#if anything grief turned me back into atheist | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

nicklloydnow · 1 year

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“Yes, I just didn’t recognize myself anymore. Did you feel the same way? I would look in the mirror and not really know who was staring back. I just seemed like a different kind of being. Grief is extraordinary in its capacity to completely alter us on an almost atomic level. Suddenly, we inhabit a different body. Our relationship with everything seems to change. It’s as if we’re simply a different person. I meant that quite literally. I changed from one person to another person.

(…)

For me, it became essential to work out a way of doing that. I needed a way to articulate grief. I did the in-conversation events, which, to me, were a not always successful attempt at expressing these things. I don’t know really what I was trying to do when I did those; I’d gone a bit mad. They were strange things to do. So it was really with “The Red Hand Files” that I learned how to write about it—even though I couldn’t really talk about it, at least I could develop a language around grief. It took the conversations with Seán—and they were sometimes quite painful—to work out, over time, a way of adequately describing the mechanics of grief. Seán allowed me the time, the room. We are often hyperconscious of the way our grief makes others feel. We become like antimatter sucking everything into the vacuum of our anguish, the air, the life. I don’t know. I just found it difficult to talk normally to people about it. I had to work out a way where I could talk about it without driving myself and everyone else crazy. It’s easier to talk to you about these sorts of things, Amanda, because I know you’re in, as they say, “the club.” The club no one wants to be in.

(…)

My belief in God—well, that’s a little complicated. I’m full of doubt in that respect, but replete with belief, too. Full of both things. Mostly, I inhabit a space between belief and unbelief. But, look, even if it turns out there is no actual divine dimension, music feels touched by something else. The creative process—especially original creation, which, for me, is writing words and music—can feel like hard labor and much of the time is as far away from anything you might call spiritual. I find it can be an agonizing and debilitating and solitary business. But there are sudden mystifying moments of spiritual freedom, where I am lifted from my feelings of inadequacy and I am suddenly flying around the room like a giggling fool, rapturously transported. That’s not just the creative process—that’s life in general. We lead our common lives, but all around there are hunches and intimations and whisperings of something else. These small, softly spoken suggestions are enough for me to feel that there is some enigmatic otherness to be experienced, and that’s where my belief lies.

I understand where atheists are coming from. But I think the relentless shutting down of the idea of the divine is, for me, just bad for the business of songwriting. It feels limiting and uncreative. I think that many musicians are more prone to spiritual ideas because they are naturally closer to the mysterious act of creation. It’s part of our occupation to inhabit a place that is at least adjacent to these ideas. So many musicians I know have a sort of unspoken, unannounced spirituality, which they experience naturally through the making of music.

(…)

Yeah, I totally agree with that. I totally agree with myself. [Laughs.] But, of course, I don’t think anyone who is serious about these matters doesn’t doubt on some level. And, at the very least, doubt is the antidote to dogma and fanaticism and reductionism. This position—and this is not just a religious point of view; I would say, personally at least, this is where I sit on most things—is a place of uncertainty. This uncertainty or unknowing, which I equate with creativity, comes from an understanding of loss. We understand that life is not stable or dependable. This doubt feeds into everything I feel spiritually. I try to approach these matters with humility and uncertainty and to not be dogmatic. That’s my problem with militant atheists: their lack of humility. But, in the end, I don’t think atheism is the real problem. The atheist’s point of view is weirdly sustained through the imagination of other people and their beliefs. A demoralized indifference to spiritual matters is the problem.

(…)

Because grief doesn’t just go away. You become more resilient; you become more effective at navigating and dealing with your feelings. Yet the fundamental loss remains—it doesn’t just dissipate—and, in a strange way, I think it can become a magnet for other losses. We come to see we are all simply creatures carrying around our ever-deepening loss. Small griefs seem to collect around the bigger primary grief. I think this realization allows us to become a true human being.

And I don’t think this situation resolves itself as you grow older. In fact, more people just die. Loss becomes the primary condition of living. That doesn’t mean you’re in a hopeless, grief-stricken state all the time; it just means that you carry a deeper understanding of what it is to be human. We suffer as human beings, but out of that can come enormous joys, and genuine happiness, too. It can run in tandem with this ordinary sense of suffering. Otherwise, joy doesn’t resonate fully. Joy seems to leap forth out of suffering. Regardless of your loss, you see how beautiful, how meaningful, how joyful the world can suddenly be. Human beings in general, you know, are fleeting things. That’s something to understand on a fundamental level. That we have value. That we are precious.

(…)

My objection is not with A.I. in general. For better or for worse, we are inextricably immersed in A.I. It is more a kind of sad, disappointed feeling that there are smart people out there that actually think the artistic act is so mundane that it can be replicated by a machine. I find that insulting. There’s no earthly reason why we need to invent a technology that can mimic this most beautiful and mysterious creative act. Particularly writing a song. The thing about writing a good song is that it tells you something about yourself you didn’t already know. That’s the thing. You can’t mimic that. The good song is always rushing forward. It annihilates, to some degree, the songs that you’d previously written, because you are moving forward all the time. That’s what the creative impulse is—it’s both creative and destructive and is always one step ahead of you. These impulses can’t be replicated by a machine. Maybe A.I. can make a song that’s indistinguishable from what I can do. Maybe even a better song. But, to me, that doesn’t matter—that’s not what art is. Art has to do with our limitations, our frailties, and our faults as human beings. It’s the distance we can travel away from our own frailties. That’s what is so awesome about art: that we deeply flawed creatures can sometimes do extraordinary things. A.I. just doesn’t have any of that stuff going on. Ultimately, it has no limitations, so therefore can’t inhabit the true transcendent artistic experience. It has nothing to transcend! It feels like such a mockery of what it is to be human. A.I. may very well save the world, but it can’t save our souls. That’s what true art is for. That’s the difference. So, I don’t know, in my humble opinion ChatGPT should just fuck off and leave songwriting alone.

(…)

Things are a little different now than they were when I was making “Ghosteen.” I was inside—deep inside—my grief. There were all manner of things that seemed possible in that space. I don’t reject those feelings at all. In the book, I call it the impossible realm, which is not the imagination—it’s adjacent to the imagination and in close proximity to death. It’s a place where one has a sharpened awareness of the essentialness of things, and of the divine. I had a very real feeling at that time that I could help Arthur’s spiritual condition—which really worried me—by creating beautiful music to surround him with. It upsets me when people wave this kind of thinking away as if it’s just magical thinking, as if it’s intellectually dishonest. Because these things helped me enormously. I would put religion in there, as well—religion can be extraordinarily helpful to people. I have a lot of time for religion, in all sorts of ways, but especially in the sense that it is a lifeline to people who really need it. There’s an idea that religion is just a crutch—this is true, actually. Religion is a crutch, and a much-needed one. And I find the radical atheist idea of kicking out the crutches from under people with rationality is mean-spirited. That point of view—I hear it a lot. It feels unkind, ungenerous, inhumane.

(…)

People harden around the absence of a person they loved who has passed on. There’s a deification of this absence. I think this is an extremely problematic situation to get yourself into, and it’s not uncommon—living your life inwardly, focussing in on the dead rather than focussing outwardly on life and living. It’s a difficult thing to negotiate early on. But it’s essential that that happens. It can be difficult and sad, because it is the kind of letting go that no one wants to do. But necessary.”

#nick cave #grief #loss #death #god #religion #art #music

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isaidtheysaid · 2 years

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Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

— Jonathan Safran Foer

A book about grief and how ones deal with it.

Oskar Schell, our 9 year old narrator lost his father to 9/11 tragedy. The book itself open with Oskar narrated things he wanted to invented, as their drove in limousine to bury his father's empty coffin.

Oskar is quirky, educated, smart, know-it-all child. Sometimes, he can be a little bit annoying too. Be it the results from traumatized after losing a father. Regardless, Oskar doesn't seems like nine year old sometimes.

I wondered, for the first time in my life, if life was worth all the work it took to live. What exactly made it worth it? What’s so horrible about being dead forever, and not feeling anything, and not even dreaming? What’s so great about feeling and dreaming?

The book contains many existential question as Oskar brand himself as an atheist.

A year after the tragedy, Oskar still grieving. He upset at her mom who's laugh and seems to falling in love again with another person. The way nine year old would do.

Oskar found a key in an envelope in his dad's belongings. He determined, then, to found the locked that could fit in. In the envelope written the name 'Black', seemingly the only clue he had to find a lock the key belong in. So, Oskar find anyone with the name Black all over the city and visited them to asking about his father and the key.

There's another narrative and different kind of storytelling too. Another plot line told from Oskar's grandfather, through letters he wrote for his son that he never could send off. And Oskar's grandmother, which she wrote letter for Oskar himself. That told about their life.

It’s a shame that we have to live, but it’s a tragedy that we get to live only one life.

The book is sad. Make you tear up. It's hard not to, when someone describe about a tragedy. I particularly moved when Oskar describe his feeling when he found out about his dad and his last call messages. Which he hid from anyone not even his mother, especially not his mother.

“Why do beautiful songs make you sad?” “Because they aren’t true.” “Never.”

Written in experimental writing, which I loved. And picture that seems like just usual picture, but the more you read, the picture made more sense.

It's always tender to read about someone's grief and loses. I think Foer does a good job to portray realistic effect of trauma.

I regret that it takes a life to learn how to live, Oskar. Because if I were able to live my life again, I would do things differently.

For me, this is the book about grief, life, and how ones crave the ability to turn back time.

#books #book review #foer #extremely loud and incredibly close

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kawaiijohn · 2 years

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A short train of thoughts fic for 4/13

It's the anniversary of the thing that changed my life, how I met the most important people to me, how I found the people I want to spend my life with.

How I figured out who I am, who I like, and how it relates to the pride flags I decide to fly.

How I relate to the world around me and shaped my sense of humor.

It's the namesake of my blog, my online identity. I will never change it, no matter how cringe or childish it looks to me now.

Keep in mind I have refused, staunchly, to read the epilogues or interact with homestuck^2, this fic is what I wish had happened.

Here we go

A young man stands in his bedroom.

He looks at his hands and swallows.

It is not his thirteenth birthday, but he remembers it well.

He wishes he didn't, but without it, he wouldn't be the same man.

It was all so fun, at first, but childish glee turned to horror quicky. And the smell of frosting and baked goods were soon followed by smoke and ash and fire.

He closes his eyes and breathes- one thing he remains masterful of. He breathes, but phantom iron and oil coats the inside of his nose and he tastes it in his throat.

He opens his eyes.

He is still in his room.

He breathes in relief.

Thirteen years has helped with the painful memories. And so has the therapy.

Lots and lots of therapy.

The Rose of back then would have picked and prodded as to why it took so long, but the Rose of now is proud of him. He's proud of her as well.

How fucked is it that the shit they'd been forced to endure by an uncaring universe shaped them into what they needed to be? The hero's journey (God he only had a middle school Earth education still) is absolute horseshit.

If he hadn't already met a certain Troll or been a God himself, he'd refuse to believe any sort of God exists in the first place. But it doesn't mean much to him anyways, because he refuses to believe a higher power or fate or the universe or whatever the fuck is anything but caring or good after what happened.

According to Rose (and her wife), it happened to her grandparents too. According to her, they'd somehow decided to continue celebrating holidays that honor God after enduring Earth's darkest tragedy but remained atheist up until they passed when she was a baby.

Something about traditions being more important than belief, but it's not like their little group has many beliefs left besides what their parents taught them.

He laughs, she always tries to comfort him about that, but it doesn't matter all that much. Not when he's finally able to see the good that came out of the whole situation.

The memories have faded, but his friends remain vivid technicolor to his dull world;

The orchid bright of wretched tongues and the weird smell of a handmade scarf. Black and lilac and orange swapping in his mind like she swaps her yarn's colors.

The vivid ruby of heat and throbbing bass, the sound of laughter twinged with southern drawl. The sharp sarcasm and wit that flows naturally between them.

The toxic lime of petrichor and moss, the snort-laughter of a sister he didn't know he wanted. The comfort of babbling on about special interests and the semantics of bullshit fantasy science.

