#like bad shit and trauma is not a competition everyone processes things differently

[crappy-homestuck-confessions]

Kinda sick of the angst in HS when it comes to fan stuff. Not in the sense that things should be happy or that its not fun, no not at all. I'm just sick of how it becomes a competition of "I suffered the most" basically.

.

[izusun]

Goblin anon here absolutely screeching over feral quirkless Midoriya, it's everything I wanted

I would like to also introduce a brand (my brand) of feral to Midoriya: pyromaniac.

Imagine Midoriya getting through the entrance exam by saving people, but also by bringing makeshift Molotov cocktails and wrecking almost as much shop as Bakugou.

Imagine the battle trials where Bakugou tries to blow up the building because "that's the only way to keep this little shit down" and in response Midoriya dodges and then sets the building on fire.

Imagine the USJ incident, which goes about the same, but his first instinct is to set the Noumu on fire. Yes he does so. He also nearly sets the stadium on fire at the sports festival so much that they had to evacuate sections of the stadium.

Midoriya (say it with me now) sets Stain on fire. When Tsukauchi meets with the murder trio after the Hosu incident, he just sighs and is like "Midoriya, really?" And this is when we learn that Midoriya has a history of coming across random villains and setting them on fire. When Inko arrives to pick him up she's just like "You're grounded."

There's theories about what Midoriya's quirk, everything from increased intelligence to extremely shitty luck to the ability to make anything he touches explodes (due to his inane ability to make a bomb/lighter out of the most insane things). When it comes out that he's quirkless, it just makes everyone even more afraid, as Midoriya can make a bomb out of some LSD and a rubber duck quirkless-

Pyromaniac quirkless Midoriya.

- Goblin anon

GOBLIN ANON IT’S BEEN AGES IM SORRY IM JUST RESPONDING NOW (ive been so bad at responding asks my god i struggle but thank u for ur au dumps, i love loVE THEM SO MUCH!!!!)

IM IN LOVE WITH THIS AU

feral quirkless gremlin midoriya going through shit by setting things on fire is just the way to go im duwldjwksk

i read midoriya with molotov cocktails and i have not stopped simping for and thinking about this midoriya

genuinely swooning at this ver of him

midoriya probably has a collection of lighters and basically does those hand tricks to calm him down or to take his mind off of things

bakugou and midoriya being more familiar with each other in their middle school days compared to canon and bakugou gifting midoriya with personalized all might lighter god that’s adorable

ok but they’re talking about their favourite heroes and bakugou goes, “shocking that you don’t like endeavour.”

and midoriya just shrugs, twisting his hand and fingers to orchestrate the fire’s dance from his lighter, his viridian eyes brighter and says, “his fire feels wrong.” and they leave it at that

midoriya being inspired by bakugou’s explosions and attempting to copy those so bad that bakugou thought midoriya’s trying out for support classes

OK BUT FIGHT WITH SLUDGE VILLAIN?

he yanks out makeshift molotov cocktails from his bag, lights them up and throws them at the bastard. the sludge villain screams and retreats slightly because not only was he facing the fires but also the exploded glass shards. it gave enough time for bakugou to explode the villain and escape enough to allow him to breathe. in the end, all might still defeats the sludge but he misses bakugou and midoriya who escaped. no ofa for firey green bean.

bakugou helping midoriya create more explosions.

“but kacchba i want fire, not explosions!”

“same difference you pyro asshole!”

midoriya learns them anyways and enjoys it.

THE EXAM!!

i have two ways:

one: midoriya appealed to the staff that he needed support items and they allowed him and they watched in shock as this little boy explodes the arena worse than the explosion-quirked student. of course he passes and aizawa took him on as his student.

two: midoriya appealed to the staff that he needed his support items but the staff did NOT allow him because they’re considered weapons (as if quirks are not genetic weapons but i DIGRESS) and so when the exam starts, he stays at the very back of the other examinees. this was so that when he arrives at the scene, there are already spare parts for him to scavenge so that he can build makeshift explosions (foregoing whatever shit he learned from katsuki because all that’s on his mind right now are molotov cocktails)

so that’s what happens. he scavenges parts and hides inside one of the buildings so that he can focus more on making explosions and be less worried about being attacked. when he was fully geared, he steps out and begins to retaliate.

he works fast as to not waste his time and the makeshift explosions. because of this, others (ahem-aoyama-ahem) had no opportunity to steal his score.

same thing happens: uraraka gets caught and midoriya explodes the zero pointer. this time, however, the robot is utterly destroyed.

aizawa and majima saw midoriya’s performance, adored it, and began fighting for midoriya.

“majima, he’s here for the hero classes.”

“great. now give him to me.”

nezu pretends that he’s not planning on splitting midoriya’s schedule anyways.

BATTLE TRIAL OH MY GOD rip all might i bet you keeled over so bad, you were one second from turning to small might there and then.

all might: ok so one explodey kid to look out for. that’s not bad.

all might, one minute later: this green kid looks familiar…

all might, ten minutes later: what the fuck.

NO BECAUSE bakugou and midoriya being excited to explode things (well, more like midoriya’s excited and bakugou just wants to fight midoriya) and having a blast when fighting each other.

1a’s probably thinking “oh no” followed by “they’re hot” (literally too because yk the building’s on fire.)

MIDORIYA EXPLODING THE NOUMU??? king shit

midoriya saw this monster running to aizawa and he just points a more eloquent looking flame thrower (thank u mei for working with midoriya with that) at this beast and sets it on fire.

it effectively slowed the noumu and gave the others an opportunity to pull aizawa from the hit zone. it also granted all might more freedom when fighting the noumu because it was slowed enough that all might didn’t have to worry about exceeding his time limit.

the fire damaged some of its nerve processes that the scientist and afo had not accounted for. of course this review is returned to them and many of the noumus become fireproof because of this incident.

OK BUT DURING THE SPORTS FEST

midoriya crushing on todoroki because fire.

he was actually very interested in todoroki prior to sports fest but something about todoroki’s fight against sero sparked something more in midoriya. midoriya saw the anger from his ice, now he wants to see the same intensity from his fire.

his spiel of “that’s your power, todoroki” goes differently. todoroki still pulls him aside and trauma dumps on him but this time he goes, without missing a beat, “that fire is a waste on you.”

todoroki full body pauses because that’s not something he’s ever, well, considered to hear after trauma dumping.

“what?” he croaks, confused at the bubbling feeling. it’s a miasma of anger and hurt, but to a scale so unfamiliar.

midoriya shrugs. “fire is unique, more so as an elemental quirk. you think it doesn’t make half of you—well, i mean you’re right. it doesn’t. you make it. you control it. fire is often uncontrollable and yet here you are, having it as your power. it’s yours to control, so control it. use it.”

todoroki’s ears are ringing.

“you have it as your power.”

“so control it.”

and so he did.

midoriya watched todoki’s fire; watched the way the flames lick up up up and leaves no air bathed in heat. midoriya sees the rawness of anger and determination and thinks, “this is how fire should always look like.”

unconsciously he also thinks how todoroki’s fire is far more beautiful than endeavour’s.

midoriya loses and he’s not as sad about it. losing to something sentient (fire, not todoroki), for him, is a blessing.

todoroki advances along with bakugou.

bakugou who is jealous of todoroki because he saw how midoriya eyed todoroki’s fire and knew todoroki’s a competition in other more ways.

bakugou wins again, this time less angry because todoroki used his fire against him.

STAIN THINKING MIDORIYA’S JUST THIS WEIRD HERO STUDENT WHO HAS NO SPECIFIC QUIRK UNTIL HE FEELS FLAME KISS HIS SKIN AND SCREAMS BECAUSE DAMN IT GREEN EYED KID JUST SET HIM ON FIRE

todoroki full on pausing because he thought he’s the one who set stain on fire unconsciously only to follow the fire’s trail and sees it’s from one of midoriya’s many support items.

“shoot i didn’t mean to burn him that fast!”

“that’s your issue!?”

midoriya gives them a “duh?” look and todoroki feels himself warming up (HAH another fire pun) at midoriya’s ease.

flying noumi still comes and picks him up but midoriya also sets this thing on fire. the difference between a winged noumu and a normal noumu is that the wings are far more flammable and midoriya had quite a bit of fun at setting it on fire and hearing the crackling of flames on rubbery wings.

endeavour casts him a glance that speaks of approval and midoriya doesn’t know if he hates it or not.

tsukauchi arrives and sees not only stain, but the noumu and heaves up a very big sigh. “midoriya, really?”

GOBLIN! PYROMANIAC QUIRKLESS MIDORIYA IZUKU IS A FAVE IM SCREAMING

[a-small-batch-of-dragons]

No, It's Definitely Funny

Prompt: Can I request a second part to "Let's Call It Funny" where Bucky, Sam, Steve, and Peter unite forces to confuse and concern all the other avengers (with at least one instance where two or all of them respond to something by pretending to jump off a building?) Love you! -Auggie

Does it count as being back on my bullshit if I never left?

Read on Ao3 Part 1

Warnings: none, unless you need a warning for gen z humor

Pairings: it's still found family hours

Word Count: 2259

Peter’s gonna be honest, he may or may not have some competition for the funniest person in the Tower right now.

Because let’s look at the list here:

Traumatized? Everybody and their private jet’s worth of vintage and designer baggage needs therapy.

Queer? If you think Steve Rogers, Bucky Barnes, or Sam Wilson is straight, you need to tell them everything they’ve ever done to make you think they’re straight so they can stop doing it immediately.

