni) who always knew how to answer interior-y problems, who has the most infectious laughter on Earth. I saw Rudi, my batchmate, always ever so passionate talking about the future of architecture. And lastly, Melinda Potter (A Gryffindorian), who came daily to the office from the other side of the world, with whom I shared my first project with.

I paused. I came to think that maybe it is not that bad to be an architect. Instead, it is tempting in its way.

***

Too Many Places, Too Little Time

The sense of separating from the people whom I shared at least my two years with was horrible. It’s like you are suddenly not allowed to come to your favorite bakery before school ‘cause the cakes are too sugary and your Mum is worried from watching some random YouTube videos. It’s like losing reasons to walk to school—‘cause, what school would be without too-sugary-cakes for brunch? It was the time when I considered that maybe loneliness can be the worst feeling.

As much as I said I am an introvert, living with huge troops for several years had changed me. It was torturing to stay all day in my place. Indeed, I was somehow fear of missing out.

Then suddenly, I had busy days during this internship. Mas Rendy always told us to experience all the possible works our office is having at the moment; site visitation, architecture observations, measurement (!!!), client-meetings, project control. But the busy-ness sometimes including: casual lunch/dinner, café-hopping, beach. Suddenly, I had something worth waiting for the weekends. Always.

***

Early (Grey) Year

In the end of 2021, I gotta come back for a moment ‘cause Mum suddenly decided to die.

Mas Ren allowed me to take day-off until Mum’s 40 harian, but I refused to take. It was partially ‘cause it seemed like all of a sudden everyone had made plans for my life—that I should come back to take care of Dad (which now I regret. Why on earth would I take this stupid path), and the rest half was ‘cause I could not stand any longer in the house where I used to share my life with Mum.

Early January 2022 I came back to the city to wave my goodbye. There were new folks in the office—some were old friends from college (Cece As Ida, Ria Racing) and some are new acquaintance (Kharisma, Izzati, Sabrina). I actually met Kharisma and Izza in the end of 2021, though.

It somehow made me sad knowing that this is what’s going to happen: our lovely office would grow up, new people would always come in: interns, clients. It made me sad knowing that I ran out of time. I was offered to stay a bit longer—little did everyone knew how bad I wanted to do so, had the situation been different.

But I was also happy knowing that I took a tiny-tiny part here.

***

Train Rides, It’s Always The Train Rides

In one of our last site visitations, Mas Ren took me and Izza to Tulungagung. We took a morning train—beautiful timing. Though the sun came out in the morning, the rest of the day was gloomy—it was either raining or cloudy.

We came back at night—beautiful timing. I don’t recall who started first, or maybe it was merely because it was ‘night’: we had a talk. The serious one. That kind of talk you wouldn’t have in a normal day in office.

It always stoned me seeing people around me sharing their stories. Though it might only be small things for them, it means the whole world for me. I always believe that only people who trust you that share their vulnerability.

It’s always the train rides, indeed. It was that exact train ride that made me feel accepted in this place.

***

Hindia and the Hidden Farewells

Dad came to Malang in early February. It meant I only had less than 10 days in the city.

Within the same week of my father’s arrival, I officially resigned as an intern from Renmeraki Architect. But guess what, it was apparently also a goodbye for Kharisma and The Amel. So we had our usual ritual: presentations. Mas Ren Invited us to a coffeeshop nearby Taman Kunang-Kunang. The dress-code: blue denim and white.

I wonder, what is the color of confusion?

I was confused ‘cause I felt relieved that I was not alone taking such a weird path. However, I also took it in a very sentimental way, ‘cause it somehow was happening: people are leaving. Departures, separation—the strangest thing mundane human ever experience.

Why can’t we just live forever and never get separated?

I wonder, what is the color of goodbyes?

***

To sum up this long crap: if there’s something that I’m grateful for happening in 2021, it is that I found a home named Renmeraki—and hence including: the moments, the people (oh, and the plants. and the chairs. and the curtain. and the---). 

Ad astra per aspera, Renmeraki!