They're his rocks. His comrades. His partners in crime.

He's glad he got to meet them, he just wishes it would have been under normal circumstances.

He daydreams of waiting at an airport with an oversized sign that reads "Mr. Strider" while he wears his Groucho glasses and his dad chuckles beside him. Of picking up Jade from an airport after somehow managing to get a flight, watching her nap on the car ride home. Of flying out to New York and being able to see NYC before it became a pile of rubble.

He wipes a few tears from his eyes and laughs.

He's working on it- letting himself work through the grief of missing his childhood, losing out on everything people should have gotten, of how many people vanished because the universe decided it was time to die.

A young man stands in his bedroom.

He's glad he has the privacy to cry it out this time- that he has to hide up in his old bedroom, he doesn't want to worry his friends before everyone else arrives.

Having to hide from everyone is a huge improvement. Because it's better than spending another birthday alone.

He can hear someone walking up the stairs. He steels himself and dons the traditional party hat he makes sure to get every year.

"Hey ass hat, why are you sitting in the dark?"

"Oh, uh... hey Dave! Is it dark already?"

His boyfriend stares at him like he's grown a second head. "Dude you've been up here for an hour, Terezi said she's almost here and you have Roxy down there staring at the cake with actual stars in her eyes. No idea how the fuck she does that but it's real weird, like anime bullshit or something. Kinda makes me wanna see if it's genetic or some shit, give you the anime ugu kawaii eyes and see if it seduces you more or something."

Dave tries to drape his body over his, but he just snort laughs and pushes his boyfriend away. "Okay yeah that's pretty fucking weird, also you don't need to seduce me bro. We're in this for the loooooooong haul."

Their play fight is interrupted by another two people entering the room.

"I'm impressed that you managed to pronounce eight os in that, John. She'd be proud of you."

"Pfft Kanaya, we all know sky Vriska is real and watching at all times! She'd slap me over the head if I didn't at least try!" John responds from the headlock Dave has him in.

He looks and sees as the rest of their group crowds behind Kanaya and Rose in the doorway.

"Hey when did everyone else get here?" he asks.

"We've all been waiting on you, numbnuts! Terezi was the last to arrive and we come up here to see you pseudo black-flirting with our matesprit!" Karkat huffs.

"Boyfriend, not matesprit."

"WHATEVER!"

"John, are you actually okay? You've been up here for an hour..." Rose asks. "We all worry about you on your birthday, but we know you've been doing better lately. We just worry." She walks over to his bed and takes a seat, patting for him to join her.

He does, and Dave sits next to him, propping his long-ass Strider legs over their laps. It's not long before Jade hops up behind them and drapes over the back of him. And then Kanaya. Then Terezi, and Jane and Roxy, and soon everyone is on his childhood bed crowding him (even Dirk!! Wow!!)

John wipes tears from his eyes.

"You guys are too nice to me. I'm such a jerk sometimes and I really didn't wanna make you worry, but I always get this way on my birthday, this is just the first year we're all together and I'm not alone. I just didn't want everyone seeing me have flashbacks and ruin their day."

"Ruin our day? Chum, you're the birthday boy, if anything it'd be ruining Jane's day, and she's too caring to give a damn about that when it concerns stuff like that!" Jake mumbles from under Roxy.

"Precisely. We're here for you, whether you like it or not." Jane responds from behind Calliope. "Just don't be a jerk and leave us guessing, let us know you're not doing well next time."

"Dude if anything you're the most valid person to be having issues with his birthday. Who else of us had all of their planet fucking explode on their birthday?" Dirk muffles from under someone else. "Shit, your trauma is old enough to get it's name today, that's an accomplishment. Congrats to your trauma, let's name it something like "zoosmell" or whatever the fuck"

John starts to laugh but then feels the tears flow for real, not able to wipe them away fast enough.

The group pulls him in for a hug and he feels like things will finally be alright.

A young man sits in his bedroom.

It was 26 years ago that he was given life, but 13 years ago that he was given a name.

Today, on the 13th of April, he finally realizes his life is getting better, all with the help of his friends and family in a cuddle pile. He finally let's them see how vulnerable he truly is.

It may not be today, nor tomorrow, but soon this young man will be able to heal fully. For now, it is still his birthday, and there's a celebration to be had.

==> John: Celebrate Life with your Friends

[END]

#homestuck #413 #homestuck fanfic #john egbert #my fic #dantes vibe corner #long post #im shoving my vintage pepsicola hands all over this yeet

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honestlyfrance · 3 years

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Sambucky — ya’aburnee // يقبرني ❤️

ya’aburnee - يقبرني

ship: sam/bucky | warnings: hurt/comfort, angst

a/n: ahh slr!! i was working on something else :) hope this suffices, tiana!!

materlist / ko-fi / commissions

Bucky Barnes was immortal. He didn't know this. No one knew this, not even the god he prayed to. All that is known by the gods is that he should've prayed more for mercy, as love is just as sharp as the jab of a knife. Bucky's death will bleed onto his lover.

No one knew how easy people like Sam Wilson were. They die faster, Bucky thinks, because they live recklessly, hiding from death's swinging ax. Benevolent, maybe even cunning. They faked death twice and fucked them into a sweat.

Maybe that's why it's harder to withstand the fall. The Reichenbach Fall, waterfall, the romantic fall, the wall, the wall— the fall, the fall—

When Bucky looked into the mirror of his bathroom, he saw himself. Lines beneath his eyes like the separations of each of earth's layers, eye bags gone but faint and blended into his complexion. His nose is crooked from battles but the scar on his lip tip is still there and it doesn't itch much anymore. His eyes were still a faint blue, the black parts hazy with age. His hair, though, hasn't changed.

He doesn't look much like a human, more of a wax figurine left on a shelf for a certain amount of time.

His hand reaches for a razor and he shaves his entire beard and mustache. He's looking quite younger but still like a figurine.

You know, he's noticed a bunch of times, but for someone out of their own original timeline, he sure does fit well with Sam Wilson.

In fixing the boat, taking long dinners outside in the backyard, watching classic movies until night turns into day. They stay close to each other, like the end of feathers sinking into a bird's skin. Painful to remove, the burden of it all. When Bucky places his hand in Sam's, the hand feels too solid.

Maybe it's the nerves. Bucky hopes it's the nerves.

They go well together, like leaves and flowers. They have their own lives but they fit into each other's existence as if deities were to fold in the nature of existence into their hand. As if it was meant to be. No one can say otherwise. Even atheists can believe.

Now, Bucky doesn't believe in saints but he prays either way. He wishes in between whispers that Sam Wilson may outlive him because god the pressure of his death will kill him either way. It's like that fucking Winnie the Pooh quote with the hundred and one days because living without someone is the worst torture Bucky could ever think above HYDRA.

He's lost so much. He doesn't want to lose more.

Grief runs down like a river for him. Bucky doesn’t want Sam drowning in that path.

“What are we then?” Sam asked as Bucky held his hand, a smile so cute and warm it’s like baby sunflowers on a sunny day.

Bucky smiled, shrugging. “I’d like to be with you forever if you’d like that you.”

Sam does, the man says. And Bucky believed that this is heaven on earth.

Yes, Bucky wants Sam to outlive him. To fuck death into the unliving, to rule the underworld and free every single soul, to love the man until the moment between daybreak and nightfall. In moments unheard, Bucky wants Sam to outlive life itself, the universe itself, atoms itself. Maybe that’s why it hurts so much, to hear a mission gone wrong, to not be there to have his back covered.

Bucky’s one hour away and he just heard that Sam went on a mission in the Bronx without back-up, some spiderman shit, he doesn’t care. He steals the nearest motorbike and almost bullets through traffic and the roads just to reach the man in time before anything bad might happen.

He feels his chest tighten as he sped through three red lights. There’s something in him that can’t help but not trust Sam’s idiotic ass, and why wouldn’t anyone? The man would rush into hell like Orpheus if it means Euridyce can live. He’s sacrificial like that, forgets his fear of death and guilt of hundreds if it could save one more. And Bucky smiles as he sees the debris in front of him. I love him despite all that, he thinks. He wants to kiss Sam silly now.

He throws the bike and rolls off and into the road like a madman. He’s running through the debris and collapsed buildings to find Sam. He ignores the calls, Sergeant Barnes! Barnes! No, at this moment, he’s not Bucky Barnes. At this moment, he is called by Sam Wilson’s name. His name is a man who he loves.

He geos under a leaking pipe, then over a boulder of brick, then through a puddle of what seems to be gasoline. Then he hears the faint vibrations of the shield. He runs carefully now, yelling, Wilson! Wilson, Wilson… It echoes through the chamber. The road slopes downward, and he slips, slides downward with elegance and precision. He lands on both his feet, then starts running.

Some madman villain is responsible for this mess, and Bucky wouldn’t let it worsen.

He reaches Sam who seems to be tired from battling with the madman. He swings one last time and hits the man directly at the head, successfully knocking the man unconscious.

Bucky runs one last time, into Sam’s arms, and they topple down to the floor and rubble. I miss you, I miss you, I miss you, he whispers into Sam’s neck. Their legs tangle into each other and they’re buried into each other’s necks. Bucky trailer kisses down Sam’s cheek and neck, tears almost forming in his eyes.

He feels something warm on Sam’s stomach.

Buckyslowly and carefully leans away from Sam, hovering over the man. Sam says, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. On his stomach is a gaping hole, deep and oozing of blood into his white uniform. Sam is crying, his chest heavy with the burden of the world and his breathing is shallow. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.

Bucky became tight-lipped, then smiled. “You’re here. It’s okay.” he whispered. He activates Sam’s homing signal on his utility belt in a hurry. “You really do bury me, don’t you Barnes?”

“Yes, Wilson,” Sam laughs weakly.

Bucky wishes Sam to outlive him, for reasons like this.

#onlysambucky #sambucky #sam wilson #bucky barnes #winterfalcon #france: works #france: requests #france: writing

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catie-does-things · 3 years

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1/2 What interests me about Susan is, compared to the other atheists, is that her line of logic is never explained (as opposed to Trumpkin or Eustace). She wasn't excited about going back to Narnia? Maybe that was because she didn't think she could, due to Aslan literally telling her she couldn't go back, and before that, the fact that the wardrobe wouldn't open for them after they came out the final time and she had no way of knowing that there were other ways to get into Narnia.

2/2 Her personality changes in every installment, unlike all the other characters. She's borderline amoral in LWW, an illogical wet blanket in PC, a mindless coward in HB, and we hear from third-hand sources that she'd adopted Lasaraleen's personality in LB. So what happened? What's her logic for being the way she is? Lewis never tells us.

So, in other words, Susan will find her way back to Narnia easily because she's weak. Losing her entire family will send her into a spiral of grief, which will turn into nostalgia, which will turn into a longing for Narnia. What a horrible message to teach children. Compassion? Ability to weather life's cruelties? Worthless. Just long for an idealized image of childhood, and you'll be set for life.

Peter and Edmund and Lucy all still believed in Narnia and Aslan after being told they'd had their last adventure, so I don't think that lets Susan off the hook, especially if what she and Peter were told was anything like what Edmund and Lucy are told at the end of VotDT: that their adventures in Narnia were specifically for the purpose of preparing them to better know God in their own world. It also doesn't make sense to say she had no way of knowing there were other ways of getting to Narnia when Susan herself has already gotten to Narnia two different ways (the wardrobe and her own horn).

I've kind of already addressed this but I don't think there's anything particularly inconsistent about Susan from book to book. Her flaws are pretty much the same: letting fear and an over-reliance on what she perceives to be "practical" cloud her better judgment. She's never outright immoral or cowardly but she does make mistakes because of these flaws - different mistakes in different situations, but the flaws behind them are the same.

The message of Susan's story is not that compassion or resilience are useless, it's that material concerns can lead us astray if we're not careful. Immediate, earthly things can be good in their own way but God is more important. Peter and Edmund and Lucy all know this by the end of the story. Susan doesn't - which is not to say she never will, but she doesn't when the books end and she might not learn it after. That's the point. Settling for lesser goods can deprive us of higher ones. If you got anything else out of Susan's story, it says more about your own assumptions than it does about the text.

