#justalifelongphase

[marzipanandminutiae]

Okay but genuinely curious so I’m giving you more than a slight excuse if you’re willing. Please tell me all the things about historical ear piercing?

So, this interests me a lot because it's something that's both small and significant to many women in modern western culture.

You may not think about your ear piercings much beyond "what earrings should I wear today?" but everyone has a story about when they first got them pierced. It's a minor rite of passage (sometimes depending on your heritage/ethnicity), and it's a common Thing in so many lives despite not being talked about all that much.

Also because it was Okay for a long time- and then wasn't.

I know less about western piercing culture pre-1800s, but I believe women in at least some parts of Europe and European-colonized America did it going back quite a long way. And by the time 1800 rolled around, it was fairly commonplace.

There were a couple of routes the 19th-century girl or woman could go when it came to piercing her ears. One was the home method, which seems to have been more or less as seen in The Parent Trap (1998). Specifics could vary, but generally the piercer was a female relative, servant, or friend. Ice and a piece of fruit to catch the needle seem to have been optional. Louisa May Alcott's novel Eight Cousins, published in 1875, mentions threading the needle with silk thread, which is then tied into loops like thread hoop earrings, to be turned through the holes often. I imagine that was one way of replicating the effect we now get from turning our studs for a few months so the holes heal open.

This 1830s painting shows a little girl having her ears pierced at home:

("The First Ear-ring." Sir David Wilkie, 1835.)

Another option was to go to a jeweler, in a sort of proto-Claire's experience. Many jewelers offered ear-piercing services to women, although I get the impression that may have been more common in the latter part of the 19th century. I could be wrong, though- it warrants more research.

(Section of an 1878 ad for the shop of J. Julius Weinfurter, a New Orleans jeweler.)

But around the 1890s, the occasional grumbles about ear piercing being "barbaric" began to get a bit louder. Some suffrage activists complained that women were being expected to mutilate themselves for fashion. Racism/ethnic prejudice and classism also contributed to the tide of public opinion turning. Screw-back earrings, an ancestor of clip-ons, were invented in the late 19th century, and by the end of the 1920s, they were far more common than earrings made for pierced ears.

During the 1930s-1950s, piercing one's ears was widely considered vulgar and possibly an indicator of sexual promiscuity. Nice Girls Didn't, at least among the culturally dominant ethnic groups, in the U.S. and U.K. (So you can imagine how that made things for girls and women for whom it was still part of their culture- gotta love that extra dose of stereotyping/prejudice.</s>)

In the 1960s, however, things shifted again and mainstream culture began slowly accepting the idea of pierced ears. A lot of Baby Boomer women have war stories about trying to persuade their parents that it wouldn't be the end of the world. My own grandma let my mother have it done by a local doctor against Grandpa's wishes, though he ultimately didn't notice until she'd been wearing her new earrings around the house for a week.

And now, it's so incredibly normalized again that I was being gifted pierced earrings like three years before I actually had mine done. People just assumed I'd be able to wear them- most eight-year-olds could, after all.

We've come full circle, in a weird way. Makes you wonder what minor bit of modern personal adornment may come to be considered taboo- and then acceptable again -in the future.

[smttnpegasus]

Experiencing my first paid adult snow day...it is going well

[islndgurl777]

justalifelongphase replied to your post “listen vax had this idea about sending scanlan inside the dragon to...”

Oh my god that plan would have been so much better and didn’t occur to anybody? Thank you for making me die over an episode months after watching it

dude it occurred to me within like ten seconds of them finding that potion, and i’m wondering if matt oh-so-conveniently left that potion for them to find for that express purpose because it just would have been so perfect, but they went with the tiny!vax plan instead and now the dragon is flying off with half of vox machina in/attached to it.

[spring-forth-from-my-mind]

Hey! Just saw you’re really gorgeous character portraits for Critical Role 2 and was wondering which medium you use? Immediate fan of your work by the way

Hey there! 

I get this question a fair bit actually. I use Firealpaca, which is a free drawing software. I find it really easy to use and does all the important bits. It’s also really easy to make your own brushes for it. I updates regularly, and I’ve never had any issues with it.

