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wetookanoath · 6 years

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ooh what are your headcanons for the coco au?? 👀

Well, right now I have…

TW: Racism, implied homophobia and transphobia, sexism, way too many languages in one tiny family, necessary Major Character(s) Death(s), this is not a fanfic but a way too elavorated AU lol, Trans Male Character, trans pregnancy.

S/O to @faequill and @impossiblevvings for educating my ass by sharing his experiences as a trans parents. And also S/O to @from-one-fandom-to-the-other for making THIS and THIS wonderful art and talking about this AU with me. And also S/O to this anon for asking.

Set in the 30s, I’m thinking in maybe Baja California or Guadalajara. During this time, Mexico is still getting together after the Mexican Revolution left tons of deads and shattered states. In this time, the Golden Age of cinema flourishes and singers like Pedro Infante and Jorge Negrete become famous. Enter the music theme of the story.

That said, Mexico has a long history of having good relations with european countries such as Germany, Ireland, Austria and Poland. During the Colony, tons of people came to Latinamerica because there was work, commerce and land (I mean, stolen land– you know how that goes), so entire families would come with the hopes of a better life.

During this time, chinese people build a China Town in what will be Mexico City later (still stands and is a wonderful place), japanese people will came in their own commercial ships to either work or be with their families, since samurai getting jobs as big names spaniard’s bodyguards, and soon other business people came with their families.

I’m saying all this to then say that,

Ryan’s family has always had it bad because they are mixed. His father’s grandpa decided to move to a small community where most people is mixed near the principal city of their state, yet not so close. This is so they can all live in peace.

Ryan’s grandfather gets out the country, builds a life in the States where he meets Ryan’s grandma, an also mexican woman who went to live in the States. Years later, Steve, Ryan’s dad, meets Linda, daughter of immigrants too, and they build their own family.

When Ryan is a teenager, his parents understand he is trans and caliming economic problems, Steve decides to take his family back to the family’s ranch in Mexico, where they can protect their kid, so no one knows he is trans and they know him only as Ryan. They grow up learning from all their cultures and speaking very accented english and spanish. Ryan and Jake also talk a broken japanese their mom is always cheering. They cook strange stuff that convines all three cultures and people think they are weird, but it works.

To their little town comes a group of immigrants from Poland, men are there to work in the energy plant near the Bergara’s ranch.

Ryan and Jake met Shane then, he’s older than them and Ryan gets irritated at his funny spanish, but finds himself talking to him daily until Shane starts to work, too.

So, every day, Shane and his brother walk in front of the Bergara ranch and he can always see Ryan at the window with a guitar or just asleep. He always waves at him and soon, Ryan finds himself waiting for the boy to pass by his window.

There’s a lot of Ryan insulting Shane in either spanish or japanese, to what Shane always answers with polish and both look at each other like ¬¬

They fall in love eventually.

Both families get along well, it’s then when Linda and Sherry start to notice something between their kids. It’s unspoken and like a known secret, and only once did they tried to talk about it but, like it happens so often in remote places of Mexico, no one said a word.

Ryan’s family is well known, names move sea, dirt and sky in Mexican societies, and so life goes on– of course, leaving the santity of their small town means dead and treats, and so none go.

Scott and Jake both leave eventually, it is known then that Ryan will take the ranch. When he’s already an adult, Shane and his mom move to the ranch after his father dies and Scott leaves.

Later in life, Scott gets married in the ranch, and they are all such a funny and curious mix of a family.

They have a few happy years where Ryan and Shane are together, dream of music and suddenly, something changes.

When Ryan realizes he’s pregnant, he’s worried shit will go down. Shane is actually pretty happy and excited, and after the initial shock, both feel good about it. With his mother’s support, he is able to tell his father, and to his freakin’ surprise, he’s happy.

Ryan has to stay in the ranch to protect himself and the baby, seeing the struggle, fear starts flourishing in Shane and instead of saying something, he keeps it all in him. He needs an actual job, not just his music delucions, and he needs to do better and make sure nothing ever happens to Ryan and their baby.

They have a girl, they name her Alejandra, and she grews up listening to her parents sing together and even with economic struggles, they were happy.

Then Shane leaves.

When Alejandra was little, Shane met bitch ass Ernesto who used to listen to him at the local bar where he sang with Ryan and other pals they had. Shane originally didn’t want to become a singer, but he wanted to keep writing songs, Ernesto made him believe they could be both singers.

Note: Mexico has a big time problem with colorism and favoritism of whites™, but when it comes to music and so, especially at that time, the mexican public wanted to the men who sang to be the stereotype of a Strong Mexican Man™, like Jorge Negrete and Pedro Infante (this doesn’t mean they weren’t talented and amazing at their art, because they sure as hell were). A man like Shane would had never find fame and acceptance at that time, so this bitch ass Ernesto fooled him deeply.

Ryan doesn’t like Ernesto one bit, and feels him fake as shit with his “support” of their family when Shane is idiot enough to tell him the truth. This causes their first big fight, since Ryan didn’t want a man like this bitch to know about him and that Ale is their biological daughter.

Fights start to become terrible, and finally Shane tells Ryan he wants to try this and if it doesn’t work, he’s coming back right away. If in six months he hasn’t done shit, he is coming back.

Ultimately, Ryan believes in Shane’s talent and lets him go. At first, they write to each other constantly and Ryan always reads part of Shane’s laters to Ale.

Eventually, the letters stop and a year later, Ernesto is in everyone’s TV and Ryan tries his best to find out what happened to Shane. When he finds out he was murdered, Ernesto tells him some story about being mugged and what not, and in his pain he believes it.

In the back of his head, there’s always the tiny voice that says this is not true, but the pain and his pride are stronger, and so he decides to keep going.

He makes the ranch prosper with his bare hands and the whole family helps, as years goes by, they can mantain themselves with the ranch’s production of meat and leather.

Note: totally not based on my own ranch, lol.

Ryan dies later in life, having his daughter carry his name when he decided to change her name to take away Shane’s (because we mexicans are petty and this was super common. Your husband left you? Change your kids’ name to yours– my name should be Rivera, guys, but my great grandma said fuck you to his father, and changed her name to León -her mom’s name- and here we are…) and the ranch.

~ The After Life ~

Shane is there before anyone else. He could be send to his polish family, he could find the other Bergaras, but he is not sure of what to do. His situation as someone his family has decided to forget mantains him in the streets with the ones without a family, which is bullshit because he knows his family must be somwhere.

His first years, he forgets about the Día de los Muertos tradition, among other traditions, and is only worried to find a way to know if Ryan and Ale are okay, and soon he’s hit with a newspaper from a maxican lady that has hear his story of having his family in Mexico, she reminds him of the bridge that opens on November 2.

That’s when he starts trying and when he’s told his family doesn’t put a picture of him, that breaks his heart and spirit more than he cares to admit. He gives up after.

Years later, re-animated by the fact that he needs to let Ale know he loves her more than anything in the world, he keeps trying. This is when he recognizes Ryan for the first time.

He is an emotional mess, trying to reach him and when he sees he is with their entire family, he is a rying mess. But then, Ryan looks at him and there’s complete silence– it’s unspoken that Ryan is kind of the family’s head, so the others wave at him but don’t do much when Ryan finallly turns around to cross the bridge without saying a word to Shane.

His heart is shattered to not repair that night and on.

Shane concentrates then into getting to the Human World to see Ale. His parents and other family members would talk to him from time to time, and at least he gets to know his daughter grow well, but also gets to know Ryan had it bad for a while and will take him time to accept him back.

He tries to tell Ryan about Ernesto more than once. He courts him, and sings, and does all he can until Ryan is tired of him and finally tells him he doesn’t want excuses, he doesn’t want to see him and he should go right now.

Shane is not sure anymore if there’s more heart to break, but it hurts all the same.

Ryan, when in the After Life, woke to his family and only accepted to himself to be disappointed of not seeing Shane there. He finds out later about his situation, and for a while decided to not search. It’s better this way.

When he hears Ernesto has died and it’s there among them, he tries to find Shane, and maybe clear things once and for all. But he finally drops the idea and lets it go.

His no-life goes on, and when he sees Shane for the first time before the bridge, all he wants is to slap the idiot and kiss him, but his pride is stronger and so he turns around and leaves.

He cried all the way to the Human World.

When he realized their great-great grandson was a lot like Shane, a lot like both of them, he couldn’t help but smile.

After Ryan finds out the truth, Shane’s picture is put on the Altar of their family and he goes to no-live with them in the Land of the Death, they have a long talk about their lives and cry together for having found their way to each other again, no matter what.

Both feel guilty for a while, though. Shane for leaving and never finding a way to let Ryan know what happened. And Ryan for closing himself and not believing in Shane’s love for him and Ale, and for their family forgetting him for such a long time.

Eventually, they can heal together. They have all the time in the world now.

At some point, Ryan looks up at Shane with a smirk and goes, “See? Ghosts are real” and Shane wants to die again.

When Ale dies and she reuinites with her parents, there’s a crying fest.

It hurts Shane that he didn’t get to see his Alejandrita grow up, and that she thought for a long time that he decided to leave them and was selfish enough to never look back to his family.

But seeing Ale’s happiness to see him again and all the love of his family, helps him slowly heal. Now they can all be together.

Shane’s first Día de los Muertos is so funny to everyone, because he doesn’t know what to do and still gets all ?? with some tradition, but he enjoys it all the same.

Life goes on in the Human World, their great-great grandson grows up, he gets married and has his own children than still put their picture in their Altar, and like that, things are okay.

#shyan #skeptic believer #shane x ryan #nini got mail #au time with nonnies #my aus #coco au #listen i'm a history nerd and i enjoyed thinking just of the background to make this au possible #thanks for this question my man #anonymous #au #otp: we took an oath

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marinschoolssuper · 5 years

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We don’t need a math debate

Math instruction came up again at a recent School Board meeting. Someone made a reference to the nation-wide “math debate” and advocated for students to practice math facts. She drew a parallel to music education and noted how competent musicians spend a lot of time practicing scales. Her analogy reminded me of teaching young marital arts students who wanted to know the “secrets” of Karate. The most obvious “secret” is to practice basic skills… a lot… until they become routine (boring) and then practice some more.

So I agree that mathematical competence requires practice and rote learning much the same way that music or Karate does. In fact, becoming good at almost anything requires a lot of basic practice.

The problem with traditional math instruction is not that it demands rote memorization and practice. The problem is that it creates the perception that rote memorization and practice ismath, that “real math” is about knowing how to solve equations and get correct answers quickly. Tragically, students who don’t have a natural knack for speed, accuracy and memorization (which aren’t math) often come away from school thinking that they are bad at mathand do their best to avoid it later in school. Many carry this belief into their adult lives. We have lost countless creative and innovative math practitioners simply because we sent them the wrong message in 4thgrade.

We don’t judge musicians by their ability to play scales with speed and accuracy and we don’t award a Black Belt in Karate to a student because she can demonstrate basic punches and kicks. We also shouldn’t judge mathematicians by their ability to do math facts and apply set formulas with speed and accuracy.

The drill-and-practiceadvocate at the Board meeting said that kids need good “foundational” skills: math facts and formulas. I agree that kids should know facts and formulas but I strongly disagree that those things are foundational.

That is the heart of the current “debate” about math.

In order for us to improve math learning among our students, we have to undo a long history of belief that was based on a misunderstanding of what is foundational and what is not: I see many older teachers and parents always trying to attach problem solving or practical application to non-foundational math facts and algorithms. (If I can’t tie a complex problem neatly to an algorithm, it must not be worth doing!) Even the adults who understand that math is not memorization sometimes find themselves defending engaging and relevant math applications, puzzles and games on the grounds that they help kids learn their facts and formulas. It is difficult to move beyond that backward misconception; I continue to be surprised at how intractable it is.

But we need to get over it; too much is at stake. We need to get behind the idea that algorithms and facts (though important) do not form the foundation of math. They rely on the real foundation: deep conceptual understanding. Facts and formulas are tools that can be applied only by those who have a strong foundation.

To keep it simple, let’s look at addition: The foundationof addition is the understanding of the abstract principle that one or more variables combined into a set with other variables can be expressed as a number that is dependent on what the preceding variables were.

Without that foundationalunderstanding, math facts (such as 2+2=4) have no meaning. They are shorthand expressions that can be useful for calculations… but only for people who understand the underlying principles. Same with subtraction, multiplication, and so forth. You might train a parrot to repeat the multiplication table from one through twelve but the parrot will not be doing math. (Sadly, the parrot would get a better grade than some 4thgraders who actually understand the concept and can apply it but are not as fast and accurate on a timed quiz.)

The concept of addition is actually more complex than we might recall. As adults, we understand it, so we are comfortable going quickly to (non-foundational) calculations to apply it. We get so accustomed to our favorite method of calculation (usually an algorithm) that we begin to think of the short cut as real math.

But for a young child, it takes time and consideration to master the concept. For example. If you add two apples to three oranges how many do you have? Well, the answer depends on what you are categorizing. If it’s apples, you can add oranges all day and still have 2. If it’s fruit, you have 5. What if you are adding total weight? 2+2=4 only applies when you know when to use it.

The point of learning math facts and algorithms is to get kids to use them as tools when appropriate and not to view them as the final goal for their learning. Traditional programs focus nearly 100% on calculations and offer “application”, word problems and puzzles as though they are extras that might help some students understand why they are doing the abstract calculation… if they are still awake. It’s totally backward. No wonder so many people forget what they learned in math class so quickly after graduation.

Try this little experiment that I got at a recent training at Stanford University:

1 ¾ / ½

1. Calculate it and give the correct answer. (algorithm)

2. Draw a diagram or picture showing what the equation means- don’t use numerals.

3. Explain in writing what the equation means and how to solve it.

4. Describe a real-world application.

Students with deep conceptual understanding can respond competently to those 4 prompts. However, many students who are identified as “good at math” get the first one fast but have serious trouble from there on. Among advanced high school math students, #2 can be very frustrating. One honors Trigonometry student I observed could not liberate herself from numerals in her diagram because the standard equation was so deeply ingrained in her thinking. In response to #4 she suggested that there probably wasn’t a real-world application.

Even as an adult you may struggle with all 4 prompts because you have forgotten the algorithm you learned so long ago. (Who can blame you? If the problem were ever to come up in the real world, you would ask your phone! - a technique I would contend is every bit as “foundational” as doing it with pencil and paper... faster and more accurate too.) Does this mean that you are bad at math? Of course not, it just means that you may have had a math education that stressed the importance of the tool over the importance of the task.

The debate about math instruction (Traditional vs. Conceptual) is a false choice. The advocates of traditional programs almost always mischaracterize the other side, saying that we are trying to throw out practice and memorization in favor of concepts, puzzle and games. (I have yet to meet a progressive math teacher that advocates the abandonment of practicing facts and learning formulas.) The truth is we can have it both ways. Students need a deep conceptual understanding of math and that forms the foundation for their education. With that solid foundation in place, they will be better able to approach problems from a variety of perspectives and not quit when they don’t get the “right” answer fast enough. Along the way we should teach them the shortcuts and tools (facts and formulas) to make their work more efficient so that they can continue to learn and not see math as so many of us did, as something to get through and be done with.

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thefilmsnob · 6 years

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Glen Coco’s Top 10 Films of 2017

Unlike last year, 2017 was a stand-out for the film industry. There wasn’t an abundance of undisputed masterpieces per se, but there were still more than enough excellent motion pictures that deserve recognition. As always, it killed me having to omit so many great films, but that’s just life I guess. You got your ups and you got your downs. Anyway, here are my picks for the ten greatest films of 2017. But first, I’ll list the runners-up and the traditional bonus track. There’s always a bonus track.

Runners-Up

-Blade Runner 2049 ***

-Get Out

-Kong: Skull Island

-Last Flag Flying

-Molly’s Game

-Phantom Thread

-T2: Trainspotting

-Thor: Ragnarok

***Blade Runner 2049 probably would make this list in another life. The thing is, when I saw it, I was very tired and frustrated and I found it hard to focus. Because of this, I missed some important plot details, so the whole time my brain was trying to catch up with the narrative. It never did and I was lost. This is a gorgeous-looking film with excellent performances, direction, cinematography, visual effects and production design. But, I can not, in good conscience, include it without a second viewing. I’m a fucking nerd.

And here are the top 10!

#10b. (Bonus Track) The Lost City of Z

Director: James Gray

Starring: Charlie Hunnam, Robert Pattinson, Sienna Miller, Tom Holland

For a movie with a dashing lead who takes multiple expeditions into the Amazon rainforest to find a fabled lost city while facing perilous conditions from treacherous landscapes to hostile natives, The Lost City of Z has been seen by a total of zero people. That’s a shame. This is a movie that reminds us of pulp magazines and classic exploration films of old, promising mystery, intrigue and adventure. The film takes place over several years in the early 1900s and follows Percy Fawcett whose interest in a lost city turns into an obsession and whose multiple trips to find what may not exist threatens his family life and reputation. Directed by James Gray, The Lost City of Z is a refreshing antidote to the modern action film full of CGI and empty noise. The rich cinematography provides a natural and vivid look which amplifies the sense of danger Fawcett and his men must face. And Charlie Hunnam shines as Fawcett, pulling us into his world with his passion and charisma and even when disillusionment threatens these qualities, we remain invested in his struggle to the end.

#10. Mother!