Finally, the idea that what Susan rejected, and what her siblings held on to, was some kind of "idealized image of childhood" is a notion that also completely ignores both the purpose of the books in real life and the purpose of the children's adventure in Narnia in-universe. "Aslan's country" is not an idealized children's fantasy world. It's heaven. Like, within the world of the books, it is literally heaven. And the lesson children are supposed to take away from the books is to long for eternal life with God in heaven.

#the chronicles of narnia #the problem of susan

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livingasaghost · 3 years

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warning: this post will contain spoilers for the new mike flanagan show MIDNIGHT MASS. content warning for death, grief, religion.

as someone who was scarred by horror as a child and someone who hates halloween, no one is as surprised as i am that mike flanagan is one of my favorite directors/creators. for those who don't know, this is the man behind THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE and DOCTOR SLEEP. when hill house was released a few years ago, it was barely even on my radar. the only reason i decided to watch it is because everyone kept going on about how it was so scary it made them throw up or pass out or whatever.

not sure how that spurred me to turn the show on because quite literally i do not like scary things and i've had nightmares for years because of the poltergeist. but, i did in fact turn on this scary show at night in the dark of my house alone. and spoiler alert: it changed my life.

since then i've seen hill house about four times all the way through and i've also seen bly manor. (and obviously midnight mass.) as i continue to watch mike flanagan's works, i've been struck by his storytelling, his vision, and his art direction. this man is a star of his craft. when i watch his works i spend half the time studying his camera angles, his script, the little easter eggs he leaves behind. his shows fall under the same category as most of my favorite media: highly conceptual creations that feature strong themes and messages that change the way you perceive the universe and yourself and other people. i think i will spend my entire lifetime trying to explain this type of storytelling. stories like house of leaves or cloud cuckoo land or the starless sea. stories about how life is just a story, just a dream, and all we can do is appreciate our time on earth and the people we surround ourselves with.

when midnight mass originally was announced and the trailer dropped, i don't think i fully appreciated what it would be. it didn't really occur to me that mike was working on a new show, and it also didn't occur to me that while this new show wasn't a "haunting" show...it also was exactly that. there was so much hype leading up to bly manor, and when that dropped i was left feeling fairly disappointed. i think it's better that this new series doesn't fall under the haunting franchise, but i can understand and appreciate that it's basically a continuation of mike's television works. it's the same cast, the same feel, the same director...just different. and nothing like hill house or bly.

MIDNIGHT MASS is the story of a small town, an island town, that gets a new priest. you can't know more than that going in, but if you're reading this i'll assume you've either seen the show or you don't mind getting spoiled. (last chance.) what first seems like a show about alcoholism and god, quickly turns paranormal and supernatural. the show explores so many deep themes like life after death, what happens when the church strays from god and begins to glorify itself, small town religion, forgiveness. while the plot itself is incredibly compelling and it's a great mystery, i think what always gets to me about mike flanagan shows is that at the end of the day, even though it's horror and it's thrilling to watch, there is always that underlying message that is beautifully crafted and explored and it's usually about death and/or grief. midnight mass is such a wonderful addition to the flanagan collection because it forces you to look at the act of death head on. while it does explore grief, so much of this story is about what happens when you die and where you go and what comes next. and i've spent a lot of my life actively trying not to think about that.

a few months back i read a little life by hanya yanigahara and that book is all about friendship and life and also grief. it's about knowing that no matter how long your life is, at the end of it, we all die and we all lose people and one day people will lose us too. and while it's been months since i've read or actively thought of that book, i think so much of that set the stage for my 2021. i have dealt with grief in recent months, i dealt with the loss of our cat, and the combination of all of that PLUS watching this show...it really struck a chord with me. a weird one. i think the older i get the more fascinated i am by death and grief and loss and while sometimes that can be debilitating and scary, i think it's also incredibly freeing.

there's a scene (that happens twice) where two of the characters are discussing what happens when/after we die. and since this show centers on christianity, of course one of those scenarios reflects on heaven. the other scenario pictured is from more of an atheistic/agnostic perspective: that when we die, our bodies shut down and that is the end of it. what shocked me most is that as someone raised christian, someone who actively believes in a god and has read a lot about "the afterlife" or what not, i don't know that i have ever let myself believe in or think about a death that doesn't have an afterlife. doesn't have a heaven. i can't tell if that's just really good brain-washing by the church or what, but in watching that scene i felt both the thrill of fear and also a bit of relief.

here's the thing. after thinking on it all more, i obviously don't have the answer. we don't know what comes next, if anything. i think most of what religion and faith comes down to is knowing we won't know and also knowing that there isn't any logic when it comes to spirituality. to a god. as much as science exists, if we believe in a higher power, we also have to accept that science cannot explain everything. that science isn't everything period. i would like to think, and will hopefully continue to believe, that erin's view of life after death is real. that heaven exists, that we will all be reunited one day, that there is a higher power who wants us all to be loved and not alone for eternity. that sounds real to me. but i also have realized that i have doubts. that the logic side of me believes that when we die, our bodies will shut down and we will go to sleep and that will be the end.

and you know what? even though that is scary and it's a recent thing for me to consider (especially as someone who is more and more becoming anti-religion in some ways), it's also a huge fucking relief. it's a blessing. to not exist.

that sounds like my depression talking, but it's not. i promise. i've never been the type of person who wants to live forever or extend my life span. part of the whole point of mike flanagan shows, of the types of books and stories i enjoy, is that without an end, there's no point. what's the purpose of living forever? if you've seen the good place there always reaches a point where you've reached your full potential, where you've done everything, where things stop having meaning because they've lasted so long. and obviously death is still scary, not knowing what comes next is terrifying, but watching this show gave me a kind of comfort about death that i didn't know was possible. and this is a horror show about religious vampires.

throughout all the gore and hypocrisy and terror and violence of this strange show, i found myself at peace.

#midnight mass spoilers #midnight mass #mike flanagan #hill house #thohh #personal #anyway i wrote this for my patrons but im dropping it here for yall too

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kimberly-spirits13 · 4 years

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Car Rides and Tragedies (Request)

Paring: Tim Drake x reader

Synopsis: It’s the anniversary of your parent’s deaths and you keep it to yourself until everyone turns in for the night and you bask in the silence of the kitchen before a certain Robin comes to cheer you up.

Warnings: Mentioned deaths, grief, talking of homelessness and parental death

Word Count: 955

The team had all retired for the night and you seemingly did the same. It was a few minutes before you came back out of your bedroom, a blue leather book in hand and an old, very oversized sweatshirt from Princeton. Your hair was loose and messy, you not really having the energy to do anything with it. In your other hand was an old coffee cup that your mother always used in the morning, according to your vivid memory. You were almost tempted to bring out the old tapes that your father had recorded of you guys and your bear from childhood before their deaths. You thought better of it however, in case one of your teammates came out and asked you about it.

Carefully and silently, you walked to the counter and set the book down before going and making your favorite drink in the cup. The room was silent as you slid into the seat opening to the first page of the book. It was a family album with a few stories inside that your parents had put together when they found that something might happen to them a few months before their sudden deaths.

The first page read, “To our wonderful child, to whom we will cherish forever, a token of memories and a story of the family. Even in separation, we are with you.”

You fought the tears welling in your eyes looking down at the pages in front of you. They were filled with happiness and the longing of a time that was no longer with you. The one page that made you almost seriously loose it was a page filled with your more recent memories with them and pictures that you had never known were taken.

Everything was flooding back into your mind before you heard someone walking in the room. Quickly, you shut the book and wiped the tears from your eyes in an attempt to hide your sorrow.

“Y/N? Is everything alright?” You heard Robin ask.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” You answered, “Watcha doin?”

“I came to get some more coffee so I can continue working this case.” He explained before cocking a brow, “You’re going to attend Princeton or just a fan?”

“Oh, this?” You looked down at the sweatshirt, “It was my father’s in college, he went and studied in the medical field. Neurosurgeon.”

“That’s really cool.” Robin frowned for a minute, “You don’t talk about your parents a lot.”

“Yeah...” Your words got caught in your throat for a second, “Today is the a-anniversary of their crash.”

“Y/N/N, I’m so sorry.” He came over and gave you a small hug blushing slightly at his impulsive action as you let a few tears slide out, sniffling.

“I-it’s okay.” You said taking a sip of your drink.

“My parents died too.” He said taking his coffee mug and sitting down.

“I’m sorry to hear so many here have such terrible back stories.” You stated almost being a bit humorous.

“Yeah, I know, right?” He smirked some.

“I was 14 when it all happened.” You started to explain, “They were hit on a mountain road... didn’t stand a chance.”

He started at you in disbelief waiting for you to continue.

“Sorry, you probably don’t want to hear my sap story.” You said tucking a piece of hair behind your ear.

“No, no, if it helps, by all means, continue. I get what’s happening Y/N.” He assured.

You bit your lip some thinking, “It was 2pm when the call came in. I remember it like it happened just today. They were riding down a highway when a massive black car rammed into them knocking them off of the road and into the valley below. There weren’t really any witnesses but one hiker who saw the entire thing. They said that the car drove off. The police cleared it as a hit and run but I know someone did that on purpose. My parents were very

well-known people in their fields, my mother, a lawyer, and my father, a neurosurgeon of course. They had had someone call a hit on them but never really took it too seriously until a few weeks before they were killed. By then the police were no help.” You signed some thinking again, “I was homeless for a few months. It was harder than losing my parents. I practically begged for food and money, stealing sometimes during the harder days and then eventually I was caught by Wonder Woman who brought me here.”

“That’s one hell of a story Y/N.” Robin said, “I never would have guessed.”

“Yeah...” You sighed again feeling the heaviness of the night creep back on your chest slowly.

“Why don’t we watch a movie?” He asked, “We can in my room as to not wake the team up.”

“Uh sure.” You consented getting up to clean out your mug and put it into your bedroom once more.

You sat down on his bed as he pulled out the bigger computer and sat it in the middle and turned on the movie you requested. You guys talked some and learned more about each other, even the happier parts. Before the movie was over however, you had fallen asleep on his shoulder, snugged into his side. Robin blushed furiously seeing as he had developed a small crush when you arrived, now only increasing since you guys had bonded so well. He let you sleep in his room and started back at his work, leaving you next to him in case of any bad dreams that might come during the night. He smiled down at you wishing you a silent good night as you lay fast asleep forgetting the cares of reality.

I really loved this request so much. We’ve had a ton of health scares in my family, some very close to parents and such so it was close. I’m not writing any new requests until my exams are over and those dates are specified in my update post. Other than that, I hope you guys have a great week and are keeping up well!

PS: So, I’ve been thinking of writing this story that I dreamed up one night, quite literally actually. It is about this girl named Seraphina that works and lives in this haunted museum kinda thing where the spirits of people from different eras are trapped in their portraits and once every year during the Summer Solstice, they are let free. One day an evil force comes in and tries to send all of the spirits to hell to become eternal slaves or smt and Sera has to travel around the world collecting artifacts with three spirits, one a Greek woman who was killed for her beliefs and is really spunky and out spoken, the other a woman killed alongside Marie Antoinette who was atheist and argues with the Greek woman a ton, and the other is an old philosopher who sits on the side lines and makes commentary about the fights. The entire thing is kinda Panic Room vibes on top of like vintage old soul stuff. I was just wondering if anyone would read it since it isn’t technically a fandom thing?

#tim drake x reader #tim drake x y/n #tim drake #tim drake imagine #dc comics #dc x reader #dc characters #young justice x reader #young justice #young justice robin #young justice robin x reader #batfam x reader #batboys x reader #batfam

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bot-imagines · 5 years

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I just watched Ghost Whisperer and had an idea for an imagine! What if the Autobots (tfp plz?) met a human who could see and speak to the dead? Like, helps them to cross over and stuff?