[toodrunktofindaurl]

WAIT Kya is canonically queer? How did I miss this? When did it happen? She's the airbender's gay aunt?!

YEAH! It was confirmed in the new The Legend of Korra comic “Turf Wars”. Kya discusses her sexuality with Korra and Asami after they came out.

[dorothycastlemore]

Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers (◠‿◠✿) Although tbh with you it'll be "who did you enjoy murdering in cold blood?"

lmao tru af

all my writing is like 2 yrs old so be prepared for embarrassing fics

this is actually hard holy shit

ummm ok

#1 The Dead Were Rising

this is an anya crack fic that I wrote for kae. it’s ridiculous and me calling something ridiculous is saying a lot. enjoy.

#2 Treachery of the Heart

this is a teeny tiny drabble, but it’s the first lawstein fic that I ever wrote, so it’s mega close to my heart

#3 Love and a Hint of Iron

lawstein angst oneshot, no character death, but oddly probably one of my favorite lawstein fics that I’ve written?

#4 It’s Not Your Fault

this was like... one of the first probably 5(?) fics that I ever wrote, and it’s basically Beth right before she dies? it’s not fab but again it’s one of my old fics so it hurts me just right tw: suicide, death, etc

#5 For the Best

by far my most popular fic, I planned on updating it again but I never did, so i apologize for how it just like... ends. anyway it’s hollstein in the future, but I wrote it in the middle of season 1 so please don’t expect any sort of canon continuity. one of my v few multichaps

[residentlesbrarian]

The Fourth Book I Read In the Dark: Of Expectations and Other Relatabilities

Of Gryphons and Other Monsters by Shannon McGee

Hey, guys, sooooo...this is aaaawwwkward. I wrote 95% of this review when I wrote the other Books I Read in the Dark series for the blog, but the ADHD hit me and COVID was still you know...a thing! So I am gonna post this review, finished of course, OH, but also pay extra close attention to the conclusion alright! Hmm...this is a bit like a time capsule...here are my concentrated thoughts from 6 months ago while I was slightly delirious on books and darkness. So go forth and uh yeah this one is...you can just feel the feral “I haven’t had access to proper internet so I’ve been curled in the corner like Gollum with my books” energy coming off it so...enjoy?

Okay, so yeah, I really didn’t have a reason to end my last review that way I just wanted to, so sue me for injecting a little excitement into a series of posts about me literally sitting in my house reading nonstop for 2 ½ days, my reviews my rules. Back to manufacturing my own excitement shall we!

It’s Day 2! I’ve just finished my last library book, whatever will I do! I could always reread The Neverending Story for the 1,273rd time, but I have a need. A need for GAY! I rack my brain, there has to be a solution. My town is without power, my local library won’t be open, but then it hits me. It’s so simple! It’s meant to be really! Like the universe knew this was coming and it made sure I was prepared! Like a prepper stockpiling mental SPAM for my stimulus needing ADHD riddled brain! I have an entire shelf of books that I haven’t read yet! Way back in Clexacon 2019 my best friend (Lookin at you @justalifelongphase) gave me way too much money from missed birthdays and Christmases all at once before the con started because the world has deemed it impossible for us to live geographically close to one another. Anyway, I went a little book-buying-crazy and have not had the time or opportunity to read any of them since then. Their time has finally come!

I figured after going full whimsy with The Lost Coast and sci-fi superhero with Dreadnought and Sovereign why not take a dip into more traditional fantasy, also this one was first in line on the shelf, yay for not having to actually make a decision! No more dawdling, let's get right into the review!

Unicorn Rating:

Blurb: Taryn always loves and hates gryphon season. She finds the lesser gryphons more cute than anything but the ever present fear that a greater gryphon might be just out of sight is terrifying, and this gryphon season proves to be the one that will change her and her families lives forever! Just let a girl herd her sheep in peace!

Disclaimer: I will try my best to not spoil anything from the book, but my book loving rambles may give more away than a traditional review. Here we go! Ramble time!