Superhero? Yeah, okay, shush, now you’re being stupid.

Neurodivergent? Have you seen the way these men behave? Definitely the model of Perfectly Normal Person™, what on earth are you talking about, absolutely 100% Normal™.

The only things he’s still got going for him that the others don’t are high-schooler and trans. That’s not a lot when it comes to the fact that hey, two of them are from the Great Depression—let’s be honest, they’re the OGs when it comes to fatalistic humor—and they’ve all got years of practice.

Sure, Peter’s got some trauma-given raw talent, but it’s not refined by years and years of throwing yourself off of buildings and out of planes to avoid having conversations about your emotions.

The day Aunt Nat dropped all of SHIELD’s files on the Internet and Peter found out that Steve yeeted himself out of a plane—without a parachute!—to avoid Nat’s prodding about getting a date was the best day of his fucking life.

“Don’t you go stealing my moves there, kid,” Steve had scolded playfully, winking over the rim of his mug.

“Try and stop me, I dare you.”

“And this is why,” Tony had sighed, looking every bit his 79 years—“Hey!”—as he watches this interaction go down, “you have a parachute built into your suit.”

“I’ll just wear my old one, don’t worry about it.”

“That heinous thing that’s just a cut-up old hoodie and goggles? Peter, no, that thing is being held together with safety pins and hope!”

“I mean, me too, so it’s fine.”

“Peter!”

“Also, like, it’s the one I almost got crushed to death in, so it’s got the emotional trauma seasoning already.”

“Wait—“ Bucky had sat up— “you almost got crushed to death by a building? Sheesh, kid, you’re really flirting with the reaper, huh.”

“It wasn’t so bad, I had training from the years and years of carrying the weight of my sins crawling on my back.”

“At least ask Death for his number next time, he’s not returning my calls.”

“Sergeant, I swear to God—“

“Actually, Death uses they/them pronouns, I asked when I met them last weekend.”

“What the fuck did you do last weekend?”

“Really? Oh cool, well, can you get their number for me? We had a date back in ’45 that they missed.”

“Yeah, sure, no problem.”

“Tony, why are you screaming? Not keeping dates is a very serious matter.”

“Trust me, I speak from experience, Tony, it’s not a good habit to get into.”

“You should respect your elders and not scream while we’re talking to you, mister.”

“All of you shut the fuck up.”

See? On one hand, it’s great to have more partners in this venture of making Tony’s hair turn grey—he’s that age, it’s bound to happen any time soon now— “One more crack about my age, kid, I swear.” — but on the other hand, Peter is seriously losing his massive lead on funniest person in the Tower.

The other thing he’s worried about is Sam’s ability to make it so the others can’t actually worry about him.

Because—listen, Sam Wilson is a fucking national treasure and all you fuckers better acknowledge that. It’s no secret that the Captains take turns going out with the shield, all of them answer to ‘Captain America’ because that’s what they are, but no one—and Peter will never say this under threat of death because he does not need any more of the Steve Rogers’ Puppy Dog Eyes™, thank you very much—no one does it better than Sam.

And that means that Sam fucking Wilson can turn a fatalistic, self-deprecating joke into a motivational speech that doesn’t feel disingenuous or cliché at all and everyone is too busy processing the philosophical revelations they’re having to scold him for his, frankly, outstanding sense of humor.

It’s not fair and Peter can’t do it.

He tried. Once.

Didn’t go very well.

No, he’s not gonna talk about it, let’s just move on.

Sam has offered to catch him a couple of times when he gets himself a little too deep into the Mamma Spider™ or Iron Dad™ trap of feeeelings, and he gratefully scoots out of the way when Sam sits down next to him and just makes another joke.

Sam is also a fantastic role model for the brand of ‘I’m going to the store and only have twenty bucks, stop asking for your will to live back’ jokes.

“Hey, Pete!”

“Yeah?”

“Let’s go, bodega run.”

“Can we pick up some hopes and dreams, too, all of those got scribbled out in fat red Sharpie yesterday.”

“I said bodega run, not Court of Miracles run.”

“But Sam~”

“Listen, kid, if you manage to find your hopes and dreams in this bodega, keep an eye out for your childhood innocence, that might be on the next shelf over.”

“Deal.”

“Do you two need some more therapy appointments?”

“Only got fifteen bucks, man.”

“I’m literally a billionaire!”

Peter eagerly studies under this pinnacle of humor and keeps his worries to himself.

Because if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, and Peter’s sense of humor is wonderful, but he is a tad intimidated by the amount of variety the others have got going for them.

“You’re a fucking terror, Spider-ling, that’s what you are.”

“Not true! I was ‘a pleasure to have in class.’”

“Oh, is that why you’re taking ‘Little Shit’ lessons from Barnes and Rogers?”

“And Sam! Don’t forget Captain Wilson, he is an invaluable part of this team. I’m surprised at your ignorance.”

“Pete—no, that’s not—“

“I’m ashamed for you, Mr. Stark.”

“Listen here you little shit—“

Anyway…

Steve and Bucky have a habit of telling these like, really awful jokes that have Peter in stitches for half an hour. It’s not fair and he doesn’t get why they’re so funny because they aren’t, and yet here he is, laughing anyway.

It’s probably some combination of Steve’s perfected innocent face that he wears when he has to do interviews and Bucky’s habit of not giving a single solitary fuck. But they’re able to make the worst jokes with completely serious expressions and it’s not fair.

“Hey, can you guys come help me with something?”

“Sure, Peter,” Steve says instantly, bounding over with his 95-year-old Golden Retriever energy as Bucky trails behind him like a cat that’s sitting in your lap because he wants to, not because he likes you or anything, “what’s up?”

“I have a history project on WWII due tomorrow and I haven’t started it yet.”

Bucky snorts, taking a swig of coffee and sitting down on the floor. Which, same. “You got your eulogy planned?”

“Drafted, sighed, notarized, but Aunt May said no so I gotta do this.”

“Well, if Aunt May says no then I guess that’s that.”

Tony, from far away in another part of the Tower, has a sickening feeling that May Parker has once again proven that she is the most powerful parent and there’s nothing he can do about it.

“I, um,” Peter mumbles, fidgeting with his pen, “I want to be respectful of your boundaries, and if you don’t want to talk about anything then—“

Because it’s one thing for someone to make jokes about their trauma and another for someone else to go poking and prodding at it.

“Hey,” Steve interrupts softly, nudging him with his knee, “first off, thank you for saying that and we appreciate your respect, but we got you. You worry about enough, sweetheart, let us take care of ourselves.”

Peter gives him a look.

“When it comes to this,” Steve amends, having the decency to look a little sheepish, “we’ll take care of ourselves.”

Bucky scoffs. “Uh-huh.”

“We will, Buck.”

“My therapist will be real happy to hear that.” He looks up at Peter and winks. “Besides, what good is our trauma if we don’t pin it up and display it for good grades?”

Peter huffs, the joke undercut a little by the way Bucky knocks his foot against Peter’s and Steve’s arm stretches over the couch behind him.

Peter has to resist the urge to lean his head onto Steve’s shoulder, because then Steve’s hand will come up and ruffle his hair and Peter’s eyes will droop slowly closed as he loses himself in the warmth and safety of Steve’s embrace and then Steve will lean down to press a kiss to his temple and—

Right. Homework.

“What’s it on specifically,” Bucky asks, clearly spotting the temptation on Peter’s end, “home front? Overseas? Time period?”

“Uh, it’s an analysis of total war.”

“Like, how much of the country was devoted to the war effort?”

“Yeah, basically. It’s talking about how the Nazi War Machine made their war total and how that extends to a lot of other countries, but also about the reasons why the war was fought—“

They delve into a conversation about total war, Peter pointing out how Italy’s motivation for territory keeps it from being a total war on their part, Bucky speaking to how the different dynamics worked in various countries and the fallout, Steve bringing up how much of the home front was devoted to bringing attention to the war being fought overseas. Then, of course, as is inevitable, they devolve into storytelling.

Peter’s notebook—with notes! He did his job!—is set aside as he gives in to the need to let Steve cuddle him on the couch. Come on, the man is warm and big and gives good hugs, how is he supposed to not? Bucky sprawls out on the floor, leaning back on his hands as he smiles fondly.

“You know,” he remarks casually, “I fought a Nazi in my pajamas once.”

Peter blinks sleepily. “Wait, really?”

“Yeah, though how he got in my pajamas, I have no idea.”

Peter snorts. Then he giggles. Then he’s collapsing into Steve’s side, positively sobbing with laughter.

It’s not funny.

It’s really not that funny.

But here he is, fucking dying, and he doesn’t even have the wherewithal to welcome the sweet embrace of oblivion.

“Okay, note to self,” Bucky murmurs when he’s calmed down a little, wiping away tears, “sleepy spider likes corny jokes.”

“Just don’t break our baby spider, Buck, Momma Spider would kill you in cold blood.”

“Listen, if Natasha Romanoff kills me, don’t prosecute. That’s on me.”

Peter can’t do corny jokes. He really can’t. He just sounds like he’s a recording so old it’s unintelligible and it’s bad. He has a reputation to maintain here!

However, there is one sense of humor that Peter is very eager to learn and adopt, and hey, it might actually be Iron Dad™ Approved!

It’s a rookie mistake, asking Bucky Barnes for a hand, but in his defense, Peter was left unsupervised and was distracted.

“Hey, Bucky, can you give me a hand?”

“Sure thing, Peter.”

