#si I really have no idea why you being Jewish has anything to do with me reblogging a pro Palestine post

[somewillwin]

I've had literal death and rape threats thrown at me because I'm a Jew. I've had men scream they will rape me because I am a Jewish woman. I do not have an Israeli passport. I do not have an Israeli flag on me. They have all done it under the guise of being "pro-Palestinian". My family have asked me to not wear my star of David in public because they are scared for me. I get you want to do the "right" thing. But seeing you reblog a post about anti-Semitism, that is from someone who is not Jewish, is disheartening. I want peace. I want to live without fear. Shame on you.

Wait what???

What does me being against the Israel occupation in Gaza and ask for a free Palestine has to do with anti semitism????

It has literally nothing to do with people being Jewish, at least that I know of.

[goldenworldsabound]

I know I already sent one in but 💫 for Star Trek too!!!

I'mma do this one first :D For those who don't know, Star Trek: The Original Series is my jam

You may have seen me go off about my various SIs before but that's what I want to do again kjfashfkjs

ALTHOUGH FIRST I do wanna talk about Spock

because I love him. I also love Kirk. BUT SPOCK IS REALLY SPECIAL and he's a main for a whole rainbow of reasons.

Spock is such a complex character and I think that's why so many people are really drawn to him. He's ostracized by Vulcans because he's half human, and he's ostracized by humans because he's half Vulcan. He acts as Vulcan as he can. He has a terrible relationship with his father. And he doesn't really quite fit in anywhere. He does the best that he can, always, and always strives to do good (and to be logical, but that logic is employed by Vulcans to do good in general imo, until you get into your extremist Vulcans who I've forgotten the name of now but anyway fuck those dudes). Even when other people are downright rude to him, he still helps them and does the right thing.

I feel like a lot of us can relate to not feeling like we belong anywhere.

And then of course his career choice ALSO further ostracizes him from his father. It's just! Man it hurts a lot how much he suffers. And he does feel very deeply (most Vulcans do) as much as he wishes he doesn't.

Anyway though, I'm sure these are some of the reasons I latched onto him in high school when my family sat down every night after dinner to watch Star Trek TOS.

At that time, my self inserting was a huge secret, and I wrote about it in my diary and told no one about it. I wrote pages and pages. I still have it - I started typing it up one time and got like 15 pages in? And we were still like. I mean. There was a lot left. I still wanna finish typing it up. That SI was intended to be the Literal Me. There would be time travel shenanigans (Star Trek has a lot of these) which landed me into the future, on the Enterprise, which it turned out was real despite being the subject of a tv show (don't worry about the details).

And of course, I already had a crush on Spock. So you can imagine the fic was largely him being aware of it and kind of ? about it while also teaching me about modern tech and science so I could adjust. Bones stepped in as a familial role as did Kirk at that time. I'm still very fond of this self insert and her story, even though it's no longer what I need. I really needed it back then. And it served it's purpose admirably. And I'm very glad I had it. And, frankly, some of the ideas from it? Stealing those for my new SI to use too.

For example, before I move onto the more current SIs, one thing I really loved about my first SI is she gets left on Vulcan for two ish years? She's got a baseline of knowledge now but no proper training in either science equipment (Spock did his best but you know) or like, Starfleet procedure or anything so she's really quite a liability. She gets to take classes at the Vulcan Academy, bond with Spock's parents, learn more about Vulcan culture, and make friends (with my OCs). I have a sort of comparable situation for the new main SI because like...I just really loved this.

So I actually have two more SIs! The main SI that I use now grew up traveling around the universe with her parents, and spent some of her formative years on Vulcan with Spock, where they accidentally formed a weak bond while playing. There was an accident, she was in cryostasis for a while, her parents died, by the time she meets him again he's the lead science officer on the Enterprise and she's just graduated Starfleet Academy and is joining up as his subordinate. Spock is betrothed (which I really didn't address in my super indulgent fic because that wasn't what I needed then) and also a superior officer, and he's faced with the weird realization of this sort of weak bond we have that is totally inappropriate. Long story short, it's more emotionally complex and tackles more difficult issues. Because it turns out we both fall in love. And that's difficult.