Review:

I genuinely enjoyed this book. It took me a bit longer to get through it than the others, but I think that was a combination of three things: A. I was starting to feel the fatigue of reading so much in such a short amount of time. B. Our local Wal Mart had power restored on Day 3 and our entire household went on a trip to buy non-perishable food stuffs and I was like a solitary confinement prisoner being let out into the yard for the first time in months when my phone picked up a wifi signal and it was a bit hard to get back into the swing of reading after talking to other humans, even virtually, that weren’t imaginary or in my head. C. Our power was finally restored on the afternoon of Day 3 so yet again I was inundated with the draw of technology and all of my friend-os I hadn’t talked to, but the book had drawn me in enough I did the most unmillienial thing and left my phone in a different room to charge while I finished this book before going back to the land of technology and interwebs. That should tell you something.

McGee was able to write this story in a way that pulls you in so you care about what happens to these characters and this little mountain town. You learn just enough about the world to understand where they fit within the overall weave of it, but you aren’t given a Tolkein-esc dissertation on the world lore. I felt the worries and the fears. I was concerned when the routines had to change. I mean she made me care about the freaking sheep! Sheep, people! One of the reasons I think this works so well is we are so firmly rooted in the head of our protagonist, Taryn. Imma use that lovely bridge I just built to skip right on over the plot section of the review to get to the characters first, don’t worry we’ll circle back round to the plot. I always do, but I just wanna talk about my newest set of brain babies.

Taryn is a character that, if the title of this post is anything to go by, I found very very relatable. Now I know relatability can be pretty subjective, some people can latch onto something with the all consuming, “It me!” While others just stare on dead eyed not understanding the appeal. I feel like Taryn could be that kind of protagonist. You are either going to really relate to her or you won’t understand where she is coming from at all. I obviously fall in the former category. I was the quintessential middle child, still am really, though my relationship with my parents has shifted now that I’m an adult. More mutual respect and friendship than parent to child. I always did my best to pick up the slack, if ever there was any, and just tried my best to be as little of a burden as possible to my parents. I see so much of that aspect of myself in Taryn and how she sees her place at the farm and even in the town, she has her place and her role, but those expectations are heavy. One of those expectations being that she will inevitably get married and help take over the farm from her parents and have kids to continue the line. The fact she finds the lesser gryphons that flock near the farm far cuter than any of the local boys that she will eventually have to choose from to fulfill that inevitable expectation is just...sad at best and down right tragic at worst. And her family doesn’t help matters either. They won’t let her forget that she will have to settle down with one of these local boys, a boy who would make a good husband and take good care of her and the farm. She knows that, logically, but she also wants to be in love, like her parents, and she just doesn’t feel like that for any of the boys in town. She doesn’t know how to make those two things line up. It’s a struggle between her head, the obligation of what she has to do, and her heart, what she really wants for her future, to be happy in doing what she has to do. Wow, I went off a little bit there, but this was my long winded way of saying I have never read a protagonist that really captured the utter confusion of being raised in a heteronormative environment without it being drenched in internalized homophobia and fear. Protagonists like this seem to always know something is off but just don’t have the words for it so they just hide it because they know it’s “different” and out of the norm, but Taryn is just livin’ her sheep herding life and ain’t got no time for these boy crazy fools. She knows her mom wants her to find a good boy to court her so she can marry someday but she’s still young. She’ll think about that tomorrow, and she just repeats that ad infinitum. The thought that maybe she doesn’t fancy any of the boys because well...girls...never even occurred to her. It's not how things are done in this small mountain town, not because of homophobia reasons, but just stubborn tradition reasons. We are even told there is a gay couple living in town who are staples in the overall dynamics in town, instrumental even, but the idea of having a lineage, being able to pass your land down is so ingrained no wonder poor Taryn was so in the dark about her own probable gayness till it slapped her in the face. As someone who was raised in a medium sized Oklahoma town...girl I feel you. I was 22 and in the middle of Appalacia, way up in the mountains for college when my gay awakening popped up and said “Hello!” Everything that never quite made sense in my life came into perfect clarity. Not quite what happened with Taryn, but the arrival of Aella surely helped, as pretty girls are want to do. Oh look a segue, good, cause I could talk about Taryn for literal hours and I’ve already gabbed about her too much for this review.