(Oh man, I used to watch this show with my mom as a kid. It was so good and yet always made me so sad)

TFP Autobots Meeting A Human Who Can See And Talk To Ghosts

Optimus Prime

When he first learns about their abilities, he’s unsure what to say. It’s very rare for him to ever be at a loss for words, but they’ve managed to do it.

This raises a whole slew of questions for him - Humans don’t have sparks, and yet their spirits linger. Do the humans have an afterlife? How can they have an afterlife if they do not have sparks? He’s going to be consulting the Matrix for some sort of answer.

He’s happy to learns that they are using their abilities for a good purpose. Helping these wayward spirits move on and helping their loved ones heal in the process is a noble cause in his eyes.

Ratchet

The guy’s an avid atheist, so it’s going to take a lot for him to even believe that this human is legit (and even then, he may not 100% believe it’s true)

He’s going to write off any and all paranormal encounters they have in their line of work as tricks of the light and such. Even after things start getting weird with Unicron, Ratchet is skeptical af.

When he first learns about how the human gets in contact with a spirit’s loved ones to try and figure out what unfinished business they have, he’s upset. They have a lot of nerve taking advantage of someone’s grief to sell a scam.

It takes a lot of explanation and time, but eventually, even if he never believes they can see ghosts, he can begrudgingly admit that their work has seemed to help people move on through their grieving process.

Bumblebee

Surprisingly, he’s also a sceptic. He just can’t wrap his head around the idea that humans have an afterlife and can be spirits. He certainly wants to believe that they do - for Raf’s sake - but he just doesn’t see how. Organics don’t have sparks - ergo, they don’t have an afterlife.

It’s not until after everything with Unicron is revealed that he really starts to come around to the idea. If Earth was created because of Unicron, than all of humanity has a smidgen of Cybertronian spark in them. Now he thinks that humans are the only organics with an afterlife. It doesn’t necessarily solve the problem, but at least he believes the human now.

He’s really interested in the human’s line of work now. He may offer to help with investigations for them if he has the time for it. It quickly becomes one of his favorite past times whenever Rafael isn’t around.

Arcee

She actually believes them right off the bat. After everything that has befallen her throughout the course of the war, Arcee turned to the idea of the Well for comfort. The notion that she may one day reunite with Cliffjumper and Tailgate in the Well of Allsparks is sometimes the only thing that keeps her going. So learning that the humans have the same thing? She’s elated.

She’s going to ask questions. A lot of questions. She wants to know everything she can about the human’s work and what they know of ‘the light’. She wants to know if she’ll be able to introduce Jack to her fallen partners someday.

She’ll definitely offer to give the human rides to help them cross spirits over. Not only because she wants to help the spirits too, but because it helps her work through her own grief as well.

Bulkhead

He’s really confused. It’s not that he’s a skeptic or anything - he just genuinely doesn’t get it. The idea of ghosts at all is weird to him. He always thought that ghost were made up monsters from TV.

Once the initial confusion is set aside, he’s more than a little unsettled by it. Invisible formless human presences that move about without anyone being able to see them? Living on and on without any rest? Gives him the heebie-jeebies.

He’ll opt out of helping the human if he can, but he won’t outright say no if they ask him to give them a ride somewhere.

He only asks that they not tell him if there’s a ghost in the base. He won’t be able to recharge if there is.

Smokescreen

What are you talking about? Humans don’t have sparks. No organics do. There is no convincing this boy. He is surprisingly stubborn when he wants to be. Sure, he believes in the mysticism surrounding the Primes, but ghosts? No way.

Smokescreen is very much of the mindset that spirits only emerge if they are needed for things like passing along wisdom or vital information. Like the Matrix of Leadership. Simple unfinished business seems pretty dull in comparison. He’s actually more than a bit insensitive about the whole thing at first.

It’s only after he realizes what a jerk he’s been that Smokescreen will start watching what he says. He’s hesitant to give rides when asked, but he’ll do it if he’s ordered to. Still doesn’t believe though.

Wheeljack

No matter how unconventional he is, Wheeljack still has some standards he keeps close. Respecting the dead is one of them. After all the comrades he’s lost in the war, it’s not surprise really. He’s not so sure about the whole ‘organics have an afterlife even though they don’t have sparks’ thing, but he’s quick to accept it. Who is he to say that there isn’t an afterlife for organics? There’s nothing wrong about just believing the human.

He’s the first to ask if the human can see Cybertronians. He knows the stories that when a spark is extinguished, it returns to the Well of Allsparks, but when he learns about ‘unfinished business’, he starts to speculate. Could there be a soldier’s spark wandering an alien planet, doomed to limbo for all eternity because of something they left behind?

He’s a bit too proud to ask a lot of questions, but he always keeps an audial open for any information they give about the spirits they help. He hasn’t heard them say anything about seeing a fallen Autobot or Decepticon yet, and for both their sake and his species, he hopes they never do.

Ultra Magnus

He’s almost as skeptical as Ratchet (maybe even a little bit more tbh). I mean, really. Human spirits lingering on an entirely different plane of existence simply because of something as trivial as ‘unfinished business?’ Ridiculous.

He openly rolls his optics whenever the human mentions their work. He’d tell them to stop, but Optimus believes them, and Ultra Magnus isn’t about to say something that could upset his leader.

He’s heard enough of this sort of thing back home, with Primus and the Well of Allsparks. He’s not sure if there’s really an afterlife for Cybertronians, but he definitely doesn’t believe that humans have one. Absolutely not.

He’s the only one who outright refuses to help them whenever they ask for his assistance. He will not be pulled into these ridiculous games. He has real work to do, thank you very much.

#tfp imagine #transformers imagine #transformers prime imagine #optimus prime #tfp #transformers prime #ratchet #bumblebee #arcee #bulkhead #smokescreen #wheeljack #ultra magnus #my imagines

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iamjjmmma · 5 years

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tldr: I have bpd. (Loong text ahead)

Note: All names have been changed for privacy.

I never like to open up about mental health. Not only is it messy- it's also degrading. But this is an exception.

So I'm going to lay it out for you. Right here, right now.

I have borderline personality disorder.

I'm telling you because, unlike with so many other things about me, you deserve to know this. And the way I got my diagnosis was long, narrow, and harrowing. So get comfy.

Of all things, it all started with a death. About a month ago, a family friend who wasn't any older than three or four died. My entire family was devastated, but for seemingly no reason, I seemed to be the one who cried the most, who felt the most heartbroken. Not even my cousins, who were closer to her, cried this much. Of course, my sister noticed and encouraged me to get myself into grief counseling. I love my sister more than anyone else in the whole wide world, so it didn't take long before I was booking my first appointment with a Catholic counselor 45 minutes away who knew me ever since I was little.

"Hey there, Sk3ltal. Something seem to be a problem?

" I get angry. I'm in your office, I think. How the hell would there NOT be a problem? I think. But over five years of this kind of anger gives you a kind of knack for brushing it off as hormonal and pretending your fine.

"Well, Manuela...something does seem to be a problem. Somebody...close to me died. And she was young..."

At this point, I'm bursting into tears. I wonder why. I get the "oh, honey, it's okay" treatment. She gives me a hug, offers me all the tissues I need, even lets me hold her dog if I can get past the fact that he's just about as still as a blast of wind. Thirty seconds later, I'm fine again.

"Manuela, I want to make sure that I'm fine. That it's not grief and just sadness. I want to know how not to lose it in public. Because I feel crazy."

Manuela bites her lip. "Grief does make the most ordinary people act like insane asylum patients, no?"

A week later, I'm back in her office. By now, it's almost the end of September. And something"s eating at me. For the first time in my sixteen years, a movie not only humanized the villian, but made me relate to her. Relate to her enough to do this. BPD. Only heard about it once or twice before. Asked my mom if I had it, then she laughed and said it was just me being a teenager and that yes, crying four times a day and slamming the door EVERY TIME YOU HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO was completely normal.

So was the scratches on my skin I convinced my parents was "wicked eczema", and so was me pulling out my hair and banging my head against solid objects. And now, people were talking about how a movie character had it, and how many symptoms she exhibited. Suddenly, hunger for knowledge reached out its hands. I wanted to know.

Could it be I had this? And what was it?

Manuela was a little concerned, but considering I was getting bored as usual in her office, she let me take the questionnaire. Five minutes pass by, half of which I spent taking the quiz. And I think the moment I saw her face turn pale was the minute things started to fall apart and go back into place, all at the same time. "Honey, I...you're positive." ...

Of course, I wasn't diagnosed right then and there. I had to make sure I could point it back to a specific event when it started- in this case, what happened when I was ten between my childhood best friend and i; she ghosted me, and i haven’t heard a word from her since- so they couldn't blame it on my "womanly teenage hormones" (yes, I was telling the truth; the event just helped to rule out those hormones). My family and close friends, whatever the hell the last one was, were interviewed. When my dad was interviewed, I could feel his face turn pale this time as he whispered, "Oh, my God. You just described my kid. Something's wrong with my kid."

Next was a rudimentary physical with my family practitioner. to make sure nothing physical, other than me being a teenager, could be causing the symptoms. When the doctor said "nothing's wrong other than what you keep on seeing me for so far", my heart didn't sink. I didn't feel anything. The diagnosis was made official a short time later, but I didn't feel anything then either. And that's, ironically, a huge part of borderline personality disorder.

Borderline personality disorder, to flaunt it in a more colorful way, is your mind constantly being fucked by a tornado of emotion while the borderline, which is what the disorder is named after, obtains a corporeal form and joins in the fuckery to create a massive threesome. Four if you count Lonely, my friend in the back.

Getting my diagnosis may havw been one of the most quietly difficult things I've ever done.

There's the fact that some mental health professionals are afraid with those with borderline personality disorder, or think it's completely impossible for children or adolescents to have it. If not for the relationship Manuela and I already had, I most likely would have been misdiagnosed again. On to the misdiagnoses, which are staggeringly common in those with borderline personality disorder. I was diagnosed...

-three times with some type of anxiety

-twice with PTSD

-once with bulimia

-accused hundreds of times of being demonically possessed because of my "temper". that priest now knows better.

But now to the real criteria. There's nine of them, and to be diagnosed, you need to get at least five.

-Abandonment issues

This was the biggie. It was almost like I grew up, then regressed. This all started when I was eleven, and my mind would switch from being 4 to being the 11 year old I was. I have too many stories of me being left alone for a ridiculously insignificant amount of time, then me acting like a scared toddler in solitary confinement about it. The time at the high school when I got locked in the bathroom. The time I got left in the car for 5 minutes and almost broke the door trying to get out. There's so many more, but this one, I think, takes the cake.

I was twelve. They had the house childproofed because of my sister, who was 7 at the time and had autism, so she tended to be grabbier than then average bear. The acting out was at its peak back then, and my parents made the mistake of putting me in time-out by locking me in my bedroom for five minutes.

What happened next was almost indescribable. Imagine the outright terror the character in the movie feels when he or she is stranded and realizes they're utterly alone. No one will come to save them. No one. The helicopter they came in is empty. The island always has, and always is, empty. Or imagine the terror you felt at school during that one time it WASN'T a drill. Now multiply that feeling by about sixty. I was nothing more than an animal that day. I screamed.

"LET ME OUT OF HERE!" "SOMEBODY HELP ME!" "DON'T LEAVE ME ALONE!" "I DON'T WANNA DIE HERE!". Bang, bang, bang, bang, BANG, BANG.

My parents always tell me that I would've beat that damn door down had they not gotten me out. They open the door. I practically jump on them to hug them. They bump me off, and while I'm not hurt, it's not like that made me feel any better, either.

"What is your problem, young lady?! Can't we leave you alone for five minutes? How are you going to be able to be an adult and be like this?"

Tears poured down my face. I didn't know.

Hell, I still don't know.

-"Borderline" way of thinking when it comes to relationships...always seeing others as either perfect angels or a bucket of nasty-ass toxic waste.

-Self-harm.