Something nudges his arm and he looks down. It’s Bucky’s metal arm, bumping up against his elbow.

It’s a cheap joke. It’s bad. It does not deserve Peter’s laughter.

He snorts anyway.

“That’s on me,” he says after a second, “you know what, that’s my fault.”

“What, is this not what you meant?”

“No, no, you’re fine.” Peter scruffs a hand through his hair. He looks down at the prosthetic again. “Well, that’s disarming.”

Now it’s Bucky’s turn to snort. “You gotta hand it to me, though, it’s a good joke.”

Oh, it’s on.

“No, no, of course, I understand. You really can’t let an opportunity like that slip through your fingers.”

Steve chokes on his next sip of coffee. “Stop making the kid shoulder the burden of making puns with you.”

Sam raises an eyebrow. “Don’t palm this off on someone else, Steve, you’re as bad as he is.”

“Oh, it’s not that bad.” Peter shrugs. “You just gotta knuckle-down and find the right one.”

“Do you have any idea how many times I’ve had to reach for puns?” Bucky hefts his arm.

“I’m gonna go out on a limb and say a lot.”

“Jeez, Pete, good one.”

“What, are you not finding them humerus?”

Sam’s gone, Steve shortly after. Bucky just grins proudly at him.

Then there’s a massive thunk from behind them. Peter turns around to see Tony slamming his forehead into the counter.

“You are all going to kill me,” he mutters, glaring up at them, “all three of you.”

“Oh, come on, Mr. Stark, Captain Barnes would never hurt you.”

Tony raises a skeptical eyebrow.

“After all,” Peter grins, gesturing to Bucky who is doing a very good innocent face—he must’ve been taking notes from Steve— “look at him, he’s completely armless.”

“Peter Benjamin Parker—“

Okay, so maybe it’s not Iron Dad™ Approved.

Oh, well.

[djemsostylist]

Of Queens and Trash

Here’s the thing. SCK has been on a downward trend since 13. The breakup was long, getting together again was tiring, the amnesia plot was poorly handled and the mess that came following his recovery was, well, a mess. The necessary break for covid gave us a chance for a fresh start for Edser. All the bad stuff in the past, and a focus in the last episodes of them being able to finally fulfill all the promises they had not been able to. After all, this was a story that, at its core, was about two people who met and fell in love and who, no matter what, chose to be together. Invisible handcuffs. And with the return of the OG writer, it seemed we might finally get that. After 39 episodes of angst and only 7(?) of real togetherness, surely it was time? Forget the pain of the past, and start with Edser navigating their world together.

And then the trailer dropped. And all of a sudden, all the people who had spent months eviscerating Serkan for behaving badly in the 30s were celebrating this new plot, the “great angst” and Eda “being a Queen.”

For me, I can’t get over the hiding of the child. It's a hardline deal breaker. I don’t think it matters who writes it, I think it's an awful plotline. No matter how "good" the trailer looks or moments seem, I will remember that I was watching a show about two people who loved each other and never wanted to be apart, about a man who learned how to open his heart, and this ruined it all.

Now, I think it's worth noting that my hard line, in this particular case, is in response to Edser, if that makes sense. I’m not hardline, “if this is in a story I’m not watching”. If it works for the characters and story because that is the type of story being told, then fine.

I don't subscribe to the woke feminism brand of "all women are Queens and all men are Trash" which seems to be a trend of late (and not just in fandom). I think people are people and people are generally imperfect but also trying. I don’t think women, simply by virtue of carrying a child, get full say in what happens to the child, regardless of the father’s wishes. I'm not fond of a “hiding a kid storyline”, and while I get the whole "my body my choice" style of arguing, it took two people to make the baby. Two people get a say in what happens. I get you are growing the kid, but you didn't spontaneously conceive.

For me, Edser being apart and/or hiding a kid is a hardline. It doesn't fit with the characters as I know them and it doesn't fit with the storyline. And look--I hated the amnesia plot. I thought there were a literal million ways this could have been done better, but it's what we got. So for everyone suddenly defending this new plot, despite it making about as much sense as Eda getting married to make Serkan remember her, then that means everything goes. No blaming writers or ignoring canon...everything has context and meaning now. And since “it's realistic” is also a common refrain, then fine. Let’s go realistic.

Imagine being in a plane crash. You wake up, you have clear physical/mental blocks. For someone who likes to be in control, that's terrifying. You have a ring on your finger with a woman's name you don't know, and an entire year missing. You call the one person you know will come (since your parents and friends are useless) and she comes and tells you a story that jives. You can't remember shit and you keep getting flashes and your hands won't work, so you take what she tells you, because why would you have any reason to doubt? It’s not like you can remember anyway, and trying to remember hurts.

You finally go back home, and you recognize nothing about your own life. Friends, family...everything is different. Your mom is out, your dad is gone, your best friends are married. You don't even live in the same house, you have people working in your company you don’t know--even your dog is gone. And then you have a hysterical woman throwing pictures in your face of a man you don't recognize and your brain is still foggy and all your friends and family seem to be shrugging their shoulders at you.

You're terrified and alone and all you get is some vagueness about an epic love story and too much emotion and all you want to do is hide. From everything. Plus your heart is doing this thing every time the girl is near and you think you might be dying maybe and remember how your brother died?

So, the girl kisses you, you literally feel like you might be dying, and it's like naw. Fuck this. I'm getting back an ounce of control. So you propose to Selin. I mean you don’t love her and you barely want her but at least she is the same. At least she hasn’t changed, and at least she doesn’t stare at you with the weight of a million expectations that everyone else does. At least she doesn’t look at you and hope to see a man you can’t ever remember being.

But then the girl everyone claims is your soulmate is suddenly engaged to another man, and spends every moment after that claiming she hates you, she is over you, she is better off/happier without you, doesn't need you.

So it's like, okay, what is the truth. Your brain isn't helping, your friends aren't helping, she isn't helping. So you lash out, you close off, because really, what else is left. Your life isn’t your life, your mind isn’t your mind, you can’t even figure out what’s real and what isn’t. And she’s getting married and you want to die but she’s getting married and surely if she loved you she wouldn’t be doing this?

And then you get your memories back. Finally. Everything comes flooding back ,and it's a lot. You cope in shitty ways, you don't respond well, etc. You’ve returned from the dead twice, and everything feels just slightly off, but maybe you can make this work. At least you have her. After a few days, you’re feeling like your old self. You've got your memories, your girl, the possibility of the future you had snatched twice, and then BOOM. She rejects you, out of nowhere.

Won't talk, won't communicate, you have no idea what the fuck is happening. She’s crying and sad but also not leaving but also not staying and your brain can’t quite work things out but all you can do is promise that you love her, only her, always her, forever. Surely she must know that by now, right?

And then she tells you about the baby. You can't remember the sex of course, but then you find out it probably happened while your brain was fucked, and you barely have time to process this before oh yeah the love of your life is leaving you bc she would rather you raise a baby with your rapist. And suddenly you might be dying, again.

But you stop her. You stop her and even though she says she didn’t come back for you, why else would she have stayed? So, you finally get her back, she tattoos you on her finger and maybe just maybe everything will be fine when BOOM. Cancer. You aren't even over the other shit, and you have a fucking tumor. You are 30 years old, you've survived a plane crash, amnesia, and now you have a tumor. How many times can a person die?

And so you don’t cope well. You withdraw, you back away. Your brother died when he was young, you know what that does to a person. You know what it did to your family. You have this fear that curls around your heart that says “but what if she becomes my mother.” And she goes. She leaves and she takes your heart and your child (that you don’t even know about) and it’s like...fuck. Again. Because everyone leaves you, eventually. And somehow, it’s always your fault.

So, what I'm saying is, Eda endured a lot, sure. She was hurt. Their breakup in 14 was hard and I’m not denying that (although there is another post I could write about how since Eda never actually uses her words to tell him how she feels he can, perhaps, be understood in assuming that breaking up after barely being together would hurt but also that she would move on and live her life happily without him. Which I guess season 2 proves…) Losing Serkan to an accident/amnesia was hard, looking at the body of the man she loves but not seeing the man she loves must have been agony. But Serkan was fucking wrecked. So instead of choosing to write a plot where they both get to heal, where they both get to explore their pain and work through it together, we get Serkan who reverted to being a robot to cope with massive trauma and PTSD, and essentially is abandoned by everyone, again.

I guess what I'm saying is, if staying with him and supporting him when he was dealing with trauma was too much for her, then fine.That is very true for some people, and it’s certainly realistic. But I don't really think that jives with Eda and her character, and while it isn't a trauma competition, I'd still think Serkan comes out a winner here. Eda lost her parents, which was awful. She lost him, but she got him back. Twice. His trauma is losing his brother, being abandoned by his parents, a plane crash, amnesia, emotional manipulation/abuse and cancer. And then he gets punished by having his daughter taken away from him because he was having a hard time coping. Keeping a kid a secret isn't "protecting the child" it's punishing the father.

Tl;dr The direction they have taken the characters is gross for both mains, but if people are trying to justify Eda keeping his child from him because “he deserves it” or “she did what was best for her” then I think we maybe haven’t been watching the same show. Even if he said “I don’t want kids,” saying that to a hypothetical child is very different then being told “a baby is very much our reality.” Because that's the crux right? It's not that he decided he just didn't want to be a father ever, he's scared of having a family and losing them or of them losing him. And then she made that very fear be realized. Which is tragic and quite the opposite of what his life partner needed to do in that situation.