Aella, you smooth motherfucker. Like I wish I could possess a quarter of the smoothness that you do. Like I’m lucky to string sentences together around a pretty girl, but here you are just strutting about being the smoothest of smooth. Honestly, I just...I can’t with you Aella. On a serious note though Aella is a character that served as showing Taryn a glimpse at the world beyond her small mountain town, as much as she had no desire to leave, unlike her brother. Nope, sit down, we’ll get to you, Michael! Oh, we’ll get to you. She’s traveled and has stories from all over and she is fairly open about the fact that she only likes girls, but she doesn’t have land, responsibilities, and a family line to continue. She just gets to live her life the way she choses. And y’all know I am a sap for the hard dark characters that are totally softies underneath that rough exterior. I think Aella was a great foil to Taryn and great at showing her what she could have if she was willing to leave, to stretch what she was allowed to wish for, but of course the biggest issue with her wishing for anything was...Michael.

Michael was such an interesting character. I loved him. I hated him. I wanted to hug him. I wanted to punch him. Again as with the town and the people of the town I was so deep seated in Taryn’s head and feelings that her conflicted feelings about Michael and how he was acting became my feelings on the matter. Not enough to not separate a tad and see what was coming or at least try to predict it as I always do when reading, but emotionally I was right with Taryn the whole way. The one thing that really pushed Michael from just a character I was conflicted about to one I really wanna give a swift kick in the nads to, is that he knew. He knew all about Taryn’s absolute lack of romantic inclinations toward any of the boys in town and her doubts that she would ever find someone to love and marry to take over the farm. He was the only person she confided these fears in and he still selfishly followed his own pursuits with little regard to her or her worries. You sir, are a terrible brother and overall a shit human, so sit your ass down and shut your mouth.

The plot for this book was so embroiled with the characters and their journeys that I can’t talk on it much but the twists at the end and the final climax was very satisfying for me and left me excited to dig into the next book. Also something of note that I didn’t talk about in the character section cause I felt it was dragging on a touch, I really only talked in depth on our three biggest players but there is a very colorful cast of side characters ranging from Taryn’s nervous pony to the boy-who-cried-gryphon neighbor no one can stand to the troupe of hunters led by Aella’s mother to Taryn’s best friend Nia, all of whom play important parts in building that sense of caring about the people of this town and the town itself, which in turn made me deeply care about the outcome of the plot at the heart of the story. And the sheep! The god damn sheep!

One thing I do want to say before my final thoughts is that whoever designed the cover of this book in a genius because as I dug into the story I found myself constantly closing it to spout off about theories of what I thought was happening on the cover and what it all meant, I was kind of reader fatigue delirious for most of those theories but some of them I was right! I might have reenacted the Captain Holt “Vindication” gif IRL just because it felt too good not to. I just love when a “cool” cover turns out to be so much more than that once you’re “in the know”. So yeah, now y’all know to pay attention for that.

My final thoughts on this book are pretty positive. I can tell the author is building us toward so much more, hence the name of the series, Taryn’s Journey, and it feels like it. This is only the beginning and I honestly can’t wait to take the next steps with her.

Queer Wrap-up:

Hey it’s me from the future...present...whatever...so, this is when I stopped writing the review six months ago and there is a reason for that. I, kind of, agonized over what to rate this book on the scale. Multiple times having to call my brother and go back and forth just to then repeat the same arguments with myself as soon as I got off the phone. Now why was this such a hard terrible no good awful back and forth well...SPOILER WARNING...seriously anything past this point will be spoiling some character beats for the majority of the book...okay? We understand one another. DANGER ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE...or you know scroll on.