In this setting Bones and are I besties (kinda like him and Kirk!) and I date Kirk on and off. That stops once Spock and I get together of course, but eventually we become the happy space polycule 🥰

And as far as the specific situation, I was thinking she gets seriously injured and they drop her off at Vulcan where she does a semester or two teaching at the Vulcan Academy, again while bonding with Spock's parents and refreshing herself on Vulcan culture. And also trying not to kill T'Pring (the woman Spock was betrothed to who was an absolute bitch to him since it was an arranged marriage and she hated him) I guess but um ignore that. I just think it's a really great formative experience and I also want to include my lesbian Vulcan OCs again. Vulcan culture is really interesting to me! And some of it incorporates things from Judaism, which is a lesser known fact, but also true. :) Also Spock's mom is canonically Jewish so Spock is also Jewish so SPOCK AND I GET TO BE JEWISH TOGETHER. It's REALLY EXCITING TO ME OKAY???

The other SI I haven't talked about much she's the angry!SI variant. She's a security officer and also has a special ability, aka my SI shield power. But I was going to make it more Star Trek, so it comes from being exposed to something funky as a child (maybe something with dilithium crystals? idk I didn't get that far). Anyway, the shields make her an amazing person to bring on landing parties as it's not a weapon that can be disabled and no one really expects it. It's a nice ace up the sleeve. She's super in love with Spock, it's super obvious, and she acts really pissy about it all the time jsahfkjsahfkjdsa but uh you know. It's fine. She also bickers with Bones constantly over nothing, but if you ask either of them, they'd say they're great friends. They enjoy it.

angry!Star Trek SI was going to have a big culminating event where in an emergency her weirdness that results from dilithium crystals in some way would allow her to help the ship escape an emergency situation (the ship is powered by dilithium crystals) but at serious personal cost. So Spock would have to grapple with this being the logical choice but also like. With not wanting it!!!

Anyway I have rambled a lot now I hope you enjoyed this!!!

[come-on-shitty-boys]

Thank you so much for writing such a detailed answer about NLMG🥰 I also really enjoyed the discussions about the novel, trying to understand things like why they never left the school etc. After reading reviews and ishiguro's statements, we came to the conclusion that he wanted to show a phenomenon (a part of human nature), which often happened in history, where people were forced to live in bad systems and just kept living in it. Also if you want to talk about HP, do it. I would love to know☺️

No, nonnie 🤧 thank you for asking! I LOVE talking books and I haven't really been able to since covid kicked me of my college campus.

But, yes! That was the same kind of conclusion we reached in my class! This refusal to leave because you don't know if leaving will put you in a better situation. There's this sense of fear that surrounds the uncertainty of what's outside the life you've been forced to live!

Continued under cut, because this gets L O N G

When nonnie reads the tags so you get to ramble some more 🥺💕

So, here's some things that you may have never known about Harry Potter and how J.K. Rowling showed that she was G A R B A G E even before letting the world know she was a terf :D! Watch me get attacked by the Potterheads oml

First things first, I'm mainly going to focus on some of the over-arching themes, because that's what we covered in class, but there's still plenty to talk about.

Let's start with the Durselys. Now, if you've only seen the movie, this fact gets lost, but in the novel, they are depicted as having blonde hair and blue eyes. Now, this may not seem like much of anything, but there's a really cool parallel between Harry Potter and Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre (another very thought provoking novel). Specifically in their openings. The Durselys are pretty much copy and pasted from the Bronte's Reed family. I'm talking looks and personalities. They're violent and always picking on little Jane (small, frail, dark hair, green eyes. Familiar description, yeah?) I'm like 62% sure that Jane gets called dirty because of her looks and how she doesn't fit the Aryan ideals (please note: when I say Aryan I mean the ideals that have come to be associated with Hitler's "master race" rather than the true background of the word). Hmmm it's almost like Harry also doesn't fit in because of something similar. Harry has Lily's eyes and his father's hair, a direct link to his magic background. Bold of you to assume that he didn't stick out like a sore thumb in the Dursley family just because. No. It's so we could have a PHYSICAL difference as to why Harry is looked down upon.

