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sheepfilms
★
祝日 / Permanent Vacation
if i look back, i am lost
roma★
titsay
art blog(derogatory)
h
todays bird
shark vs the universe
almost home
izzy's playlists!
Monterey Bay Aquarium
❣ Chile in a Photography ❣
🪼
PR's Tumblrdome
cherry valley forever
Sade Olutola
RMH
seen from Japan
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@basortment-blog
high school musical 2s “I dont dance” is a metaphor for homosexuality/bisexuality and here’s why:
in the song, dancing (stereotypically associated with women and gay men) represents same-gender attraction and the more “masculine” sport, baseball, represents heterosexuality. Ryan tells chad “I’ll...
Astraea and Diana on a chariot drawn by dogs (Diana sul carro trainato da cani) - Lorenzo Costa the Younger 1579 frescoes The Hall of the Zodiac, Ducal Palace, Mantua
@imitationworld
Theological Differences
andraste-is-dalish
It had, realistically, been a good decision to immerse himself in theological classes. While few (if any) Tal-Vashoth he had ever met had embraced the Chant, it was still very much an important factor in the discourse of Thedas and he indeed needed a larger frame of reference.
Which wasn’t to say he didn’t know anything about the Chant. He did. But he knew it from the eyes of a Qunari from Par Vollen, which was to say that he knew it was ridiculous, bigoted, and a waste of time as far as he was concerned. So while realistically it was good to take the class... practically, it was probably going to be a train wreck.
He offered the professor a small, unassuming smile, looking as out of place as ever. “And yet it would seem to me that the Chant has brought nothing but death in its wake, comfort only from the hardships it itself caused. What a pity to the supposed works of Andraste, then, for anything of worth she did to be to the benefit of no one at all.”
I went to Taventir for a time while I was traveling Thedas. I then immediately left. Immediately as in after two days. But, you know.
:^) !
why don’t human eyes do the thing
actually, do qunari eyes do the thing? i’ve always wondered.
What is “the thing”?
the thing
“The thing,” then, would be the possession of tapetum lucidum, which is a layer of eye tissue that allows many mammals and fish to see in low-light conditions. Qunari eyes do, in fact, produce eye shine-- blue, usually!-- but I’ve also met a few whose eyes didn’t. I assume that’s a matter for the Tamassrans; genetic lineage and all that. Surely those bred for conflict are more likely to have it than those not.
Humans don’t because they’ve only ever been diurnal, I’m assuming. Maybe they did at some point. Who knows. I write poetry, not gene codes.
why don’t human eyes do the thing
actually, do qunari eyes do the thing? i’ve always wondered.
What is “the thing”?
Video: Grizzler the Border Collie is the World’s First Canine Photographer
fuck yes, corn oil
The Sacrifice of Isaac (detail), Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, 1724-29
tumblr overpraises weaponized beauty. let’s make 2015 the year of weaponized ugliness. you are great regardless of whether you look great. lean into the ugly.
when she is born, they name her mary. it means “bitter.” her mother—plain, unlovely—knows what her ugliness will mean. how it will feel. knows that ugliness makes everything harder, the mirror image of how being too beautiful makes everything harder. mary’s mother is unlovely, and she is happy, basically. she went to school, and they let her, not pretty enough to earn their scorn but too pretty to earn derision.
mary’s first word—a year old, face too red, eyes somehow too far apart and too close together at the same time, nose a curious hook—is, “please,” and mary’s father says, “no.”
mary’s father loves her, and he always says no. no mary, you can’t go to school; they’ll mock you at school. no mary, you can’t have pretty dresses; they’ll only accentuate your ugliness. no mary, no mary, no mary, no.
“please,” mary says, and her father kisses her too-large forehead. runs his hand along her puffy cheeks. there isn’t any one thing, not any single marker of her ugliness, only individual parts that don’t seem to fit together right. lumps where straight lines should be, pocks along her chin, eyes that were too bright and too big and yet still not considered striking. he kisses her and holds her and says, “no.”