So, Taryn is never confirmed to be queer in the text of this book. Now you would have to be wearing the tightest hetero goggles in known history not to see the heavy HEAVY subtext saying THIS BITCH GAY! It’s basically a full grown elephant painted sparkly rainbow trying to hide behind a dead shrub aka not hiding at all. I so desperately wanted to give this book four of those darling unicorns but in this rare case I just don’t think I can justify it. We have a protagonist that is still figuring herself out, which is amazing that we get to see that and go on the journey with her. Some of the things Taryn does and thinks are queer coded as hell, especially if it involves Aella who is explicitly gay on the page, but Taryn herself never express whether she herself is queer. Which, fair, other really important and traumatizing things were going on and I love that about her as a character, she didn’t meet Aella and suddenly that was all she could think about. Aella, of course, is representation who I’m counting because even though she shows obvious interest (you smooth motherfucker) in Taryn she is so much more than just a love interest and her character isn’t just boiled down to her sexuality. Now in this wrap up I’m also including the doctor and his husband in the town. They are very minor characters but they give us interesting insights into the town and the people. They are accepted and treated well in town even if some do almost, pity isn’t the right word, but they seem sad that they won’t be able to have any kind of legacy or lineage. As I said in the review it’s not homophobia it’s being stuck in your ways and it’s an interesting take.

Links:

Shannon McGee Website

The Storygraph

Okay so this one is a bit of a mess. Pieces of it were written 6 months apart and most of it was written while I was kind of delirious but hey at least I can say it’s honest. I still stand by everything my past self wrote and I still really enjoy thinking and talking about this book and am excited for whenever I get around to reading the sequel to continue on Tayrn’s journey with her. This is a book I probably would never have known even existed without ClexaCon and trolling through artist alley for literally every table that had books on them. I guess, moral of the day is maybe you won’t just find great books on library shelves but on unassuming convention tables too and it never hurts to look. Trust me, I’m a lesbrarian.

Oh bet you thought this post was over. I did the sign off and everything but oh no no! I have some info and such to impart. I am WELL AWARE these reviews have been fairly inconsistent to down right sporadic. Well, this is just a little info dump letting you guys know I am gonna be putting up one more review after this one that I wrote ages ago and I mean AGES (think years, as in multiple) and just never got around to posting and then the old blog is probably gonna be going through a PLANNED dormancy while some pretty big stuff is coming down the pike. You may notice visual changes and other stuff before anything else is announced but just keep an eye out. To quote the Fates from Hercules, “It’s gonna be big!”

Okay now for the actual sign off, I got shit to do! No one look behind the curtain, it’s a surprise!

[ao3feed-shoot-poi]

Thanks For Pushing

Read it on the AO3 at http://bit.ly/2STpVK0

by JustALifelongPhase

Shoot ends up being a little family. And they have dinner. Yeah that's pretty much it.

Words: 2361, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English

Series: Part 4 of We Love Through Hate

Fandoms: Person of Interest (TV)

Rating: Not Rated

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories: F/F

Characters: Sameen Shaw, Root | Samantha Groves, John Reese, Harold Finch, Grace Hendricks, Genrika Zhirova, Joss Carter

Relationships: Root | Samantha Groves/Sameen Shaw

Additional Tags: Completely and utterly shameless fluff, Some John/Joss but not the main focus, at all

Read it on the AO3 at http://bit.ly/2STpVK0

[phasewriter]

Anyways this is the latest installation of my Shoot fic

[ptanalo]

I'm new to poi fandom, could u recommend some fics? :D

I gotchu fam!

We Love Through Hate (series) / ongoing: [warning: has self-harm in some parts (tho it won’t go on through out the whole series)] written by @justalifelongphase​! It’s a childhood au wherein Shaw gets adopted by Finch and Grace after her car accident. It’s slow burn and most parts were pretty cute in Root and Shaw’s developing relationship from enemies, to frenemies, to friends, and then each others significant other!

T-swift (series) / finished: There is no actual t-swift for some reason lmao. Written by @constantlyhalfcocked​ (I suggest you check out more of their other fics too!) Anyways, it’s a /really/ long college au! It has a lot of explicit parts, but I loved how Shoot’s relationship was interpreted here :’)

Brightly_brightly’s fics: tbh brighty’s fics are my favs??? You’ll see what I mean when you read their works :’D

Alicekittridge’s fics: Her fics have the specific theme of p tender and melancholic stuff, but they’re really great! My favorite is Camera Obscura :’)