Bitte.

Thanks to @lolo-deli for the proofread and the final lines, you are the best. And for putting up with my uncontrollable ranting about this for days.

[autumnblogs]

Day 8: The Universe Will Eat Paradoxes for Breakfast

Alright, time to get back on this horse.

https://homestuck.com/story/1358

We open with John exploring his planet. This game is a lot shorter than I remember it being, which is kind of welcome. While these little walkaround are fun, it isn’t until some of the later ones that they have some really heavy content, and this one in particular can be effectively skipped since I know we rehash it later with PM. That said, as part of the work as a whole, especially for first-time readers, and especially especially back when it was first being written, these are a lot of fun.

More after the break.

https://homestuck.com/story/1363

The militarist surrenders at the first sign of being overpowered (Bec is a symbol of trauma for him)

https://homestuck.com/story/1365

And is easily subdued.

https://homestuck.com/story/1372

More of the highly-jade-specific interactions.

Most of our opportunities to directly control characters so far have been pretty exclusively John and Jade. I wonder if Prospit players in particular are just more susceptible to the layered narrative true nature of reality in Paradox Space, or if it’s even just specifically John and Jade? We can directly control John through the walkarounds in his house and on his planet, and are implied to be indirectly influencing Jade through the sections where Jade breaks the fourth wall and lets the audience do things (whether literally through the couple of polls so far, or during the memory match game).

I’ve already theorized about all the parts of the story where Jade lets the audience take control as being representational of Jade’s highly overactive imagination - the audience serves as her gallery of imaginary friends, effectively.

Going back momentarily to the walkarounds with John, I wonder if we could read out of them that John’s wandering around tends not to be voluntarily directed by John almost at all - he zones out, and just lets the wind take him wherever it will, not really consciously exploring so much as aimlessly wandering. For John, everything in his environment is potentially a source of meaning, so everything in his environment is equally meaningless.

https://homestuck.com/story/1382

The Pumpkin is far too semantically complex to be rendered as a human-readable captcha code.

Which is weird, because as symbols of Void, shouldn’t Pumpkins be almost elemental? I would have expected a pumpkin to have one or two slots tops.

https://homestuck.com/story/1383

As @mmmmalo​ has already pointed out (or maybe one of the many people who reply to their posts!) this page conceptually connects a pair of hands holding each other with Squiddles, building Squiddles as a symbol of intimate contact.

https://homestuck.com/story/1389

In spite of Jade’s inner desire to go ape shitt [sic] she nevertheless remains by far the character with the best foresight until Terezi enters the comic (and Rose finds her groove as a Seer of Light.)

https://homestuck.com/story/1391

While inquisitive and probing when he comes across something he can interact with, when he talks to his friends, John seems very happy to mind his own business about their inner lives, and not push too much for more details than they are willing to give.

Another line in here has John mirror Dave’s language but end differently, turning the trope “take him out behind the woodshed and shoot him” and turning it into a playful joke. The fact that they both make use of nearly the same language makes me wonder whether John and Dave have talked about Becquerel alone, Dave sharing his discomfort with John leading him to make this remark, or if strange minds just think alike in Paradox Space?

https://homestuck.com/story/1393

Jade and Dave’s interactions with each other continue to be priceless. I think Jade’s guilelessness and lack of pretension makes it considerably easier for Dave to exist around her and just be himself, he doesn’t feel too competitive the way that he does around John (who is another boy/man - a significant part of Dave’s future arc is the level of insecurity that he feels over the way that John is arbitrarily powerful and he can’t catch up. Bro’s version of manhood is one where men have to compete with one another to establish dominance. I keep mentioning Toxic Masculinity in relation to Bro, Dave, and manhood in Homestuck in general, and instead of writing on the subject myself right now, I’ll direct you to Cinema Therapy’s excellent video about the subject.) or Rose, whose non-traditionally-feminine characterization and superior affectation eggs him on in a similar way. Dave can just be Dave around Jade.

https://homestuck.com/story/1394

Unlike Jade, John does negotiate with terrorists! I think that John is definitely only tolerating Karkat here specifically because the game is giving him reasons to believe that Karkat is actually an alien. But I also think that if Karkat had contacted anybody other than John he would have been shit out of luck. While in other places it manifests as gullibility (like when Terezi tricks him into getting killed by his denizen), John is generally extremely tolerant, willing to accept apologies, and believe the best of other people. He will kick the shit out of you if you’re an unrepenant jerk like Caliborn, but John has faith in just about everyone.

https://homestuck.com/story/1401

If it feels like I can barely be bothered to stop talking about the genders for twelve seconds, these characters can barely stop talking about the genders for twelve seconds, or sex, or psychosexuality, or being tangle buddies. Sometimes, they’re just talking about being friends though, and that’s alright too :)

https://homestuck.com/story/1403

The way that Jade deploys Sburb machines is nearly the opposite of what Rose does. Rose looks for pre-existing places within John’s house to deploy Sburb’s apparatuses, filling space that isn’t filled yet. Jade removes Dave’s bed to deploy the Cruxtruder there, his Television to put the Totem Lathe there... you’d really think a Hero of Space would display better spatial reasoning!

https://homestuck.com/story/1431

Rose, like Terezi, is more cognizant of Narrative Prompts meddling with her internal thought processes. I feel like that probably feeds into her paranoia in a vicious cycle.

Dave does not like being watched.

https://homestuck.com/story/1442

I’m pretty sure that this is the first time the Bluh imagery gets used but I could be wrong? I feel like I might have missed an earlier one if there is one.

John’s expression of disgust here does recall an earlier panel that has its basic theme repeated with all three characters though, and I forgot to comment on it completely until now!

Characters have intrusive thoughts, and intrusive trains of thought like this all the time in Homestuck, as they think about random shit that doesn’t pertain to their circumstances at all, ideas that they don’t want to have, and then reject. Dave’s train of thought here in particular immediately recalls another intrusive thought - Apple Juice and Urine are linked in his head now, so he can’t think about one without thinking about the other now, unfortunately - it’s not a conscious decision.

The quartet of Intrusive thoughts I’m thinking about are

Squawk like an imbecile and shit on your desk.

Writhe like a flagellum and puke on your bed.

Bleat like a goat and piss on your turntable.

Squeal like a piglet and fertilize some plants.

Interestingly from amongst the aforementioned establishing intrusive thoughts, the only character who humors hers is Jade, who proceeds to do exactly that. Go Ape Shitt Jade.

Really, this entire little aside is a bit of an intrusive thought made manifest.

Dave is extremely clever, thinks on his feet, and ruthlessly cunning. I think these are the hallmarks of a Knight, who exploits their aspect (as a weapon, if all the references to Knights as specifically warriors are to be believed.)

https://homestuck.com/story/1452

More intimacy symbolism with squiddles.

https://homestuck.com/story/1483

https://homestuck.com/story/1484

John and PM are in pretty much the exact same predicament.

https://homestuck.com/story/1487

John’s powers manifest just by his being there, without him even really doing anything to trigger them.

I wonder if an Heir of Light would passively cause outrageously lucky happenstances in self-defense like, all the time? Like the dude from that one episode of X-Files with the Rube Goldberg machines.

https://homestuck.com/story/1501

If we go with the theory of AR as a Bad Cop, he is extremely quickly rehabilitated by his community, as almost all such cops are. Again, this reading of AR is extremely experimental and is probably bullshit.

https://homestuck.com/story/1504

More juxtaposition between what is going on with the Exiles, and what is going on with the Kids. I forgot how rapidly Homestuck switches back and forth between perspectives.

This too is probably a kind of circumstantial simultaneity - events that coincide or follow each other not because of geographical continuity, but because they are both related to the same set of information.

https://homestuck.com/story/1521

I think it’s neat that Sburb has built in mechanics like this to ensure that it is played as a cooperative game, but also places limits on how much members of the team are allowed to use each other’s stuff so that douches like Eridan don’t steal the entire team’s Grist Cache to make something stupid.

I wonder if the Red Team and the Blue Team could use each other’s grist? That’s probably one of those things that hinted that they were actually one bifurcated session.

https://homestuck.com/story/1524

Terezi’s use of the phrase Hyper-Flexible Mythology here reminds me of an essay with that phrase in its title that discusses the way that elements like the Classes and Aspects are extremely constructive toward building a story that will have endless room for original characters, and with them, other kinds of fandom engagement.

Other than that, I notice two things here. The first is that Terezi informs Rose and the crew about the Exiles, and by doing so, helps us, the audience, understand why we keep flashing sideways to them.

Terezi also names the setting of Homestuck, Paradox Space, and in nearly the same breath, she alludes to the nature of reality in Homestuck - reality in Homestuck is self-fulfilling. Its only meaning is its own existence - Paradox Space exists just because it does. It needs no external justification for its own existence, it does so because it will. People who live in Paradox Space are like this too. While this is literally, materially true for Gods like John, Rose, Dave, and Jade, it is probably more spiritually true for everyone who lives in Paradox Space.

Nobody in Paradox Space is alive on accident. Everyone assents to their own existence. Everyone gets what they want. Everyone gets what they deserve. Even if they don’t know that those are the same thing, or that Determinism and Karma working together to create a system of distributed responsibility where no one actor is entirely to blame for the ultimate final outcome, but everyone simultaneously played a part in having it end up where it is, and in ending up where they are in all of it.

And with that, I’m going to pause here. We got a lot of information from Terezi, so before we get too much further into Troll shenanigans, we’ll take a break for an evening.