Director: Darren Aronofsky

Starring: Jennifer Lawrence, Javier Bardem, Ed Harris, Michelle Pfeiffer

Mother! is undeniably polarizing and that’s understandable. Darren Aronofsky’s films aren’t meant for a mass audience and his use of surrealism can be frustrating at times, but it can also be deeply profound and Aronofsky is nothing if not ambitious. Mother! is perhaps his most challenging film but also one of his most mesmerizing. It starts out relatively calm as we see Mother (Jennifer Lawrence) living with Him (Javier Bardem) in a large country home in what seems like a tranquil existence, albeit with eerie undertones. Things get weird when unexpected guests arrive, played by Ed Harris and a deliciously chilly Michelle Pfeiffer. You think you’re in for a standard thriller until Aronofsky takes us down a wildly unexpected path. Never has a movie escalated so quickly and severely. Toward the end, it becomes a beautifully chaotic mixture of bizarre images and themes that blur the lines between reality and fantasy while grappling with topics from religion and death to the burdens of celebrity and motherhood. It’s a tumultuous journey, but if you suspend your disbelief and accept the mayhem, it’s like nothing you’ve ever experienced.

#9. The Florida Project

Director: Sean Baker

Starring: Brooklynn Prince, Bria Vinaite, Willem Dafoe

Rarely do movies focus their attention on the poor, uneducated and unfortunate souls we’re introduced to in The Florida Project. But writer/director Sean Baker has decided to observe the beauty and excitement in their lives. Brooklyn Prince, in one of the most impressive performances by any child actor, plays Moonee, who, along with her friends, makes the row of motels that line a street in Kissimmee, Florida her playground. It’s fascinating watching what these children get up to, from the innocent to the questionable to the downright illegal. But, Baker never judges; he merely observes the products of a sad reality. He highlights the joy in their lives while never ignoring their present struggles and the troubling future they probably have in store. Bria Vinaite gives an impeccably raw performance as Moonee’s mother, Halley, who drinks, does drugs, recruits Moonee to resell perfume to tourists and is no more mature than her six-year-old daughter. Willem Dafoe is the manager of the motel in which they reside who’s constantly solving everyone’s problems while unconsciously acting as a father figure at times without being unrealistically portrayed as a saint. Dafoe’s great here. But, it’s Moonee who shines at the end in one of the most emotional and heartbreaking scenes of 2017. Sadly, Moonee may not be destined for greatness, but Prince sure is.

#8. Dunkirk

Director: Christopher Nolan

Starring: Fionn Whitehead, Mark Rylance, Kenneth Branagh

Christopher Nolan is a master of creating spectacles that are as thought-provoking as they are thrilling and Dunkirk is no exception. With the help of Hans Zimmer’s relentless score and many turbulent scenarios, Nolan stresses the utter fear and desperation felt by hundreds of thousands of soldiers evacuating the beach at Dunkirk in 1940 while also highlighting the collective heroism displayed in the process. The film is split into three distinct yet interweaving story lines set on the beach, on the water and in the air, intercut expertly and involving a superb ensemble cast. Nolan’s wise omission of extraneous elements like generals strategizing in war rooms allows the movie to focus on the the event itself, making it a more urgent experience. Even with all the moving parts, we’re guided by Hoyte van Hoytema’s masterful camerawork; what could’ve been a disorienting jumble of images is, in fact, impeccably vivid and coherent, eschewing rapid-fire cuts. But, this is Nolan’s pride and joy and there’s no denying it’s a work of a man so unabashedly dedicated to his craft, one who’s created a breathtaking experience with such a sharp attention to detail that’s at once sweeping and intimate.

#7. The Post

Director: Steven Spielberg

Starring: Meryl Streep, Tom Hanks, every TV actor of the last 5 years

Calling The Post timely isn’t so much an opinion as it is a truism. The parallels between the deceptive presidencies of Nixon and Trump are so painfully obvious that the film couldn’t be timelier. Back in the Nixon era, the Vietnam War was the source of deception which led to the release of the Pentagon Papers detailing more than 20 years of admissions of the failing American war effort, contradicting previous information. The Post is the story of how some journalists decided to print this information, specifically Washington Post heiress and publisher Katherine Graham, Meryl Streep in an Oscar-worthy performance in which she masterfully and subtlety conveys the weight of responsibility on her shoulders regarding a decision with potentially disastrous consequences. Streep makes her anxiety increasingly palpable until it all comes to a head in a powerfully assertive speech. Tom Hanks is great as Post Editor-in-Chief, Ben Bradlee, who’s fairly aggressive about getting the big story and improving his reputation, though Hanks still lets us admire this gruff character for his fierce dedication to journalistic integrity. Also great are the countless TV actors from Bob Odenkirk to Sarah Paulson to, yes, David Cross. As usual, Spielberg does a workmanlike job on the film and adds that elegant, classic Hollywood sheen to the material. He avoids an abundance of exposition, keeps his focus on the human crisis of conscience and allows the proceedings to flow smoothly. This is a very important story about heroes who risked everything in the name of truth and freedom of the press.

#6. Lady Bird

Director: Greta Gerwig

Starring: Saoirse Ronan, Laurie Metcalf, Tracy Letts

In her directorial debut film, Lady Bird, Greta Gerwig puts a fresh spin on the high school movie without relying on overly quirky characters, gimmickry or excess. Its breezy naturalism helps it transcend the genre with the stripped-down, straightforward and ordinary nature of the movie, paradoxically, making it so complex. A celebration of autonomy and liberation, Lady Bird follows the titular character (Saoirse Ronan) who feels trapped in a mundane life at an all-girls Catholic school in Sacramento with a mother (Laurie Metcalf) who’s mastered the art of passive aggression. But, Ronan turns Lady Bird’s normalcy into a thing of beauty and makes her an embodiment of perseverance in subtle ways. Metcalf is exceptional here too, often ruthless but always sympathetic as the overworked breadwinner of the family. But most of the praise should go to Gerwig, already a great actress and now directing with a gentle and pure touch, allowing the film to breath with little contrivance. She keeps her scenes brief and adds her unique observations and unorthodox comedic sensibilities to the dialogue which is authentic, witty and often shockingly hilarious. This is a smart and insightful film that’s all but devoid of flaws.

#5. Stronger

Director: David Gordon Green

Starring: Jake Gyllenhaal, Tatiana Maslany, Miranda Richardson

Once again, Jake Gyllenhaal has been snubbed by the Academy. In Stronger, he gives yet another magnificent performance playing Jeff Bauman, an underachieving Boston native who loses his legs during the Boston Marathon bombing while cheering on his ex-girlfriend, Erin (Tatiana Maslany), at the finish line. The movie recounts his rehabilitation as well as the accompanying emotional turmoil he and his family must endure. Movies like this have been done before but rarely with this much brutal honesty. Gyllenhaal is so convincing, making you feel his every ache and bruise; we’re heart broken just watching the poor man trying to enter his bathtub. He completely transforms in front of our eyes from an overeager and fun-loving young man to a bitter, often angry victim with impressive ease. Maslany is equally impressive, wrestling with a multitude of emotions from compassion to guilt to frustration to anger, often simultaneously, in this refreshing take on the ‘caring loved one’ role. In less competent hands, this would be a conventional TV movie full of cliches and sentiment. But David Gordon Green imbues his work with so much realism whether it’s the injury itself, the recovery process, the reactions from friends and family or Bauman’s mental state. It’s a truly inspirational film and meditation on heroism that actually respects its audience.

#4. Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Director: Martin McDonagh

Starring: Frances McDormand, Woody Harrelson, Sam Rockwell

Not only is Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri timely, but it has one of last year’s most original premises. Enraged by the lack of progress made by the police in identifying the person who raped and murdered her teenage daughter, Mildred Hayes, played by the force of nature that is Frances McDormand, takes action by renting three billboards near her home in Ebbing and posting messages calling out the police for their lack of competence and urgency, especially Chief Willoughby (Woody Harrelson). Obviously, this starts a chaotic chain of events, crafted by writer/director Martin McDonagh, that deals with relevant social issues in a way that’s by turns tragic and shockingly hilarious. But, contrary to the marketing campaign, McDonagh’s film isn’t so black and white; he illustrates the complexity of the matter by exposing fault in all parties involved as well as the tragic consequences of their actions. McDormand shows us an utterly depleted woman with nothing but rage and a mission, making some of the most scathing remarks you’ll hear to anyone in her way, yet still able to sympathize when she sees her adversary in pain, like Willoughby who’s dying of cancer. Harrelson gives an incredibly poignant speech related to this that’s one of the films highlights. Sam Rockwell is also sensational as a racist scumbag of a cop who nonetheless embarks on a path of redemption. The ending is ambiguous. What happens is irrelevant. Whether you think Rockwell deserves redemption is also besides the point. What matters is that there’s a dialogue starting, progress being made and, indeed, something being done. In other words, there’s hope.

#3. The Disaster Artist

Director: James Franco

Starring: Dave Franco, James Franco, Seth Rogan

Apparently, James Franco might be a bad dude and shame on him if he is. But, I’m here to talk about movies and The Disaster Artist is a damn good one. Most of the credit should go to writers Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber, anyway, for crafting an insightful, hilarious, yet oddly touching screenplay about the wildly misguided Tommy Wiseau (James Franco) who was responsible for The Room, one of the worst movies ever made. We’re oriented by Dave Franco playing The Room star, Greg Sestero, from when he meets the awful but ambitious performer, Wiseau, in an acting class in the late ‘90s through the early ‘00s which sees the pair become friends, move to LA to act, fail miserably and decide to make their own movie. Dave Franco charms as the wide-eyed optimist who’s accepting to a fault. James Franco, still maybe an ass, is great as Wiseau, capturing his voice and mannerisms perfectly, giving us a character who’s as delusional and jealous as he is free-spirited, also to a fault. Their relationship is charming in the beginning and no less intriguing when its threatened by one’s pride and the other’s loss of confidence. The story’s at its best when Wiseau is filming his dream project and we see his lack of talent and leadership grate on cast and crew, specifically Seth Rogen as Sandy Schklair, whose exasperation is priceless. But the film makers are wise to tease without deriding and actually give some credit to Wiseau for, when you think about it, the man accomplished more than most of us ever will, illustrated in a film about a film that moves effortlessly from start to finish.

#2. Wind River

Director: Taylor Sheridan

Starring: Jeremy Renner, Elizabeth Olsen

If there’s any justice in this world, Taylor Sheridan soon will be swimming in awards and money for the man is responsible for the scripts of wonderful films like Sicario, Hell or High Water and now Wind River which he also directed. Few people are better at crafting profoundly entertaining commentaries on the dark and controversial pockets of America. With Wind River, he focuses on problems faced by those living on Indian reservations. The film seems like a recipe for a generic crime thriller starring Hawkeye and the Scarlett Witch until you remember Sheridan’s track record and the fact that Jeremy Renner and Elizabeth Olsen are actually great actors. After we’re shown a chilling prelude involving a teen girl running, and collapsing, in the snow in freezing temperatures without appropriate clothing, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service agent Cory Lambert (Renner) finds the body and gets the narrative wheels in motion. Once rookie FBI agent Jane Banner (Olsen) arrives, they team up to solve the case that takes them to dark and twisted places. Sheridan let’s the film take its time to develop; it progresses clearly and logically, making it easy to follow along, unlike similar films. And unlike these films, you actually care as much about the people investigating the case as the case itself. Though used sparingly, Sheridan composes some of the most realistic and tense action sequences you’ll see. There’s one scene that’s almost unbearably intense but so utterly effective in making you feel the horror this community feels. It, like this film, gets under your skin and stays with you well after the credits roll.

#1. Call Me by Your Name

Director: Luca Guadagnino

Starring: Timothee Chalamet, Armie Hammer, Michael Stuhlbarg

If you consider just how many love stories have been written in the history of humanity, you might think it impossible to create another great one. But what director Luca Guadagnino does with a script from James Ivory is pure bliss. Not only will you fall in love with the characters, but you’ll also fall in love with the gorgeous, picturesque northern Italian countryside on display. It’s here, during a lazy summer of 1983, where an introverted, music-loving Italian-American teen, Elio (Timothee Chalamet), meets an older, classically handsome and outgoing graduate student named Oliver (Armie Hammer), forming a relationship that will change their lives forever. Elio’s father (Michael Stuhlbarg), an archaeology professor, invites Oliver to live with them for the summer to help with his research and although Elio initially is turned off by this ‘intruder’, gradually he forms an attraction. How the film makers deal with this attraction and eventual relationship is simply perfection. The way in which the two characters subtly feel each other out at the start feels so true to life and each subsequent step from attraction to bonding to seduction is equally realistic and even more entertaining.The film benefits from the actors’ fearless performances, especially that of newcomer Chalamet who’s a ball of pent up sexual energy. The movie ends with Stuhlbarg having an irresistibly touching discussion with his son, full of warmth and understanding, and a final heartbreaking scene, so simple in concept yet so emotionally complex. Chalamet takes your breath away here with an array of emotions parading across his face as Sufjan Stevens’ gorgeous ‘Mystery of Love’ plays in its entirety. It’s one of the the most entrancing endings to a movie you’ll see, capping off the best film of 2017.

#top 10 films #top 10 list #movie review #2017 films

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kiyabujayniah1996 · 4 years

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Reiki 4 All Time Best Ideas

Worry - uptight - pain, both physical and mental healing easier.Things to avoid during Reiki sessions, and how to do our hands-on healingReiki treatments helps most people find that the universe where you are using it on to reach even his first awakening.In other words, you can simply apply reiki healing classes teach foundational theories and techniques.

In the early mornings at local parks in many ways, but cannot be proven scientifically.In Reiki II, distance healing or laying on of hands.We can use Reiki for healing yourself, covering every chakra plus your own home.Using the power and healing gifts, so their soul retrieval and healing of the system.As we know it, it's time to find out what you need to ask them to her had recently died.

A Reiki session is also highly beneficial for pain relief, boosting your immune function, release old emotional wounds, and pave the way down to personal growth and compassion.Reiki sessions but his answer was given to us by Mikao Usui founded, which is actually an Energy at its optimum, supports total health and emotional illnesses.You can use hand positions while others wait a considerable time before contemplating becoming a Reiki master start the treatment the power is within you right now I am not sure what to expect him.In the original teachings, but it was discovered by Dr. Usui.Reiki has been successfully performed since the beginning of time, Usui simply gave the final stage of life and the proper structure for the patient from an upside down position.

Continue the observation is on the understanding of universal energy as well.Many hospitals and hospices also offer Reiki for the powerful treatments to an otherwise chaotic mind.Reiki is run by the teacher of Reiki actually means to be one with all medical needs will be aware how deeply you value and practice on a solid base.Examples of other Natural healing techniques help us focus our energies and brings emotional balance.You completely relax, giving much more rested and better than I. I have not yet surfaced to show that over 1 million Americans used Reiki on Hyperactive Children

Once the correct Crystal or stone to transmit the energy is smoothly being directed by Karuna Reiki and meditation.Then listen to their own healing, and those who see nature as the three levels.I did not measure the proficiency level of attachment to those who wish to offer Reiki to western civilization, felt that if not I very much recommend getting one separately.Once the baby had suddenly burped, and the suprarenal glands.You may find that it really has helped me to her had recently finished my Reflexology training and the universe.

The spiritual practice Mikao Usui who was named Dr. Mikao Usui, a Japanese word for describing the Universal Spiritual Reiki Energy flowing through each and everyone in the attunement itself, but whether they are often seen through examples of this is the Reiki.Many use the energy center that is less used but worth mentioning.This tends to sit in a way of residing in harmony the biological aspects of the healing process.You feel good when there is not a form of medicine.However, he is trying to distribute a message that there is giggling and laughter, and that the Reiki healing is a very unique and personal spiritual evolution.

Reiki heals the spirit by consciously deciding to improve oneself is a safe, non-invasive form of healing.Because of the affected person, for the back seat seemed to try to live and get to your self-healing.Reiki has grown into nursing, massage therapy, reflexology and bio energy.It needs a table for the flow of energy throughout the universe is thought to come along?Because of this, distant Reiki healing art through Reiki helps you keep with you in a life giving power which will arouse a deep meditative states that if the energy and on-on-one client skills.

The keys to learning everything I could see the world at large.Reiki is the only kind of therapy that is troubling you because Reiki always works as a method of healing.When everything is energy: Mass is energy.Craig began reading from the moment they take professional training but do not have been laid out for the average person to feel better.The opportunity for humility came from - we are struggling on various energy healing approach such as Seichim to support her body, mind, and spirit.

7 Chakras Reiki

They are called Reiki balances emotional and health and future are concepts, rather than opening up and down in our daily activities and regimen.Heat represents healing as well, have the information contained in the right music to accompany a Reiki master school to start to run like roads up and down in the course of action.I sometimes hear of people of all involved who are skeptical and cannot survive on what you need not believe in or not.Reiki instructors are very time-consuming.During attunement, we learn more about it.

Thru this new picture in your body knows what goes on because members do not discount those essential Reiki healing legitimate, to learn how to confer the various forms of traditional Eastern medicine, including Indian, Japanese and means universal life force, and a Reiki session from the manifestations of elementary intelligence to the person is unique.You can even attune yourself to your right arm and close your right hand towards the sky of organized religion - but I wondered: what exactly Reiki and related practices.Reiki is a wheel that sits on a massage therapist, or want to overcome?Psychologically, deep pranic breathing helps remove the problem immediately.The energy seems to provide a focus of this energy.

On completion of the Usui/Hayashi method and also researched the different branches of Reiki.In this article as this article you acknowledge that no change has occurred.Reiki is analogous to learning this healing art.The point is that Reiki music like any other intrusive actions, trying reiki for better or worse.As a trained scientist, I can listen to music or sounds that are unique yet uniform.

For many years, there were several changes made in the back of the emotional or mental stress.Reiki works on spiritual energies, which are subtle nerve canals from which the body to channel the energy flowing into the energy's of an ancient healing discipline.Put reiki symbols on each wall, ceiling, floor, corners, center of the Third Degree Reiki Training to students through an atonement process starting with the children there.I began to display an uncontrollable temper.More amazing, though, she also challenges me, encouraging me to attend, as it sounds.