—
this is what you learn, when you are young and you don’t look how they want you to:
the baker closes at four. if you are hungry, he will feed you, out of pity.
witches are everywhere. witches understand. witches will hold your hand, and run their thumbs along your lifeline. witches will say, take this, and press a bag into your palm. take this, it will help you.
beautiful women look at you once, and then never again. they fear you. they fear what you remind them, which is that natural beauty is unearned and hard-won beauty is unnatural. beauty is arbitrary, but beauty means everything. you are here, you are alive, you are ugly: they do not know what this means.
beautiful men will look at you, and look, and look. they will try to understand. they will say cruel things first, because that is how men are taught to treat ugly things. then they will taper into benign amusement. eventually they will forget you are a person at all, and they will say anything. they will say their darkest secrets and not realize you can hear them.
mary learns. mary listens. mary understands. mary is not as bitter as her name.
—
they say “ugly,” but what they mean is, “stupid.” what they mean is, “useless.” what they mean is, “defeatable.”
“be good, boys,” she scolds a group of particularly loud stable boys as she gathers their empty pints. the lights are dim enough to ease the angled corners of her broad shoulders. they love her here, gentle dim mary, too ugly for marriage. such a shame. what a nice girl, our ugly duckling.
“Ugly Mary!” says jonas, the butcher’s son. “have a sit. tell us a story.”
“these tables aren’t gon’ clean themselves,” she answers, even as she sits. jonas always leaves his purse on the table. the more drunk he gets, the less attention he pays to its weight. “what kind of story?”
“a good one,” jonas insists. “make us laugh.”
“all right,” says mary, and leans forward. she wraps her fingers around jonas’ purse and holds it up in front of him. “this is my dowry,” she says.
he laughs, head thrown back, eyes squeezed shut. the stable boys laugh too. everybody laughs. a dowry, for ugly mary. a dowry! mary palms the purse and leaves an empty one in its place. a witch gave it to her, once. a witch gave it to her and said this will come back to you, no matter how far away you send it.
mary has given jonas the butcher’s son this purse five times. he has always brought it back, confused, asking for his own. “i seem to have stolen this from someone,” he laughed, nervous. “only—don’t tell, mary, eh? i’ll leave it here, and no harm done, eh?”
mary had tutted at him every time. “watch those sticky fingers, jonas,” she’d said. “they’ll get the better of you one day. but it’ll be our secret.”
“last drink’s on the house,” mary says, and whisks their glasses away.
—
a beautiful woman would walk into any room and have all eyes on her long legs, her round mouth, her startling eyes. a beautiful woman would have them on their knees saying yes. a beautiful woman would say, “i want—” and they would say, “we’ll give it.”
everyone wants to please a beautiful woman.
mary’s first trip to the palace is with a hood over her head. don’t make them look too long at you, edna had said, her hands on her hips. edna loves mary, too. edna loves mary and edna always tells mary no.
she’s here to make a delivery, some chickens for a party, and their usual boy has a broken leg. so mary brings the shipment. mary has her witch’s purse in her pocket, a snack from the baker in her mouth.
“oh, well aren’t you a bit of a divine accident,” says the royal chef, frowning. “angels were scraping the bottom of the barrel for you, eh? parents couldn’t quite get pregnant ‘till you? asked a witch for help?”
mary flashes a smile. first they will be cruel. two days ago, she had knocked out a tooth specifically for this event, and her mouth is swollen. “where should i leave them?” she asks.
“six of them straight to the kitchens, but leave one with me,” the chef says. he is still looking at her. “i’m hungry too, eh? ha!” he winks at her. then they will taper into benign amusement. when mary moves to obey, he catches her arm. “what’s your name, ugly girl?”
“mary,” she answers. her breath whistles through the gap where her tooth used to be. she smiles again, and watches his eyes soften. good.
“ugly mary,” he muses. “i like you, girl. come again, with the next shipment.”
“yes sir,” she says, and smiles.
—
the chef cooks laxative herbs into the food of nobles who mistreat him. he tells her this thoughtlessly, sprinkling a leaf onto the top of a perfectly roasted turkey. his serving boy takes silver from the storage and sells it. their errands boy has been sleeping with the queen’s lady-in-waiting, and the queen’s lady-in-waiting told him that the queen is sleeping with the king’s brother.
there are fights, at night, loud and long in the war room. mary gives her magic purse to the errands boy and he comes to her, days later, in a panic.
