I was working on this cause I thought the poses looked so bad ass but only until I got this far did I realize that I didn’t even know the meaning of the original painting
It didn’t make sense so I won’t be finishing it
But it’s called The Hesitate Fiancée and in simple words is a bride against her future marriage
Crocodile finds a strange stray cat an 11-year old Nico Robin
(AU where they met 13 years earlier. Robin's been on the run from the World Government for 3 years. Crocodile's 27 and has not set up base in Alabasta yet)
It seems like I have become possessed. By some sort of demon.
because sometimes there are invisible tests and invisible rules and you're just supposed to ... know the rule. someone you thought of as a friend asks you for book recommendations, so you give her a list of like 30 books, each with a brief blurb and why you like it. later, you find out she screenshotted the list and send it out to a group chat with the note: what an absolute freak can you believe this. you saw the responses: emojis where people are rolling over laughing. too much and obsessive and actually kind of creepy in the comments. you thought you'd been doing the right thing. she'd asked, right? an invisible rule: this is what happens when you get too excited.
you aren't supposed to laugh at your own jokes, so you don't, but then you're too serious. you're not supposed to be too loud, but then people say you're too quiet. you aren't supposed to get passionate about things, but then you're shy, boring. you aren't supposed to talk too much, but then people are mad when you're not good at replying.
you fold yourself into a prettier paper crane. since you never know what is "selfish" and what is "charity," you give yourself over, fully. you'd rather be empty and over-generous - you'd rather eat your own boundaries than have even one person believe that you're mean. since you don't know what the thing is that will make them hate you, you simply scrub yourself clean of any form of roughness. if you are perfect and smiling and funny, they can love you. if you are always there for them and never admit what's happening and never mention your past and never make them uncomfortable - you can make up for it. you can earn it.
don't fuck up. they're all testing you, always. they're tolerating you. whatever secret club happened, over a summer somewhere - during some activity you didn't get to attend - everyone else just... figured it out. like they got some kind of award or examination that allowed them to know how-to-be-normal. how to fit. and for the rest of your life, you've been playing catch-up. you've been trying to prove that - haha! you get it! that the joke they're telling, the people they are, the manual they got- yeah, you've totally read it.
if you can just divide yourself in two - the lovable one, and the one that is you - you can do this. you can walk the line. they can laugh and accept you. if you are always-balanced, never burdensome, a delight to have in class, champagne and glittering and never gawky or florescent or god-forbid cringe: you can get away with it.
you stare at your therapist, whom you can make jokes with, and who laughs at your jokes, because you are so fucking good at people-pleasing. you smile at her, and she asks you how you're doing, and you automatically say i'm good, thanks, how are you? while the answer swims somewhere in your little lizard brain:
how long have you been doing this now? mastering the art of your body and mind like you're piloting a puppet. has it worked? what do you mean that all you feel is... just exhausted. pick yourself up, the tightrope has no net. after all, you're cheating, somehow, but nobody seems to know you actually flunked the test. it's working!
I like to think that Vulcans who come to understand that Humans just can’t try to process emotions the same way as them, it’s just healthiest to let it out in harmless ways, decide that venting and stuff should be taken just as seriously as Vulcan’s meditation time, and will encourage the Humans around them to complain about what’s upsetting them
People who are used to aloof Vulcans who avoid Humans at all cost running into one comforting a Human
“-and then they said my cheesecake was subpar, and they didn’t even bring a dish!!!”
“The purpose of this event was that every participant brings a food item of sorts, correct?”
“Yeah!!”
“And they did not follow this rule while insulting dishes that were brought?”