With some luck, I’ll get back to an even number of hundreds in terms of pages tomorrow.

Cam signing off, Alive, Not really feeling like myself today, but still Not Alone.

[spidersmiceandeverythingnice]

Gonna write my scatterbrained Spicy Hot Takes on Agartha before the news is stale and I delete this annoying and boring chapter from my mental landscape, so bear with me:

I think Agartha’s main issue was just straight up poor writing. The Japanese direct translations being as downright offensive as they were is one thing - but overall, the chapter is just one plot contrivance after another. It tries so, so hard to go for a certain tone but can’t seem to stick to any one thing or idea. Disregarding themes about sexuality probably would have been the very best way to go about this chapter, since I think the most interesting part was the theme about storytelling and in-authenticity - we all know that That Line was annoying af in a game like FGO, but it CAN work in a series like Fate as a whole. I had a helluva long day at work so allow me to explain in the least scatter-brained way I can manage right now:

Here’s what I’m thinking: Scheherazade, whose name I guarantee I will spell wrong/differently every time I write it even though I’ve been able to pronounce it properly since I was thirteen (I was in a speaking competition and told some of the Thousand and One Nights using her framework as the opening monologue, long story short ANYWAY -) is traumatized by her ordeal with the king. This is a really good and interesting thing to explore! Fitting it in with the theme of storytelling - Scheherazade is deeply afraid of dying and will do whatever it takes to live, so she makes a fantasy world and fills it with legends, and feeds their energy to a Holy Grail. With this, and the power of a Demon God at her side, she plans to reveal magic to the human world in the most destructive fashion possible, allowing the fantastic to become ordinary, and destroying the Throne of Heroes itself in the process. Fate is a series were stories have power - but Scheherazade survived basically by telling the most fantastical, interesting tales she could and never finishing them. She always would pause in the middle, and say, “That’s all for tonight.” I think this is the kind of thing we can run with in terms of setting.

Dahut is the weirdest example because it’s the one story in the chapter that I know next to nothing about. At one point it’s mentioned that Dahut is impossible to summon as a Servant, and so Drake was “forced” into the role of the Pirate Princess. Ys is probably the weakest part of the chapter for that, but I did like the idea of her being “Drake Alter,” where Drake vibrantly pursues her goals and desires but takes nothing for granted; Dahut gives into her every whim and takes absolutely everything for granted. The conflict between “Drake” and “Dahut” should have been emphasized more instead of having the player/Da Vinci dismiss her as “Oh, it’s not Drake, except when she conveniently comes back to delivery us the MacGuffins Ex Machina in the eleventh hour.” Dahut has little connection to Drake - it’s not her story, but a role she was forced into because Scheherazade was building a very specific kind of world. Therefore it is inauthentic. Perhaps that’s all it needs to be in this context. 

This can also work with the Amazons. Scheherazade never told stories of the Amazons, but she has access to basically all stories in the world through her Noble Phantasm - she learns that they are a society of warrior women who live without men, and so decides that they will be a society which oppresses men due to her fear/bitterness towards men after the ordeal she suffered through. The “oppressing men” plotline was honestly dumb all around but using the Amazons as a mechanism to explore Scheherazade's trauma would’ve been more interesting than just having them be the Big Bad before the Big Bad Columbus Reveal: Scheherazade doesn’t like fighting, but wishes that she had been strong enough to protect herself. Because she views herself as a coward and her ordeal with the king has complicated her view of sexuality - “I’m better suited to a bedchamber than a battlefield” - she uses the Amazons of Agartha as a mechanism to cope. 

This brings us to Wu, whose design I’m still not happy about even though I think the in-story justification is somewhat fair. (Let Helena and Wu be gray-haired grannies together or so help me!) Wu was absolutely an authoritarian ruler who did, in fact, invade and conquer several nations and institute a terrifying network of secret police. In her later life, she was given to decadence - but her tenure on the throne showed her to be a highly competent administrator. Notably, she ruled over an era of religious tension and balanced matters quite well, and though she was accused of undoing meritocracy to put her supporters into power, many of the men she appointed held positions in government long after she’d died because they were actually good at their jobs. Wu has been heavily mythologized over the years - later Tang emperors and Neo-Confucian scholars wrote her off (Wu founded her own dynasty under her own name, so they kind of had to legitimize it somehow), she became associated the nine-tailed fox spirit thanks to a few popular novels and poems, etc., etc., etc. The crazy thing is that Wu actually left very few records of herself behind, apart from some poems. Even the inscription on her tomb is blank! People can say whatever they want about her - it’s extremely difficult to know the full truth of the matter without any objective observers in the field (and without Wu’s own words to give context/another story), especially if you don’t read any Chinese. 

BTW - the first thing I learned history class is that when you’re dealing with primary sources, you must always remember that translators have agendas. Every word is a deliberate choice, and it changes the meaning from the original text. When dealing with historical documents, this is not always a good thing. 

Scheherazade reads some, but not all of these stories, and integrates Wu into her world as the sadist empress with an iron grip on her decadent mythical city. 

Do you see what I’m getting at here? It’s a lot, but I’m not done. Now we have to deal with Columbus - there’s “In Defense of Columbus” video is floating around in the Agartha tag, but I haven’t watched it in full and haven’t done like, any intensive research on Columbus in particular, so I’m going to apologize right now for any historical inaccuracies/misconceptions that I’m about to write. The point I want to make here mainly is that Columbus, like Wu, has been heavily, heavily mythologized for both good and evil at various points. The thing about Columbus that is also interesting is that the authenticity of his journals is or was apparently a subject of debate. The man who published most of them actually happened to be Bartolomew de las Casas - one of the founders/first vocal supporters of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. The reason de la Casas supported this is because he believed that using African labor would be an improvement over enslaving the native populations of the New World. Soon after, he had a change of heart and devoted the rest of his life to fighting against slavery in all forms. De la Casas went on to be named a saint, and was possibly the first person in history to propose the idea of universal human rights - which is how I had heard of him until literally just this afternoon; I had no idea he’d ever supported the slave trade until I was looking up basic info about Columbus’s writings so I could write this long-ass post. History is full of complicated people. 

But as I mentioned in Wu’s bit, it’s very important to note that in many ways, Columbus is literally just whatever people decide he is. Like, he never even set foot in any land that would become the United States, and yet he’s a huge symbol here! Along these lines, his amnesia would fit the theme of inauthentic storytelling, choosing what to read and what to believe in. Columbus regaining his memories was an understated moment, which is actually fucking fantastic because it could be used to really emphasize the choice that is being made here. He’s a Heroic Spirit who can choose to be whatever he wants. He can choose to be the simple hero-explorer that schoolchildren sing about, or he can choose to be the Big Bad, the first and perhaps most infamous conquistador. And he chooses to be the bad guy. That is so fuckin’ fantastic, y’all! I honest to God love that not only did FGO portray Columbus as a villain of history but that the bad reputation is something he chooses to maintain! I can write a list of Servants who were less than stellar people and got a makeover for Fate. Nero is probably one of the worst examples but like - Ozymandias absolutely owned slaves in his life as a pharaoh. Hercules and Medea murdered their own children. Asterios literally ate humans as the Minotaur. Gilles de Rais exists as a playable character. Jack the Ripper is your daughter. Hell, Nobunaga burned temples with the monks still inside - but she feels bad about it now! Enough digressing but I a hundred percent get why Japanese fans found Columbus “refreshing” at his introduction. He owns his cruelty, his desire to exploit others - he challenges the narrative that everyone is redeemable because he doesn’t even want to be redeemed, he just wants to get rich and famous, and he doesn’t give a shit who he steps over in the process! Like, Columbus said, “I’m just doing what comes naturally,” at one point when he still had amnesia, so when he got his memory back and turned on the player, I really would’ve liked for him to say is something like, “You’ve already decided that I’m the bad guy, right? You know my story, and I’m nothing if not a man of my word.”

These kinds of questions/debates could have been used to emphasize the themes of Agartha. Legends are what people decide they are. People make choices and history decides whether they were good or evil or important retroactively. Can you know what someone is like by reading a translation of their poetry? Can you judge a king’s reign by the words of their successors or their rivals? Does the context of a story matter? This all could have been super interesting to explore!

Like I said, the main theme of Agartha being “inauthentic storytelling” could have been hella, hella good considering that this is a world created by Scheherazade’s fears and trauma feeding into her escapist desires. But Minase’s incompetence as a writer made everything so hamfisted and awkward that everything just suffered under his desire to insert his fetishes at every moment. It was so obvious that he didn’t read any material for old Fate characters - like Astolfo you poor sweet thing, you deserved so much better! - and even the new characters that he clearly did research on, like Columbus, fell flat because he couldn’t figure out what he was trying to say beyond mildly-to-extra offensive sex jokes.

[pupsandnubs]

I don’t know what havoc I caused in a past life for karma to bitch slap me around like this, but it’s like I can’t catch a break.

I just posted all of these cute, loving pictures from our weekend together- and I mean we did have the loveliest weekend. I really enjoyed myself, I enjoyed being with you, everything was light and airy and peaceful and so much fun. It was so nice just laying with you, or being in your arms and just enjoying the rhythmic rise and fall of your chest.

But it’s like for every good moment we have, I get slammed with a moment that makes me so mad my ears get hot, my chest hurts, and the blood drains from my hands leaving me cold and physically shaking. 

I don’t understand why this turned into an argument.