The Smelting stick :) oh you mean something that I did extensive research on? It's a symbol for Dudley's power in the house :) the historical connotations behind walking sticks shows us that they were more widely carried by those who were in high power and authority (think about how royalty wield scepters). As time progressed, they also were made into weapons, some even being equipped to conceal daggers and pistols. Now, Dudley's stick may not have been doubling as a knife, but we can ALL tell that Dudley is the real ruler of the house, even before getting his stick (possible penis imagery which adds another level of masculinity into the conversation. I promise if you ever study lit in an upper level course, everything is a penis). But by giving him the Smelting stick, Rowling is really just giving you affirmation that Dudley is the head of the household as he B E A T S Harry with it. (The same idea of stick = power can be seen with the Malfoy men. Lucius carries a walking stick which is then given to Draco my BABY in half blood prince because HE'S calling the shots, so to speak. Also are going to ignore that a 16 year old CHILD started a W A R? like come on. That's fucked up. I can and will write an essay on why Draco deserves way more sympathy than what he gets and I'm not just saying this because I love him. But back on topic)

Harry living under the stairs? That is literally showing how he is beneath everyone in the Dursley home and how they walk all over him. There's not much else to explore there ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

The Goblins at Gringots oho ho 👀 this one left me shook when I found out. They're supposed to be Jewish people. It plays very heavily into the anti-Semitic view that Jews are stingy and greedy. Also?? They work underground?? Which uhhh doesn't sit right with me now that I know what I do, but maybe I'm reading too much into things.

We all know the House Elves are literally S L A V E S employed by everyone's favorite school nonetheless 👀 but here's what really drives me bonkers about that. Rowling insists that they LIKE it. Dobby is the only one who gets out of the system and the others are essentially like "bitch why the FUCK do you wanna be free." But isn't it nice to get a little insight on what she thinks of slavery smh 😔 didn't Kanye say the same thing? About slavery being a choice or that they liked it or something?? Or am I just tripping?

N E WAY. Here's one of my favorite parts. DIALECT. I don't remember if this gets mentioned in the books, but I know it's in the films. So, if we put Ron, Draco, and my queen McGonagall all up next to each other and have them say the same thing, what the difference? Their dialect. They accent they have is directly linked to their social class. Ron has more of a cockney accent, which is used by working-class Londoners. It's essentially the Southern accent of Americans, so it's typically associated with being dumb, so it kinda fits that not only is Ron Weasley poor, he's also not the brightest. Say it with me friends. Classist. Draco has a posh accent, so he's rich and super smart but also kind of a brat, especially early in the series ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ McGonagall is Scottish. That accent is very desirable because it EXUDES class. So, it seems to make sense that one if the older, wiser characters gets to be Scottish.

I wish I could go on and on, but I don't remember everything we talked about?? There was a lot of stuff JUST on Hogwarts itself and the British private school system and the classism you can find rooted there, but I don't really remember it all?? There's things about the roots of last names, specifically Potter vs Malfoy and the whole Anglo-Saxon vs Anglo-Norman roots of their names and how it translates to class and their beliefs. I could go on for YEARS about why I can't stand Albus Dumbledore but this post is already massive 😩 so I really shouldn't.

Nonnie, thank you for letting me ramble on about all of this. I've missed talking about books. It's honestly something that I will always enjoy :') my brain just thrives off of underlying meanings 🤧

Tagging @nekxrizawa because sis wanted to get in on this discussion.

[finalvlog]

[ A very descriptive and detailed profile of your muse ] REPOST with the information of your muse, including headcanons, etc. If you fail to achieve some of the facts, add some other of your own! ( If you’re in doubt on some hover over them to discover what you should put in there! ) When you’re done, tag 15 other people to do the same!~

TAGGED BY: No one, I stole it​ // placing under a read more because this is A LOT. —————————————————————————- “NAME” / ALIASES: Alex Josiah Kalinsky / AJ.  AGE: 23 at time of Hope County events, 26 present time.  SPECIES:  Human. GENDER: Cis Male. PROFESSION: Vlogger/Online personality. STATUS: Single —————————————————————————-

PHYSICAL ASPECTS

BODY TYPE: Alex is short and naturally skinny, but he works out regularly to get some muscle and body mass on him. He’s still slim, still shorter in stature but he is strong.

HAIR: A brown that borders on dirty blonde with hints of red at times. It has a natural curl to it that will grow out of control if he lets it. For the past four years or so he’s taken to keeping it cut short to avoid curls but that means haircuts at LEAST once a month. If he misses a few haircuts he will take to wearing a beanie.