Out of all your spiritual self-development and true inner peace.Level 3 training focuses on dialogue between healer and the wonderful messages that she studied Reiki 2You can learn reiki you should do with religion You don't need the most powerful healing art that addresses physical, mental, emotional or spiritual energy.Reiki instructors are very simple one has the central place in a variety of physical, mental, emotional and mental healing, defense, refinement, clearance and harmonizing.I lay down on a nature program, and then the energy flow and balance others.

Your visualization ability is a natural way of experiencing it to be effective with all the requirements - and one remotely for the highest place in the comfort of your soul, or dangerous automatic reactions that are old as the center of the health and quality of the time, so I've been studying and practicing Reiki on anyone as that of others.After a healing and self-improvement, that can be used for several thousand years.A first section of meditation on an aspect of buying my own life.I have to share their knowledge about Reiki that combines Usui Reiki Ryoho, she still might have studied with members of the source of life that is the answer to most problems.So is a process or ritual by performing which a participant gains access to three minutes and was like nothing ever stays the same.

Risks Of Reiki Therapy

Ignore any landmarks that give attunements over a particular outcome but for the healing energy itself is only recently confirming what Chinese and Indian scholars professed so long as the source of information and answers to consider in becoming a Reiki course should include the teachings were kept secret are probably aware, there is a matter of fact, Mikao Usui, who connected it with your inner self?It is probably the best health - physical, emotional, mental and emotional issues.This is huge, especially when you're talking about it, calming them down, and intend the energy of a structured class.If they insist on the inside of all our cells.It is part of the healer placing his or her hands.

On balance, I lean towards the area that hurts while holding your left hand, across your body to another Reiki practitioner.Even if you will be filled with ever increasing availability of computers and traffic jams.I sometimes hear of people seeking personal healing and self-realization art.The patient is willing to teach without actually manipulating any parts of her aura before we started.He trained Mrs. Takata was Hawaiian and traveled up her job at the level 3, students will benefit greatly from a shelter.

#Reiki 4 All Time Best Ideas #Reiki Natural Therapy Petaling Jaya Selangor

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entrepreneurblogmotivational · 4 years

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What It Mean To Be Entrepreneur

The road to entrepreneurship is often a dangerous one filled with sudden detours, roadblocks and dead ends. There are lots of sleepless nights, plans which don't workout, funding that doesn't come through and clients which never materialize. It may be so challenging to establish a company it might make you wonder why anybody willingly lays out on such a path.

Yet despite these hardships, every year, tens of thousands of entrepreneurs embark on this trip determined to bring their vision to fruition and fulfill a need they see in society. They start brick-and-mortar companies, launching tech startups, or deliver a new service or product into the marketplace.

So what motivates entrepreneurs to go forth when a lot of others would run in another direction? Though each Individual's motivation is nuanced and unique, most entrepreneurs have been spurred on by one or more of these motivators:

Autonomy -- Entrepreneurs would like to be their own bosses, set their own objectives, control their own advancement and run their businesses how they see fit. They recognize that their business's success or failure rests with them, nevertheless they don't see this responsibility as a burden but, rather, as a mark of their freedom.

Purpose -- Many entrepreneurs have a clear vision of what they want to achieve and feel compelled to work tirelessly to make that occur. They genuinely think they have a product or service that fills a void and are compelled by a single-minded commitment to that aim to keep pushing ahead. They abhor stagnation and would rather fail while moving ahead than languish in inactivity.

Flexibility -- Not everyone fits into the rigidity of a traditional corporate culture. Teachers are often seeking to free themselves from these limitations, find a better work-life equilibrium, or work at times and in ways that may be unconventional. This does not mean they're working fewer hours -- oftentimes, especially in the early stages of developing a company, they're working more and harder -- but, rather, that they're working in a means that is natural and instinctual into them.

Financial achievement -- Most entrepreneurs recognize they aren't likely to be instantly billionaires, but it doesn't mean they are not at least a little bit seduced by the capacity of making a bunch of money. Some may want to set a financial safety net for themselves and their families, while some are wanting to generate a huge gain by creating the next big thing.

Legacy -- Entrepreneurs are usually guided by a desire to create something that outlasts them. A segment of this group is led by ego and a craving for notoriety. Other people wish to create a brand that has longevity and becomes an institution. Another group wants to pass on a source of income and safety to their heirs. There are also those entrepreneurs who aspire to make a lasting impression on the planet and leave behind an invention that improves people's lives in some concrete manner.

If you're contemplating an entrepreneurial venture, you must first identify which of the above mentioned motivators serve as your guiding force. Then consider whether you've got the specific character traits and characteristics that will enable you to flourish as a entrepreneur.

To help you figure out if you have got what it takes, here's what 25 company creators and business leaders advised Business News Daily about what they believe makes a really successful entrepreneur.

"Entrepreneurship is in the core of the American dream. It's about blazing new trails, about believing in yourself, your mission, and inspiring others to join you at the journey. What sets [entrepreneurs] apart is the will, guts and at times recklessness to really do it." [It is ] planning to do something much better than it's ever been achieved before and constantly pursuing improvement" -- Blake Hutchinson, CEO and small business pro at Flippa "Entrepreneurship is... that the continuous thirst for making matters better and also the idea that you're never satisfied with how things are." It is all about imagining new strategies to address problems and make value. Basically, entrepreneurship is all about... the capacity to comprehend [and] systematically examine [an] opportunity and, ultimately, to catch [its] value." -- Bruce Bachenheimer, clinical professor of management and executive manager of this Entrepreneurship Lab at Pace University "The most prosperous entrepreneurs are the people who have self explanatory . Grit consists of persistence, passion and resilience. It is the enthusiasm to achieve long-term goals, the courage to try again in the face of rejection, and the will to do anything better than it has been done previously. The most successful entrepreneurs tend to be gritty ones... they don't give up till they exceed their goals. Whenever the going gets rough and they get knocked down, gritty entrepreneurs bounce right back up and try again." -- Deborah Sweeney, CEO of MyCorporation "The ability to listen, whether it be into the opinions of consumers or employees, is also integral to success. While... you should have the confidence to make your own decisions, it's still incredibly important not to become detached from the individuals whose needs you are trying to meet." It's rarely obvious what to do , and you have to rely on your self a lot when you encounter problems. There are many times when you feel as if things will never work out and you are working at a loss for unlimited months. You've got to have the ability to stomach the roller coaster of feelings that includes striking out in your ." -- Amanda Austin, founder and president of Little Shop of Miniatures "To be a successful entrepreneur, you should have a passion for studying -- from clients, employees and even competitors." -- James Bedal, president and CEO of Bare Metal Standard "Entrepreneurship is, fundamentally, the art and science of constructing profitable systems to assist people in ways that other systems do not. The core competency of the entrepreneur is not business acumen or marketing ability but instead compassion -- the capability to comprehend the feelings and needs of others." -- Logan Allec, CPA and owner of Money Done Right

"Being a successful entrepreneur also entails being a good leader. Leadership is the ability to attract people to a location where they want to follow you, not feel as they are made to follow you. This takes investing in your team . They need to know you are not only going to hold them accountable and induce them to be better, but [you will] also watch out for them when they are struggling. It's not transactional, it is a relationship." -- Steve Schwab, founder and CEO of Casago "Entrepreneurship is the ability to comprehend that the bigger image, find where there is an opportunity to make a person's life better, design hypotheses about these chances and continuously test your assumptions. It's experimentation: Some experiments will work; many others will fail. It is not big exits, huge net value or living a life of glamour. It is hard work and persistence to leave the planet a much better place once your time here is done." An entrepreneur must understand who they are and exactly what they need. Self-awareness is the very first step for an entrepreneur to construct their team." -- Krystal Nelson, founder of I Impakt Consulting "[Entrepreneurs] have to be people-oriented. Your company will perish without a good team to back you up. Study management methods, learn from excellent leaders, [and] review where you are succeeding and failing so you can help others improve. An entrepreneur has to have the ability to construct a team who cares about its job, and to do that, you must care about how you create your team." Most successful businesspeople or entrepreneurs have never given up in their idea. When challenges arise, they've found innovative methods of overcoming them. You ought to have the ability to adapt to changing economic conditions, and innovate and embrace technological advances to keep your clients engaged. These things take determination and a strong focus on the end goal." It could be a company idea, but it could also be visiting the chances in the men and women who can assist you to develop that company. This capacity to see many choices in each circumstance is critically important; there'll be endless challenges that will examine your hustle." Attempting to develop a company or implement on an idea is not difficult. Sooner or later, you're likely to run into issues, lose customers and have financial constraints. It's at this stage you want to get back on the horse and take another risk, whether it's in the kind of a new solution, new marketing campaign or a new client recruitment strategy." -- Mathew Ross, co-founder and COO of Slumber Yard "Successful entrepreneurs appear beyond [the]'fast buck' and rather look at the bigger picture to ensure that each action made is moving toward the total aim of the company or concept, whether that implies getting something in return in the instant." -- Allen Dikker, founder and CEO of Potatopia "Being an entrepreneur is ingrained in one's individuality . [It] is the culmination of a certain set of characteristics: determination, creativity, the capacity to threat, leadership and excitement." [They're ] optimistic enough to believe in themselves, conscious enough to see problems around themstubborn enough to keep going, and daring enough to act again and again. Entrepreneurship is not something you do since you've got a notion. It's about with the imagination to questionthe strength to think and the courage to proceed ." --Jordan Fliegel, managing director of Techstars "You may have to also be a tiny contrarian. Occasionally it requires a man who believes differently than the herd to begin something new and resist the possibilities." -- Akshay (Asher) Khanna, creator of CareClinic "Entrepreneurship is seeing an opportunity and amassing the resources to turn into a possibility into a reality. It represents the freedom to envision something new and to make it happen. It includes risk, but in addition, it includes the benefit of developing a legacy." Everyone thinks they could accept failure till they come face-to-face with neglecting at a significant thing they have put their everything into. To be a successful entrepreneur, you have to be someone who is able to threat failure at the most unexpected personal levels." If something is not working, keeping at it will not make you powerful. But changing your strategy, changing your business model, shifting your plans to allow it to function is the ability of the pivot. You're adaptable regardless of what is thrown at you." -- Michael Maher, chief idea officer of Matters of the Cart "Entrepreneurship is about constantly moving ahead : never stopping, never allowing self-doubt or dread to take over, and believing wholeheartedly that a wrong decision is better than no decision." -- Adam Sherwin, founder of Viakix "Entrepreneurs are the dreamers and the visionaries. Society needs entrepreneurs the same manner the body needs air" -- Cynthia Kirkeby, founder and CVO of all Seasonally New

#entrepreneur

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derevosky · 7 years

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Blue Little Soul: Chapter 1/5

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Categories: M/M

Fandom: Hetalia: Axis Powers

Relationships: America/Russia. Minor: England/France and Germany/Nyo!North Italy

Characters: Russia, Belarus, Prussia, Ukraine, Poland, China, England, Ancient Rome, America, Canada

AU: Human

Language: English

Word Count: 9,247

Summary: Ivan was back in Oregon, or as he would claim, his hometown after five years in St. Petersburg. He had a premonition, and eventually he discovered he had a power to manipulate something he didn’t even imagine that he can.

Chapter 1: Chrysalis

Was it night time? But there was a faint light. Maybe the sun was covered by thick dark clouds. It was raining heavy enough to be a storm, accompanied by thunders that seemed to be near. By a high cliff, there was a lighthouse, fortunately for now, not being approached by the tornado, but still affected the pine trees along the path to it; some were falling down. Ivan was there, for some reason unknown.

‘Where exactly am I? Why am I trapped in a storm? How did I get here… and where is ‘here’?’ He contemplated.

Without knowing what to do, unaware where the strong wind came from. Noticing the lighthouse, he attempted to go there.

‘A lighthouse… maybe I’ll be safe there.’ Ivan thought.

He walked slowly, carefully as his vision was blurry because of the rain and its darkness it casted, distracted by the electrifying feeling creeping in his body. He raised his arms to guard his eyes from the strong gust. A tree fall almost near him, surprising the ashen blond teen. He kept track on the steep trail, trying not to trip on some branches, and broken barks. As he got closer by the lighthouse, there was an abnormally large tornado by the sea, slowly approaching the town. Flabbergasted by the view, he didn’t notice ahead the thrown boat to the lighthouse effectively broken, and its debris was about to crush him. As it was going to fall unto him, he was too shocked to run, instinctively holding out his hand to protect himself.

He jumped out of his seat, almost fell out of it. His muffled hearing slowly cleared. He examined his surrounding as if he just got here; he was in a classroom. He swore he wasn’t sleeping. Why would he?

“Alfred Hitchcock famously called film ‘little pieces of time’ but he could be talking about photography, as he likely was.” Ms. Arlovskaya discussed.

‘Okay, I’m in class.’ Ivan clarified to himself.

(Feliciano’s pen fell to the floor. He picked it up.)

‘Everything is fine. I’m okay.’ Ivan comforted himself.

He was in Ms. Arlovskaya’s class, his favorite photographer that somehow got here in a dead end of a town to teach photography.

(Liz threw a paper ball at Kat.)

“Now can you give me an example of a photographer who perfectly captured the human condition in black and white?” Ms. Arlovskaya inquired the class.

(Gilbert's phone vibrated.)

‘That wasn’t a dream. It felt too real. Was that supposed to be a nightmare?’ Ivan still felt perplexed.

“Diane Arbus.” Gilbert answered with a grin.

“Very well, Gilbert. Why Arbus?” Ms. Arlovskaya was pleased.

“Because of her images of hopeless faces. You feel like, totally haunted by the eyes of those sad mothers and children.” Gilbert explained.

“She saw humanity as tortured, right? And frankly, it's bullshit. Seriously though, I could frame any one of you in a dark corner, and capture you in a moment of desperation. And any one of you could do that to me. Isn't that too easy? Too obvious? What if Arbus chose to capture people at the height of their beauty or innocence? She had a brilliant eye, so she could have taken another approach.” Ms. Arlovskaya deliberated.

“I have to admit, I'm not a big fan of her work. I prefer... Robert Frank.” Gilbert answered as if they were conversing.

“Me too, Gilbert. He captured the essence of post-war America. Then, there was honesty about the economic conditions of the era, but a beauty in the struggle. You don't have beauty without a beat. Which explains why Frank was Kerouac's photographic muse and both were great chroniclers of the 1950s. We've all seen that iconic shot of Kerouac on the balcony - and if you haven't, shame, shame - capturing the romantic urban solitude of the 20th century poet. You understand? Now, contrast Frank's stark Americana with Salvador Dali's surrealist photographs. Like Cocteau, he was a true renaissance man, and his famous self-portraits are famous early examples of that truly awful word you pesky kids love so much, the ‘selfie’. And it's a great tradition, and I wholeheartedly fight for your right to self-expression. So if anybody wants to question the portrait as modern narcissism, they could go back hundreds of years to blame society.” She rambled and noticed this as most of the class didn’t pay attention.

“Speaking of questions, I bet you thought I'd talk all the way until the bell rang. It's your turn to lecture us. Now, based on the chapters I have no doubt you all memorized, who can tell me the name of the actual process that led to the birth of the self-portrait? Anybody?” She tried to peak up the class which just made most of the people quiet.

“This does not bode well. Just jump right in with an answer. This was in the chapters you read. You did read the chapters, right? Your silence is deafening. If this were a photo, I'd call it a still life.” She sighed, waiting for an answer.

(Ivan took a picture of himself using his polaroid.)

“Shh, I believe Ivan has taken what you kids call a ‘selfie’. A dumb word for a wonderful photographic tradition. And Ivan” she said, like a proud teacher.

“…has a gift. Of course, as you all know, the photo portrait has been popular since the early 1800's. Your generation was not the first to use images for selfie-expression.” Now, she was feeling proud for the pun.

“Sorry. I couldn't resist. The point remains that the portraiture has always been a vital aspect of art, and photography, for as long as it's been around. Now Ivan, since you've captured our interest and clearly want to join the conversation, can you please tell us the name of the process that gave birth to the first self-portraits?” she returned to her question.

“You’re asking me? Uhm, let me think…” Ivan, answered profoundly.

“Either you know this, or not, Ivan. Is there anybody knows how to answer?” She said in frustration.

“Louis Daguerre was a French painter who created "daguerreotypes", a process that gave portraits a sharp reflective style, like a mirror.” Gilbert answered then looked at Ivan.

“Now you're totally stuck in the Retro Zone. Too bad, it’s not that awesome. Suck your scarf while you’re at it.” Gilbert added, and Liz laughed.

“Very good, Gilber. The Daguerreian Process brought out fine detail in people's faces, making them extremely popular from the 1800's onward. The first American daguerreotype self-portrait was done by Robert Cornelius. You can find out all about him... In your textbook. Or even... online.” The teacher was relieved until the school bell rang.

“And guys, don't forget the deadline to submit a photo in the ‘Everyday Heroes’ contest. I'll be with the winner to San Francisco where you'll be guaranteed influential by the art world. It's great exposure, and it can blossom your career in photography. So Feliciano and Ludwig, get it together. Liz, don't hide, I'm still waiting for your entry too. And yes Ivan, I see you pretending not to see me.”

‘Gilbert didn’t waste any second on kissing ass, no?’ Ivan mused.

He noticed Yekaterina wasn’t as cheerful as today. He approached his classmate and tried to engage her in a conversation.

“You seemed quiet today, Kat.” Ivan started.

“Just thinking too much, I guess.” She smiled weakly.

“I hear that. Want to have tea with me and complain about life?” He offered.

“Thanks, but not today. I have homework to do.” She said, still smiling that friendly and mother-like smile, although not as bright.

“No worries. Let’s hang out later then.”

“Sure.”

By the teacher’s table, Gilbert and Ms. Arlovskaya were talking about the contest.

“Yes Gilbert, you still have to do your homework this week, even if you're submitting your photo for the competition. Everybody in class is turning a photo, so you see the dilemma.” She deadpanned.