I understand why things got tense- I know talking about your family triggers you. But I am no longer needed to be in a position to coddle or dance around your triggers. Now I’m meant to initiate them, process them with you, and help you use the tools you have to work solutions out of them. 

HOW it ESCALATED into EVERYTHING ELSE I have no idea.

You dismissed me in the car, and like I am SO used to you doing it that it didn’t even bother me the first time. I legitimately just rolled my eyes and decided I didn't give enough of a fuck to further that conversation with you anymore. Once again, we would start and end and restart and resolve: on your terms.

You’d text me the following morning with a long processed paragraph and apologize for reacting the way you did, and in typical Cristi fashion I would shrug and be over it and forgive and move on. 

I don’t know what you want.

Hell, YOU don’t know what you want. 

And I’ve convinced myself this long that it’s okay and that it was just a necessary part of our journey- but I’m starting to think maybe it’s not supposed to be.

I deserve to be part of someone’s plan. And a definitive “want”. I deserve a certain level of certainty from a person, and to be someone’s “absolutely”.

I can’t figure out one day to the next wtf I am, or where I lie. One day it feels Absolute. For a few more days it feels Certain. Then there’s a wave of I Think So’s. And then some Maybe’s. Then only when something drastically wonderful happens to I feel that relieving Yes, For Sure. Then when something drastically goes wrong it suddenly becomes I Don’t Know.

I get that I’m not the most consistent person in many areas of my life. I get that I don’t always know what I want in some instances either.

I rarely know what I feel like eating. I don’t know what I want to do with my life. I don’t know what career is suited for myself. I don’t always go to the gym like I say I will. I didn’t quit Canvas according to my deadline. I didn’t give up on you and just date someone else according to my mental timeline either.

But I was always sure about my love for you. My want for you. My wants for a future with you. My want for being a part of your family. My want for you being a part of mine.

I know I want children. I want a dog. I want to get you your cat.

I know what I want with you. I know HOW I want to live my life, I know what I wish for my family and what I wish for yours. I know I want my friends to succeed and that if I can be a part of that, I’ll do my best.

I don’t fucking know what you want.

You love your family, you never want to be far from them, you want you and your brothers to have houses close to each other. You want to be closer to them. You want to repair your relationship with your father, you want to love your mother. 

Then you don’t give a fuck, fuck them, your family hasn’t done shit for you so why should you ever change for them- blah blah blah.

Let me tell you something. That is selfish. Feel valid in whatever pain and trauma and despair you want, it’s still selfish. And you are the source of your own ongoing pain. I learned this the hard way about myself.

Are you a perfect son

Are you a perfect brother

If you can’t answer yes, you have no right to expect only them to change and not put the effort in yourself to change. This isn’t a competition for “who should change first”. If you want to see a change, fucking be the change!

I am not a perfect sister. I am far from a perfect daughter. I was always self centered growing up and truly felt misunderstood and that no one bothered to try to get to know me. 

I’ve been thrown out. I’ve been hit across the face. I’ve been called a bitch by my dad, who was my hero. I have been TOLD I was DEAD to them. That they (my mom and dad) had no daughter. I was instructed to never show my face at their place again. My dad told me that if I ever tried to come back and “hurt my mother” again, he would deal with me himself. I have had my dad try to call the cops on me to make me leave his (my) house. My mom has called me a whore. My family in upstate uphold that rumor and add new ones constantly: I’m a whore, degenerate, drug addict, etc. I have been black listed from a whole fucking town in upstate NY. I was told I was never allowed to show my face or interact with my former students.

I was never a bad person. The “bad” things I did didn’t merit the half of that. I snuck out and lied about going to prom. I fell in love with my coworker. I got married. I wanted to be happy even if people thought I made a bad decision. 

But I was treated like I’d committed the worst offenses. And I held that hatred close to my heart for a long time. 

My mom tried to kill herself, and told the doctors that it was because of me.

I was only 19.

Do you remember being 19? The world felt so big, and the sky felt like it was crumbling at my feet. 

I woke myself up crying every night for almost 4 years. I didn’t speak to my mother for 2 of those years. 

My husband held me until I finished crying myself back to sleep.

I hated them. I hated them for abandoning me. Blood was supposed to be thicker than water. Family was over any and everyone. Why was I suddenly the exception? They didn’t even shun BOMI’S biological mom. How could my family abandon ME, but didn’t turn their back on a woman who just dumped her children off? I hated every single one of them. 

Until I didn’t. Until I got a call that my dad had suffered his first stroke. 

I showed up to the hospital and I saw my mom at the elevator. I froze. I expected her to snarl, or go in without me. I expected to feel the hatred and resentment and get a “what are YOU doing here, LEAVE”

But my mom looked small, her shoulders sagged, and the bags under her eyes looked heavier. She sighed and waited for me. In silence we got into the elevator together, and she looked at me. I hugged her and cried. We never spoke about why we hadn’t seen or talked to each other. She just patted my back and said “Ok, it’s done.”

She’d forgiven me. And I had forgiven her.

The trauma is still real. The hurt still happened. For all of us, not just me. But the hate isn’t worth it. My parents weren’t perfect. I was not either. I had to forgive myself. I had to forgive my parents. I had to forgive upstate NY. Not for anyone but myself.

Did they deserve it? It doesn’t matter. I had to give it in order to heal. In order to move on. I had to rewire my brain to better handle my family. And it’s BETTER but still not perfect. It’s not on our parents for our own self healing. 

Whether you want to admit it or not, our parents did their best by us. It wasn’t always right, and it wasn’t always fair. But take a moment to reflect inward.

In order for YOU to get what YOU want, YOU need to change. 

For me to be friends with you- I had to forgive you for hurting me. I had to become more patient. I had to soften my tone. I had to change my approach. I had to learn YOU first, and then CHANGE my patterns/behavior too.

For me to be best friends with you- I had to control my temper, my impulse. I had to forgive you for lying to me. Did you deserve that second chance? In that moment, no absolutely not. But I gave it to you anyway and I would watch to see if I’d regret it.

For me to be with you- I had to accept that I would have to relive and relearn a whole new type of patience. I had to accept that you wouldn’t know what you wanted or how you felt for awhile. I had to accept that it could backfire on me and I could lose everything. I had to trust the process.

I had to change. And I did. Otherwise none of this would be as it is. 

Your mother wants to be able to walk over to you and touch you, or have a conversation with you. Your dad wants to be able to see you laugh or smile instead of seeing the look of despair or anxiety clearly sunken into the lines in your face.

Your brother want to be able to hang out with you and laugh and joke and go out. They want you to stay home on a Saturday night and socialize with their friends that come over.

If YOU change, they will follow suit. If they see a difference in YOU, why wouldn’t they give US a bigger chance?

My mom allows you over as much as you are because I have changed. I don’t whine or bitch about walking the dogs when she asks. I complain less about washing them. I take it upon myself to do the dishes if the sink is full, or take out the garbage she leaves by the door. I bring home snacks for my dad, or a meal if I know its around that time. I buy household things when we’re low so she doesn’t have to so much.

Small stupid things, that she’ll never say thank you for out loud- but that’s why she doesn’t mind that my boyfriend and I lock ourselves in my room for hours on end. 

I don’t intend on interfering with your journey with your family anymore. It’s not my place past this ... post I guess. I don’t have it in me to want something more than my partner, FOR my partner. I sound like a broken record, my attempts and encouragement will eventually feel like nagging, and innocent and genuine advice will eventually turn into resentment. And that isn’t what I want.

You handle this however you see fit. They are your family, not mine and I accept that. If no one wants to speak up to you about it because of fear of retaliation from you, that is your guys’ problem and not mine.

This is my lesson in not meddling. I understand that although intentions were good, that I should not have said anything. 

I hear you loud and clear, karma.

[delhi-architect2]

Journal - 8 Demands for All Future Architects

Michael Riscica is a Licensed Architect, Speaker and Thought Leader, who is deeply committed in helping the NEXT Generation of Architects succeed in their careers. Michael has helped thousands of ARE Candidates pass their exams and creates ARE 5.0 study materials at The Young Architect Academy.

Dear Future Young Architects,

First and foremost, I want you to know that I love and support each and every one of you! I get really excited about architecture when I look at what is happening with younger generations.

This is partly what inspired me to start the Young Architect blog. I got bored with all the Old Architect blogs. I mean, yeah, all those old white guys are really, really nice people. But I just thought the world needed a Young Architect blog.

I have a few important things I would like to discuss in my letter to “Future Young Architects.” So let’s get started …

1. Please do some soul-searching before you start working on your architecture license.

I don’t believe a vegan diet is universally healthy for everyone on the planet. Sure, many people thrive on it, but everyone has different habits, beliefs, upbringings, lifestyles and (most importantly) physiologies. A vegan diet may be the very worst diet for some people. But a diet is a personal decision: Who am I to tell anyone what’s right or wrong?

I also don’t believe everyone who graduates architecture school needs to become a Licensed Architect. In full disclosure, I’ll admit that at this point in my life I have accidentally stumbled into the business of architectural licensing and I would appreciate it if everyone going through this process would read my very popular book, appropriately titled How To Pass The Architecture Registration Exam. Despite this, I wholeheartedly believe that architecture licensing is not a requirement for “being successful.”

The profession has collectively been fostering the belief that there is only one path: Everyone with an architecture degree needs to become a Licensed Architect. If you don’t get your architecture license, you’ve wasted your expensive education, and you’re basically a loser.I couldn’t disagree more.