EYES: Large, round eyes, down turned at the outer edges but very expressive. Because of this he tends to keep a neutral expression, bordering on RBF (resting bitch face) with a concerned furrow to his brow. He’s been told he has a deer in the headlight looks when surprised. They’re a bright green color.

SKIN: Pale skin with an underlying olive complexion from his mom. If he goes out in the sun he has the tendency to tan rather than burn. Alex’s skin is smooth for his age, he’s often mistaken for being up way younger than he is. 

HEIGHT: 5′7”

WEIGHT: Anywhere from 140-155 due to his muscle mass. When he stops working out he drops the weight FAST and has been as low as 125 lbs before.

SIZES: He has no idea.

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FAMILY

SIBLINGS: Alex is an only child. His parents were told they wouldn’t be able to conceive in the first place. So he was considered very much their miracle child.  PARENTS: His mother is Tova Malka (second last name Kalinsky after getting married). His Father is David Kalinsky. Both are MD’s, his father specializing in cardiology as a surgeon and his mother a neuro-psychologist specializing in healing from brain trauma. His mother is Jewish Israeli, born in Ashdod, Israel. His father was born in New York City, from parents that immigrated from Germany shortly before his birth. David, and his parents also practice Judaism.  GRANDPARENTS: On his mother’s side his grandmother is Esther Malka, grandfather Dov Malka. Both live in Israel still but visit the states and vice versa. On his father’s side his grandmother is Nadina Kalinsky, grandfather Walter Kalinsky. He has met and grown up with both sets of grandparents. OTHER RELATIVES: A LOT. His mom alone has one older sister (Amaris), two younger brothers (Davi and Elias). Her older sister, Amaris is married to a woman named Mary and they have three children together. Davi is married to a woman named Adele and has two children, Elias is unmarried. His father has one younger sister, named Johanna that went missing when she was twenty seven.  ANY PETS?: yes [] || no [ x ] IF YES WHICH AND HOW MANY? — N/A.

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SKILLS

PHYSICAL

ENDURANCE - Bordering on absurd. Alex will endure more than he should. It could get him killed even (hahaha). He can take a beating and his endurance for mental manipulation is fairly strong too, but he’ll cave mentally before he does physically most likely. If someone can be patient with him, they can exhaust him.

HAND TO HAND COMBAT - Very good. Better than the average person. He has been doing wrestling since he was a kid, boxing since high school, and took some akido in college. Boxing is where he excels.

GUNS AND WEAPONS TRAINING - Alex knows how to handle a gun. He was in a shooting club throughout college, skeet specifically. He got into timed course shooting with handguns on his own. Alex took to the sport with a natural inclination. He’s better with a rifle/long distance than handguns but he is capable at both.

ATHLETIC - He lifts weights and does strength training on his own to stay fit, to keep muscle mass. Hannah forced him to go running each morning and he keeps active on the road with push ups, burpees, star jumps, anything really. He doesn’t want to be skinny, which his body naturally trends towards without work put in.

NON-PHYSICAL

FAST THINKING / INTUITION / ADAPTABILITY - Alex has proven time and time again he can adjust to a situation and will try to think his way out of it. When at the Revival he keeps calm, listens, watches the crowd, and picks up on the ONE guy openly carrying. Alex keeps him in his line of sight and when Mark threatens to blow their cover he steps in and with a single word “Relax” he calms him down. He remembers that they have a pocket cam, he is able to figure out they can upload to the cloud backup he has that will automatically push the upload to the YouTube channel. Alex takes things in stride and will remain optimistic, probably because of his ability to quickly analyze a situation and come up with a plan or way out. Where others lose hope, he holds strong to it.

CALM IN STRESSFUL SITUATIONS - To a dangerous degree it may seem. This will get expanded upon in major experiences but Alex keeps a level head in almost any situation. Part of why he did so well with the subject matter of their vlogs was his ability to calm people down and maintain that calm himself as well. He only panics when he loses all control of a situation or sees someone else getting hurt or possibly hurt. For example when he can’t prevent Mark from being dragged to the river for the baptism, it’s the first glimpse we have of Alex panicking, trying to make a deal. “We won’t say shit!!” He tries to come to an agreement that saves Mark from getting hurt. He fails but he tries to appease the Baptist.