No, I don't cut myself. that's the stereotype, although there's people I know who self harm in this way. I didn't know what it was called or what I was going.

but all I knew was that I was relieving whatever tension I had, even if it meant hurting myself. I quickly learned how to keep it hidden, and that was by realizing the millions of nerves on the surface of my skin and how that would cause pain without much overall damage. so I scratched myself. and scratched. and scratched. and scratched. pulling my hair was also a good option. if I feel really crummy, I start to bang my head into solid objects or bend one of my bones, although not enough to break it.

at first, it was to transfer emotional pain into physical pain so I wouldn't have to feel it emotionally anymore.

and it's still that now, to an extent. except it's more about controlling my anger and not letting it show in public, instead keeping it chained to my skin. and I'm sorry if this sounds emo or cringy, but it's true.

now, it's turned into an impulse.

-unstable relationships.

my friends can all tell you that I love them dearly, more than the vast majority of the people they know. and they also know that I'm also more prone to lashing out or doing things in the relationship that don't make sense, like purposefully ignoring texts and phone calls for a day.

-shifting self-image.

what I wanted to be when I grew up was sometimes as fickle as the time of day. I wanted to be an actor during one point in my childhood. it consumed my everything, kept me from eating, from sleeping. and at another short point, I know wanted to be a singer.

in the course of one particular year, I wanted to be a nun, then an author, then an engineer, then a truck driver, then a nurse, then a teacher. it was ridiculous,

and all happening during a period where the education system expected me to decide what I wanted to be.

and what about who I was? was I a girl? a boy? young? old? the best Catholic there was? a solid atheist?

I have my 5. there's more, but I don't want to share it all, at least right now. and most of it is actually because the program I'm using to type this is really shitty when it comes to saving huge chunks of text lol.

Treatment:

I've started therapy. So far, both Manuela and I are still researching BPD so none of us are blind to stigma. However, there's a long road ahead of me, and a road I most likely wouldn't even consider taking if it weren't for my love for my sister (which I'm begging is genuine and not just a product of my mental illness). Finding a medication will be tough, seeing as there's no official medicine for BPD but so far, for the first time, I can feel the "BPD me" fading away when I drink tea with ginseng (a mood stabilizer).

getting "better" from BPD, or at least working to alleviate the symptoms, requires just that: work. lots of patience, persistence, and just lots and lots of hard damn work.

it'll take us getting rid of societal stigmas and working through the root causes, which unfortunately I can't just be "taken away from" as with those whose BPD diagnoses came while they were still living in broken homes.

And the worst part of it all is that I still love my best friend.

#Bpd #mental illness #diagnosis story

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kimabutch · 5 years

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JLCR: kimabutch edition

To celebrate somehow reaching 1000 songs on Jam Like Critical Role, the giant fan-created playlist that I’ve been curating since February, I’ve decided to put together a mini-playlist of own, featuring two of my favourite songs for each member of Vox Machina and The Mighty Nein! Each song has a YouTube link, but you can find the whole mini-playlist on Spotify here.

By mini-playlist I meant that there are “only” 36 songs, and also that I’ve pulled out my favourite lines and explained why I associate the song with them, so that this whole thing is approximately 5400 words long. I tried to restrain myself, but, well, Jam Like Critical Role is a testament to my lack of self-restraint. If it helps, I’ve tried to incorporate a diversity of artists, eras, and genres, from folk-punk to techno, country, dream-pop, classical, and beyond. I hope you find something you enjoy.

Grog

We’re Going To Be Friends, Jack Johnson (cover of White Stripes), for Grog and Pike’s incredibly wholesome childhood friendship. While many of the lyrics describe friends at school, which is not totally accurate for them, I can just imagine the two weirdos playing among the bugs:

“Walk with me, Suzy Lee/ Through the park and by the tree/ We can rest upon the ground/ And look at all the bugs we’ve found”

Not to mention Pike teaching Grog his ABCs:

“Tonight I’ll dream while in my bed/ While silly thoughts run through my head/ Of the bugs and alphabet”

I just love these two silly monstahs.

Giant, Juno Reactor: to balance out that last song, have some techno that makes me want to yell “Vox Machina, Fuck. Shit. UP!” and split Kevdak in half with a nat 20 from the sky. Appropriately named for our goliath friend, this song always temporarily convinces me that I, too, am a seven foot tall barbarian (which is not recommended while you are trying to do anything that requires brainpower.)

Keyleth

I Lost Myself, Lauren Mann and The Fairly Odd Folk, for Keyleth’s self-doubt about whether she can do her Aramente (or whether she even wants to) and fear that she’s hurting everyone:

“I’ve got voices in my head Making me think that this is where I end Hey, what do you see, if anything What do you see in me”

This specifically reminds me of her Aramente, and how it taught her so much more than she was expecting:

“You and me we made a plan To travel from here to there and back again Somewhere on that weathered road I found the dreams that I’d been looking for”

And “Hey, we’ve got the world to see/ So let’s forget our anxieties and get on our way” makes me think of Keyleth and Percy’s friendship, and how both of their stories are about trying to figure out what to do once you’ve achieved your goals. I want to think that after the story ended, they were still occasionally able to leave behind their responsibilities and travel the world together.

Take Us Back, Alela Diane, for a post-canon Keyleth, reminiscing on the old days and eventually outliving the rest of Vox Machina. I get a strong image of Kiki coming down from Zephra to see her friends:

“Atop the crags and cliffs the air is thin/ So we’ll find a mountain path on down the hill/ Meet me where the snowmelt flows/ It is there, my dear, where we’ll begin again”

And of her listening to Scanlan’s music, centuries later; they’d be the last two alive: “I’ve a friend who lives out by the river’s mouth/ He knows the fiddle’s cry is an old sound”

And then Keyleth, alone, listening to a river’s gurgle or the wind’s howling, and almost thinking she hears her friends: “Muted voices, just beyond/ The silent surface of what has gone.”

Percival

The Devil Spoke Here, Chicken Little, which I think is actually about the aftermath of a protest, but which I feel works eerily well for Percy’s development following the Briarwood arc. The beginning reminds me of his guilt, feelings of brokenness, and anger issues after he’s cast out Orthax — right down to his guilt about guns:

“There’s bullets in the streets/ and broken dishes on the floor/ enough anger in my heart/ to take the blame for it all/ I could take every bullet back/ if I could never feel like that”

It also covers Percy’s realization, after his conversation with the Raven Queen, that he’s free from the judgment of the gods, and acceptance that he’s the one who has bad thoughts for the greater good:

“I have no god for guidance/ still I’m praying all the same/ may everything I do/ be done for everybody’s gain”

And then this, for a reason that I can’t quite explain, feels so much like Percy’s forgiveness of Ripley at Glintshore, and his death at her hand:

“May we always fail/ with the best of intentions/ with our hearts always pure/ and our souls only human”

Wandering Star, Portishead: the weird trip hop vibe to this song somehow feels appropriate to Percy, and in particular to his darkest thoughts. The song addresses the possible punishments for these thoughts: “Wandering stars, for whom it is reserved/ The blackness, the darkness, forever.” It helps that this is an allusion to a Bible passage about atheists.

The second verse makes me think both of Percy’s relationship to the concept of eternity (because of the “needle’s eye” — a parable about the entrance of heaven for the rich) and his raven mask:

“Those who have seen the needle’s eye, now tread Like a husk, from which all that was, now has fled And the masks that the monsters wear To feed, upon their prey”

Additionally, “Doubled up inside/ Take a while to shed my grief” is reminiscent of Percy’s revelation, in the last episode, that he just really fucking misses his family. This whole time, something inside of him has been curled up into a little ball like the teenager he was five years ago, grieving his family.

Pike

Holy, Jamily Woods: a song about self-love and self-assurance, underscored by Christian imagery:

“Though I walk through the darkest valley I will fear no love/ Oh my smile my mind reassure me I don’t need no one […] Woke up this morning with my mind set on loving me”

Many of the lyrics can be interpreted either as the singer being self-sufficient because her god is there — or being sufficient even beyond her god: “I’m not lonely, I’m alone/ And I’m holy by my own.”

I think both interpretations work for Pike: that she has found (or is attempting to find) peace when she’s not with her friends, or that although she worships Sarenrae, the Everlight doesn’t necessarily interfere in her day-to-day life and she makes her own happiness. Either way, the song makes me feel at peace in the same way that Pike does.

The Otherside, Ohbijou, for Pike’s feelings about Scanlan during the year gap. Particularly, I’m reminded of Pike’s attempts to talk to Scanlan on the earring: “With things left unsaid so unsatisfied/ And a burning to hear your voice just one more time.”

And in these lyrics:

“And it’s so silly for me to worry/ About situations that don’t exist/ We create these problems and try to solve them/ Why waste each passing moment?”

I hear Pike trying to figure out her feelings for Scanlan, but shooting herself down because he’s gone, why even try?

Scanlan

The Pilgrim - Chapter 33, Willie Nelson (cover of Kris Kristofferson), which really encapsulates, for me, Scanlan’s complex relationship with religion: the fact that a guy who regularly produces lightning from his dick, messes with people’s memories, and actively attempts to cultivate a drug habit finds himself praying to the Everlight at night and eventually becomes Ioun’s chosen:

“He’s a poet, he’s a picker/ He’s a prophet, he’s a pusher/ He’s a pilgrim and a preacher/ And a problem when he’s stoned”

The lines “He’s a walking contradiction/ Partly truth and partly fiction” reminds me of all the identities he’s taken on, both for fun and to shield his emotions from his friends, whereas “Taking every wrong direction on his lonely way back home” makes me think of Scanlan’s long road back to Vox Machina after leaving them.

Handle With Care, Traveling Wilburys: almost every single song on this album works for Scanlan, so choosing just one was a real challenge. But this song is so good for all the shit that Scanlan’s been through (and all the shit that he’s been), and his relationship with Pike through all of that:

“Been beat up and battered around/ Been sent up, and I’ve been shot down/ You’re the best thing that I’ve ever found/ Handle me with care […]”

“Everybody’s got somebody to lean on” reminds me of Scanlan’s feeling, in episode 85, that he’s the odd one out in Vox Machina.

The last verse encapsulates Scanlan acknowledging his own fuck ups, working to make them right, and eventually, having a healthy relationship with Pike:

“I’ve been uptight and made a mess/ But I’ll clean it up myself, I guess/ Oh, the sweet smell of success”

Taryon

Father and Son, Cat Stevens, for Tary’s relationship with his father and his decision to leave home; the song is a duet of sorts. I think the father’s part of the song is a little generous for Howaardt Darrington, but retains the message of (somewhat condescendingly) trying to keep his son at home and have him reconsider his far-reaching plans: “I know that it’s not easy to be calm/ When you’ve found something going on.”

The son’s part, though, captures Tary’s frustration with his father’s strictness and inability to actually understand his passions:

“How can I try to explain?/ ‘Cause when I do he turns away again/ It’s always been the same, same old story/ From the moment I could talk/ I was ordered to listen/ Now there’s a way and I know/ That I have to go away”

And the last verse is some real closeted gay feelings that always make me tear up:

“All the times that I cried/ Keeping all the things I knew inside/ It’s hard, but it’s harder to ignore it”

What’s It Gonna Be, Shura, not so much for the song’s lyrics, but for its music video, which is all about falling for a different gender than you expected, and which is incredibly sweet and beautiful.

That being said, you could definitely take the lyrics to be about his crush on Percy and his obliviousness about who in Vox Machina is sleeping with whom:

“Do I tell you I love you or not?/ 'Cause I can’t really guess what you want/ If you let me down, let me down slow”

Vax’ildan

Glorious, Muse, for Vax’s early relationship with faith. He can’t help but feel drawn towards Sarenrae’s light, even as he has doubts and perhaps even anger towards the gods:

Faith: It drives me away/ But it turns me on/ Like a stranger’s love It rockets through the universe It fuels the lies and feeds the curse And we, too, could be glorious”

He wants that glory that he sees in Pike, but he doesn’t know how to approach it or reconcile it with his life experiences. And then he finds his whole world shattered as he’s chosen by the Raven Queen, and he once again has to find faith, though in a way that he never expected:

“I need to believe But I still want more With the cuts and the bruises”

Fields of Gold, Sting: a song from Vax to Keyleth. I can imagine them so perfectly in this scene, perhaps during their year of downtime, with the winds of Zephra blowing through the fields and their hope beyond hope that they’ll be able to stay together:

“Will you stay with me? Will you be my love?/ Upon the fields of barley/ We’ll forget the sun in his jealous sky/ As we lie in fields of gold”

“See the west wind move like a lover so/ Upon the fields of barley/ Feel her body rise when you kiss her mouth/ Among the fields of gold”

Years later, Vax knows that Keyleth will see those fields again and think of him: “You’ll remember me when the west wind moves/ Upon the fields of barley.”