Please do some soul-searching before you start working on your architecture license. Make sure licensing is the right thing for you. It may or may not be. Architectural licensing is a very personal decision. It’s as personal as the diet or religion you choose to adhere to. I completely support you in whatever decision you arrive at. Both decisions can and will have positive and negative impacts in the long term depending on what your personal life goals are.

Most importantly, stop letting architects from another generation bully you into thinking you must have an architecture license and that expensive AIA membership, because you really don’t need it — IF they’re not aligned with what you want to accomplish in your life. I have zero patience with this “You’re either with us or against us” approach to inspiring Young Architects toward licensing.

Via Arch Student

2. Please stop waiting for permission.

We all went to architecture school so we could learn how to make cool shit happen.

Then after school was over, you quietly sat and waited for permission from a company, a boss, a client or some other outside force or circumstance to give you permission to share your unique gifts with the world.

Have you ever realized how self-absorbed everyone is? No one is ever going to pay attention to you, unless you grab their attention. No one is ever going to ask you to put yourself out there and share whatever value you have to offer the world.

I’ll say that again … If you’ve been waiting to be asked to put yourself out there, it’s never going to happen. Everyone is way too busy checking how many Instagram followers they have.

STOP WAITING FOR PERMISSION!

JUST DO IT!

3. Please honor and respect the past.

Our parents and grandparents’ generations blazed a fantastic trail that will help us take the profession to the next level. There is sooo much value in analyzing them and seeing what we can learn from their careers — good and bad. Sometimes, finding bad examples can be more powerful than finding good ones.

Study them, learn from them, ask them a lot of questions, use them as a resource and thank them for their contributions to the profession. Apply what you’ve learned to help you figure out what you want to do, how to be successful or how to see the mistakes you never want to make.

Either way, alwaysappreciate and acknowledge their hard work. Tell them how thankful you are to have them as a teacher.

Via JUMO

4. Please volunteer your time.

Society needs your help. Architecture may be a service profession, but that doesn’t mean you don’t need to volunteer your time without getting paid.

We became architects so we could make a difference and make the world a little bit better. And yes, we’re doing that. But you still need to take your architect hat off for a minute: Turn off the computer and volunteer as a citizen contributing to society.

I don’t care how, but you must volunteer. Service means giving your time, energy and attention to someone who needs it. The “I’m too busy” argument is old and tired. You’re always going to be too busy. There will never be a better time, which is why you need to start right now.

Your time and attention is more valuable than your money. Volunteering doesn’t mean throwing money at a problem. And it doesn’t mean donating time to build some silly, glossy art exhibit inside your local AIA office — that no one will ever see. Volunteering means giving time to a person or a cause that genuinely needs your focused attention.

5. Please be yourself … And find situations that allow you to be yourself!

NOTHING is unhealthier than putting on uncomfortable clothes you don’t enjoy wearing, showing up at a job you don���t like and working with people who don’t acknowledge or appreciate you. Day after day, year after year.

Every day you do this, it is the equivalent of feeding your soul a McDonald’s and cheap generic diet soda!

It’s not easy finding an employment situation that is aligned with who you are and how you want to be an architect.

Be realistic with yourself. Do you want to work 50 to 60 hours a week pushing projects and your career? Or do you want to work a maximum of 40 hours a week so you can spend time raising a healthy family? There is no right or wrong answer. Both are definitely noble pursuits. You need to find a firm that is aligned with who you are, how you want to work, spend your time and live your life.

There are a million different types of firms and jobs. It’s often significantly easier to find a new architecture firm that understands what you’re looking for, rather than change the existing culture of an office. It’s a lot like dating, you just have to figure out what you want first.

Image © 2013 – 2014 thehobosapien

6. Please don’t contribute negativity without taking positive action.

The profession of architecture gets thrown under the bus all the time. There is no shortage of bad news or problems in architecture. It doesn’t help that Architects are trained and given college degrees in sniffing out problems or recognizing how things could be always better.

The profession of architecture isn’t fair. It’s not only a big gender or diversity issue, it’s an issue for everyone. Architecture leaves people behind who can’t compete and adapt to change. The profession is supposed to reward hard work and those who can execute. The same time it often treats those same people unfairly.

The truth is: Every single person who has found success with architecture has been burned by this profession at one time or another. People get lied to, not paid and sued. At the same time, the successful ones have taken those setbacks and used them as opportunities for inspiration to keep moving forward. This profession isn’t easy and is highly competitive.

There is way too much complaining about the profession. If architecture has burned you and you can’t use that to take positive action, then maybe you should find another profession. No one wants to be around a person who is complaining all of the time.

Try to connect with the positivity in the profession and people doing great things and making changes within architecture. While we’re not perfect as a profession, only focusing on how terrible it is, without pairing it to positive action, isn’t helping us move forward.

The very last thing I’ll say about negativity is that every industry has its own problems. Nurses, lawyers, doctors, astronauts, golfers, scientists, firefighters, politicians, real estate agents and definitely teachers all have their fair shares of issues in their own industries. I recently listened to a physician tell me about all the trauma she went through in medical school. The grass isn’t greener. The Architects and the AIA aren’t special.

Via Klear

7. Please don’t let architecture ruin your health.

Pretty self-explanatory.

Did you know: Spending one hour each day exercising your body will have a significantly larger impact on your success as an architect than if you spent it sitting in front of that AutoCAD/Revit machine for another hour? You need to get your blood moving, eat REAL food and breathe every day. If your belly isn’t moving, you’re not breathing.

One hour a day isn’t a big commitment for your health and well-being. Unfortunately, your architecture career will do everything it can to try to prevent or rob you from taking this time. Your #1 job is to defend this time and take care of yourself first. Your life, career and everyone you take care of all depend on how well you can take care of yourself. I sound pretty dramatic, but this is the truth.

8. Screw around!

I am the King of Screwing Around. I have the five-year bachelor’s degree in architecture … and a Ph.D. in screwing around and jackassery.

If architecture didn’t give me permission to screw around, I would have ended this relationship many years ago. I don’t care what your Boss or Professor tells you … Design, project management and making money is mentally exhausting work. We’re humans, not architecture machines. So I’m going to screw around a little.

Screwing around is an important part of my creative process — If I didn’t screw around, I wouldn’t learn anything. By taking my mind off the problem to fool around, it helps me focus when it’s time to be serious. This is why I get more work done than everyone else. It’s because I laugh more, while everyone else is serious.

I wholeheartedly give you permission to screw around if it’s going to help you work hard, be focused and do better work. In fact, here are a few stupid blog posts I wrote to encourage your screwing around.

The Architect’s Postmodern Thanksgiving!

The ARE Book Reviews

Gifts and Toys For Architecture Students

Cheezy Architecture Videos

Thank You!

I want to give a shoutout to all of my good friends in the American Institute of Architecture Students. You know who you are. I see all of your conversations and everything you’re working on come across my social-media feeds. The rest of the profession has absolutely no idea how well-networked and supportive of each other you are. I am inspired and excited to watch your careers unfold.

Thank you for being great leaders, helping others and giving unconditionally to make the world a better place.

You all have the power to make massive change across the board. And you’re already doing it! We’ll get there by working hard and staying positive, committed and disciplined!!

Sincerely, your biggest cheerleader,

Michael Riscica AIA

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[joyusdancer]

Why Silence Heals

I remember sitting in that waiting room, thinking, “what the hell am I going to have to take on board this time?!”,  “Will this get some of my life back?”,  “Will it be less painful?”.  So I patiently   waited on busy experts who held job titles I couldn’t even pronounce like ‘prosthetist’; words that now run off the tongue so easily a decade later.

Amongst all this madness, the last thing I wanted to do was talk to anyone else about my accident, let alone a perfect stranger wielding counselling leaflets!  I’d already been through the police statement, the insurance claim, health professionals, the curious acquaintances, more so than friends.  I guess real friends know when to shut the hell up and just be with you, they know when that’s enough. I sure as hell didn’t want to go through it all any more than I had to, and every time I spoke about it, that’s what happened.  I know now that this was exactly why I should have had some kind of therapy, but talking about it back then wasn’t appealing, I just wanted to get back on with my life, get mobile again.  I had been a professional dancer up until the moment I lost my leg, but no prosthetic seemed to offer a solution.  It was painful and movement was restrictive.  No one cared about me getting back to dancing.  Hobbling around apparently was good enough for the clinicians I saw at the time.  No wonder I got very depressed about two years later.  I knew I had to get dancing again, somehow.

My refuge was dance.  The next man’s refuge might have been using the tools of his trade or in his shed, the next woman’s might have been mountain climbing, or simply playing spontaneously and feeling physically free with her kids.  The gap between the clinic and life outside was a chasm.  Nothing was bridging it except me.

Back then, I was being bombarded with new information left right and centre and yet none of it offered me any kind of solution.  Talk about life throwing you a curved ball, somewhere in all of this I lost the me that I knew, on a deep physical level.  The single best piece of advice I got back then and that was from the hardass prosthetic consultant the insurance company sent out, ‘You need to become your own expert’.

No one in my family seemed to know what to do to help, but actually the role of family it seems, was enough that they were there for me if I needed them and letting me know I was loved.  Interesting now, I reflect on that and wonder how this differs depending on what age this shit happens to you.  Yes I feel I deserve the right to swear after all this, certainly I’ve had to embrace a darker side of life.  The support that we have around us at times like this plays a huge factor in things.  Feeling like someone has your back.  You need people you can trust at a time like that, but when you feel vulnerable, on a primary physical level, it’s not always easy to see the wood from the trees.