COOPERATION- Alex is a very stubborn individual but he is great at getting along with other people. He has spent years working on the vlog alongside his two best friends and so he’s gotten used to working in a group, so long as the group is people he trusts. Alex is a great person to collaborate on and an easy mind to bounce ideas off of but his sometimes blunt honesty turns people off of him or his advice.

TRAITS

—— POSITIVE ——-

Loyal

Intelligent

Charismatic

Witty

Calm

Friendly

Brave

Compassionate

——- NEGATIVE ——-

Stubborn

Skeptical

Distant

Reckless

Compulsive

Single-minded

Disruptive

Blunt

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MAJOR EXPERIENCES

[ TW for some childhood bullying/mental trauma ref. ]

Alex was born with some health complications as a premature child, and his mom had preeclampsia as well. For the first three years of Alex’s life he was in and out of the hospital due to asthma and respiratory complications. Eventually he grew out of his asthma, but it’s something his parents never let him forget. That he is LUCKY to be alive.

From a young age Alex was taught the value of humanity and compassion. His parents would remind him that they worked hard to get where they were to have the income and money they did. His paternal grandparents didn’t have an easy life and immigrating to the United States had been a struggle, even with his grandfather being a well-established doctor. His mom and dad did not want him to take for granted what he was given. From the archery lessons to Hebrew School and everything in between. He remembers when he first understood the impact of donating some of his presents to kids in need on his birthday and the holidays. When he turned ten he stopped accepting gifts altogether except from his grandparents and would instead volunteer with his parents at shelters or the hospitals they respectively worked at.

On that note, he did grow up immersed in medicine but he had NO desire to pursue it. His father was disappointed at first, yes, but he supported Alex in whatever he decided would catch his eye. Neither his mom nor dad tried to force him into a field like medicine when he wasn’t intrigued by it. He did want to do something to help other people, but medicine wasn’t how he wanted to go about it. Because while his parents were there for him as much as they could be, they still had a good amount of absences because of their work and how often they would travel for it. His father with doctors without borders and his mother to conferences. Medicine had to be your LIFE and Alex was too interested in everything else to commit to it.

His first episode happened when he was thirteen years old. School hadn’t been going well; he was bullied for his curly hair, his big eyes and small stature. Leading up to the holiday break it’d gotten especially bad. Alex had been feeling strange for days, in a deep sadness, a sensation of approaching dread. Nothing felt real, it all felt pointless, and he was struggling to connect with those around him. Around this time the whole family was visiting for Hanukkah, including all of his cousins. The kids were playing off on their own and Alex, being the youngest was being picked on, as usual. They teased him for his big green eyes and how expressive they were and so on and so forth. Kid stuff. Alex walked over to his eldest cousin, seventeen at the time and proceeded to beat the shit out of him. Not even with just his fists, but with the nearest piece of furniture he could grab – a candlestick. The other kids didn’t do anything, too shocked by the sudden outburst of violence. One of the girls screamed and by the time the adults got there Alex had stopped hitting, but his cousin’s nose was broken, a couple of teeth lost and hairline fractures to boot. He was unconscious.  Hanukkah was called off, and the family spent their respective holidays in the hospital or at home. Alex was admitted to a hospital to try and figure out what happened to make him respond the way he did. When asked he simply said it wasn’t real and that his cousin wasn’t there. It was just someone or something but not someone he knew. Just shapes. Alex hadn’t even recognized his cousin’s face or really taken in the words said prior. It was all a blur of sounds and shapes, and colors but none of it connected to him. Eventually he talked about the excessive bullying at school, about how he’d been locked in a janitor’s closet after they’d spilled some of the cleaning supplies, how his lungs burned, and other events. He’d been keeping it from his parents and the teachers, not wanting to cause a problem and figuring he could handle it. Alex didn’t think them a big deal, but the psychologists pointed towards the months of bullying as a potential trigger for what had happened. He was switched to a different school soon after, but he refused to ever name the kids that had left him with bruises and mental trauma he figured wasn’t that big of a deal.

Alex was diagnosed with a minor dissociative disorder brought on by the general stress and anxiety of being bullied. His derealization of the situation with his cousin compounded the situation and he was put on medication. Eventually, after years of therapy he got through the worst of his symptoms but he still struggles with this now and then, and he was never the same. Alex can swing between over-empathizing or detaching himself, he tries to stay in the middle ground, but it isn’t easy.