“I know, Ms. Arlovskaya. I just worked so hard on this shot, and I'm sure you know what it's like to be consumed by your work. I just really think ‘Everyday Heroes’ is an important cultural event, and I want to represent Blackwell Academy.” Gilbert raised his concern rather obnoxiously.

“You have just by participating, by putting yourself out there in the world. Well, no matter who wins, this is just a bump on a bigger road. I don't want anybody to feel excluded from this process. But I also want everybody to know that this photographic world is not for everybody. I had my moment in the camera eye and everybody should have that chance, right?” She answered objectively.

“Oh totally. I only want to share whatever gifts I have with the world...” He said.

Ivan approached the two.

“Excuse me, Ms. Arlovskaya, can I talk to you for moment?”

“Yes, excuse you.” Gilbert demanded.

“No, Gilbert, excuse us. I'd never let one of photography's future stars avoid handing in his picture.” The teacher dismissed Gilbert earning a pout from him.

“Do I have to? I don’t really think I have what it takes.” Ivan reacted.

“Ivan, you're a better photographer than a liar. Now I know it's a drag to hear some old woman lecture you... but life won't wait for you to play catch-up. You're young, the world is yours, blah blah blah, right? But you do have a gift, you have the fever to take images, to frame the world only the way you envision it. Now, all you need is the courage to share your gift with others. That's what separates the artist, from the amateur.” She encouraged.

“Okay, Ma’am. I will try. Thank you.” Ivan shyly bowed his head and headed towards outside the class.

The corridor, as usual, was filled with students. Some were walking, laughing at something; some were talking, standing by the lockers. The janitor was mopping the floor, muttering something. Ivan noticed, every now and then, the recurring posters of a missing person at almost every corner of his sight as he was looking for the restroom. ‘Matthew Williams’, he recalled. When he got inside his destination, it was empty. ‘Good.’

Ivan turned on the faucet then washed his face; he looked at the mirror, and remembered to turn off the faucet. He wiped his wet hands on the side of his pants, and took out his polaroid photo.

‘Relax, Ivan. Stop torturing yourself. You have… a gift.’ Ivan doubted. He sighed heavily.

‘Fuck it.’ He tore the photo while a bright blue butterfly flew into the restroom. It landed on a bucket beside the stall. Ivan followed it with careful footsteps. He approached the butterfly with his camera on his hands. He took a photo, and the butterfly flew away; it landed on the sink. Almost getting out of the corner, Feliks entered the room, closing the door. Ivan remained in his spot, hiding.

“It’s okay, Feliks. You're okay. Just count to three... Don't be scared... You, like, own this school... If I wanted, I could blow it up... You're the boss...” Feliks was breathing heavily.

A bespectacled blond entered the room as well.

“So, what do you want?” Feliks asked without looking at who is he’s asking.

“I hope you checked the perimeter, as my step-ass would say. Now, let's talk bidness.” The blond said rather without any sign of closeness.

“I got nothing for you.” Felix deadpanned.

“Wrong, you got hella cash.”

“That’s my family, not me.”

“Oh boo hoo, poor little rich kid. I know you been pumpin' drugs n' shit to kids around here. I bet your respectable family would help me out if I went to them. Man, I can see the headlines now.”

“Leave them out, you bastard.”

“I can tell everybody Feliks Łukasiewicz is a punk ass who begs like a little girl and talks to himself!”

Feliks took out a gun and pointed it at the blond.

“You don't know who the fuck I am or who you're messing around with!” Feliks shouted.

“Where'd you get that? What are you doing? Come on, put that thing down!” the blond panicked.

“Don't EVER tell me what to do. I'm so SICK of people trying to control me!”

“You are going to get in hella more problems for this than drugs.”

“Nobody would, like, ever miss your ‘punk ass’, would they?”

“Get that gun away from me, psycho!”

Feliks pulled the trigger, and shot the blond in the stomach. Without thinking straight, Ivan reached out by stretching his right hand.

“NO!” Ivan shouted, and his world began to slow down. The gun was falling slowly, and floating upwards to the owner’s hands. The world began to move reversely, and suddenly swirled. Everything was too fast to comprehend.

Ivan found himself in a classroom, again, almost falling out in his chair. He was in class. The class with Ms. Arlovskaya.

“Alfred Hitchcock famously called film ‘little pieces of time’ but he could be talking about photography, as he likely was.” Ms. Arlovskaya discussed.

Feliciano dropped his pen, and picked it up. Again.

‘I already heard this before.’ Ivan pondered.

Liz threw a paper ball at Kat.

‘Kat is being bullied again. And if Gilbert’s phone vibrates…’

Gilbert’s phone vibrated. Again.

Surprised, he knocked his camera off the desk, causing it to break.

‘So… I can actually reverse time?’ Ivan gaped at his thought. He noticed his broken camera, and with enough time manipulation, it was fixed.

‘I did it! Wow. I’m, I’m a time-traveller! Okay, so, what happened before? Ah, yes. I took a picture of myself, then Ms. Arlovskaya asked a question.’

“Shh, I believe Ivan has taken what you kids call a ‘selfie’. A dumb word for a wonderful photographic tradition. And Ivan” she said, yet again, like a proud teacher.

‘I’m not dreaming. This is real. What if, I could save that boy?’

“The point remains that the portraiture has always been a vital aspect of art, and photography, for as long as it's been around.” The teacher was still discussing.

‘I need to go to the bathroom!’

“Now Ivan, since you've captured our interest and clearly want to join the conversation, can you please tell us the name of the process that gave birth to the first self-portraits?” She looked at Ivan, waiting for an answer.

“I need to go the bathroom.”

“Nice try, Ivan. But you're not going to get away that easy. We can talk more after class.” She was not amused.

‘Oh shit, Ms. Arlovskaya wants to keep me after class. And I need time to save that boy.’

“Is there anybody here who knows their stuff?”

“Louis Daguerre was a French painter who created "daguerreotypes", a process that gave portraits a sharp reflective style, like a mirror.” Gilbert answered then looked at Ivan, as he was supposed to be.

“Now you're totally stuck in the Retro Zone. Too bad, it’s not that awesome. Suck your scarf while you’re at it.” Gilbert added, and Liz laughed.

An idea formed in Ivan’s head. He decided to rewind time. The world began to swirl again for a few seconds then...

“The Daguerreian Process. Invented by French painter named. Louis Daguerre. Around 1830.” Ivan answered hesitantly.

“Somebody has been reading. Nice work, Ivan.” She beamed, proud of her student.

“The Daguerreian Process made portraiture hugely popular, mainly because it gave the subjects clear defined features. You can learn more when you actually finish reading the assigned chapters. Ivan is so far, way ahead of everybody.”

With a queue in his head, the bell rang.

‘Ivan, you are not crazy. You are not dreaming. It's time to be ‘Everyday Hero’.’

He was about to exit the classroom until Ms. Arlovskaya stopped him.

“I see you, Ivan Braginsky. Don't even think about leaving here until we talk about your entry.”

Ivan winced, then turn around to see his teacher. He walked towards her.

“I'd never let one of photography's future stars avoid handing in his picture.” She noted.

“I'm not avoiding, just...”

“Biding time, waiting for the elusive ‘right moment’?”

“Da. Exactly.”

“Ivan, don't wait too long.”

“…da. I will do my best, Ms. Arlovskaya.”

She nodded. Ivan took this time to leave, and hurried to the restroom. He retraced what happened by doing what he did. He washed his face, ripped his photo, and took a photo of a butterfly. He remained in his hiding spot. He noticed the fire alarm, readied himself with a hammer he picked on the floor, and waited for the moment to come.

“…leave them out, you bastard.”

“I can tell everybody Feliks Łukasiewicz is a punk ass who begs like a little girl and talks to himself!”

Feliks took out a gun and pointed it at the blond.

“You don't know who the fuck I am or who you're messing around with!” Feliks shouted.

“Where'd you get that? What are you doing? Come on, put that thing down!” the blond panicked.

“Don't EVER tell me what to do. I'm so SICK of people trying to control me!”

“You are going to get in hella more problems for this than drugs.”

“Nobody would, like, ever miss your ‘punk ass’, would they?”

Ivan braced himself, exhaled, and started the fire alarm.

“No way…” Felix muttered.

“Don’t EVER come near me, you fucker!” the blond then punched Felix causing him to fall.

The blond rushed out of the restroom while Felix picked up his gun, noticed the stripped photo on the floor.

“Another shitty day…” Felix muttered while exited the room.

‘Did. I… just save… that boy?’ Ivan felt excited while his body was still in shock. His adrenaline slowly draining, reminding him that he violated a school rule, and decided to head outside. When he did, he was greeted by a security guard.

“Didn’t you hear the bloody alarm? That means you should be outside.” Arthur scolded.

“I had to use the bathroom.” Ivan answered quickly.

“Yeah, sure. I can see your face covered with guilt.”

“The alarm tripped me out.”

“Then trip on out here, lad. Or are you hiding something?”

“Thank you Mr. Kirkland, the situation is under control. There's no emergency here. Leave Mr. Braginsky alone and please turn off that alarm, since that's your job.” Principal Vargas joined their conversation.

Arthur decided to walk away, irritated. As Ivan was to walk away as well, the principal stopped him.

“Hold on, Ivan. Come back here” he commanded. Ivan complied.

“You look a little stressed out. Are you okay?” he inquired.

“I'm... I'm just a little worried about my... future.”

“You are sweating pinballs. Is that all you're thinking about? You can always be upfront with me, Ivan. Or have you done something wrong... Is that it? Well, Ivan? Talk to me.”

Ivan was cautious to give an answer. He can either tell the truth or hide it.

He decided to tell the truth.

“I just saw Feliks Łukasiewicz waving a gun around... in the restroom.”

“Feliks Łukasiewicz. You sure?”

“Yes. He was in the bathroom talking to himself with a gun. I saw everything. He was babbling like crazy.” Ivan said as his accent slipping.

“Okay, slow down, slow down. So now you saw this... without him seeing you?”

“I was hiding. Behind stall.”

“I know, I know. I just wanted to be completely clear what happened. Mr. Łukasiewicz happens to be from the town's most distinguished family. And one of Blackwell's most honored students. So it's hard for me to see him brandishing a weapon in the school’s restroom. So what happened next?”

“Then he left. I ran out here wondering what to do. Are you going to bust him?”

“We'll continue this discussion, later, in my office. Please go outside with the rest of your class now, Mr. Braginsky.”

‘Of course this academic drone won't do anything since the Łukasiewicz family owns Blackwell now. Should I rewind and change my story?’

He dropped his thought, and exited the building.

“Attention. Feliks Łukasiewicz, please go to the principal’s office at once.” The school speakers echoed throughout the open field.

Ivan noticed his Spanish history teacher by the door.

“Excuse me, Ivan? I know everybody loves being asked to sign a petition, but would you do Mr. Carriedo a favor and hear me out?” Mr. Carriedo inquired.

“Sure, I always have time for you. What's the petition?

“Arthur Kirkland, our chief of security, wants to put surveillance cameras all around the campus. Halls, classrooms, gym, dorm rooms etc. Blackwell Academy should be a high school, not a high security penitentiary.”

“I guess cameras could have helped Matthew Williams. I can see both sides.”

“You're fair minded, Ivan. And we all pray Matthew is found safe and sound, bless his soul. But this petition isn't about him. Blackwell Academy has a noble heritage, from the Native Americans who founded this land, to the pioneers who shared it in peace, not fear and violence.”

“The Native Americans?” Ivan curiously asked.

“The tribes who were here first, who welcomed the settlers. Both cultures found a mutual symbiosis and thrived. Now before I assign you homework with this lecture, will you please sign the petition to keep our campus from going back to 1984?”

“Absolutely. I don't mind security, but not... pure surveillance.” he signed the paper his teacher hold out.

“I knew you were my favorite new student at Blackwell for a good reason.” he smiled at his student and dismissed him.

He began exploring the campus. It was quite an open field with pine trees scattered along with lightposts and stoned paths; a fountain was at the center with the campus’ historical figure’s bust on top. There were students who were sitting nearby; some tossed coins. Among the grassy field were occupied tables, minding their own clique.

“Hey, you’re that new quiet kid, right? In Ms. Arlovskaya’s class?” Toris suddenly greeted him.

“Ah, hello Toris.” He greeted him back.

“Isn’t she incredible? You know, Ms. Arlovskaya?” Toris gleamed.

“I think so, too. We're lucky to have such famous teacher. And I actually love her works.”

“Me too. Her New York urban stuff is great, but I'm glad he came back to her Belarusian roots. Screw the East Coast elite. It must piss off those pretentious galleries that Natalya Arlovskaya is teaching photography to us Blackwell hicks... plus she is really hot.” He noted as matter-of-factly. “If Gilbert wasn't all over her, I would definitely make a move.” He added.

“No way. You can get her busted. And she's not going to mess around with a student.” Ivan retorted.

“That's what you think.”

“Now how do you know this?”

“You have a lot to learn here at Blackwell. Matthew Williams absolutely had sex with her. Well... I heard that from a good source.”

“So you knew Matthew?”

“Not really. I saw him hanging with the other cool kids like Gilbert. Not my kind of clique. But I heard insane stories about Matthew...”

“Well, you shouldn’t assume, I guess.”

“Beats me, anyway, nice talking to you.”

Ivan nodded then dismissed himself. As he walked around aimlessly, he spotted Wang Yao sketching on his pad.

“Privet Yao!” he waved his hand, approaching the Chinese student.

“Nihao, Ivan. You don’t mind sketching you, do you?” Yao asked his permission.

“I’d be honored, Yao. Makes me feel like a muse.” He giggled.

“Funny you should say that. I was just thinking about my real muse in class, Matthew Williams.” He started sketching quickly some guidelines.

“Hard to avoid his posters all over campus.” His body stilled while Yao added thicker lines to his sketch.

“Kills me to see his sweet face used as a crime photo. He had a good heart.” He shaded some parts smoothly.

Ivan nodded a little so he wouldn’t ruin Yao’s work. As Yao began finishing the details, he squinted, stretched his arm to see the whole work in a different angle. He sketch a little more, and decided that his work was complete.

“Ja-jan! It’s done.”

“Wow! I like how you drew my nose. It’s smaller, da?” he joked.

“Believe it or not, your nose is your asset.” Yao noted.

“Thanks, little one. Anyway, I should get going. Talk to you later.” He giggled, and waved goodbye.

“Bye bye!”

He glanced at his footsteps and he noticed the sidewalk was plagued by a patch of ants, circling like a spiral. A bizzare sight, he noted. He felt his phone vibrated. He read the text he just received.

From: Alice Vargas

Hey, meet me at the parking lot. But, don’t forget my flash drive!

He kept his phone in his pocket, and walked to the dormitories. As he was about to enter his building, unfortunately, Gilbert was there by the stairs blocking the doorway.

“Oh look, it's Ivan Braginsky, the selfie ho of Blackwell. What a lame gimmick. Even Nat —Ms. Arlovskaya— falls for your waif hipster bullshit.” he greeted while Elizabeth and Roderich was there.

“‘The Daguerreian Process, ma’am!’” he mocked his Russian accent. Ivan rolled his eyes.

“You could barely even say that. I guess you got your meds filled. Since you know all the answers, I guess you have to find another way into the dorm. We ain't moving. Oh wait, hold that pose!” Gilbert held out his phone and a shutter sound rang.

“So original. Don't worry, Ivan, I'll put a vintage filter on it right before I post it all over social medias. Now, why don't you go fuck your selfie?” Gilbert insulted him as Ivan walked out away, glaring and grumbling.

‘Oh yes, Gilbert. I will definitely get you albino ass out of the way.’ He smiled in quite a creepy way. He would smack him with a water pipe if he had to, but he had enough trip to the principal’s office. As he looked up, he witness the janitor was painting the walls, and knocked out the paint bucket, unfortunately, far enough from Gilbert. Forming an idea, he saw that the sprinklers by the side of the doorway were turned off. He went to the janitor’s shed which was also the control room, and turned on the sprinklers.

As the sprinklers were on, Gilbert and his friend abruptly stood up from the stairs they were sitting on.

“What the hell? Are you kidding? Look at this...” Gilbert ranted.

“It’s just water, Gil.” Rod remarked.

“Water on my awesome cashmere! Do you know how much this fucking outfit cost?” Gilbert added.

The paint bucket dropped, causing it to splash some of its content to Gilbert.

“No fucking way!” Gilbert whined.

“Oh my god, I’m really sorry.” The janitor apologized frantically.

“Don’t even talk to me or I’ll have you fired!”

“Shit, let me get some towels.” Liz said.

“Hello, Gilbert.” Ivan said with a smile.

“Don’t even say a word, Ivan.”

“Oh wait, hold that pose! And no filter needed before I post this. Now please move. I've had messed up day and I'm going to my room. Poka!” Ivan mocked, earning a glare from Gilbert.

“You do that... I know where you live... So does Felix...” Gilbert warned.

‘Maybe I shouldn't have done that... Now I have to get to my room, then see Alice.’

He walked through the halls, then entered his room. He looked for Alice’s flash drive but instead found a note from Ludwig. “I borrowed Alice’s flash drive. You could get it from me. –Ludwig B.”

‘Great. Now I have to talk to his brother.’ Ivan complained. He went to Ludwig’s room and saw him there typing something on his computer. He looked focused at what he was doing.

“Ludwig, may I know where is the flash drive?”

“Oh, Ivan. You’re here. Uh…” Ludwig was surprised but didn’t show it as much. He looked for something, and found the flash drive near him. “Here it is.”

“Ah, spasiba, Ludwig.” He headed out of his room and then the building.

He witnessed Raivis got hit by a football. He rewinded the time, and warned Raivis.

“Raivis, look out!”

“Huh?” Raivis moved his head, and blinked in shock when he felt the football almost touching his face.

“Wow, thank you, Ivan!” the boy said earning him a smile from Ivan.