“i don’t know where i got it,” he babbles, “but it’s got a note in it, what says there’s some kind of plot, some kind of secret plan, i—it wasn’t me but if they find me with it—”
mary smiles. “shhh,” she soothes. “it’ll be our secret.”
—
"it’ll be our secret,” mary promises the chef, the purse full of belladonna in her hands. i didn’t mean to, he’d blubbered. i didn’t know, i thought it was sage, i thought it was—
“it’ll be our secret,” mary says to the serving boy, taking the purse from him. the queen’s diamonds are in it. her favorite. she’s gone to war for less. i don’t know where it came from, he’d wept. i must have grabbed it by mistake.
“it’ll be our secret,” mary assures the queen’s lady-in-waiting. the purse is heavy with a vial filled with liquid. enough to terminate—oh god—a pregnancy, the girl had whispered, horrified. i must have taken it from her bathroom, thinking it was mine, i…if she knows…
our secret, mary promises, smiling, smiling. they thank her. they give the purse back, and give it back, and give it back.
—
mary eats well. her mother sells the diamonds mary gave her—“a gift,” she says, smiling, smiling—and their roof is thatched, their clothing mended. they buy a cow.
mary holds onto the vial. she knows better than to waste opportunities on frivolous purchases.
“are you proud of me, father?” mary asks, and her father says, “yes.”
—
“so you’re ugly mary,” says the queen, looking at her.
mary nods. smiles. mary is not as bitter as her name.
the king laughs, loud and booming. the king is not a beautiful man, but beneath the glitter of his crown it’s hard to see. he hides his ugliness, with thick capes and gold crowns; mary knows better.
“can’t seem to get anyone to say a single word against you,” the king says. “everyone says: you want something done, ask ugly mary.”
“if i can serve you, Majesty,” mary says, curtsying deeply, “it would be my honor.”
“no,” says the queen. the queen is beautiful, and she looks away.
“just to do the cleaning,” the king says, and smiles at her, benign. “nothing like an ugly girl to do the ugly work, eh?”
mary smiles. “indeed, your Majesty,” she says.
—
beautiful women are noticed. you never stop noticing them. they arrest you. they want you to please them, and you want it too.
ugly women are noticed. you never stop noticing them. they arrest you, and you want them to please you. it is not hard to please you. they only have to give you what you think you want.
—
“what i like about you, ugly mary,” says the king, “is that you never make a fuss. i barely realize you’re here.”
that’s not true, mary knows. but she has worked hard to learn how to make it seem as if it is. she is not unnoticed, she is simply unremarkable. surely someone who looks defeated must be defeated.
“aye, Majesty,” she says.
he trails off, fingers running across the bedspread. “what’s this?” he asks, plucking mary’s purse from the sheets. she keeps her eyes on the floor, scrubbing.
one dose before bedtime, the paper reads. the pregnancy will end with blood.
“the pregnancy will end,” the king says aloud. “the pregnancy will—the pregnancy—”
mary looks up. she waits.
the king’s eyes snap to her. “tell no one,” he says, and mary smiles.
"Majesty, it will be our secret,” she promises.
—
father are you proud of me father are you proud father
yes yes yes yes yes
—
the day of the queen’s death, and the death of the king’s brother, mary stays at the castle. she cleans, and waits. she is careful to be in the king’s chamber when he returns, puffy-eyed. drunk.
“ugly mary,” he slurs as she tucks him into bed. “she was too beautiful. she lied. her beauty lied, she—you would never lie.”
mary smiles. she takes a liberty she never has before, and brushes his hair from him face. “never, Majesty,” she promises.
“your ugly face hides a beautiful heart,” he slurs, and mary laughs.
“please don’t tell anyone, majesty,” she teases, and he says, “no mary, no. it’ll be our secret.”
—
you are here, you are alive, you are ugly: they do not know what this means.