After that event he never really smiled the way he used to as a kid. His smiles became reserved, muted expressions. Of course he could still smile and he could pretend to be happy but Alex crafted a very specific persona. One that would come in handy for the vlog he’d later help found. He’s a good person at heart, wants to help others, is comfortable with his friends, but he still struggles.

When Alex left for college his parents were concerned about him potentially relapsing into another dissociative episode. To try and prevent this from happening he threw himself into EVERYTHING feet first. Clubs, classes, events, everything. Alex had his own dorm room and being by himself held the potential for a relapse so he kept busy and was often seen out on the campus green or in the library. Very quickly people grew to like him and his casual but genuine attitude. When he met Hannah the two clicked instantly and he was so happy to have a friend to spend time with. Sara was met within the next week and another friend was made. He would talk with other people but these were the first two he connected to and the only ones that mattered to him ultimately.

In addition to his activity on campus he was busy online. Alex was ridiculously popular on vine, to the point of being recognized as he walked to his classes. He had a YouTube channel that was a borderline casual blog/how-to do things that covered a variety of topics and had hilarious failures. His instagram was popular by proxy of vine and he was into the hundreds of thousands of subscribers across his different platforms. He was accepted into the journalism school around this time but the courses seemed easy and like something he could teach himself so he opted for challenging himself with linear algebra and flowcharts in computer science. Nonetheless he had a love for journalism and digging into the heart of a story, along with a passion for technology. Which was how TRUTH SEEKING TRIO STARTED. He was at a party when he overheard some frat guys bragging about their fraternities history – including having KILLED a guy. Alex was skeptical but intrigued. He would end up getting Sara involved with his conspiracy theory about them ACTUALLY having killed a guy. The two would spend late nights at the library researching the fraternities’ past while Hannah was roped in as well, playing reconnaissance and watching the group. Alex ended up infiltrating as a new ‘brother’ and after a few months he actually found a skeleton in the basement. Literally. A skeleton. The police were called, alumni were arrested and the trio skyrocketed to fame after they posted a video that recorded all of their experiences to Alex’s YouTube channel.

Shortly thereafter they began taking on more stories, more urban legends, recording and posting it to a newly minted name of TRUTH SEEKING TRIO. Their videos would go viral, their personalities on camera were well liked and Alex had the benefit of a strong online following already. Eventually they moved from urban legends to real life issues. People began writing them, asking for their sleuthing help when the cops had turned a blind eye or the law wouldn’t help them anymore.

The last of the letters they received was from a guy named Mark, out of Hope County, Montana.

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LIKES

COLOURS: He likes sunsets and sunrises, the oranges and purples. Red is also a favorite, same with greens but mostly for wearing. I.E. that plaid shirt SMELLS: Alfalfa in the summertime. Mint toothpaste. He uses mostly unscented soap and naturally gravitates towards hints of freshly cut grass scent. FOOD:  Spicy food is his favorite. Anything new. He has a weakness for gummy bears. FRUITS: Blueberries, peaches, bananas. DRINKS: Water, coffee, black tea, energy drinks. ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES? yes  [] || no [ x ] IF YES, WHICH ONES?:  None

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OTHER DETAILS

SMOKES? yes [] || no [ x ] DRUGS?: yes  [] || no  [ x ] DRIVER LICENSE?:  yes [ x ] || no [] EVER BEEN ARRESTED? yes [ x ] || no []

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DONE! NOW TAG OTHER 15 PEOPLE [ OR MORE IF YOU WANT ] TO DO IT: This is a hell of a ride, so if you want to, please do, just tag me!

[selfawarenessawareness-blog]

Nous Sommes Si Seuls Dans Ce Quartier

There was always a bit of darkness to Sydney. It was hard to miss, I suppose. He could be really withdrawn sometimes. You’d be sitting with him, at a bar or pizza place or something and everything would be just fine. But then, he would get this very far away look in his eyes and just sort of, I don’t know—drift off. He would snap out of it eventually, after a few minutes or so. The first couple times he did that, I’d ask him what was wrong, but he’d just smile at me, this perfect smile of wildly imperfect teeth and tell me it was nothing and I shouldn’t mind him.