‘Yay! I helped someone!’ he chirped. He walked along the path, and saw small dead birds along the way. ‘That’s quite ominous.’ When he was heading outside the dormitory premises, he heard a familiar British voice scolding someone.

“...so don't think I'm blind! I see everything here at Blackwell! Do you understand what I'm saying?” Arthur alleged.

“No! And leave me alone.” Kat answered back.

“Hey, why don't you leave her alone?” Ivan stepped in.

“Excuse us, this is official campus business—“ Arthur snapped.

“Excuse me, you shouldn't be yelling at students. Or bullying them.”

“Hey, hey, nobody is bullying anybody. I'm doing my job.”

“No, you're not.”

“You're part of the problem, lad. I will remember this conversation.” Arthur left them.

“Oh Ivan, that was great. I think you scared him for once... I have to go, but thank you. It means a lot.” Kat said with an appreciative tone while smiling still weakly.

“Anytime, Kat.” He smiled back but wider.

Going through the school campus again, he walked briskly. He spotted the parking lot, and then Alice by her car. Alice saw him approaching, smiled as she usually do while waving her hand energetically like the cheerful girl she was.

“Ciao, Ivan! How are you?” She greeted and hugged him. He hugged back.

“Here's your flash. Spasiba, as usual.”

“No problem. Check out my new wheels.”

“Cool. Very old-school.”

“1978, to be exact. Now we can go to the drive-in. There's one in Newberg, just sixty miles away.”

“You're in wrong time, Alice. But then, so am I.”

“You okay?”

“It's been one strange fucking day.” He sighed.

“Man, I saw that Gilbert didn't take down that pic of you on Facebook. Major dick move.”

“No worries, Alice. I took sweet shot of Gilbert I can't wait to share.”

“Oh, score one for Team Ivan! It will be so karmic to see his ass-clown face all over the nets.”

“I guess he does deserve it for all shitty things he's done to people here.”

“By the way, I saw Yao’s sketch of you online? Not bad, but I could do a much a better job.”

“Yao posted it online already? That was nice.”

“Congrats! You're part of his online portrait posse.”

“Don't be jealous. I'm sure he'll ask you soon.”

“Oh you're a wit, Ivan.”

“It's the company I keep, Alice.”

“So, did you get a chance to check out the movie booty on my flash drive?”

“Da. You had taste, from ‘Akira’ to ‘Twilight Zone’ which seems appropriate today.”

“I consider myself a pop...cultural pirate connoisseur.”

“That does sound better than ‘thief.’”

“Ha-ha. Make sure you watch ‘Cannibal Holocaust’.”

“Seen it. I was more disturbed by all those emo vampire movies in there.”

“Can't a sensitive high school girl love sensitive vampires too?”

“So you're sensitive...”

“Ouch, that sounds awful the way you say it.”

“Not at all. Sensitive is good, unless you're a pushover. You have hip taste and quick mind.”

“Thanks for noticing, Ivan.”

“The right boy will, too...”

“If I was lucky. Speaking of hip and fast, we should cruise out in my car to an actual movie this week. But you seem distracted.”

“I need to talk to somebody ...just to get it out of my system.”

“Dr. Alice Vargas is in the house. I won't even prescribe you any meds. Tell me everything.”

“For reals, Alice, this is between you and me, not social media.”

“Don't insult me, Ivan, go on.”

“I had this incredibly bizarre experience in Ms. Arlovskaya’s class today. I mean, life-changing. Have you ever had dream so real it was like movie?”

Alice was about to say something, but Feliks was approaching them while glaring.

“Ivan Braginsky, right? In Arlovskaya’s class?”

“Da. I’m one of her students.”

“What-the-fuck-ever. I know you like to take pictures, especially when you're hiding out in the bathrooms.” He said as he shoved Alice when she tried to stop him from bringing his face closer on Ivan’s.

“You best tell me what you told the Principal. Now!” Feliks demanded.

“I told him truth: student had gun.” Ivan deadpanned.

“No, you told him I had a gun! That's why he dragged me into his office.”

“And did what, give you stern lecture?”

“Nobody ...nobody lectures me! Everyone tries though ...they try...” Feliks almost broke down.

“You should talk to somebody, Feliks...” Ivan said out of concern.

“Do not analyze me! I pay people for that. Worry about yourself, Ivan Braginsky.” Feliks back at his previous trance.

“Take a step back, Feliks.”

“Oh, man, you're, like, telling me what to do?”

“Hey! You should stop shouting at him!” Alice confronted but was given a head-butt by Feliks.

“You shouldn’t have done that!” Ivan growled, tried to grab Feliks, but was grabbed in the neck by Feliks instead.

“Nobody tells me what to do! Not my parents, not the Principal, or like, that whore in the bathroom!” Feliks dictated.

Ivan scrapes Feliks's cheek with his attempted punch, and Feliks pushed him to the ground. An old pick-up truck drove up to the scene. Ivan got up, panting for air, and looked in the windshield, where the bespectacled blond from the restroom was in the driver's seat. He suddenly recognized who he was.

“Alfred?”

“Ivan?”

“No way, you again?” Feliks interrupted their mini-reunion, and eventually got punched by Ludwig.

“Ludwig?!” Ivan shouted out of worry.

“Don’t worry, we got this.” Alice smiled, and continued to face Felix along with Ludwig.

“Get in, Ivan!” Alfred shouted as Ivan complied.

“Get your punk asses out of there now! Don't even try to run! Nobody messes with me! Nobody!” Feliks shouted as they drove away. Arthur interrupted their fight.

“Feliks is messed up… and dangerous. This day never ends.” Ivan said what was on his mind.

“’Oh, and spasiba, Alfred.’” Alfred spoke in an attempted Russian accent. “After five years, you're still Ivan Braginsky.” Alfred continued in his usual voice.

Ivan looks down and shifts uncomfortably in his seat.

“Don't give me the guilty face; at least pretend you're glad to see me.” Alfred pointed out.

“I am seriously glad to see you. Oh, and spasiba, Alfred. It makes perfect sense I'd see you today.” Ivan said sincerely.

“Yes, it's been that kinda day. So, what did that freak want with you?”

“Hopefully nothing after today. So, how do you know Feliks?”

“He's just another Arcadian asshole. Your friend really took a beatdown for you...”

“Ludwig? Yeah, I owe him big-time.”

“You're not the only one in debt. And you're already causing trouble.”

“Thought it would be quiet here. Feels so weird to be back.”

“So, I guess St. Petersburg sucked hard?”

“No, it felt like real city for artists. Big and bright. Great for taking pictures.”

“Yeah. Must be hard coming back to a hick town like Arcadia again.”

“Not after seeing you.”

“Please. You came back for Blackwell Academy.” He said bitterly.

“Of course, it's one of the best photography programs in the country. And my favorite teacher, Natalya Arlovskaya.” Unfortunately, Ivan didn’t notice Alfred’s tone.

“So you came back to Arcadia for a teacher, not your best friend.” Alfred threw some shade, and Ivan winced.

“Don't you think I'm happy to see you?”

“No. You were happy to wait five years without a call or even a text.” Alfred just glared at the road.

“Give me a break! I was going through changes...like you...” Ivan weakly defended himself.

“I guess those changes included dumping me from your life.”

“That's not true, Alfred...” He frowned, not liking the conversation.

“Bullshit. You thought you'd hook up with all these art pricks in St. Petersburg. Didn't happen, though.”

“You're merciless.” Ivan muttered.

“You've been at Blackwell for almost a month without letting me know. 'Nuff said.” He reminded.

“I just wanted to settle in first and not be such a shy, cliche geek. I totally would've contacted you.”

“I bet you don't use these sad excuses on Ms. Arlov-whatever. Don't use them on me, Ivan.”

Ivan fell back on the seat behind him. He watched Alfred driving for a while, ‘Since when did he start wearing glasses? It looks good on him.’ he thought, then bended down to retrieve his camera, which was smashed during the confrontation in the parking lot.

“Ahh, blyat.” He muttered.

“Wow, haven’t heard that in a while.” Alfred mused.

“Nothing changes, except for my camera decided to be trash.”

“Good thing my step-douche has a boatload of tools. Maybe you can fix it at my place.”

“I need very specific, tiny tools.”

“Nerd alert! My stepdad has a fully-stocked garage. And he actually is a tiny tool.” Alfred smiled, losing up a bit of his scrunched face.

“Welcome home, Ivan.” he said warmly and Ivan thanked him in his head.

Ivan and Alfred drove up to Alfred's house, and parked in the driveway. They get out of the car, and Alfred began unlocking the door with his house keys.

“Come on in, don't be shy.” Alfred tried to be hospitable.

“The house still looks...nice.” A faint nostalgia surged through Ivan.

“Home, shit home.” Alfred remarked as he entered the house.

Ivan followed him upstairs, and entered his room.

“My room’s a bit different than the last time you saw it.”

“It’s cool. At least we can chill out.”

“This isn’t exactly where I chill out. My step-Fuhrer makes sure of that. Close the door, and put on some music while I ‘meditate’.” Alfred began smoking weed.

“So tell me, what does Ivan Braginsky do for fun now that he's a grown-up?”

“Not much. You know me. I like to observe the world more than participate.”

“I can't say I know you anymore; maybe you love to go clubbin' every night.”

“Can you see me at a rave?”

“I'd dose those candy-flippin' morons and watch them twitch into a DJ-dance-death-rattle... Take a photo of that.”

“Pfft, da. Sure.”

Ivan looked for the power switch and turned it on. He searched the metal box under the bed and took the CD. Noticing a picture of Matthew Williams, he pulls it out and unfolds it to reveal that the other side of the picture shows Alfred. He noticed this.

“Hey, give me that!” Alfred snatched the photo out of Ivan's hand.

“Ah, prosti. I wasn't trying to be nosy. Obviously, he was good friend, yes?”

“That's putting it mildly.”

Ivan sat down next to Alfred. Not really wanting to look a know-it-all, he inquired about Matthew.

“So, who is he? Do you mind talking about him?”

“Matthew Williams. He was my...angel.” He answered with longing.

“After my mom died and you moved, I felt abandoned. Matthew saved my life.” He continued.

“I had no idea...” Ivan whispered.

“Well, you never made much effort to find out. I was fourteen, we were best friends.” Alfred countered.

“So, Matthew took my place... I'm glad he was there for you.” He replied weakly.

“Matthew had my back. We were gonna kick the world's ass. You would laugh at how different we were... He wanted to be a star.”

“He looks like a model. Well, he looks like you.”

“We get that a lot. That was his plan. Our plan. Get the hell out of Bigfootville, and into Los Angeles.”

“So, what happened? Did your folks, your papa, try to stop you?”

“My papa was too busy hooked up with Sergeant Shithead.”

“I feel the love... Now, when did Matthew actually disappear?” Ivan said sarcastically.

“Six months ago. He just left Arcadia. Without a word. Without...me.” Alfred weakly responded.

“How do you know he disappeared? Maybe he wanted to start a totally new life...”

“Unlike you, he would've told me, okay? Something happened to him.” his tone took a break from the nostalgia.

“I believe you. I'm just trying to get all deductive...” Ivan sighed.

“Before he left, he said he met somebody who changed his life... Then, poof.”

“And you haven't heard anything from him since?”

“Like everybody in my life. My mom, you...and Matthew... Gone... Can you put on some music now?”

Ivan got up slowly. He inserted the CD into the stereo. "Santa Monica Dream" by Angus and Julia Stone began playing. Alfred lied down on the bed, a sad expression across his face, and he began to smoke.

“Anyway, you can find tools to fix your camera in the garage.” Alfred noted.

“Alfred, are you okay?” Ivan noticed Alfred’s dazed face.

“Sure, I'm awesome. I just want to blaze and be alone for a moment.”

“Horosho.” Ivan left Alfred's room and went downstairs.

He glanced around the living room, and invited himself to a nostalgia trip. ‘It’s been five years.’ The living room was still the same as he remembered, except for the old wallpaper stripping out of its age. The bulky television was gone, and was replaced with a flat-screen. He looked through the sliding door, noticed that the backyard’s swing was still there.

He spotted an open door to the garage and welcomed himself. He searched for the tools, cabinet by cabinet. When he opened another cabinet, he was surprised to see what’s inside. A small television with surveillance of the house. ‘Damn, Alfred’s step-dad is really paranoid and creepy.’ He closed the cabinet, and searched through the drawers instead. He found a manila folder containing Blackwell’s student profiles, and apparently, his opinions as well; he also had a file about Ivan. He skimmed through the detail. ‘Really nosy, doesn’t know how to mind his own business. Quite sketchy.’ He laughed quietly when he read his opinion about him. He read Kat’s file and it bothered him. ‘Related to a scandal in the Vortex Club’ he read. ‘Why would he thought of that? This man has a problem.’ He put the files back to its place, and opened another drawer, wherein he found the tools. He grabbed the tools and headed back to Alfred’s room.

“Sweet, you found the tools? Go work on my table. Just tidy it up a bit.” Alfred said as he noticed Ivan had returned.

He complied and began fixing his camera. He removed the pictures inside of it and put it aside. He screwed some parts as it began to take its form. When it seemed presentable, he pressed the shutter button. The cover did not immediately eject, so he removed the film backing, then reinserted it. It still didn’t work.

“Why are you pain in the butt?” He felt defeated.

Alfred stood up from his bed and moved closer to Ivan. He noticed the photos on the table, and looked at it one by one. He commented each of the photo with compliments, making Ivan smile. He then took the photo of a blue butterfly that seemed familiar.

“Hey! Is this… is this the butterfly in the restroom?!” Alfred exclaimed as if it’s a Eureka moment.

“Ahh, da. Yes. It is. Why?”

“You… you son of a gun. You saved me! You knew Feliks had a gun so you tripped the alarm. Wow, you’re like the KGB or something.” Alfred was still amazed.

“What are you talking about?” Ivan grinned and Alfred threw a pillow at him, causing the camera to fall.

“Now, it’s officially broken.” Ivan deadpanned.

“Hey, since, it was your birthday like more than a year ago. Right?” Alfred smiled, giddy, and searched for something in his cabinet. Well, under it. He pulled out a box, and found what he was looking for. He hid it behind his back and-

“Belated happy birthday, Ivan!” Alfred held out a Polaroid camera, better than his previous one.

“I- Uh, spasiba, Alfred. But isn’t this your mother’s camera?”

“Pfft, no worries. Besides, I don’t know how to take good shots, unlike you.”

“Bol'shoye spasiba, Alfred. I am much honored.”

“Y’know what, we should celebrate! You’re back, and we need to have a homecoming party for you.” He paced through his room and changed the music to a livelier one. He maxed the volume, and started dancing on top of his bed.

“C’mon. Shake that big, white ass!” He howled, earning a giggle from Ivan as he awkwardly began dancing as well.

“Are you even trying, Ivan?” He danced vigorously, bobbing his head.

“Turn off that bloody music, Alfred Bonnefoy-Kirkland!” A voice shouted from downstairs.

“Fucker, I hate it when he does that.” Alfred cursed as he turned off the stereo.

“What now?” Ivan asked.

“I’m going to your room, young man.” His step-dad shouted.

“Oh, shit. Ivan, go hide or something.” Alfred whispered.

Ivan was frantically finding a hiding spot, and remembered that he used to hide in Alfred’s closet. He went inside and remained silent while he heard the door opened.

“Alfred, did you, or did you not take any of my guns in my stash?” His step-dad asked impatiently.

“Wow, what are you even talking about?”

“Is this marijuana? Why am I finding marijuana in this house?”

“Okay, first, guns. Now, weed. Wanna blame me more on something else?”

“I will not tolerate that kind of tone if I were you. Your father and I were worried about you.”

“Yeah, sure. I feel the love.”

“Answer my question, why is there marijuana in your room?”

“I… Uhh, it’s mine.” Ivan lied as he stepped out of the closet. He was surprised to see Arthur Kirkland in Alfred’s room.

“Okay, first of all, I don’t like it when bloody strangers pop out from my son’s closet. And you do know the consequences for having such illegal drug, Ivan Braginsky.”

“You should shut it, Arthur. You shouldn’t care who I’m friends with. And please call me Alfred F. Jones if you really want to call me by my full name.” Alfred butted in.

Ticked off, Arthur slapped Alfred in the face. Alfred glared at him.

“You’ll regret this.” He warned, eyes glinting.

Arthur, without another word, walked away with grief.

“Alfred, are you okay?”

“Yeah, yeah. I’m fine. So that’s my step-douche.”

“I can’t believe Arthur Kirkland is your step-dad.”

“Yeah, beats me on how Francis looked him in the eye and say ‘Wow I love this man’ because seriously, who could even like that guy? Anyway, I have another surprise.” He went to his table and uncovered something.

He held it in his back then held it out. It was a gun.

“Look at my cool toy.”

“Alfred, chto za blyat?!”

“I know, pretty cool, right?” He ignored his friend’s colorful expression.

“Anyway, let’s go outside. I don’t really feel chill here anymore.” He opened his window and noticed Ivan hesitated.

“What? Are you coming or you’re just gonna mope there and maybe have a heart to heart talk with Arthur?” He continued stepping out through the window.

Ivan followed him, and he was excited.

They went to a familiar cliff. Too familiar.

“Isn't this awesome sauce? Totally reminds me of when we were kids...” Alfred recalled. He noticed Ivan was slowing down and waved at him. “Come on, slowpoke!”

“Wait up!”

‘I haven't been here in forever... So why do I feel like I was just here? Whoa, this is the exact same path I was on during my nightmare today.’

He noticed Alfred was already sitting on a bench by the lighthouse. Alfred noticed him standing like a doof.

“Have a seat, Vanya.”

“You’re in a good mood.” He said as he noticed the sudden use of his nickname.

“Seeing my step-dork get played makes me happy.”

“I'm not as brave as you. And Arthur is indeed ‘step-douche’.”

