#text in image

[aroworlds]

I'm working on a few more cross-stitch bookmark designs (with actual charts and tutorial this time) for Aro Week.

(And, yes, the orange is way too bright. One day I'll figure out the perfect colours for the sunset flag, I swear!)

[alloaroworlds]

[image description: a collection of cross-stitch patches in allosexual aromantic--green, light green, white, yellow and gold--and finished with hand-embroidered edges. Patches include pineapples, dragons, hearts, rainbows, square and zigzag flags, arrows and the words "alloaro", "allosexual" and "pride".]

Because my main project for @aggressivelyarospec's Aggressively Arospectacular is all about the aromantic flag, I thought I'd add some yellow and gold to proceedings with a photo of some of the allo-aro cross-stitch patches I've made over the years.

I do have more: these are just the patches I have yet to attach to my backpack and jacket. Is it more fun to sew the patches then it is to sew the patches onto something else? Absolutely!

[apocalypse-angel]

Text from Image:

"I was at DragonCon one year when Avery Brooks was on a panel, and a Black dude stood up and talked about how the year DS9 came on, he became the sole custodial guardian of his small son, and he was *terrified* and felt helpless, because he hadn't really had a father himself, and he didn't really know any Black fathers he particularly wanted to emulate, and no Black single fathers at all. He talked about how every week he'd put his kid to bed and sit down and watch Deep Space Nine, and think to himself, 'Okay, this, I want us to be this kind of father and son,' and how, silly as it might sound, the idea that Ben could be there for Jake, all the time, successfully, and earn his admiration and trust, was the only source he really had of inspiration, the only voice that was telling him he could handle this job.

I swear to fuck there was a whole auditorium of people in tears by the time he was done, including both him and Brooks. It was one of the most beautiful moments I ever saw about the sometimes bloodless-sounding term 'representation,' and about fandom in general, and I will never forget it."

Edit: Source (provided by gwendelaneyisatrekkie)

Don't let anyone tell you that seeing someone like you on television isn't important.

[nattousan]

it was not on wheat...

[hug-your-face]

via @swatercolour here on Tumblr and also on [insta]

EDIT: I do not interpret "just managing" as "just suffering, just enduring, curling into a fetal position and waiting for it to be over." Managing is an active process.

So I'm using this post as a platform to make the reminder that "the power of the people is greater than the people in power," and we all are cordially invited to:

Take good care of ourselves. Mental, physical, emotional health. Hydrate. Move if we can, get outside if we can.

Keep up a routine. Remember quarantine and we all had to find a routine? This is the same.

Be intentional in our news consumption. Let's not stick our heads in the sand but let's not doomscroll either. Get an RSS aggregator. Subscribe to WTF Just Happened Today, Yoour Local Epidemiologist, Fix The News (for some inspiring hopeful news!). We'll check our feeds a few times a week, but no more than once a day.

Connect with friends and loved ones. Remind ourselves that while SOME people are horrible, for the most part people are awesome... if complicated. Share our fears but also our hopes. Eat together.

Now that we're keeping healthy, safe, sane, and hopeful... now we also fight. Quietly if we prefer, loudly if we prefer. But sustainably. I hate that I had to live through three rounds of this nonsense where a few people use half of us as tools to fuck over ALL of us, but here we are again. So let us take just one moment every week or so to...

Use 5calls to keep blowing up our reps phones. Tell them to either break ranks with the Orange Administration, or to stand up louder than just matching outfits and signs. Or to THANK them for standing up.

Use Vote411 to find elections before the midterms. A lot of villages, cities, townships etc have local elections that will affect where we live... and more importantly, the people in office there will affect things upwards too.

Use Ballotpedia to know exactly what's on our ballots ahead of time.

Protest, because it actually works.

Use Vote.org to make a plan to vote in the midterms. Make a plan that is immune to voter suppression tactics. Get our documents in order. Reach out to our friends to go to the polls as a group. Plan to livestream our visit, up until the point we have to turn our cameras off.

Make and share memes that promote hope, organizing, solidarity, and/or resistance.

Get involved with an action network like Indivisible, MoveOn, or Working Families Party.

Go to a local town hall meeting. Speak up.

Heck, start our own local activism networks, letter campaigns, call campaigns, or fundraisers with Action Network.

And we will remember our self-care. We will remind ourselves and each other that they want us scattered, focus is how we resist.

It IS coming back. Things ARE going to get worse. The world has become a place where a very few people are pulling levers and pushing buttons that are actively destroying much of what is good about living in a society where people care for each other.

Many others are in shock, sputtering "but can they do that?" MANY many others are waiting for someone to come save us.

But there are those who are actively, loudly, opposing.

And there are more people speaking up, acting up, every day. More people saying it's time to get scrappy. It's time to get into some good trouble. The shock is wearing off.

Yes, it's gonna get worse before it gets better (the long-term damage of the acts of the past momentum of all the damage that has been done will take that long to be felt -- but it WILL get better.

If WE will it.

[ao3commentoftheday]

memes are fun and relatable and all that, but don't let them discourage you. all of that stuff that doesn't make it into the final product is part of how the final product gets made

[rioblitzle]

working retail

[trochaic-mutant-ninja-tetrameter]

[tophats-tea]

sliding scale of posts about Jesus being a carpenter who was nailed to a cross

[aroworlds]

I thought Trans Day of Visibility a good time to mention that I have a post collecting my stories with trans aro protagonists. I often feel disconnected from the aro community in that the (albeit very limited!) representation we celebrate and bond over largely depicts cis aros. Characters who seldom encompass, because they are cis, much of how I experience being aromantic.

In order to be seen as aro, I must push my transness into the shadows. The reverse is true in trans-centred fiction, where acceptance--by ourselves and/or others--is often demonstrated via a character's experiences of romantic relationships and love. Time and time again, I must choose which part of me to celebrate and which part to ignore: I can only be transgender or aromantic in the stories about which my communities express delight.

So this is a list of aro stories about gender and trans stories about aromanticism, because we deserve recognition as trans and aro.

[evenlyevi]

Stars in full bloom.

[yuriinullification]

what the hell man

[theshehulkproject]

Some D&D party is out there playing the coolest campaign ever.

[jabberwock-the-lemur]

so who's moving here w/ me?

awesome

[just-spacetrash]

the 'what if you played it a little risky' post literally Changed my life but i cant fujkign find it in my blog because its. a tiktok screenshot