At first, I thought it must have been something I did or said. God, he could get you so anxious by doing nothing at all. It always seemed like there’d be a day that he’d just sort of drift away. He always stuck around though.

That darkness he had though, it was quite appealing, really. At least to me. Maybe that sounds crass, but I don’t think it ought to be, and I certainly don’t mean it in a crass sort of way, at all.

I wish we could be telling this story together. He wasn’t a great storyteller. His stories meandered, never quite getting to the point. Sometimes he’d begin telling a story and by the end I wouldn’t have a clue how we’d landed at that point. He was really insightful though, he saw things that most people ignore. People often say things like that to describe some bon vivant or something, but that’s not quite what Sydney was. It wasn’t that he loved life, he just had a clearer picture of what life is than most people do, I think. Maybe I’m wrong. I read Plato’s Socratic dialogues once, and that old Socrates seemed to get people, too. Maybe lots of people are pretty insightful, it’s really hard to say. Most people, though, if you take a look at them you sort of get the impression that they’re a bit of a moron, like this guy I once took picture of on the train—I took the picture to send to Sydney, actually. He had like this very shiny looking suit on. He was trying to be very suave as hell and all, but he just looked like a moron, you know? He was doing this terrible thing to—first he was posing, which is a very lousy thing to do. He seemed to want people to be taking pictures of him. But also, he was standing in a way that his butt was mere inches from this guy that was sitting down, his face. It’s a very crummy thing to do. I’m sure he thought he was very insightful though. If for example, you’d gone up to him on that train—or wherever the hell he was going, who knows where that could be—and told him you were having problems with your girlfriend or your husband or something, he probably wouldn’t have even asked for any details, he’d just give this very stupid answer.

“A lifetime sure seems like quite the daunting undertaking, doesn’t it, Hol?” That’s the last thing Sydney ever texted me. It was maybe vaguely insightful, but it lacked the humor and originality that I’d come to expect from him. His last text should have been something like, “Jesus Christ, did you ever figure out your real bra size?” Or, “I’m going to be reincarnated as someone that sings show tunes when they walk down the street, won’t I?” But he died without saying any of that. He would have said something even better though.

I still have our texts on my phone, even though it’s been a year. I have to scroll through dozens of conversations now though to reach the conversation we had daily for three months. Our conversation was always one of the first in my messages, and now its not. I got a new phone a few months after he died and I asked the Apple store guy three times if he was positive iMessage conversations would transfer to the new phone.

I still talk to him sometimes, sort of. Even if I don’t think about him, sometimes I think of things I want to tell him. I’ll text him. Twenty minutes later I’ll get a notification saying the message failed to send. Sometimes I’ll just pretend it’s him trying to be funny. He rarely made me laugh out loud, but he was always funny. Bitter. World-weary. He had short black hair and mossy green eyes.

Sydney killed himself. I kind of knew it would happen sooner or later. He hinted at it at least a dozen times. I did ask him not to, but he’d gone off and done it anyhow.

The worst part was—nobody seemed to care. People said he had seemed to make me depressed and anxious. They said I’d become emaciated and withdrawn. I always look so tired when he was alive, people would say. Nobody had the nerve to say, it was for the best but they all seemed to think so.

Now that he’s dead, nobody wants to hear about him anymore. He didn’t have many friends, besides me, at least for the time I knew him. Even his family has put him behind them now. His funeral was really more for show, a chore they had to complete before they could move on. His younger relatives all thought he’d put them through hell and now it was time to move on. His older relatives all shared that sentiment, while also pointing out that he was now in hell. Once he was underground he was Out of Sight, Out of Mind, as they say.

It’s been a year now and I still think about him all of the time. I would be lying to you if I said I hadn’t often thought of just joining him, wherever he is now. It’s May, New York is vibrant. God that’s a word and an atmosphere that I really hate. The moment spring rolls around the only thing I’m excited about is for winter to come again. It’s almost Fleet Week, which will mark exactly one year since we buried him. On my way to the funeral, I’d been stopped by three sailors to ask if we were near the Natural History Museum. We weren’t — we were on the East Side and the Natural History Museum is on the West Side. They’d have to cross Central Park to get there. I told them that there was definitely a crosstown bus stop somewhere, but I didn’t know where exactly. I hate busses, I never take them. When I do, it’s always either a bus with a door that you have to push super hard to open and you practically fall out once you do, or it’s one with a weak hinge that opens with the slightest push, and, yeah you practically fall out of that one too.