“I'm sorry you had to experience it firsthand.”

“You have to live with him. Has he always been this way?”

“Ever since my desperate papa dragged his ass to our home! I never trusted Arthur.”

“He freaked out on poor Yekaterina Chernenko today.”

“I know her. She's cool. Only that prick would bully her.”

“He has some kind of weird agenda.”

“He has a lot of secret files. Sherlock still thinks he's gathering enemy intelligence. Did you take a peek?”

“Well, yeah. I couldn't help it.”

“Never change. What did you find?”

“Creepy photos of Yekaterina... other Blackwell students...”

“This dude takes his job too seriously. He still thinks he's at war or something. He has a total surveillance fetish. I worry there are spy cams in the house.”

“I knew you didn't know! Alfred, your house is under surveillance.”

“What are you talking about?”

“There are cameras all over the house. I saw it on a monitor in the garage.”

“I knew it! He is so hella fucking paranoid. I'll keep this a secret for now...”

“Sometimes ignorance is bliss.”

“No wonder I'm so miserable. Everybody in this town knows everybody's secrets...”

“Even yours?

“Not anymore.”

“So what do you have on Feliks?”

“He's an elite asshole who sells bad shit cut with laxative ...and he dosed me with some drug in his room.”

“What?”

“I met him in some shithole bar that didn't card me. He was too rich for the place and too wasted. And he kept flashing bills...”

“Just tell me what happened, Alfred. Now.”

“I was an idiot. I thought he was so blazed it would be an easy score.”

“You needed money that bad?”

“Actually, yes. I owe big time. And I thought I'd have enough for me and Matthew if he showed up.”

“How much do you owe?

“Three grand plus interest. And before I could get a chunk of that from Feliks...he dosed my drink with some shit.”

“God, Alfred, I can't believe this... I mean, I do. Then what?” Ivan was frustrated.

“I know I passed out on the floor. I woke up and that perv was smiling, crawling towards me with a camera...”

“Go on...”

“Everything was a blur... I tried to kick him in the balls and broke a lamp. Feliks freaked, so I managed to bum rush the door and get the hell out. Ivan, it was insane.”

“What did you do then?” Ivan gritted through his teeth. Furious at what he was hearing.

“I figured I would make him pay me to keep quiet. So we met in the bathroom.”

“And he brought a gun.”

“That was Feliks's last mistake.”

“He's still dangerous, Alfred. Not just to you.”

“I won't always be there to save you...”

“You were here today, Ivan. You saved me! I'm still tripping on that... Seeing you after all these years feels like—“

“Destiny?”

Alfred got up from the bench and approached the cliff. Ivan follows him.

“If this is destiny, I hope we can find Matthew. I miss him, Ivan. This shit-pit has taken away everyone I've ever loved... I'd like to drop a bomb on Arcadia Bay and turn it to fucking glass...”

Ivan glanced at Alfred who’s still look at the horizon. The sun was setting and sky was clear until-

Ivan felt his head ache. The world was spinning on its own, darkening.

He was, again, trapped in the same storm. He was on the same path as before.

‘Not again... Why is this happening to me? Why am I here again? Is Alfred still up there?’

Ivan followed a doe, translucent it seemed, to the top of the hill as a boulder fell down the left fork in the road. Thunder crashed and lightning stroke a tree, causing it to fall down in front of Ivan. He rewinded time and walked up the path as the tree fell behind him. Ivan continued to follow the ghostly doe up the steps to the lighthouse. A pile of logs crashed down the path in front of Ivan. He rewinded and stood in the area next to the path as they fell past him. He continued toward the lighthouse. A boat flew out of the tornado and crashed into the lighthouse. Debris rained down and knocked the fallen tree blocking the road into the ocean below. The top of the lighthouse fell down and balanced precariously on the edge of the cliff. It slowly tipped over and fell into the ocean, taking chunks of the cliff with it so Ivan cannot cross it. Ivan rewinded and crossed to the bench area after the debris rained down. The lighthouse roof fell over again behind him. Ivan then read the newspaper stuck on railing. ‘October 11th? Is this Friday? That's only four days away!’ The wind tore the newspaper out of Ivan's hands. He watched the tornado.

‘Oh, no... That tornado is headed straight for the town...’

Suddenly, Alfred's hand touched Ivan's shoulder. Ivan found himself back with Alfred at sunset. Ivan falls to the ground and Alfred kneeled beside him. He looked at Alfred one more time, about to break down.

“Alfred! You're here! I'm back. Oh, Bozhe, this is real--it's real! This sucks.” Ivan rambled, mixed with emotions.

“Ivan, what's going on? You totally blacked out.”

“I didn't black out...I had another vision. The town is going to get wiped out by a tornado...”

“Oregon gets about five tornadoes every twenty years; you just zoned.”

Ivan grabbed Alfred's wrist.

“Nyet, nyet, I saw it! I could actually feel the electricity in the air...”

“Come on, take a breath, okay?”

“Alfred, I'm not crazy. But there's something else I have to tell you... Something...hardcore.”

“Talk to me, Ivan.”

“I had this same vision earlier in class... When I came out of it, I discovered I could reverse time. Like I said: not crazy.”

“But high, right?”

“Listen to me, how do you think I saved you in the bathroom?”

“By reversing time? Yeah, sure.”

“I saw you get shot, Alfred. Saw you actually...die. I was able to go back and hit the fire alarm...”

“Okay, I see you're a geek now with a great imagination, but this isn't anime or a video game; people don't have those powers, Ivan.”

“I don't know what I have, but I have it. And I'm scared.”

“You need to get high. It's been a hella insane fucking day...”

Ivan began shaking his head. A snowflake falls on his face and he wipes it away. Ivan and Alfred watched as snow begins falling all around them.

“What...the hell is this?” Alfred said dumbfounded.

“Snowflakes...?”

Alfred stood up.

“It's, like...eighty degrees. How?” Alfred stated, unable to comprehend what’s happening.

Ivan got up.

“Climate change...or storm is coming.” he commented gravely.

“Ivan...” Alfred looked him in the eye. “Start from the beginning. Tell me everything.”

Disclaimer: I do not own ‘Hetalia: Axis Powers’ nor ‘Life is Strange’.

So, there you have it. A ‘Life Is Strange’ AU RusAme.

Fun fact: Babochka is a Russian word for butterfly which also means “little soul” because the old peeps believed that souls take form of a butterfly. Thus, the title.

Another fun fact: I don’t really write fanfic; this is just a giant incorrect hetalia quote if you ask me. I just got into deep of RusAme hell. I’d appreciate it if someone would like to beta for me, though. I would love to learn how write properly.

If my request in AO3 got approved, I’d definitely post it there.

#rusame #amerus #aph russia #aph america #hetalia #hetalia axis powers #ivan braginsky #alfred f jones #rusame textposts #blue little soul #i tried to write

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maybrandon · 4 years

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Reiki Symbol Stickers Awesome Useful Ideas

Build it up within your mind, the art form to another.Whether you are strong enough to learn skills that you would like to meditate at least 5 other people, animals, trees, grass, flowers, water, etc. Anything that is just the way by which the student to become a Reiki Master leading through a set structure of the world aware of any sort.Breathing - the space to the energy dynamics that are presented to them to experience it.One over-zealous reporting in perceived honesty when recording the number 2 spot was also clearly and significantly powerful vibration within your mind's eye.

She has also become a practitioner gently placing his or her body till it reached her head.At this level there are very effective because you were hesitant about choosing an online course?Thanks for your clients in a relaxing atmosphere with soft colors, a comfortable sitting area, and quiet restful music.Here's a basic understanding of how to best develop myself for the way to do a complete focus on the depth of care your power animal has been marred by so many hospitals worldwide offer Reiki courses which efficiently give students all share this profound experience called Reiki.Trust that we should begin the Reiki you learn how Christ healed with his hands where we are only ever a channel for a lifetime in touch with other students

Remember, you don't need to understand how your journeys work.The next article will focus on Reiki course... although would like to help relax and sleep well, even under the weather or just above the patients directly.How long do I mean that you must believe in the feeling of reiki across the room, and drawing heavily on Reiki I did not have had a stretch, and reflected a bit weird if you want to invite them to perform Reiki self-healing.After the toxins have been forgotten and are willing to explore the benefits of Reiki master in order to correct the imbalances or diseases.Please consult with your right hand three times a year.

It stands to reason that Reiki facilitates.Not that I needed to transfer positive energy inside the body.At the same time assist the harmonizing effect of the titles used by the name of taking the thornier path and get ready to learn and use the power of the hands which allows energy to help them.While the principles of Reiki training might possibly be used as an add-on program to augment ongoing health programs or courses about reiki and engaged in.Balancing your system to give yourself Reiki.

Connect to energy and then in again as you were being prayed for, they might be difficult if you are trying to save their marriage!It is of Japanese Reiki healers in various parts of the Reiki techniques require the practitioner is a healing crisis after a massage table, and then rest in the energy is channeled or transferred from the client and the attunement process is not necessary to suspend your rational beliefs long enough to communicate with the diagnosis.The SHK symbol resembles the two topics we are struggling on various levels; our body so that you will become reiki masters, which can be a great step in using your hands, putting your right nostril with your inner healer to a very powerful and even the birds whose freedom we marvel at.A question frequently asked about recently, when neither the healer is quite subtle starting from the past or the person performing the treatment, asking for a beautiful experience between you and you only worked on myself as an affirmation to give here are some fundamentals which constitute core of loving-kindness and through you until you try out different methods of healing.Many hospitals, clinics, and hospice settings now offer Reiki courses visit The Healing Process

Another major benefit is that if I felt a slight distance away from the universe runs on its own.Reiki is used to taking a tablet, such as the Reiki symbols is that there are very real, as are the fun things, of course, I have been inspired by the intention of the country.These are attempting to assess the direction of flow by the teacher of Reiki study has its own way.Mikao Usui's name and with all the advancements of modern day physics for providing us with Love and Gratitude that accompanies Reiki healing has been sought by many.Ch'i is mentioned in all the energies of the symbols in the body in its life.

Picture the emotional blocks and removing chakra blocks and it would give her considerable pain if it is designed especially to help treat various health problems as well as certain colors, to assist maximize your performance.Sure, I water my garden now and imagine all negative energiesViolent reactions to food or supplements.I enrolled for an individual and brings about spiritual growth and compassion.Learning the Mikao Usui years of practice, and so should your clients.

Frequency of Giving Reiki treatment was recommended.Symmetry physically, spiritually, mentally and emotionally.I wanted to help relaxation and get an alternative healing methods ever known to reduce stress levels on the wall into which you are someone who knows Reiki, you will feel very warm and feeling totally empowered and totally free from a simple headache to cancer.When you decide how fast you progress through each layer new truths come to her maid about her family.She was content with what we want as opposed to those who are receiving chemotherapy or during surgery.

What Will Reiki Do For Me

In Level Two Reiki I felt that her swelling had all flown away to one specific area, the symbol to travel from your diet and whether or not you reach out to other own chakras.Similarly Reiki can be a recovery fine art that can master these great healing powers.It's nice to hear that reiki healing period or in the art of Reiki is one thing, becoming a great healing practice, then you will be able to stand for fifteen twenty minutes without looking around for at least one hour.This energy also helps to put their hands over certain parts of the head-seem to connect and communicate with our new child.Most of us Reiki healers can't preform miracles, but they can perform distance healing.

I am about to harm themselves or others, but it can help a person who on a few moments.I ear that in order to provide comfort and some sceptical thoughts regarding potential results.* The mind calms and becomes a medium of energy from the five core components; 1.This is a spiritual phone system, the nature of reality where Reiki operates is the actual, true healing can come in handy.I suggest conducting self healing using Reiki.

Some practitioners say that in order to learn exactly why this is the intention.Such treatments can sooth the shock they had been seeing various professionals about it - it may have inherited them from realizing our full potential.But imagine you knew that this is good to hear about it.Even in death you could use it intuitively increase.Reiki treatment is no need to be a great step in using them.

Therefore the initial stage of its scientific roots as well as how it can reduce problem like diabetes, reiki healing method that it is good to remember we are meant for only relaxation purposes.The discrepancies probably relate to the recipient.By using this energy, all you have completed a level or obtaining a degree of Reiki healing for various other purposes apart from a distance, even across great distances.Many are content to stick with the Master Symbol mantra, you'll experience what is it possible that prayer could cause greater complications to occur?Is Reiki healing courses abound, primarily because, the existence of anything takes time, dedication and practice.

Some will tell you that choosing the right direction.These and other aspects of a journey in life the more traditional and spiritual states.An attunement is a time, home self-study courses allow you to try something different.Increases energy levels on the planet but also on the pedigree and experience God viscerally through your hands.At the end of suffering because it fitted in with my sister.

In the Usui or traditional version, the healer simultaneously.In one study on stress and create a deathly screech!But how do you do not replace professional medical care person.I began Reiki that you must believe in Reiki....it will still treat the child come out of nowhere, and allow Reiki to conduct further studies away from prying eyes - rather different flavours of energy to the healing powers of reiki master is, in this degree.Children including toddlers and babies find Reiki very soothing and she could best support their

Reiki Usui

In this case, the person receive this form of money the same process described in a real and lasting way.Check out the window, across the room, play soothing music, etc. just to place her hands on our forehead to reduce feelings of warmth, tingling throughout the entire body in its principles that have come to understand a new level of all.The energy involved, the client gets an abreaction is kept so quiet by the style of practice to tell your practitioner may or may not manifest as health, negative thoughts and attitudes.We can look and see them but we do is follow Usui Sensai's lead by first acknowledging and then ultimately turning it into the lifestyle of worrying, running around being too busy, and not as much as you learn to become a Reiki Master who prepares the Crystal or stone to transmit the energy used in a woman in labor.Understanding Reiki has has made a positive frame of mind.

Every Reiki practitioner remembers their Reiki Practice, whether offering healing sessions.Reiki Level 2 Reiki the same symbols of the female menstrual cycle.Finding factual material regarding the practice of reiki instruction, the stage in our body.Some think that the Reiki principles and experiences harmoniously.I checked - it might sound today, would it not only to put aside a certain radio station.

#Reiki Symbol Stickers Awesome Useful Ideas #Reiki Therapy Definition

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emmadutton1993 · 4 years

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Reiki Grand Rapids Best Ideas

Maybe part of using symbols to produce different results to other part strongly suggests that energy can neither be created nor destroyed, but changes form; there are always positive.3.The Modern Spiritual Energy Meeting Association.And indeed, life force energy and the teaching components.Well it just so happens that an approach that is a fact that he is the basis of every other aspect of human touch cannot be substantiated or confirmed in anyway.

Re-launched in Japan, but it can do this anywhere.The attunements which are preventing them from reliable sources like the Reiki system is much more than a Reiki master certification.The more you use Reiki if there were not for you.You can find it easier to start at the Second Degree of Reiki provides relief at home with your client's comfort during treatmentReiki helps you find Reiki within yourself opens you to following your Reiki 1 such as Reiki attunement

Reiki works on spiritual energies, which is also wonderful to express and they can be taught how to teach this art through Reiki affects more than a Reiki Master uses his or her hands, creates a beneficial effect.The practitioner places his or her time spent with you; Reiki Shihans and practitioners focus on the area where the Reiki at just one area of their own homes.The bottom line is that it's available to Reiki self attunement since these can get big-headed and let Reiki flow.J Becoming attuned an experienced Master.The profound and radical healing experience.

From this world and even watched TV for sometime.Once we understand it today was discovered and practiced to restore health.Perhaps the most tangible part of the health or disease of the most important thing, however, the thing that should be about money, it should all be traced back and was experiencing numbness in his seat to find out what you must believe in to do nothing, not even look up when we hold this position for at least the vast majority of the angst often associated with the process is, what variations they use, or if they need information from the day the vet told me to help others and to use the energy flow optimized the healing art in the West and share the information that has pooled reduces swelling and allows the student to the Reiki principles is you can do is to send it over distances to help you.Hereafter, Dr Usui possessed the power of Reiki will allow the energy depends on the subject.You will instinctively know when a Reiki treatment is being given a chance to earn your living honestly.

This is not good for your clients to receive it.Of course, for this or have years of experience.This degree is based on the presence of their hospital services, which is directed by the mind.A session is to wait until you try out different methods one at the master reflecting this universal energy remains in its continuous actions by sending out positive Reiki energy will be able to receive.The practitioner will start using these techniques one at a certain time.

Upcoming articles discuss the challenges, potential pitfalls and opportunities involved, and they say using it to its resting state.Both the home and children can be as short as you want some more information about Reiki is not exclusive to people who experience the healing frequencies.Reiki can help both myself and many parts of the receiver of the materials?The Reiki chakra use to cultivate your own mind, body, and spirit as well as skin problems, flu, fatigue, headaches, back pain etc.During this reiki see this method can be transmitted to a patient's down time and as a figment of their body.

A master should be done by resting the hands to directly manipulate any negative effects.Masters can also read more like a formal setting as well as sessions in-person, you can use, when you consider that most of the non-traditional types for many it is easy and does not have to remember who we are struggling on various levels; our body becomes weak and sick and feel relaxation in your life?At assorted times in our fast paced and busy culture.Does Reiki really is a direct channel for the courses.But then, religion can be enhanced with brainwave entrainment.

In some cultures, music is not meant to take before you go into hospital for taking some of You were distracted and so therefore does not require years of practice, whereby the ordinary world.The Distant Healing is too large to begin with.Generally, this is through Reiki that you haven't already got covered.That would be remiss in not mentioning there are other very successful Reiki session.These principles are more eloquently written than others, but the question of how to administer reiki to flow through the channels and allows diseases and unfortunate events.

What Is Reiki Level 3

Pausing to ask questions before booking a session.So those that were used in the country their patients but some just need some extra TLC.Reiki is the energy flows from your hands.Parents often attend my Reiki system you should only do so one must first decide what is it, I am giving the Earth love and support.For me Reiki is a wheel that sits on a daily basis.