Vex’ahlia

Half Jack, The Dresden Dolls: a truly haunting song about the pain and unavoidability of being her father’s daughter — she’s always half Jill (her mother) and half Jack (her father.) The whole song is incredibly painful for Vex, and the lines:

“It might destroy me But I’d sacrifice my body If it meant I’d get the Jack part out”

always makes me think of “If I could pull the blood of you from my veins and give it back, I would.” Also,

“But if you listen/ You’ll learn to hear the difference/ Between the halfs and the half nots”

reminds me of her asking Percy if she looks like she comes from money — or a younger Vex, in Syngorn, gradually realizing why everyone looked down on her and Vax. Lastly, isn’t “I see my mother in my face/ But only when I travel” absolutely heartbreaking for her?

Fall Down or Fly, Lindi Ortega, only partly because Lindi Ortega strongly resembles my headcanon for Vex. The other part is because of my abiding love for how Vex learned to fly, and how that worked with her character arc: from the first time, in the Briarwoods arc, that she discovered her love for flying, to her flaunting convention and stealing the broom, to Percy modifying it for her, to her friends cheering her on with chicken target practice, and finally to her soaring through the skies with confidence. And the song captures that so well for me, as well as her decision to keep going even when her father, Saundor’s words, and her own self-doubt bring her down:

“This is your life/ You can fall down or fly/ You can burn out a shot if you want/ This is your life/ You can live it or die/ You can quit now or try if you want/ But don’t you give up, don’t you give up”

This also reminds me of how much all of Vox Machina adores and supports Vex (and I will join them in crying about how awesome she is):

“You said what is there to lose?/ Do it if you choose/ I got faith in you/ Everything you do/ I know you are gonna make it to the top”

(I also maintain that a modern Vex would be really into country music, particularly the genre of country song in which women tell people to fuck off.)

Vox Machina

Call Them Brothers, Regina Spektor feat. Only Son, for Scanlan’s departure from Vox Machina and the whole team’s attempts to deal with it. I first heard this song in an absolutely heartbreaking TAZ animatic, and my pain increased exponentially when I realized how much it also worked for Critical Role. It’s perfect, in my opinion, for the sense that their family, which has seen them through so much, is irreparably broken — “That’s it, it’s split, it won’t recover/ Just frame the halves and call them brothers.”

But then you also get “Over and over, they call us their friends/ Can’t we find something else to pretend?” for Scanlan’s insistence that Vox Machina doesn’t really care about him, and “Find your fathers and your mothers/ If you remember who they are” for “what’s my mother’s name?”

Maybe this should go on Scanlan’s playlist, but I think “The hunt is on, everyone’s chasing a shot” also works for the way that the rest of Vox Machina independently searched for Scanlan during their year of downtime… and the feelings of defeat in the song just feel appropriate to the whole group.

(I actually have a playlist full of songs for episode 85, because I enjoy making myself sad; it took a lot of effort not to put them all here.)

Freaks, The Hawk in Paris: I can never decide whether this is a Mighty Nein or Vox Machina song, but I’m putting it here mostly because “If you come along with us, the doors are never ending” is absolutely hilarious in for Vox Machina’s single greatest enemy.

That, and there are a lot of lines that work for individual members of the group: “We have a flair for the shade and the inbetween” (Vax); “We like to run with the wolves from the darker scene” (Keyleth); “When we turn the safety off, the shots are automatic” (Percy); “All our friends tell their friends we’re so dramatic” (Scanlan); and “We’ll make you swoon, make it hurt just a little” (Vex).

Additionally, “We have a plan, we’ve got the means for your liberation/ You’ll only have to blur the lines on a few occasions” makes me think of the Briarwood arc, and I makes me think of Percy dramatically revealing his identity to the priest — and cut to Grog pulling out a guy’s tongue.

Anyways, if I learn to make AMVs by the time that the animated series is released, this will be the first that I’ll make.

Beauregard

Saint Simon, The Shins, for Beau’s escape from the Cobalt Soul. The song expresses frustration at weighty intellectualism and how much it doesn’t teach you — which i think is something Beau felt strongly with her monk teachers:

“After all these implements and texts designed by intellects/ So vexed to find, evidently there’s still so much that hides […] Since I don’t have time nor mind to figure out the nursery rhymes/ That helped us out in making sense of our lives”

So she tries not to care about anything because it’s safer that way (“The cruel, uneventful state of apathy releases me”), and she runs away:

“I’ll try hard not to give in, batten down to fare the wind/ Rid my head of this pretence, allow myself no mock defence/ Step into the night”

I think the last part of the song could also work for her meeting the Mighty Nein and starts understanding friendship and love: “Mercy’s eyes are blue when she places them in front of you/ Nothing really holds a candle to the solemn warmth you feel inside you.”

Jonas and Ezekiel, Indigo Girls, because what kind of lesbian would I be if I didn’t put at least one gay-written song on Beau’s playlist? This one is about road trips, wandering, and looking for a purpose:

“I left my anger in a river running Highway 5 New Hampshire, Vermont, bordered by College farms, hubcaps, and falling rocks Voices in the woods and the mountaintops”

But also contains one verse that I think fits her strict family, her new family in the Mighty Nein, and the “devils” — or tieflings — of which her family would certainly not approve:

“Now when I was young my people taught me well/ Give back what you take or you’ll go to hell/ It’s not the devil’s land, you know it’s not that kind/ Every devil I meet becomes a friend of mine/ Every devil I meet is an angel in disguise”

And something about this reminds me of her journey into Xhorhas and attempts to uncover conspiracies and work out the truth: “In the war over land where the world began/ Prophecies say it’s where the world will end.”

Caduceus

Born at the Right Time, Paul Simon, for Caduceus’s belief in destiny and his place therein. The chorus describes his occasional naïveté, and the happiness of his life in the Blooming Grove, with his family:

“Never been lonely Never been lied to Never had to scuffle in fear Nothing denied to”

And then gets into his conviction that his goddess and the world itself put him where he is:

“Born at the instant/ The church bells chime/ And the whole world whispering/ Born at the right time”

The very chill vibe of the song is also very Clay, to me.

Happy All the Time, Danny Schmidt: the singer himself has said that he doesn’t know whether or not this song is ironic and/or melancholic, so I’m going to go with a sincere and cheerful interpretation for Caduceus, with maybe a hint of nostalgia for more peaceful days among his family. It’s got some incredibly lush and occasionally strange nature imagery that I think is perfect for him:

“I took the time to breathe cause I was happy all the time/ Among the rootbuds and the weeds cause I was happy all the time/ But the peat moss and the leaves took turns with both my feet/ Until my toes took root and I was happy, I was happy all the time”

I think Caduceus is still happy, but he was definitely at peace as a hermit.

Caleb

I Miss That Feeling, Tennis: a song about panic attacks and how the physical effects, when described, almost seem like falling in love. It works not only for Caleb’s panic attacks, but also, relatedly, his relationship with fire, which scares him, even as he likes the way it feels — “Something like pleasure, you’d never believe it.”

The fiery way that the singer describes panic attacks is also very Caleb:

“I miss that feeling/ Flicker hot and hovering/ Like my own discovering/ Eagerly, tenderly/ I miss that feeling/ Flicker spread into an itch/ Into a burn, into a twitch/ Slow and even”

It brings me back to the first time we saw it, in the gnoll mines. Also, “Every little thing starts trembling/ Recorded by the needle of an EKG” feels very reminiscent of his hospitalization, though from a modern perspective.

Putting the Dog to Sleep, The Antlers, for Caleb’s very tentative trust in the Mighty Nein, and in particular his friendship with Beau. I think this song really encapsulates Caleb’s pain and skittishness, especially near the beginning of their campaign, as well as his desperation (unknown even to himself) to love again:

“Well, prove to me I’m not gonna die alone/ Unstitch that shit I’ve sewn/ To close up the hole that tore through my skin/ Well my trust in you is a dog with a broken leg/ Tendons too torn to beg for you to let me back in”

And this feels like something that Beau would say to Caleb — upfront and caring all at the same time, reminding him that his actions affect everyone else and asking him not to run:

“You said, ‘I can’t prove to you you’re not gonna die alone/ But trust me to take you home/ To clean up that blood all over your paws/ You can’t keep running out […] Kicking yourself in the head/ Because you’re kicking me too.’”

By the end of the song, Caleb is starting to believe her, and even asking her to trust him: “Put your trust in me/ I’m not gonna die alone… I don’t think so…”

Fjord

Release the Kraken, The Daysleepers: I added this to Fjord’s playlist back when everyone was speculating that his patron was something kraken-like, and even now that this is clearly not the case, I think it still works for Uk’otoa (Uk’otoa) and his attempts at freedom: “It pulled the ships down/ It’s rising from the deep below.”

But also for Fjord’s relationship with Avantika — for his attempts to get close to her in order to save himself and his friends:

“Turn the lights down Careful as a serpent’s tongue Move without a sound Gentle as the cold wind moans”

I think “When you sold love/ Your heart becomes a monster” is some of what Fjord felt after those encounters: like he gave part of himself away.

21st Century Child, Daggy Man, for Fjord’s self-hatred and the masks he puts on. Many of the lyrics could fit several characters (particularly Beau, Caleb, and Scanlan), but

“I hate the sound of myself/ When I’m being honest/ Sounds like somebody else/ And I don’t wanna listen/ To the whinings of a 21st century child”

just perfectly captures his feelings about his voice and his past self — weak and whiny, and not who he wants to be. And then we get these lines, which feel like a good summary of his issues with identity and deception:

“And I’ve struggled with how/ Others perceive me/ And I can’t tell if I’m better/ Or just better at deceiving And I’ll keep going until I’m called out”

Jester

The Sweetest Sounds, Ella Fitzgerald (cover of Richard Rodgers), for pre-stream Jester barely waiting for her exciting life to begin. I first heard this song in Rodger & Hammerstein’s Cinderella, and while there is something fairy-tale-like about Jester, I think this upbeat, jazzy cover fits her well:

“The most entrancing sight of all Is yet for me to see And the dearest love in all the world Is waiting somewhere for me”

I can just imagine a 10-year-old Jester listening to the band at the Lavish Chateau play this song, dressing up in Marion’s clothes, and pretending she’s in a storybook romance.

One Hand in my Pocket, Alanis Morissette, which really captures her beautiful complexity:

“I’m free, but I’m focused/ I’m green, but I’m wise/ I’m hard, but I’m friendly/ I’m sad, but I’m laughing”

because Jester is so many things all at once, and none of them negate each other. It’s so hopeful (“What it all comes down to/ Is that everything’s gonna be quite alright”) and comforting (“What it all boils down to/ Is that no one’s really got it figured out just yet”) in a way that really reminds me of my favourite blue cleric.

The whole song has such a fun, free, summer vibe that always makes me smile — just like Jester.

Mollymauk

Carnival Overture, Antonín Dvořák (Leonard Bernstein & New York Philharmonic Orchestra): one of my favourite pieces of classical music ever — when I hear it, an entire music video about a carnival plays in my head. The exuberant theme that bowls you over from the start reminds me of Molly’s effervescent, ostentatious personality.

The slower and quieter part in the middle with the violin and woodwind solos gives me a picture of Molly and Yasha sitting alone in the evenings just outside the carnival encampment, cuddled together — Yasha talking about her wife, Molly telling jokes, and the both of them making up names for constellations and flowers. Then the quick-paced minor section makes me think of the bloodhunter tiefling in combat, deadly with his swords and vicious mockery — before the return to the joyful, triumphant original theme.