My little sister, Francine, got me this really nice notebook for Christmas. It took me five months to start using it. It’s such a nice, clean notebook and my handwriting is so lousy, I didn’t want to ruin its crispness. But, I need to talk about Sydney, and these pages seem inviting.

I have a nasty habit. I’m a writer, see—strictly a dilettante though, you won’t find me in any particularly notable journals or magazines. I have a really depressing habit of falling into puppy-eyed love with the characters I create—and then I’m entirely unable to let anything bad happen to them. I can’t even make them slightly ill without agonizing about it. Sydney was the only person who ever read my fiction. He said it was “too saccharine.” He thought I wasn’t thoughtful enough to write something meaningful. I think he was right, but I think I changed once I met him. I told him that once and he absolutely hated hearing it. He said that the only things worth reading were written for God, not for simple human consumption. He also thought he was an inadequate human, so writing for him was particularly blasphemous. He may be right about how we ought to write for god, but he was wrong about the inadequate human part. He was an extraordinary person, a superlative human. And I think I’m the reason he’s dead. I always was clinging to his words, I guess you could say, but I don’t think I ever really listened to him. And now he’s dead.

I’m not a particularly religious person, but I rather like God. My father is Jewish and my mother is Catholic. Dad’s not particularly devout, but mom sort of is. I was baptized Catholic and confirmed, all of that stuff. If I ever get married, which seems doubtful, I’d probably get married in a church. Sydney was the same unusual mix of Jewish and Catholic, not that it matters but it always does seem to matter a bit.

In college, we’d always have these late night discussions about the meaning of life and all that stuff. There was this guy, Jerome Castor, he had a pretty good argument for why God didn’t exist, well rather that God was dead—that was the phrase he was always using. I don’t remember the exact reasoning he gave, but it was something to do with the Enlightenment, I think. Jerome studied philosophy, so he knew lots of great quotes that maybe he used out of context, but none of us knew any better. There was this one guy, Steve Bick, who was very Catholic. He would always argue with Castor, but Castor always said, “You buy what the Catholic Church is selling? Those perverts?,” whenever Bick would back him into a rhetorical corner. But Bick was a bit goony looking, so nobody ever really took his arguments seriously.

Sydney was the first person to really get me to give God a second look. He didn’t go with the usual argument, stuff about the beauty of sunrises and stuff, he didn’t try to prove his existence. He just said that you can’t try and do things for other people because other people are an ephemeral part of our life. You can’t do things for yourself because humanity has agreed that selfishness is wrong. So—you do things for God, the you know your doing things for the right reasons. So, if you’re going to make anything, you really need to at least believe in God. He hated writers of the modern era. He thought book tours and publishers and the whole lot was the secularization of a particularly spiritual craft. He thought the best writers in the world are the ones whose words are never seen. He made an exception for Emily Dickinson.

I spent about three months telling everyone I was going to write the story of Sydney before I actually sat down and started it. The characters in this story hate the idea of being identified by at least a very small subset of the world’s readers that may someday read this. I offered to use fake names for those that resent anyone attempting to immortalize them in print, but my mother, who spent some time in the public eye in the 1980’s resents that he’s even mentioned and pointed out that a pseudonym would do her no good.

Some of the sentiments come from the same sentiments that people felt when Sydney died. The belief among that cohort is that I would be much better moving on with my life, in effect, letting the whole thing drop, dead boys be damned.

Others have attempted to suppress my story for the good of the community. My sister—a successful psychologist operating out of a strip mall in Buffalo, New York has informed me that American readers don’t desire what I have to offer. “If it’s not mystery or thriller the public will not buy it,” she said cooly while balancing one of her auburn haired, two year old twins on her lap. I told her that new mothers may crave escapism but they do not reflect the general public. She quickly assumed the air of moral authority that anyone who has a child takes with anyone that does not have a child and told me that most Americans work very hard and yes, do crave escapism. In effect, she is not the outlier, I am.

I’ll concede that he may have a point, I suppose. This is the story of my dead friend.