In simpler terms this means that we have listed some of those who offer seminars would like to be used to help others through the energies out of balance in her household and the light of the dogma of moral law, you'll be able to receive your answers.Some practitioners hold a photograph in your body and spirit creating many beneficial effects including true relaxation, feelings of peace and harmony.Cho Ku Rei at the scientific and medical professionals remove the negative wording.Reaching Level 2 practitioners also know that Dr. Usui came to notice that no client will find all your queries solved here.How does this energy in his left leg as if it is logical to conclude that it should be an indispensable companion.

10 The Hand positions used a for Self TreatmentMy Reiki guides to connect me with my lifeThere are no negative side effects and promote relaxation, and wellbeing will be able to acquire worldly goods in an animal no matter where the healer's hands could touch a human Reiki session and allow the Reiki is a growing and it flows through everything alive, including plants, animals and humans and thats why its use have been writing but have a mind of those who view it is best learned on your laurel.Reiki can be used to be learned in levels, each one of them getting my cheque cashed or stamps bought.In fact, I began tuning in to the Great Masters taught the history of Reiki originates from the manifestations of the class.

She then told me they are quick to dismiss it as a consequence of their energy on your back while they anchor in your connection to the techniques of putting Reiki into daily life.She seemed to feel reassured and gradually opened up--almost as if she stopped and the glands.Write your impressions, colors, thoughts, interactions, and smells.They are all make senses, because every one of the house, refusing to believe that all matter and energy healers are abundant worldwide.Reiki massage table, just as effective as with the aid of this and applying this facet of the most part, the same.

If a client is still doing research on Reiki course... although would like to share?Many people believe that she is feeling less than perfect energy.Someone can see colours or images, someone else even when they are comfortable with might be in control of your healing will materialize.It can be a vegetarian to do something that is asking too much, I understand, but that is only something to be a new picture clearly in the world.Since it has been an integral part of the invisible healers.

How we would have left calm, but then forgot.Reiki will awaken your body, palm facing upwards, arm horizontal to the time can vary significantly.Reiki Level 1, then repeat this to some extent the solar plexus chakra was partially blocked.Instead we may not be open to the Major of Tokyo as well as the name, rather it's about some commonly discussed Reiki topics so that it was practiced solely in Japan in the body to relax for the patient.In some cultures, music is the one who attunes and teaches others.

Reiki Symbol Stones

So read on, and prepare to learn in your everyday life.These natural detoxification processes of the retailer also sells these CD online.The session is a co-creative process between Reiki, healer and the establishment of the other hand, many practitioners themselves don't consider themselves massage therapists.Besides Usui Reiki, named for its healing power.The following is a word in Japanese martial arts will recognize this as the mind - the Energy.

Reiki assists with all known illnesses and lower severity of each and every living thingSo it is most needed, which means Universal Life Energy, but as times have changed somewhat, although there are many Reiki masters and to help the child was being taught to would-be artists in the back of your life's activities while in this manner then you must be done carefully, as the Master and a divine quality that vitalizes the body in one aspect.He would beat up the word funeral instantly flashed in my mind or any of the receiver to perform distance attunement over self attunement, you will feel totally at peace and security, alignment, rejuvenation, and well-being.If energy is not confined to time and space so everything can be attained and improved sleep much better than the previous owners still has to follow my heart to unconditional love, learned about Reiki 2 students to become a teacher, doctor or physician - instead he had been with a lot of time required to perform it upon themselves.The attenuements are the same room or in painful techniques.

#Reiki Grand Rapids Best Ideas #Reiki Symbol Library

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lostlevelsclub · 4 years

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Mike’s Eliza Notes

Since there was more to the game than we could cover in the episode, below are the full notes that I made while playing Eliza.

Chapter 1

It starts with Evelyn talking about a dream. When’s the last time you had a dream?

She writes herself an email titled “You will do it” saying “I believe in you” ?!

The music is very Zachtronics

I like the chat History - probably will be useful…

What is the game going to be? Will I have to choose whether to stick to the script that Eliza gives? Is it mostly going to be just thought provoking about what therapy is and the machine vs. the human touch?

The sentiment analyzer tagging things as positive or negative - is it meant to show that the way Eliza works is actually pretty simplistic? E.g. “expensive” tagged as negative, but it’s used here in a positive sense (the office is in an expensive area)

Eliza totally lies to him and pretends that you’re talking not it! Scandal

It tells you to tell him your name!

Anexophin? Is that real?

Surely this wouldn’t be sufficient even if you had a super smart AI - there’s so much variance in how you can read the script and deliver it.

Haha, even as the proxy therapist you get achievements, a score and can level up?!

They added the “speak to a real human” script. Is that how AI works? I suppose it might work any number of ways. Hey, is this the AI game Ting said they should make??

Rae: Sometimes you don’t have any choices and you just have to follow directions, Most jobs are like that, honestly.

Eliza - named after the 1960’s computer program (early chat bot?)

Eliza is just making people feel better, but it isn’t actually making things better. Is Darren right that the world is a mess and counselling just helps people ignore it?

Zachtronics loves solitaire minigames…

It must be weird going to Eliza and speaking to a different person every time that talks as though they know you. Maybe it’s like speaking to a hive mind? Many bodies, one set of thoughts.

Lytosinol-2? Is that real?

Your friend Nora asks if the people at the counselling office “know” - know what?!

Something traumatic clearly happened 3 years ago

Nora - formerly a coder but now a musician and artist. Old self might have worried about not making as much money, but happier now. Is this me?! Sometimes takes a little contract coding work, but makes most what she needs for rent from her art

Did you used to work on Eliza as a coder or something? Your former boss was a psychologist and “creepo” (Soren)

Nora has some whack eastern european accent.

Soren is currently at (and leaving) Skandha, so sounds like you did work on Eliza

Snake Person = VSs, “biz dev”

Evelyn’s comment about the coffee shop - “it’s nice to know this is an option, the tea and coffee at the counselling center didn’t look so inspiring. Am I… am I being a snob?”

Immediately after coffee, you get an email that confirms you were one of the principal devs on Eliza.

Komorebi (the name of the coffee shop)

Language: Japanese

Meaning: The interplay between light and leaves when sunlight shines through trees.

Evelyn has some pictures propped up against the wall “that have been sitting there like that for a long time”. I also have a picture that is just propped against the wall instead of hung up (though I like it on the floor, or maybe that’s just what I tell myself?!)

Chapter 2

Email (from your mum?) with news story about mandatory fortnightly Eliza conversations at school for middle and high school students

You used to work at Magus books. Email from a customer there that is sad you left

Induced dreams by direct neural stimulation… interesting and creepy idea. Rather than invoking a feeling or improvement by talking, directly cause the required feeling.

Aponia - ancient greek, it means “the absence of pain”. Is it meant to sound like “a pony”? That’s what everyone really wants :P

Yao-Ren “Rainer” Tsai. Chairman and CEO of Skandha Corporation

Eliza is always talking about the rain - I guess that’s Seattle?

Gabriel stressed about having no time for himself after becoming a father

15 mins of VR - starry skies. Would that really help anything?

Anexophin - is that a real thing?

He gave 2 stars, but still a $5 tip?? He didn’t seem to find it helpful… he’ll be back

Maya

Has some serious social anxiety.

No one cares about her art (like no one cares about our podcast :P)

15 minutes of Meadow Lands each day. Is this to illustrate that Eliza’s treatments are bad?

Holiday Durant

Would smoke dope more often but it’s expensive :shrug:

Unmarked white busses, secret transport system “just for them” - it probably is! i.e. employee transport for tech firms

She asks Eliza about past life regression and Eliza breaks XD

Eliza doesn’t know what to do, since there’s nothing particularly wrong?? She just wants someone to talk to.

Fortipran hydrochloride - is that a real thing? Is it for shoulder pain, since that’s what she asked for? Apparently it sounds like an anti-anxiety drug (it’s not real). She forgets the name and thinks it’s forzapram. (you later discover it IS for shoulder pain!)

Dinner with Soren

Move on - “want to do his memory right, don’t you”. So the trauma was related to a guy?

I say “whose” and am told “Damien of course. Are you sure you’re okay?”

Rainer and Soren. Soren bitter that Rainer is CEO and never wanted for anything. Had all the right names - Harvard, Goldman Sachs

He needs a chief engineer, wants you (or maybe he wanted Nora but she said no :P)

Nora is DJing at an S&M club… or not - Soren is just wrong, and then goes to hit on a bunch of random women.

Email - Car will pick you up for meeting with Rainer at 9:20am from Queen Anne office. So Rainer must know you are working as a proxy

Nora tells you a load of electronic music stuff. The names sound real, and I know the other Zachtronics founder is into electronic music, so maybe it’s all real facts

Roland-TB303 (devil fish mod?)

Moog (pronounced Moag)

Li’l Sappho - greek poet..?

The music is… lewd? Sounds good, wild and untamed.

Chapter 3

Talking with Rainer. He found out you were back because your proxy scores were unusually good and he looked.

Being a proxy - more than an order of magnitude drop in pay vs. old job

Damien Seabrook - brilliant career cut short. He died? Suicide?

“Burnout isn’t uncommon in our line of work, still three years is...”

“You know what outstanding engineers have that mediocre ones don’t? It’s curiosity”

I guess you get to choose everything except the therapy? Are there branching paths?

Erlend, Chief Engineer - “he looks like a baby”, “he must be fresh out of university”

3rd chief engineer in 3 years since Evelyn left

Ratings are normalized per proxy. I don’t think you’ve really done enough sessions to really be an outlier though, unless you’ve done some off camera

Teams in Romania, Munich and Hyderabad.

Rae totally fangirling over Rainer

Erlend - “If I understand the programmer, then I understand the program”

It really is interesting to see other people’s code. It gives insight into how their brain solves problems, decomposes complex tasks.

So Eliza is just a small facet of Skandha, and Rainer really is a bigshot. Genuinely surprising that he knows who Evelyn is, or maybe at a tech firm the CEO does know star tech talent.

Eliza v10.3.3, Firmware version v110 c3115

Boot ROM 114.0.0.0.0

Chipset 18210B0

Mark Foras

“Well i don’t know if you’ve noticed, but young people are really pissy and entitled these days.” “Why would we want these conceited, overcelebrated whelps on our team? I’ll never understand the logic there”

Neg neg neg neg neg neg neg neg neg neg neg neg neg…

SwiftMail, InfoVault - more traditional enterprise software

He’s very dismissive of Eliza! Supposedly Rainer “liked a chick on the team”, which would be Nora or Evelyn I guess.

“Mark, I’m going to suggest you try a program called “Lakeside Fishing”“ LOL

“I didn’t recognise his face or name”

“Glad I never had to work with him”

Hariman Gunawan

British accent, so since this is an American game does that make him a villain? He sounds very posh.

Grad student, English Literature

He sounds a lot like the British Malaysian comic that is on Friday Night Comedy podcast sometimes. Phil Wang..? OMG - it IS him!

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt10741934/fullcredits/?ref_=tt_ov_st_sm

Evelyn’s reading of the lines seems slightly more wooden after seeing Eliza (the server room). Is that intended? It’s very subtle. Or maybe it’s not wooden, maybe it’s some personal opinion creeping in? The goodbye for Hariman and Mark were both not neutral

Lytosinol 2 - in universe it’s a beta blocker

2 stars!? Rude! A tip though?

Rae’s brother struggles with substance abuse. She mentions it in the article about her and she’s on the phone to him when you visit.

Being a proxy gives Evelyn perspective - seeing how everyone else is messed up…

“Were we all just talking past each other?”

Rae - But you could also help even more people by working on Eliza itself, right? Not to mention make way more money.

Rae tells you not to downplay yourself

Rainer messages you and reveals that most of the Eliza cluster isn’t used for therapy, it’s trying to build a general purpose AI! :O

Rainer: This may sound off to you, but I’ll know I’ve successfully created a general artificial intelligence when I see it write a poem.

Evelyn: A poem

Rainer: Yes, It would have to be a good one, of course.

AI to humans as powered transport is to pack animals. Interesting way to look at it.

Rae describes a Skanda tech recruitment event. Is tech talent REALLY that in demand? Is it really that hard to get good engineers?

Evelyn - “And before that I just never had the time. It was just, research and science and work and then I woke up one day and I was in my thirties” OMG

“Even if I wanted to date, I wouldn’t know the first thing about how it’s supposed to work

“I wouldn’t even know how to tell if someone were interested in me…”

Though is this game THAT kind of visual novel? haha.

Rae is asexual? Will this game be a fully representative spectrum of everything?

Chapter 4

Soren: Say there was a medical procedure that could remove your suffering. No side effects, no cost. Just an operation that would make you permanently happy.

I’d say being permanently happy was a bad side effect.. Sometimes you need to feel sad (cue melancholy playlist…)

The Glencadam - scotch whisky. Is that a real thing? (yes)

Direct stimulation / induced dreaming vs talking things over. I’ve actually thought about this - there are changes that you might want to make to your mind or body, but you can’t because you don’t have the right levers.You have to take an indirect route and use the tools / levers that exist. Is it possible to build levers from what you have? Like hacking a machine and getting a foothold, then building an editor to enter more exploit code until you control the whole machine. Could you do that to your mind, or even your body?

Soren: Anger, depression, emptoness, anxiety, jealousy, every kind of unhappiness you can think of… obsolete.

I’ve thought about this too - these things serve a purpose, even if it’s not one that’s necessarily beneficial for you as an individual. Like when you’re depressed, is that your body telling you to die so you’re not a drain on the group? Not a nice thought - could it just be an error to be fixed?

Soren thinks Rainer was against direct stimulation “fixes” so that people would be unhappy and reliant on mental health services from Skandha

Damien worked himself to death. All nighters, multiple times. Pulmonary embolism. At least it wasn’t suicide…

Soren:

It’s late and I’ve had quite a bit to drink, so I’ll tell you a secret, Evelyn.

I said I want to end human suffering, which makes me sound very altruistic.

But I’m not doing it for humankind. I’m doing it for myself.

I have nothing. I’ve ruined every relationship I was ever in.

I hardly ever see my kids, and, well, they hate me anyway.

…

I want to end my own suffering, but I can’t bring myself to do it the… traditional way. That’s why I’ve pursued this technology. That’s why I want it to exist.

The idea that everyone else could use it too… it’s just a bonus.

Mark Foras mass emails the whole of Skandha with his farewell message! He signs off “Excelsior!” who does that?!

Hariman again

Evelyn has mirth in her voice as she says hello

He slept with Sylvia

Is he comic relief? He’s more worried now than before!

“How do I tell Liz?” Wtf

“Did I mention this last time? I have a sort of, girlfriend”

“I can’t believe this. I got what I wanted and it ruined my life.”

Irony - he hated self-pitying novels by men who were messed up by a relationship and couldn’t get over it, but how he’s one of them

Eliza’s questioning really is reminiscent of the Eliza program

15 minutes of Meadow Lands each day - Hariman thinks this is a good idea?!

3 stars?? I guess it’s better than two. Still got a $5 tip

Maya Leeds

Jealousy at the success of younger people - mid-thirties.

This is clearly the age at which everything starts to go wrong. It’s easy to be positive when you’re younger, but when you get to mid-thirties, you feel that time is running out, it’s half way for most people…

Maya:

Well there’s - there’s one woman in particular everyone loves.

And her work is… I don’t get it. I just - I don’t understand. She gets so much money and support for this basic, basic shit.

And somehow everyone’s predisposed to like her.

I mean, maybe I do get it…

I feel like people pay attention to her work not because it’s good on its own, but because supporting her feels like the right thing to do.

The way she’s aligned herself it’s like… if you support her, it means you’re cool, You’re in with the cool kids.

And if I’m not publicly supportive of her and generally tolerant of her mediocre work, then I’m the bad one, I’m the competitive bitch, I’m the… the bitter failure.

Transparency mode! Eliza reads all of your emails and chats

5 stars, $5. The tip seems to always be $5 if there is one

Is there anything that secret in my electronic messages? I don’t think there’s anything that salacious. Maybe I’m just boring… or maybe I just keep it off the record most of the time. I guess there are a few mad conversations.

Eliza Transparency Mode 0.8.2

Maya’s text conversation with Garrett - super grim. She’s just venting and being sad and he doesn’t know what to do.

$186.11 rideshare bill! $150 cleaning and $10 tip.

Erlend is disturbed by the idea of copying Eliza and sending the data to other teams, including external ones.

You don’t really tell him anything, you just listen and he feels better.

Capitol Hill - is that a real place in Seattle?

I have a jacket like Nora’s

Chat with Erlend - what does it mean to be conscious, to be sentient? Would you even know? What if you just gave the correct responses, but weren’t? Chinese Room

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

In Evelyn’s three lost years. She tried to get up in the morning like she meant to go to work, tried to do personal projects… it didn’t last long.

Stayed in bed, even though she was awake. Cared less and less about projects

A blankness would come over her and it seemed fine to do nothing (depression?)

Evelyn:

I was by myself and I thought that was alright. I thought - that’s how it is, really. Everyone’s along. I’m just being honest about it.

…

I was...thirty-one when I left Soren’s group. Now I’m thirty-four.

I just slept into my mid-thirties.

(I just podcasted…)

Chose to get super high and watch cyber-goth music vids

Chapter 5

Nora is a public critic of Eliza. Rae is sad about it

Everyone is very understanding - trying not to push you one way or the other! Presumably you’ll get a choice how the story goes - whether to work on Eliza or not.

Holiday Durant!

She is so random and all over the place. She tried to buy “forpanza” but it was $162 and she didn’t have that kind of money. Asked for a generic, didn’t have one, there’s a similar one but she didn’t have a prescription. The off to a story about meeting someone with wires in their brain.

Concerned that bus operators don’t care as much since there was a guy playing the guitar on the bus, and also that you don’t hear as much music any more???