Wonderful Everyday, Chance the Rapper & The Social Experiment**: this is sort of a cover of the Arthur theme song, but in the absolute best way possible. The meandering, loose, and extraordinarily happy vocals always remind me of Molly’s way of living.

Although some of the lyrics are more optimistic than Molly (I think he’d laugh at “Everybody that you meet/ Has an original point of view” and say that their points of view are usually bullshit), the message of appreciating every single day is just wonderful for him.

And the last bit hits me like a ton of bricks:

“And when I go down/ I'ma go down swinging/ My eyes still smiling/ And my heart still singing”

“Eyes never shut,” indeed.

**not on Spotify, sorry!

Nott

The Sore Feet Song, Ally Kerr: at first it appears to be a simple song about traveling long distances to find your love, which certainly describes Nott’s search for Yeza: “I walked ten thousand miles, ten thousand miles to see you/ And every gasp of breath I grabbed at just to find you.”

But the second verse is where it really gets into Nott’s thieving, rat-eating, badass ways:

“I stole ten thousand pounds, ten thousand pounds to see you I robbed convenient stores cause I thought they’d make it easier I lived off rats and toads, and I starved for you I fought off giants bears and I killed them too”

I love this strange little goblin.

Fox in the Snow, Belle & Sebastian: this song has always been a bit of a mystery to me, but the lyrics remind me of Nott’s intense vulnerability after she was transformed into a goblin — and in particular her self-image as something animalistic:

“Fox in the snow, where do you go/ To find something you could eat?/ Because the word out on the street is you are starving/ Don’t let yourself grow hungry now/ Don’t let yourself grow cold”

The second verse, which switches to describing a human girl, reminds me of pre-transformation Veth, more acceptable in body but no less socially ostracized than Nott:

“Girl in the snow, where do you go/ To find someone that will do?/ To tell someone all the truth before it kills you/ Listen to your crazy laugh/ Before you hang a right/ And disappear from sight/ What do they know anyway?”

I can just see that exact scene play out with a young Veth, right down to the “crazy laugh.” I’m glad she found Yeza, but she must still have been pretty lonely without any other friends.

Yasha

Into the Barrens, Grizfolk, for Yasha’s years of blank wandering after Zuala’s death. This song fits Yasha so well that for months, I somehow tricked myself into believing that Ashley had put it on her playlist. But I feel like this encapsulates her hopeless feelings, away from all society, not living for anything or anyone:

“Cast me away, my shadow’s cold/ Into the barrens where I will grow old/ Well, I’m not looking for answers/ And I’m not looking for gold”

And I can see this verse for the beginning of her relationship with the Stormlord, following voices she can’t understand as she wanders, barely alive:

“The voices in my head/ They echo in the wind and I begin to sway/ I follow what they say/ I can’t see their eyes, but I hear howling through the haze”

Dreams, Fleetwood Mac: technically a break-up song, but I can’t help but think of Yasha’s ever-present guilt and her memories of Zuala when I hear:

“Listen carefully to the sound of your loneliness/ Like a heartbeat drives you mad/ In the stillness of remembering what you had/ And what you lost”

The storm imagery also works for Yasha — “When the rain washes you clean, you’ll know” makes me think of her fight with the Stormlord on the boat, which allowed her to open up to her friends. And it touches on Yasha’s opaque dreams (“Now here I go again, I see the crystal visions/ I keep my visions to myself”).

(Ally and Stevie also have a lesbian mash-up of Dreams and Rhiannon, two of the gayest Fleetwood Mac songs, that I associate strongly with Beauyasha.)

Mighty Nein

Old Black Train, The Blasting Company (from Over the Garden Wall): trains don’t exist in Exandria (yet! — Percy or Taryon should get on that) but this is more of a metaphor for life. It reminds me of the Mighty Nein setting out from Alfield, not knowing the twists and turns they were going to face, the places they’d go, nor the family they’d become:

“This journey is a long one/ It will take you all around/ Life rushing by your window/ Before it lays you down”

Then there’s this verse:

“Oh come on now young stranger/ Weren’t you someone’s son? How’d you find this depot 'Cause it ain’t where you belong”

which feels very appropriate for many members of the Mighty Nein, separated as they are from their families and wandering in lands that aren’t welcoming to them. There’s also a verse that’s reminiscent of the graveyard they passed on the way to Zadash, which more and more feels like a portent of things to come:

“You will pass a graveyard/ Stones worn by the years/ The train’ll stop a minute but don’t let it leave you here”

Sailing, Leisure Cruise: another song about transportation, although this one is a little less metaphorical. As you can probably guess, I associate it with their adventures on the Mystake and the Ball Eater, which begun by total accident but which, in my opinion, was a turning point for the group, and ultimately helped them grow closer together:

“And to our surprise we’re sailing The high seas in the middle of the ocean […] We’re sailing the wildest mystery And to our surprise we’re happy and free”

Okay, so maybe “happy and free” is a bit of an exaggeration for that arc (particularly for poor Nott) but I think there were a lot of moments in which the Mighty Nein learned unexpected lessons about themselves.

And I think this is a good summary of the Mighty Nein’s modus operandi: seize every passing opportunity, because you don’t know what tomorrow will bring:

“Maybe it’s today Maybe it’s tomorrow But we have to make a play Or the chance will fade away”

And that’s a wrap! Thanks for listening and reading. Love you all <3

#critical role #Cr music #my stuff

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askmidam · 5 years

Text

Interlude IV

“I thought you were against celebrating Thanksgiving,” Michael deadpanned, watching Adam hurry around their kitchen.

“I am,” Adam explained, “Trust me, I am...but I was against the idea of my family until my mom’s family showed up. Them being here, it brings me closer to her.”

Michael smiled softly, just nodding, “What can I do to help?”

“Uh…” Adam trailed off, thinking, “We’re making pies, my grandfather is doing the turkey and stuff at home, it’s always been a tradition that he did that. Joy and Martin are coming too, since they don’t really have their parents anymore...most of my friends are coming, actually, except Jared.”

Michael swallowed, “I am still trying to locate him.”

“I know, you’re doing your best,” Adam smiled, kissing him on the cheek as he walked passed, making the guilt in Michael’s chest swarm around a little more.

“So who all is coming?” Michael changed the subject quickly.

“My grandpa, my grandma, my Uncle Keith, my Aunt Ellie, my two cousins, Lorie and Lorna, Lorna’s boyfriend, Mark, Lorie’s girlfriend, Elena…” Adam trailed off, trying to think, “Like I said, Martin, Joy, Ryka...Dawson,” he added, clearing his throat.

Michael tensed slightly, but didn’t say anything. Adam seemed stressed enough, he didn’t need Michael’s weird stomach feeling bothering him about Dawson.

“This will be good for you,” Michael said quietly, “Having a good family around.”

Adam smiled softly, finally stopping his running around for a minute and wrapped his arms around Michael’s neck, “My family is you...you’re the one who’s been in my life and been there for me the longest, Mike.”

Michael leaned down, pressing his lips against Adam’s.

Adam pulled away after a few seconds, “Okay, no distracting me, help me with this pie crust, halo.”

…

Dawson arrived first.

Of course he did.

Well, technically he arrived with Ryka, but that was beside the point.

He was still the first person to walk through the door, carrying a bowl of what Michael considered to look like chunks of blood.

Adam explained it was cranberry sauce and needed to go in the fridge until they ate.

Dawson sat on the couch like he owned the place and it annoyed Michael to no end as he sat there watching the “football” and drinking a beer.

“Two’s his limit,” Ryka explained as she helped Adam in the kitchen, “I’m putting him on a limit.”

“Joy said he had a problem with alcohol after…” Adam trailed off.

“It’s not your fault,” Ryka said quickly, “At all. Don’t think it is. People deal with grief in different ways.”

Adam just swallowed, nodding. He smiled at Michael weakly, where he was hovering in the doorway between the kitchen and living room, watching Dawson, “Hey, Mike, I’m pretty sure my granddad just pulled in, wanna help me carry some stuff inside?”

“Yes,” Michael said immediately, following him out the side door.

…

“Adam!” his grandfather, Kate’s father, James, called, waving as he stood beside his grandmother, Katherine, “Bring you and your muscles over here, we need some help.”

Adam chuckled, walking over with Michael, “Granddad, Grandma, this is my boyfriend, Michael.”

Boyfriend.

Michael had never thought of himself as a boyfriend before.

Of course, he and Adam were together. They’d been together for a thousand years but now they were together romantically by human standards.

He was a boyfriend.

Adam was his boyfriend.

“Well, good to meet you, Mike,” Katherine patted him on the arm.

“You the one who has been taking care of our boy?” James asked.

“Yes, sir,” Michael nodded, “I will do so everyday of my life.”

“He’s, uh…” Adam trailed off when he saw James and Katherine staring at him, “Formal.”

“Ah,” James nodded, “Mormon, then.”

Adam covered up his laughter with a cough.

Michael mouthed the word mormon in confusion but was quickly cut off by James shoving a huge pan into his arms.

“Take that on inside for me, Mike,” James clapped him on the shoulder, “I need to talk to Adam for a minute alone.”

Michael stared at Adam for a moment who nodded in encouragement, a smile on his face. He smiled back before turning and going inside the house, looking over his shoulder a few times as he did.

When he looked back, James had pulled Adam into a tight hug.

…

“My boy,” James said quietly, hugging Adam tightly.

Adam hugged him back, not saying anything. His grandparents had always lived too far away to be there for him when he was younger and his mom was working all the time, but they were still his grandparents, the only ones he had ever even met. He got to spend summers with them every year with Martin and Joy sometimes tagging along, it was always so peaceful with them.

“That man who took you is lucky they can’t find him,” James said, pulling away and touching the side of Adam’s face, “I’d kill the son of a bitch myself.”

Oh yeah.

The cover story.

The lie.

Adam smiled softly, “Don’t worry, grandpa, Michael is protecting me...and I’m pretty good at protecting myself.”

“Let’s not get so serious so quick,” Katherine said quickly, pulling Adam into a hug as well, “It’s a happy day, we’re all together again.”

Adam smiled, hugging her back just as tightly.

“So,” Katherine pulled away, her hands on his shoulders, “Tell me about Michael.”

…

“Stop spying,” Joy elbowed Michael, having snuck up on him.

Michael glared at them, seeing Martin standing beside his cousin, hands stuffed in his pockets.

“It’s his grandparents, we used to stay with them every summer when we were younger, chill, angel boy,” Martin rolled his eyes, “Come help us set up the table.”

Michael huffed and followed them.

“Not like they’re from the damn Visit or anything,” Martin scoffed.

“What is the Visit?” Michael looked confused, following after the cousins.

…

“Here, Mike, sit by me,” Adam said quickly, grabbing his hand and pulling him down to sit at the table with him.

Michael smiled softly, continuing to hold his hand under the table.

“Should we...say a prayer-” James started.

“Nope,” Adam said quickly, causing everyone to look up at him, “Everyone dig in.”

Everyone went silent.

“What?” Adam asked, “Our house, our rules.”

“I’m an atheist anyways,” Lorie shrugged, starting to eat as well.

Michael went to say something, but thought better of it.

“Good enough for me, let’s dig in,” Adam’s uncle, Keith, said simply.

…

“What are they doing?” Michael peered out the window.

“Football,” Martin said simply, wincing when Joy tackled Adam to the ground, “Joy always wins.”

“He won’t be hurt, will he?” Michael asked quickly.

“Well, you can just heal him if he does, right, angel?” Martin asked, taking a long drink of beer.

Michael narrowed his eyes, “I sense you have a problem.”

“Yeah, no shit,” Martin scoffed, “Dude, you’re an angel of the lord and you’re banging my best friend. This group doesn’t have the best experiences with God and stuff, because he hasn’t been helping us out much.”

“Yes, well, my Father never helped me out much either,” Michael snapped, continuing to watch out the window. He quickly leaned down and picked up Aira when she brushed against his legs, holding her close to his chest.

“He left Adam and I to rot in Hell for ten human years,” Michael told Martin softly, petting Aira’s head, “I have lost faith in him as well, you aren’t alone there.”