Luke being given a quest at 17, feeling like there's no glory in it because it's a quest someone's already succeeded before, but then failing that very quest he considered to be beneath him, getting a permanent scar, "ruining it" for the rest of the campers because now no one else can go on quests and earn glory in the eyes of the gods, so he turns to Kronos, and years later here comes a possible candidate for the great prophecy, 12 years old, gets the first quest the camp has done since Luke's fucked it up, and Luke is actively ensuring this quest is an impossible quest!! he's literally rigged it so Percy's gonna fail (the shoes, the bolt appearing in his bag) and then this kid somehow succeeds still??? and not only that, Percy got the unique quest Luke wanted in the first place and achieved feats no one else had and earned glory in the eyes of his father, all because Luke created the circumstances for that to happen??
oh my god yeah I don't think I'd ever recover from that either
I think one of the biggest tragedies of Laios & Falin and their relationship is how much his actions impact her life. But like. Specifically how much they WOULDN’T impact her life as much if they weren’t both stuck in such a shitty abusive situation.
This part of the Falin-tries-makeup daydream hour comic is what got me thinking about it again because truly it just... it seems like such a like an offhand comment that I'm sure Laios didn't mean to be cruel or anything. That's just like. A little kid not thinking about what they are saying. ESPECIALLY when the kid in question is Laios.
But man they depended on each other SO much as kids. Too much. It really feels like they didn't have any other source of positive reinforcement, or anyone else to share themselves with. So of course an offhand comment like that has a huge impact on Falin.
Or this little bit from one of the flashbacks:
This tears me apart. Do you think it tears him apart to think about? I think it does. I think Laios holds every small failure to care for Falin against himself.
And then there's the Bigger stuff. The way that him coping with his own trauma ended up impacting her.
Like his interest in monsters. Like him going to find a ghost, and accidentally revealing Falin's magic to the whole village in the process.
Like him needing to leave. And leaving her behind.
He shaped her life so much, and he carries so much guilt for it. And again, there should have been other people there to help. The same things that made Laios need to leave home are the things that made his leaving so hard on Falin. She ate alone after that. She shouldn't have had to eat alone just because Laios wasn't there.
She was 9 when he left for school, and he was 11.
Nine. And Laios feels like he failed her because he didn't stand by her through this better. As an eleven year old.
Both of these kids deserved so much better from the world.
lived my whole life in guilt bc i thought i was responsible for people's feelings. newly realizing that other people are responsible for their feelings and reactions, even if they make it seem like i'm the problem. a lot of the time it really has to do w them and their own emotional regulation. i can't keep thinking i'm not allowed to have space bc of other people's insecurities. like i literally refuse to dim myself. other people are responsible for their feelings just as i'm responsible for mine.
a video call for help from @haya-orouq19 who is in gaza
[Transcript: Please don't scroll if you want to help a family in Gaza. Hey everyone, this is Haya Orouq, I am 18 years old from Gaza City. Today is the 167th day of the war in Gaza City. And through this war we lost our house, my university was bombed. My whole childhood neighborhood area was completely damaged. We have been displaced to three different places in search of a safer place but unfortunately there's no safer place in Gaza. Everywhere there's bombing, everywhere is dangerous, so we are now displaced in Deir al-Balah. And me and my family lost everything, we have nothing left here in Gaza.
And my mom is very sick also, she is suffering from Lupus and because she has Lupus, she is a kidney failure patient in need of an urgent treatment and care outside of Gaza. The hospitals here is so poor and bad and the quality of her treatment is getting worse and worse because the quality of the hospitals is bad, because of the conditions of the war. So please guys, help my family, we deserve to- we deserve a decent life, we deserve to start a new beginning and deserve a new life.
So, here's the link in the bio and you can help me by sharing the video, repost, comment, like, whatever you can do can help. Every one dollar can make a difference. You can make life-changing difference to my family, you can save my family, you can save my mom. I am also trying to reach out to as many celebrities who are interested in helping people like me by making videos about the family that needs help in Gaza, like me. So I will mention them in the comment and please go to them, ask them to share my videos, and to make a video about my campaign and ask them to share my link. This is so urgent, I need your help guys because my account is prevented from receiving and sending messages so I can't reach out with them. I will mention them so please help me, and help my family.
I can't bear seeing my mom struggling with death because she has a dangerous disease which is Lupus and she is a kidney failure patient and I can't bear seeing my older sister suffering from hunger. So please guys, you can do it and please make #HelpHayasFamily. Share this video, whatever you can do can help. You can share the link as widely as possible, you can share the video. End of transcript.]