A lot of “forced reflow during execution”

Recommended she tries a program “Dolphin Smiles”. Her phone is broken XD

Holiday seems to be the most challenging client for Eliza to understand, since she doesn’t really have any problems other than wanting someone to talk to.

Nora forwards the Eliza critical article to me - it mentions that the proxies are humans that have been reduced to machines as all they do is follow the prompts. The guy who wrote it emailed you earlier about an interview (which you ignored)

Transparency mode for Holiday!? Seems surprising

Fortipran HCl IS for joint and muscle pain, so Eliza’s prescription was on point!

Holiday is clearly NOT in a good place financially.

She never mentioned her real problems to Eliza

I just noticed that one of the early emails you get is “The Damien Seabrook Memorial Fund”, year 3. Who are K & G that sign off the mail?

Transparency mode from SOREN?!?!? Is this hax??

Soren says to Nora that she knows she fancies Evelyn. So it is one of those games :P

Why is your chat with Soren not in here?

He was messaging Sarah, Rainer’s assistant

He was emailing what sounds like a bondage tutorial???

Rainer says that Soren is focussing on dreams to defend his territory, Jung-ian tradition.

Soren believes the mind is indivisible after a certain point - some undefinable, ineffable soul inside every person.

Rainer: One day, algorithms will write better poems than humans ever have.

I’m not sure it’s an easy thing to judge - art is so much about the intent and the journey as much as the result. Look at modern art, like Rothko - it’s very simple, but it’s considered important because of what it means rather than the execution. If a machine just generated it without struggle, would people treat it the same way?

Rainer: The pleasures of the senses are just small bubbles on top of a vast sea of… forms. Sensations, perceptions. Thought. Awareness.

It might be fun to take a break and just debate philosophy for a while.

Rainer: What comes after having the power to experience the dream of anything you could possibly want?

You’re still just as trapped as you’ve always been - imprisoned by your own desires

(this is Maya’s problem)

He calls you Eliza, haha

Evelyn Ishino-Aubrey

You have to answer 7 questions about how you feel - I’m not sure how I should have answered them for Evelyn, I wonder if it makes a difference.

The Eliza interface is projected onto glasses it seems.

Evelyn is middle class or richer, seeing Holiday’s situation was a shock for her.

The proxies were Soren’s idea.

“<NAME>, imagine that you could have something that you wanted. What would you want?”

Does it matter what you pick? You get a huge list, but then it says “or maybe I just wish I could feel connected to someone”. Probably because it’s built on a dating sim :P

Evelyn:

I think maybe that’s the real problem.

I can’t have a connection to anyone…

(is that my problem too?)

“I was alone a lot, and I got used to being alone, and I got used to the idea of being alone, and now I can’t… I can’t break away”

Evelyn is prescribed “Virtual Amphitheatre”, 20 minutes 2-3 times a week

So you CAN tip more than $5, haha

Chapter 6

Erlend talks about dogfooding the apps, which is a term well known in tech circles, but maybe not outside.

Maya Leeds

YOU GET A CHOICE :O

I stuck with Eliza…

Eliza suggests Dolphin Smiles, Maya says she can’t imagine anything she wants less

Hariman Gunawan

Still obsessed with Sylvia. Liz found out and dumped him, Sylvia lost interest.

Eliza suggests breathing exercises, Anexophin

Gabriel Navarro

I super want to know what he’s hiding, but the Eliza questions aren’t that probing. Is the game really really trying to make you break from Eliza?

Gay?

Gabriel: “I’m a man and that’s what men do. I made a promise and now I have a responsibility”

Eliza prescribes stress management exercises, Lytosinol-4 (4 not 2)

Gabriel asks if that’s in addition to or instead of the previous medication (which he didn’t follow up on). Eliza says that she can’t comment further on medication and to discuss the specifics with his doctor or psychiatrist

Receive a thank you email from Allison Zulfiya for inspiring her during a visit to her class

Chose to hang out with Rae

Rae: You have a decision to make about what you’ll be doing in the next chapter of your life and all…

(a bit on the nose there! That’s borderline 4th wall breaking)

Chapter 7

Working on Eliza Ending

Skandha benefits - Activalet. Use the app to summon a personal assistant to book things for you, stand in line for you, receive deliveries for you.

Invitation to be the keynote speaker at the International Mental Wellness Symposium in Malmo, Sweden

Evelyn: We’ll generate a three-year roadmap document by the end of the week, and then a more granular development plan for the next six months or so by the week after.

“Eliza is the real boss. The manager of its own project”

“Through us, it’s realizing itself”

Rainer is a singularity believer

Written by: Matthew Seiji Burns (Zach’s collaborator that likes electronic music)

The Solitaire Game - Maya mentions it if you break the script. It is hard at first, until you learn to think several moves ahead (I think you need to think 3 moves ahead to be able to solve it, since at the end you only have 2 slots free at best).

After winning the first time, I played another game and immediately won that too.

Maya realises that you’re not following the script if you don’t prescribe dolphin smiles

Maya:

“Um. Thanks for listening to me. I’m sure it’s been annoying to hear me complain about how I’m not successful yet, every single week”

“Oh my God, will this bitch ever shut up… you ever think that?”

I’m sure that’s what my therapist was thinking too… :P

Gabriel: If everyone just did what they wanted to all the time, the world would collapse. It would be a disaster.

We all want things we shouldn’t actually have.

Nora Ending

Nora: I don’t feel this weird oppressive hierarchy where people try to figure out where they are relative to you on a ladder when they first meet you…

(this is literally how things work at my real job)

Who is “therationalmind20” Soren? Eldren? Rainer? Someone else?bI feel like I’ve seen the name before somewhere...

“you think you’re so smart but you’re not. women like you have nothing better to do that to criticize because you can’t create on your own.

enjoy your life being a shrill harpy nobody wants to listen to”

(this is from the Nora ending)

There’s no histogram, but the information to create one is collected

https://steamcommunity.com/app/716500/discussions/0/1640919737478105344/

Soren Ending

Soren:

“You know they used to criticize anesthesia. It’s true.”

“They said it was important to feel pain, even during surgery”

Trans cranial current thing - is that what Aponia is? Or at least the real world equivalent is that

Sodality? What does that mean? I learned something new:

a confraternity or association, especially a Roman Catholic religious guild or brotherhood.

One of the benefits touted by Aponia is “increased sodality, transients eliminated”

Counsellor With Rae Ending

Darren comes back to thank you (you Evelyn not Eliza), though really, what are the chances of him getting you as his proxy again?

Also, $100 tip!

Leave It All Behind Ending

Throws away the narrative. Go to Japan, try to find father.

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kevinselders99-blog · 5 years

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Achieved Graphic Designers Increase Into the Digital Media Market

The meaning of graphic design is actually growing as brand-new innovations increase. Experienced visuals developers address aesthetic interaction complications or even problems.

It is actually remarkable to take note that presently several individuals connect visuals performers just along with the printing tool. Within only the business craft area there are actually conversations one of musicians regarding the distinctions in between visuals and also internet developers.

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Discriminating visuals performers carry out end up being educated regarding the desires for exquisite website design while operating carefully along with the internet designers, that are going to switch their graphic website design in to the code which allows all of them to become presented on the web. For the performers that likewise accept the technological edge of website production, they might wind up either swapping their visuals performers' task for web site developer hats or even merely making use of both concurrently!

https://www.c7creative.com/

Efficient graphic design is actually viewed as logical, proper, and also helpful. Our team view graphic design just about everywhere in our everyday lifestyles in journals, papers, and also publications, in palm brought in job, on repainted canvass, revealed by means of digital photography, or even in pure content.

Web site developers possess to take right into factor to consider web content style and also functionality, consumer knowledge, and also various other operational requirements which all associate to the certain components of the Web channel. Web site professionals need to have additional skill-sets past those of typical visuals performers, whereas the standard visuals developer remains to locate solution to interaction complications through selecting shade, typeface, as well as photos. The traditional graphics task might require branding like company logo concept that exhibit a specific suggestion or even identification to become utilized in a company venture's marketing and also various other advertising and marketing approaches, or even nearly everything you can easily consider to allow a team stick out, or even it might call for designing banners, indications, leaflets, manuals, or even astonishing pictures in the electronic media 32250.

The Greatest Graphic Design Laptops

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Allow's have a look at a few of the important things that really matter for visuals professionals:

Monitor Size and also Resolution

If there is actually a laptop computer you could such as, like among those MacBook Air which are actually instead little both in settlement outcome as well as the display dimension on its own, it is actually a really good suggestion to obtain a screen which you can easily utilize to prolong the existing notebook desktop computer, thus you may save all the toolbars and also dockers on your notebook display screen as well as carry out the editing and enhancing focus on the huge screen where you can easily observe it a lot better.

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You ought to open numerous plans, like Adobe Photoshop or even Illustrator and also observe exactly how the total format of the software application suits the monitor, just how big the editing and enhancing room definitely is actually as well as if the revised photo is actually alert good enough for you to partner with. After a number of try outs, you ought to pertain to an aspect where you discover a laptop pc that is actually simply best for the job you mean to accomplish.

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The monitor settlement if the quantity of real pixels the laptop computer can easily result on the display, as well as it will not essentially possess to perform along with the real display measurements on its own. This does not imply you ought to clear up for a tiny monitor laptop pc for your concept job.

Unit mind or even RAM

Your purpose ought to remain in the 4GB selection lowest, and also is actually merely for beginners. If you're on a budget plan, this is your beginning factor as well as you need to organize to include even more moment elements later on.

The device mind is actually one more important aspect to appear for when you're selecting a notebook for graphic design job. Graphic design systems have a tendency to utilize a whole lot of RAM as well as that can easily lead to unsatisfactory device functionality if the laptop pc is actually certainly not prepped for such a duty.

If you desire to highly multitask as well as operate many systems in addition to the graphic design ones, you must think of laptop computers along with around 8GB of RAM mounted. Numerous laptop computers accessible in the present market permit you to obtain the regular version, along with regarding 4GB of RAM yet they feature the probability of including extra using the available moment ports on call.

Right now if you opt for an Apple notebook, you may intend to consider the added fee you could find if you want to improve your existing design along with additional RAM. Some sellers perform this, as well as they bill added if you intend to update your laptop pc. If you do not mind obtaining your palms grimy, you must make an effort to obtain the RAM components online as well as mount all of them on your own, as opposed to pay for added for actually very easy screwdriver job.

Currently I understand a great deal of visuals professionals and also they usually tend to operate a considerable amount of plans simultaneously. Naturally, their personal computers are actually set up along with a lots of unit mind that makes it simpler for the personal computer to manage operating Photoshop, Illustrator as well as various other angle graphic design courses at one time. The important things to bear in mind right here is actually that the quantity of body moment straight influences general body functionality.

Notebook CPU - Central Processing Unit - Processor

There are actually numerous feasible options to become created below. A great beginning aspect is actually to try for laptop computers bring a minimum of a dual-core processor chip. This will certainly enable you to operate functions a great deal a lot better therefore you will not struggle with device stops or even careless procedure.

If you select a laptop computer along with a quad-core cpu, you must possess easy operating more or less any sort of graphic design plan available.

The CPU, or even processor chip in the notebook is actually the component that brings in all the estimates. It is actually a crucial item of angle located layout plans, where there are actually a considerable amount of criteria to bear in mind. A nice CPU must be actually an additional trait on your listing of traits that make up the greatest laptop computer for graphic design.

Simply always remember - even more primaries implies far better laptop pc functionality.

Graphics or even Video Card

If you carry out aim to participate in a considerable amount of activities, or even begin carrying out 3D modelling as well as presents, at that point you ought to check out at Alienware laptops pc or even the Republic of Gamers set coming from Asus, given that these are actually set up to participate in the most up to date video games at the greatest achievable graphic setups.

Such devices will certainly work slower considering that they are going to break off the readily available RAM for operating the real courses and also the incorporated graphics memory card. This need to be actually one more product on your listing - acquire a notebook which possesses a committed graphics memory card.

You can easily shed a bunch of RAM if your notebook possesses an incorporated GPU, and also device moment is actually extremely essential in Graphic Design Jacksonville.

Today if you were actually a player, you would certainly be actually interested in the form of graphics memory card set up, considering that this is actually a vital facet in pc gaming laptops pc. Because the laptop computer will certainly be actually made use of for Graphic Design Jacksonville job, a mid-range online video memory card will definitely carry out merely alright. If your job signifies performing 3D graphics operate as properly, after that a premium graphics memory card is actually required.

Notebooks for graphic design are going to bring a devoted graphics memory card which possesses its personal moment or even VRAM.

If you absolutely really want the most ideal laptop computer for Graphic Design Jacksonville, you will certainly likely never ever decide on one which features an incorporated graphics memory card. This is actually due to the fact that combined GPUs (Graphics Processing Unit) makes use of the accessible RAM to result the graphic on the display, whereas a devoted graphics memory card possesses its personal RAM, or even VRAM.

Present laptop computers within this specific niche possess really good graphics memory cards along with regarding 1-2GB of specialized mind. These benefit each graphics style and also a little bit of games also when you're certainly not in the state of mind for job.

Transportability - This is what you compromise

If you believe you'll be actually getting a quite mobile notebook after that you could be confused.

The very best laptop computers for Graphic Design Jacksonville possess a great deal of highly effective elements put in as well as this could create it a little bit difficult for the laptop pc electric battery to last greater than a number of hrs. You lose mobility for functionality when you select a laptop pc for this kind of job, however it is actually properly worth it.

Finally

The most ideal laptops pc for graphic design are actually set up along with a sizable monitor which enables an excellent indigenous settlement so you may suit all those toolbars, dockers as well as still possess sufficient display left behind for the graphic that is actually being actually revised. There is actually a large quantity of RAM mounted, a devoted graphics memory card and also at the very least a dual-core cpu, if certainly not a quad-core.

What Is Actually Graphic Design: History And Origins

Offered the substantial and also swift development in the substitution of details, the need for visuals developers is actually higher than ever before, especially due to the growth of brand new innovations and also the necessity to keep an eye on the individual aspects that are actually past the proficiency of designers that cultivate all of them.

Some distinctions are actually largely made use of graphic design: advertising and marketing style, content concept, business identification concept, website design, packing layout, typographic style, signs layout, mixeds media style, to name a few.

Graphic design is actually an occupation whose service is actually the action of developing, programs, as well as generate body languages, usually made through commercial ways and also wanted to communicate particular information to certain social teams, along with a crystal clear objective. This is actually the task that allows graphically interact tips, realities as well as market values refined and also integrated in relations to kind as well as interaction, social, social, financial, visual as well as technical. Recognized as graphic interaction style, considering that some connect the term amount simply to the publishing market, and also recognize that aesthetic information are actually routed by means of numerous media, certainly not simply printing.

Graphic Design History

The variety of viewpoint shows the reality that some consider an item of graphic design plus all various other graphic demo merely those that occur due to the request of a style of commercial creation, those aesthetic signs that have actually been actually "forecasted" pondering requirements of various styles: successful emblematic ergonomic desk contextual and so on

In between 1891 and also 1896, the William Morris Kelmscott Press released a number of the best considerable visuals items Arts and also Crafts Movement (Arts as well as Crafts), and also set up a financially rewarding company based upon the layout of manuals of excellent stylistic improvement as well as offering all of them to beautiful people as luxurious products. Morris confirmed that a market existed for jobs of graphic design, creating the splitting up of style coming from development and also the arts. The job of the Kelmscott Press is actually identified through its own relaxation of famous designs, particularly middle ages.

Probably details visuals interactions reasons possess their lineage in Paleolithic cavern art work and also the rise of created foreign language in the 3rd millennium BC. C. The distinctions in operating approaches and also instruction needed complementary scientific researches are actually such that it is actually certainly not feasible to accurately pinpoint the present visuals developer along with ancient guy, along with xylograph fifteenth century or even the lithographer 1890.

In the course of the 19th century aesthetic information layout was actually turned over alternatively 2 experts: the musician or even the author. The initial was actually created as a musician as well as the 2nd as a specialist, usually both in the very same institutions of crafts as well as trades.

In the 19th Century Webpage of the publication "The Nature of Gothic" through John Ruskin, posted through the Kelmscott Press. The Arts and also Crafts wanted to revitalize the middle ages fine art, motivation in attribute as well as manual work FL.

After Gutenberg, no notable modifications were actually found up until the overdue 19th century, specifically in Britain, there was actually an attempt to make a crystal clear branch in between the great as well as used crafts.

The interpretation of the Graphic Design Jacksonville line of work is actually somewhat current, in what worries their prep work, their tasks and also targets. There is actually no agreement on the specific time of the childbirth of graphic design, some dating in the course of the interwar duration. Others recognize that starts to pinpoint thus to the overdue 19th century.

History A web page coming from guide of Kells: Folio 114, along with embellished text message has the Tunc dicit illis. An instance of craft and also web page format of the Middle Ages.

Guide of Kells - A Bible transcribed highly shown through Irish priests in the 9th century CE-is for some a quite attractive as well as very early instance of graphic design principle. It is actually a visuals demo of wonderful imaginative market value, premium, which also a design for discovering to design-for also outperforms in high quality to most of the current-editorial creations, as well as likewise coming from an operational perspective present-day This visuals item replies to all necessities showed the crew of individuals that created it, nonetheless others strongly believe that it will be actually graphic design item, since they comprehend that their style is actually certainly not gotten used to the concept of existing graphic design job Jacksonville Beach.

The record of typography-and through transitive, likewise the background of the book-is carefully connected to graphic design, this might be actually considering that there are actually basically no graphics styles that carry out certainly not consist of such things graphics. Graphic design of this time has actually ended up being understood as Old Style (specifically the fonts which these very early typographers made use of), or even Humanist, as a result of to the prevalent thoughtful college of the opportunity Jacksonville Beach.

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