Sliding Towards Chaos / ongoing: A canon-divergent fic by @asleepinawell where Shaw decides to save Root in 3x12 instead of Finch! Really fucking long, but it has the character dynamics/interactions we never got from the series I love it! It’s also pretty funny with most parts, so every philosophical and long discussion they have here are honestly so enjoyable and interesting in my opinion! How Shoot’s relationship is interpreted here? TOP SHIT for me really :’D

One-Shots/ shorter fics who I also suggest other works of the writers: [x] [x] [x] [x] [x] [x]

[brightly-brightly]

Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers (◠‿◠✿)

Cool! Not sure I can think of five I’ve written. Um... connective tissue, monday prologue, the thing about root, the mistakes we make, and... oh my god she’s looking at me. Yeah those are five I wrote that I like.

Whom should I tag? @likeafouralarmfire @bleedthrough @lettersandsodas @winged-mammal @justalifelongphase THESE MIGHT BE THE WRONG TUMBLR NAMES AND THESE PEOPLE MAY ALREADY HAVE DONE THE THING BUT WHATEVER I LIKE THEIR WORK PASS IT ON.

[smttnpegasus]

"At least... we're furthering... the plot...." The writer dies and the scene cuts to the lesbian protagonist sleepily wandering into her kitchen. She moves around making breakfast. Every shot is framed so that a fridge is prominent in the background. Finally she moves to the fridge and opens it and... it's just a fridge. No heads, no suspiciously meaty leftovers. She grabs the milk and makes some cereal. As she takes the first bite, we cut to the intro. The writers are never mentioned again.

I really thought this was an extension of that post from my best friend but they say it wasn’t them @justalifelongphase look some one continued your fantastic post!! How cool is that!!

Seriously though anon this is brilliant and I bow down to you…seriously fantastic!!

[ao3feed-shoot]

Thanks For Pushing

read it on the AO3 at http://bit.ly/2STpVK0

by JustALifelongPhase

Shoot ends up being a little family. And they have dinner. Yeah that's pretty much it.

Words: 2361, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English

Series: Part 4 of We Love Through Hate

Fandoms: Person of Interest (TV)

Rating: Not Rated

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories: F/F

Characters: Sameen Shaw, Root | Samantha Groves, John Reese, Harold Finch, Grace Hendricks, Genrika Zhirova, Joss Carter

Relationships: Root | Samantha Groves/Sameen Shaw

Additional Tags: Completely and utterly shameless fluff, Some John/Joss but not the main focus, at all

read it on the AO3 at http://bit.ly/2STpVK0

[ao3feed-the100]

Missed You

read it on the AO3 at http://ift.tt/2s101Gx

by JustALifelongPhase

Prompt from an anon on tumblr:

"anya/raven. just like a little homecoming fic kinda thing, like anya is in the armed forces and surprises raven by coming home before she told raven she was meant to. (My wife is back from syria in 3 weeks and I am so excited I wanted to read a little thing similar. if its not too much trouble)"

I hope you like it friend and again, congrats on your wife coming home!

Words: 581, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English

Fandoms: The 100 (TV)

Rating: Not Rated

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories: F/F

Relationships: Anya/Raven Reyes

Additional Tags: Fluff, Homecoming

read it on the AO3 at http://ift.tt/2s101Gx

[dorothycastlemore]

"I can kill them better" Ally WHY

i mean

you’ve seen the percentage of my fics that have the major character death warning

[ao3feed-shoot-poi]

I'll Put Up With You Forever

Read it on the AO3 at http://ift.tt/2qLBkkk

by JustALifelongPhase

Root gets to meet Gen, Shaw gives Root a shock, and Root is dramatic. What tremendous fun.

Definitely recommend reading the prequels, they help set the scene. Although you could probably figure it out without them if you really want to.

Words: 1821, Chapters: 1/3, Language: English

Series: Part 3 of We Love Through Hate

Fandoms: Person of Interest (TV)

Rating: Not Rated

Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories: F/F

Characters: Root | Samantha Groves, Sameen Shaw, Genrika Zhirova

Relationships: Root | Samantha Groves/Sameen Shaw

Additional Tags: rather fluff-filled, but with plot

Read it on the AO3 at http://ift.tt/2qLBkkk