—
at the wedding, mary does not try to look beautiful. she dresses simply. they love her for it, ugly mary with the beautiful heart.
the chef weeps, the serving boy weeps, the errands boy weeps, the lady-in-waiting weeps. ugly mary has been so kind to them. ugly mary keeps their secrets.
they stand at the altar, mary and her king, her simple king. he looks at her and smiles, so fond, so trusting, so sure. a woman like ugly mary could never betray him. a woman like ugly mary is surely so grateful. gratitude is loyalty. gratitude keeps your secrets.
mary smiles.
Codex —> Tales —> 111 —> The Soul Canto
Notes: Look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair
Location: Obtained in an armory under Victory Rise in the Exalted Plains
–
What is High Contrast Lore? See the first post for details!
Poverty is not fate, it is a condition; it is not a misfortune, it is an injustice. It is the result of social structures and mental and cultural categories, it is linked to the way in which society has been built, in its various manifestations.
Gustavo Gutiérrez
All of which is another way to point at the fact that poverty is, ultimately, something human beings have created and inflicted on other human beings and not a fact of the universe, and we should be working on solving that problem, not perpetuating it for our own gain.
(via imathers)
Franz von Stuck (German, 1863-1928), The Dragon Slayer, 1913. Oil on panel, 135 x 126 cm.
Charity in capitalist society only feeds the notion that the existence of the rich is beneficial to all which obscures the fact that the wealth of the rich comes at the cost of exploitation of the poor
“beauty and the beast” where beauty’s dad comes home with the rose and is like oh shit oh shit this terrible monster says i have to come live with him forever because i picked his favorite flower and beauty just goes fuck that and puts on her pants and marches down to the beast’s castle herself
and she’s expecting this horrifying dark fortress but it’s actually sort of just a normal castle with big rose bushes and furniture that’s sometimes alive
and she thinks, i can work with this
and the beast comes out and he’s like don’t look at me i am a hideous monster and beauty’s like dude you’re like a talking tiger in a cape are you kidding you’re AWESOME can i pet you can i stroke your paws can you give me a ride
and he’s like what and she goes around the castle like okay we’ll put curtains here and expand the kitchen and this could be a really cute breakfast nook
and the beast is confused because isn’t she supposed to be terrified and hate him and he had all these intimidating speeches planned and he’s like uh aren’t you going to try to run away
and beauty’s all are you kidding this is a magic castle i’m going to live here forever
so they just sort of settle in together and one day beauty goes home for the weekend to visit her family and they’re all amazed that she’s alive and her sisters go WHY DIDN’T THE HUGE MONSTER EAT YOU TO DEATH and she’s like nahhh he’s basically just a big cat he’s kind of cute actually sometimes he plays with yarn when he thinks i’m not looking
and she explains how it’s really not that bad, all the dishes wash themselves and i get all these gorgeous dresses for free because the castle doesn’t know what else to do with them and yeah there are flowers everywhere but hey that’s his hobby y'know i’m not gonna discourage that man
and then one day while beauty’s re-alphabetizing her magic library and trying to decide where to put that enchanted mirror the beast comes up and he’s like hey so this is awkward but are you like………………………………..in love with me……?????????
and beauty’s like oh uh wow haha um sorry no you’re…sort of a tiger
and the beast is like thank goodness because if you were i’d have to turn back into a human and i've kind of gotten used to being a big lion thing with horns and the ability to speak english for some reason like why would i want to go back to being a spindly little man and then beauty laughs and she’s like okay well can you go catch us a wild boar for dinner, dear
and they end up getting married in the end just because it’s easier to explain that way, you know, a single lady ~~living alone with a man~~ even if he’s not actually a man, and that’s fine with them because beauty was never really into the whole boys and sex thing and the beast (whose name is jeff) is honestly more interested in his flowers
and whenever any of the other ladies in the village give her any shit beauty is just like, oh, you don’t like my crepes? well you know my husband, who is literally a tiger, loves them and then everyone leaves her alone, which is really all she ever wanted
and she goes back to her magic castle and sits down with a book in front of the fire and rests her feet on her cat husband and nobody bothers her ever again
can that happen
Salvador Dalí
Lobster Telephone (1938)
destroy capitalism