Martin stayed silent.

“And I am not banging Adam, we are boyfriends,” Michael added, “And I love him very much.”

And maybe he said it just a little louder, knowing Dawson was helping clean up in the kitchen.

But it made the weird feeling in his stomach feel a little better.

…

Adam closed the door once the last of his family left, letting out a sigh of relief. He rested his forehead on the cool door for a moment, finally letting out a breath he didn’t know he was really holding.

It had actually went well.

He felt a familiar pair of arms wrap around his waist and he sighed again, leaning back against Michael.

“I am happy you were happy with your family,” Michael told him softly, pressing a kiss to the side of his head.

Adam relaxed a little, “Me too...it was actually nice. They loved you too.”

“I’m glad,” Michael added, “But I am tired and would like to head up to bed. Will you join me?”

“Yeah,” Adam nodded, “Yeah, I will, Mike.”

…

Adam’s family’s FCs, they’ll be added to the character page tomorrow probably:

Cloris Leachman - Adam’s grandmother, Katherine Scott Glenn - Adam’s grandfather, James Kellan Lutz - Adam’s uncle (Kate’s younger brother), Keith Rebecca Ferguson - Adam’s aunt, Ellie Dakota Fanning - Adam’s cousin, Lorie Diana Silvers - Lorie’s girlfriend, Elena Elle Fanning - Adam’s cousin, Lorna Beau Mirchoff - Lorna’s boyfriend, Mark

#cutscene;

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ehsan-nouri · 4 years

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Simple Rules Rule: A Confession of Human-Made Misery

This is real. We are stuck in our homes and breathing through our narrow windows, worrying to go out, just in case that death might give us a random visit outdoors. Corona is real, physical and probably a touchable disease. A world-wide catastrophe is caused by this nasty creature, however, we wise human beings are aspiring to show our strength in the battle. But this has just popped into sight, while there were many other diseases out there, ones we were simply unable to see. Their symptoms have been long misunderstood and been referred to other causes. Their consequent effects have been so subtle to address and you may at the end of the next paragraphs, oppose me aggressively due to calling them a “disease”.

I haven’t been able to write and to live in the past few months, or even years. So, this is my most desperate effort to alleviate the pain of resting for more than a hundred days (How dare you want to have a life-time of rest and joy! That’s unbearable). But that’s not how it looks from inside. At least, I am not relieved of a long-time working agenda by this rest. On the other hand, a futile struggle of thoughts has been constantly happening in my mind, draining all the energy and leaveing no other option for better muscles to enjoy (every other part that can feel the real touch of joy, not this imaginary, perception-constrained and deluded machine we call “brain”).

I am asking you to dive with me, hand-in-hand in the endless ocean of thought. You already have done so, sorry not inform you early on. I do it alone everyday, but a companion will probably save me from draining, or maybe we will be swallowed by the monster, which is yet another great adventure. So here we are, watching the wild waves and deep dark blue eyes of our gorgeous friend who invites us to jump off the cliff and embrace her. The charm is irresistible.

Have you ever been re-engineering your self? Have you been successful in identifying your core drives? Sadly, we have a disadvantage of not having a tablet that shows what drives our emotions, in comparison to hosts in the Westworld TV series. Just the same drives that push you in the re-engineering room, prevent you from touching them. What a misery!

The sad ones among us, are consumed by the over-thinking virus. An incurable disease as old as the human consciousness and unfortunately the most ignored one! That’s even a larger misery that we, wise human beings, have stopped finding remedies for such a terrible illness. I guess it has always been the selfish healthy who ignored the danger carried by this virus, and since it was less contagious than the Corona one, they just let it out to infect the vulnerable and bring them slow decay. Who cares? Do you care for the drug addicted up until they cause you any harm or maybe infect you? No, you don’t. Take off your altruistic masks and let your inner monster be exposed.

Overthinking is paralyzing. It’s the lamp draining all the car battery and leaving you helpless in the middle of nowhere. It’s a process that consumes all the CPU and your systems becomes unable to handle simple tasks, like writing into Microsoft Word, as I’m doing now. Happily, my laptop is not traumatized that way and we can still put a few words together. But on certain days, we are both down. He is unable to play a single music track and I am as well unable to do anything other than watching him fail! As a former engineer, I some times make comparisons of the real world entities, with electronic parts, and only my fellow engineer friends get the point. On an expert level, one of my friends, with the same super-atheist level as me, usually quotes from important Muslim figures like Ali-ibn-Abi-Taleb to clarify his points. Can’t deny I love this offensive level of humor.

“We aren’t yet drown, there is hope.” That’s a lie! Let us go deeper to see how scientists and psychologists have failed us for centuries. This is a nasty monster who offers comfort getting away from him, while he’s still breathing out there. And the only remedy offered by our fancy science has been ignorance, let alone the chemical anti-depressants that treat us like the miserable pets we are. I’m in no position to criticize their efforts and not certainly ignore them. Ignorance is their game, not mine. They have been quite successful in curing the mentally paralyzed, but the case has not been fully resolved. The symptoms are vanished by force, but the inner cause lives. Usually these treatments take a long time and there’s still the possibility of a relapse, which puts the ill no other option than taking a life-time increasing dose of pills. Let’s hope they are not changing us in unforeseen ways. The vocabulary these fellow scientists and coaches use includes certain words like “Letting go”, “Vulnerability”, “Adaptation”, “Fate”, “Belief” and finally “Hope”. The most disgusting package of the human-made world of misery!

Indeed, it should be a simple issue. Since it’s rooted in a single monster, all explanations converge. Last year for example, I watched three movies from the amazing writer Charlie Kaufman, “Synecdoche New York”, “Adaptation” and “Anomalisa”. They were truly brilliant works of art that made me fall in love with Charlie’s works and for the first time I printed someone’s picture and sticked it onto the wall.

They were passionate moments. I tried to find every writing of him, watch all his speeches and movies. That’s how love works, and please spare me a lot of your time if you’d like to know more on how it works. You’ll love the love’s way and that puts you in an exponentially growing loop of feelings. But please don’t fall in love with your thoughts because you don’t want to occupy your brain with an exponentially growing demon. Do it with your heart, which as simply as possible “denies any thought!”

The secret behind my love story with Charlie was simple. He made confessions in an honest and vulnerable way. In his movies, you do really feel how characters fail in understanding the dynamics of their lives, despite their desperate efforts to understand. Caden Cotard in Synecdoche New York for example (named after the Cotard delusion, that one thinks he’s already dead), spends a life-time to build a massive theater representing routine human lives of every actor, letting them play their own story to show the secrets of real life. He wants to decipher them in a truthful way for his own comfort and in the eyes of the audience. But he fails, and Charlie portrays his failure with the ending of his life, having lost every endeavor, every precious meaning and finally “fading into oblivion”. Caden chose titles that could represent his huge theater over and over, but could never feel contempt with any. “Simulacrum”, “Flawed light of love and grief” and “The Obscure Moon Lighting an Obscure World” were among them. This challenge of understanding was likewise presented in his Adaptaion movie, written out of Susan Orlean’s “The Orchid Thief”. The name speaks itself.

When you adapt, you surrender. There’s no radical motive left. Nothing exceptional. You realize “That’s how it should work” when there’s no other option. Brené Brown introduces vulnerability as a symptom of courage. That is stepping into the unknown with all its uncertainties and possible failures, because there’s no other way. Our rational mind is unable to assess all uncertainties and alternatives. The more you push it towards a whole understanding, you find your self more troubled and helpless. But then we invent Courage, which says “If you can’t win with your mind, win with your heart”. If you knew there were strategies in a war that can put soldiers out of the field, you would definitely do, unless you are suffering from another disease called religion, which is irrelevant for now.

Let’s sort all other wise responses of our fellow intellectuals. Letting go of thought, as prescribed in many East Asian philosophies, stands as the most naïve one. Accepting the foolish concept of fate, as the banner of victimhood. Belief and faith as the food for fantasies. And finally, HOPE, the most deceptive force, has appeared in many literary works, paintings, songs and even social movements over time. Hope is like a temporary relief, a small bondage to stop bleeding while the wound is right there. I think we play with hope and protect ourselves when fears rush through the door. That’s a good game by the way. I have been dreaming for many months now, that I can bring this deceptive force back into myself and I’ve failed. After all, if the wound is meant to be there, why not using a bondage? Let’s decorate it with fancy colors, turn it into a piece of clothing and enjoy. The idea of decorating something immovable seems familiar, doesn’t? How many societies, books and doctrines have been built upon? But surely, we know that hope has the same rotten roots as courage. We project success in the future when we have no idea what is going to happen. Yet of course, why not?

The world grows unknown as you grow older. A world-wide false expression is that the elder, given their experience, understand the world better, while they only learn their limitations over time. That’s all. As kids, we falsely believe in our knowledge about the surrounding things and aging comes with the enlightenment of limitations. That’s why the elder hesitates in making decisions while the kid makes in an instant. I envy myself in five years ago, when I bravely made decisions and stood firm supporting them. That’s braveness my friend, however foolish it might seem.

Realm of creation is the realm of god. It’s stepping into the dark, courageously, anticipating various outcomes. That’s how Dr. Rollo May defines creation in his book “The courage to Create”. Once, in a long discussion with Mr. Zia, we both agreed in the comfort of accepting the melancholy caused by fears since it was god-like to be brave. And that’s true, we all like to be gods - The omniscient and powerful creature we invented in our most profound fictions. In him, the humankind has invested his most wild and selfish dreams. But it seems that Dr. May forgot the fact that gods are supposed to be free from constraints like time and limitations of knowledge. Fear of failure and unknown does not apply to those who know the consequences of every act, and believe me, that’s super boring!

We enjoy far more than gods do. The concept of courage is coupled with the concept of unknown. There is no courageous being who knows everything. Besides, when there’s unlimited time and resources available, no penalty for failure and no vision for success, you won’t feel anxious because you can always test other alternatives in your infinite life. How many times have you used cheat codes in a game and later felt regret because infinite cash destroyed the joy of earning it? Silly gods work with cheat codes.

We want wise men who can tell us the best scenarios in our daily decision making. They should be free from feelings and emotional attachments but decide best under time constraints- Time breeds anxiety when the process of reaching a conclusion takes long, and anxiety is a weakening force, if not a stopping one. But that will neither be humane nor god anymore. We have created another fiction, a constrained super-hero. It does not exist.

Let’s finish our miserable search for role-models and take a look at our real surroundings. All we own, is a bounded rationality limited by many elements. The world is complex. Events are the same and so does the relationship between things. Yet, simple rules rule. We know joy is out there and so is sadness. We will someday experience success and fail the other day. But is it a mess? Some of the successful among us may believe so. I guess because they are a mess themselves and have won by chance. Remember, sad losers who lost by chance, never express themselves. Contents published out there are mostly coming from fool naïve successful folks, who in their own terms were gifted with intelligence and wise decisions. Only a true loser can defeat them if he gets a say out there. Otherwise winning by chance turns into a culture and idiots will be ruling us. Oh, am I a bit late to say so?

There’s much left to say but I’m tired of writing. It’s 9PM already in Tehran and we’re in lockdown. Such a terrible complicated time to write about these simple rules. I study economic complexity in my thesis, and everyone should know that most complex behaviors arise from simple rules. Bounded rationality is too one of the core concepts. Actors in a complex system are not gods, but they can feel contempt with their limited decisions. The simple rule is that as humans, we can be contempt. We can accept our boundaries and learn few universal rules about love, expectations, happiness and staying sharp. The more we try extending our decision-making logic, the more we will grow weary of time and greedy of the results. So, am I letting go of all the heavy thought process I’ve defended up to now? No. That’s a gift. A wise man’s approach that should be treated with honor and be understood, while he learns and accepts his limitations. I am reading a book called “Simple Heuristics that Makes us Smart” with a group of friends and most of these notes were inspired by that. Hopefully, I can share a lot more about how these techniques could alleviate the pain of understanding while giving us good reasons to stop endless venturing in the unknown like gods! I wish to be contempt being a human.

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