You see, my accident happened right in the midst of raising young children and going through a divorce.  Interestingly, the insurance company’s psychoanalyst didn’t seem to hit the nail on the head at all.  Surprising that.  I mean, if I had needed years of therapy, wouldn’t that have been more expensive?……   God forbid, I should actually get what I needed.  You see, what no-one can tell you or prepare you for is the feeling of being so dam vulnerable.  I didn’t want to seem vulnerable, so I glossed over things, but the fact is, I was.  You have no idea if you’re not an amputee, what tricks and methods I have had to learn even to walk around a supermarket without the fear of being knocked over, bumped into, dealing with the pain of simply walking, even the inability simply to push the dam trolley, (always seemed to get the one that wouldn’t go straight!).  I had enough trouble just keeping myself upright and straight.  I was a professional dancer at the time of my accident, but what happened to me afterwards, in my feeling so vulnerable, changed the course of my life.  The strong resourceful me, went on a weird field trip.

Sure, Ive always been me, and I had a pretty reasonable upbringing and was lucky to have that kind of resource.  My personality is a courageous one, I guess it always has been.  I never set myself limits and was never afraid to walk away from a bad situation and I believed anything was possible, but I wasn’t walking away from this one, not without serious intervention.  I had no idea then that it was going to take the next ten years, becoming my own expert and championing my own cause and it would take this long for me to finally retrieve all of that personality again, and some.  

Back then my life didn’t look like mine anymore and I had big questions about how on earth I was meant to turn up to it. When I did start dancing again in the style I was trained for, initially it felt amazing, but after a while I realised I was never going to be able to pick my career back up again.  It took six years of trying but everything was against me.  It’s a competitive world at the best of times.  Then I had two more significant losses within 3 years, people close to me died.  This was horrendous, but coupled with the emotionally abusive relationship I was in, all this finally put me under.  The problem with being vulnerable is you attract people who are more than willing to take advantage of you.  The other thing is that if you don’t deal with loss properly, they accumulate.  The thing about hitting rock bottom is that one of two things can happen, either you fight your way out of it and rise like a Phoenix out of the ashes, or I guess you stay there and wither.  It was a chance for me to re-appraise my life.  What was it about dance that I loved so much?  I worked it out, finally, because I found it to be healing and all at once I was passionate and driven to find out more.  I realised I didn’t really want to perform professionally any more, it wasn’t helping me.  It was time to take the dance inwards, not outwards.

Now I’m writing a Masters dissertation, and it’s like me-search.  They say all research is.  I chose a psychotherapy degree, but not your average modality.  This particular therapy uses the body and movement to shift awareness and ways of being.  It works on the basis that body mind and spirit are one.  It’s been a challenge as an amputee to work alongside able bodied professional dancers I can tell you.  It brought up every shitty feeling I had about the prosthetic and my relationship with it.  Of course I knew it would and that’s why I wanted to do it.  I undertook the training towards becoming a Dance/ Movement Psychotherapist.  The training school instilled a person centred approach, which was a world away from all those self professed experts.  Person Centred practitioners allowed me just to be and explore in a safe way.  There was no choreography, only sometimes themes and theory to explore in a practical and personal way.  Working with clients who had much worse disabilities than me, made me realise that the Self, that is consciousness, and the intelligence of it, is in all living things.  This self organising intelligence that inhabits matter gave me a spiritual experience I hadn’t had before.  It was up close, personal and actually in my body!  When communication happened on that level, massive changes happened, both in my clients and in myself.  

I really started to appreciate my prosthetic leg in a new way and for the first time, I felt whole again.  I walked differently, I felt different.  Everyone noticed it.  I was me again, and this had repercussions for my life and those in it.  I wasn’t that vulnerable broken person anymore.  You know, it’s not until you’re strong again, that you realise how weak and fragile you really were.

Needless to say that doing the psychotherapy journey affected my life outside practice because there was a huge amount of self work and growth that happened.  I began to realise that a lot of people were completely out of touch with the massively intelligent resource inside of themselves and like vampires they were running around trying to take it from the people and other living things around them, or they were shut down and pretty lifeless.  They didn’t even seem to inhabit their bodies at all, the lights were on but no one was home.  I’m not entirely sure how much of this I want or need to share on a public platform.  Well, how can any inner experience be shared in such a way anyway?  Needless to say, I broke free from a 10 year situation that was emotionally abusive and found the strength to finally stand on my (own?) two feet.   There have been amazing wonderful and horrid experiences, in these past ten years, yet these kinds of experiences seem to be a fact of life for all of us.  The only difference is that amputation caused me to visit some extremes, that have ultimately served to make me more resilient, but the trick to acquiring that resilience has simply been to keep going and to never give up hope. Once you can sit with that amazing intelligence inside of you, it is possible to bear witness to the best and worst of life and accept the feelings and emotions that come with it.  This allows a free flow of experience, where nothing gets stuck or lodged inside your being.  Once this happens the ability to observe and adapt to change increases happiness and the chances of not only surviving but thriving. The problems start when you shut down your feelings, because then, you’re shutting down that amazing intelligent resource as well.  

Any mental health professional can tell you that meaning making and some kind of acceptance are important processes after severe emotional trauma (i’e talking with the rational side of the brain) but what they don’t tell you, is that you have to feel it in your body too and let your body express what you feel and this is more right brained territory, or as neuroscientist Antonio Damasio puts it, ‘the music of experience’, or as the well renowned trauma psychologist Van der Volk puts it, ‘the body keeps the score’.  The right brain is contextual, speechless and symbolic in nature.  This world we live in tends to de-value the symbolic and creative side of the brain, which is a real shame because its value doesn’t just lie in healing from bad situations, it can also mean working for optimal health and functioning.  If you don’t feel it in your body, trust me, you don’t have it. It doesn’t matter what that is, it could be flexibility and flow, it could be lethargy which may translate as inertia, or hyperactivity and muscular tension and pain, which could translate as bound and unprocessed emotions.  It could be balance, which means ‘wanging’ around between two or more of those things, not enough or too much of something.  Either way working through the body is a deeply personal experience by its very nature, mainly because YOU are the only one getting the full experience of the inner and outer world.  You decide how you turn up to the outer world, by the very organisation of that inner world.  The other thing is that when people stop talking, our felt states become more ‘audible’.  Ironic isn’t it?  This is why a smile can say so many different things, or a picture can speak a thousand words, or why a dance or song can move us.

This becoming our own expert, reminds me of the song, the ‘Man in the Mirror’, only what you have to understand is that the mirror does not give a proper depiction of you.  Even a selfie would give a more accurate visual interpretation of how others see you.  But vision alone will never let you see yourself as others see you.  That magic happens on the inside and neuroscientists explain this by the wonderful presence of mirror neurons, which allow others to feel the very ‘essence’ of what your’e feeling and visa versa.  This magic happens without words.  This is what it really means to be ‘seen’, or heard, it actually means being ‘felt’.  This sharing of our felts states, as well regarded developmental Psychologist Daniel Stern puts it ‘affective attunement’ depends upon the amount of emotional connection and attunement, i.e./ intimacy you have with that person (in other words, relational intimacy).  How well you can attune to others feeling states also depends upon you having a known and embodied similar experience of their emotional state.  This explains why after amputation, it can be most healing of all to talk to and be with other amputees.  Without this real and tangible connection with others, we actually remain unheard and unseen.   No wonder we can be in a room full of people and still not feel seen or heard, in other words, lonely.  

What I’m saying here, is that in many ways, my own profound healing came through the sharing of the Self between myself and others, which occurred entirely without words.  The famous experiential psychologist, Irvin Yalom says, ‘its the relationship that heals’ and he called it his professional ‘rosary’.  Being fully ‘seen’ and ‘heard’ is the most validating thing you can experience in life and from there existence becomes more concrete, more defined and you can start to model it.  As Carl Rogers put it, ‘the curious thing is that once I can accept myself for what I am, I can change’.  He developed the person centred approach in therapy during the sixties, where the therapist accepts the client without judgement, exactly where they are, without labels or diagnoses, and funnily enough, this is still much criticised today by drug companies and the psychologists who get their research funded by them.  Drugs have their place, but they have not been kept in their place if you get my meaning.

I hope my dissertation proves useful in helping other people.  I don’t think it should take 10 years to rebuild a sense of wholeness after amputation.  It is not something you can get by reading or talking about it, you actually have to do it, with all of your senses.  My work and my writing is about bridging the gap between the clinic and life outside.  It is about the only one constant, the Self turning up in the body, in the matter that is you, or me.  Or as the celebrated British philosopher Alan Watts puts it, understanding what really is in this ‘bag of skin’. In my mind, body and spirit, I now totally own what it is to be my own expert.  

The journey of self expertise starts within, when you are quiet and when you tune into and observe your feelings and felt bodily states and those of others.  The reason why we avoid doing so, is because sometimes, it’s just too dam painful, and then it is much easier to distract ourselves with verbal narratives and anything else that allows us to avoid doing the real work.

That is when sometimes we may need the help of a good therapist that understands the importance and significance of the body in psychotherapy.  Especially if we don’t have the right kinds of supportive relationships or the luxury of just being an observer of ourselves in our busy modern lives.  A good therapist can help bring awareness to ourselves of what we are avoiding and to support us when we stop doing so, and the best therapists on the planet will do this entirely without words.

I will be forever grateful to the team at Dance Voice in Bristol.  Studying there changed my life forever.