i like being haunted

kai/kaya (they/them) sometimes a ghost sometimes an alien but always a nonbinary lesbian i lost my old blog in a fire (@theworstkindofforgetful) and i’m still haunted by it

[lovely-v]

It’s crazy and fucked up that being yourself is actually the solution.

[lovely-v]

It’s like. When I was told to “just be yourself” as a kid I thought it was a passive thing. Like oh easy I just have to sit here and be myself. but the reason so many people think that “being yourself” is bullshit advice is because you actually have to make active choices to do this and it WILL make your life way more fun. You have to wear t-shirts of bands that were popular ten years ago because you like them. You have to do your hair in a way that you find cute or comfortable even if it’s “so nineties”. If your friend says a food you enjoy is gross to them, you can’t be afraid to admit you casually disagree. You have to do hobbies that you’re interested in even if you’re bad at them and you cant feel like you have to get good at something before you tell people it’s an activity you do. You have to read manga and comic books in public and get piercings your relatives think are unattractive. You don’t have to tell people you dislike that you dislike them, but you don’t have to give them your time and attention either. You have to rewatch that kids show you’re nostalgic for even if you’re in your 30s. You have to change your name if you hate it, even if only a few close friends can know. You have to get fun girly drinks at the bar. You have to order hot chocolate when you don’t like coffee and black coffee when you don’t like sweet things. I am still bad at practicing this but it is the only way to make it all tolerable.

[roach-works]

you have to do it on purpose

[salmon-n-hazel]

Dandelions

Shop print INPRNT | Scarves & Bandana: Ko-Fi

[nikoisme]

i imagine being medicated would feel good as fuck. unfortunately i have to rawdog whatever's wrong with me

[penny-anna]

the thing w there being potatoes in lord of the things is that there ARE actually at least 2 built in explanations for it:

1: they don't have potatoes; the references to potatoes in the Shire were added by Tolkien-the-translator as part of a wider localisation. when Sam mentions potatoes he's actually talking about some other vegetable

2: given that Middle Earth was historically ruled over by the Numenoreans who come from a lost kingdom on the other side of the western ocean, it could be that Numenor was in or had contact with ancient America and brought potatoes back with them

2 is kind of a stretch tho interesting to contemplate; 1 however on some level i think is the correct answer. the Shire's resemblance to England is 100% canonically a localisation thing. The Shire is England bcos it's the main characters' home and the intended audience of the book was English people.

the decision to incorporate post-colombian exchange plants like potatoes and tobacco isn't innocuous but it was a purposeful decision with reasoning behind it beyond 'they have potatoes because I said so'.

[penny-anna]

lord of the rings adaptation where Sam is talking about how much he loves potatoes while holding a vegetable that is visibly not a potato, a la pokemon characters talking about jelly donuts while eating rice balls

[penny-anna]

just bringing this back for no particular reason to clarify:

the point i was gesturing at in the OP is that sometimes in LOTR Tolkien did stuff For A Reason (in this case a bad, racist reason) and subsequent fantasy authors picked it up and ran with it without thinking through the implications so now it's just a Thing in fantasy literature even tho most writers aren't trying to do the specific thing Tolkien was doing (create a world that's evocative of mid 20th century England) so in addition to be vaguely racist its also kind of incoherent.

[crabussy]

small tips for Enjoying Being Alive from someone who went from wanting to die to genuinely loving life. these won't fix your life but they'll make it a lot easier to want to live day by day. I promise.

tell yourself things you do not believe. it feels stupid at first but I've done this for years and now I believe it when I say "I'm good at this" or "I love myself" or "I deserve good shit!"

make a note of every mundane good thing that happens to you. mental or literal notes! could be as little as "the sky is a nice shade of grey, it's calming" or "I ate a piece of fruit today, I'm looking after myself" or "I talked to a friend". again, feels stupid at first, but I genuinely believe this is part of why I have so many "good days". trick your brain into storing things in your long-term memory that you wouldn't otherwise remember.

diet deficiencies can make you properly miserable. your physical health impacts your mental health more than you'd think. get some vitamins, some omega-3s and so on. whether from food or supplements. they can make quite a difference! your brain is responsible for a LOT of the way you feel, and giving it the fatty acids it needs to function at its best can go a long way.

[crabussy]

I know these all sound like stupid junk people who have never wanted to die tell you. I know they sound like dumb "self-help" tips written by people who have suffered mild anxiety at worst.

they're coming from someone who had multiple daily panic attacks for half a decade. someone who genuinely felt like he did not deserve to live. someone who hated himself so much he convinced himself he was irredeemably evil. someone who loves being alive these days, even though it's difficult sometimes.

you truly don't have to follow any of this advice. but just read through. store it in the back of your mind. come back to it when you want. best of luck. [:

[nedzira]

These are genuinely great! If I can add a small comment it would be to try to change scenery every now and then, take a different route home and go for walks. And make appointments to meet your friends!

[crabussy]

ABSOLUTELY. anytime I feel myself descending into a slump where everything feels wrong and bad and gross and hard, I go on a Weird Walk. I choose a familiar destination (the dairy, the beach, a specific hill) and intentionally choose a route I've never tried before. it's crazy but it makes me feel better almost instantly, even if the new walk is worse than my usual route. your brain CRAVES new stimulation! you are a member of a species with one of the most active brains in the animal kingdom. please try not to live like a hamster.

[coast-modern]

isn't it kind of crazy that for any moving vehicle you need to wear a seatbelt but then on buses they're just like fuck it stand up whatever

[evenlyevi]

Here again.

[rars]

saying this as a lesbian who loves women's boobs--sexually, even! but i don't think that we as a society should consider breasts inherently female or inherently sexual. a flat chest should not be seen as the "default" for gender neutrality but instead just one way a person can present. boobs should be normal. anyone of any gender can have boobs

[kosmogrl]

"whats your 5 year plan?" buddy I nearly go insane thinking about what I should have for dinner

[bookwyrminspiration]

just finished a desolation called peace and I can't stop thinking about empire. it's not about upholding the empire, it's not about tearing it down. the empire simply...lives. amnardbat and tarats are threats to Mahit, but they're not wrong. it's a vast, colonizing force that seems almost incapable of seeing anything or one other as a person; it is a direct threat to Lsel, even with their tenuous peace--to everyone outside the empire. they're not wrong to be hostile, though Mahit herself doesn't deserve it. and at the same time we see, again and again, the empire is made of people. writing poetry, sharing nicknames, getting drunk. twenty cicada gave himself to an alien hive mind for a chance--a chance at peace. nine hibiscus fired on her own legion to save that peace. eight antidote, 11 years old, used every resource he had and experienced dozens of deaths to defy the emperor and stop a genocide because he was the only one who could. but that doesn't absolve the empire, nor does it try to. it's simply a coexisting truth. and in the end, the empire still exists. not because the narrative believes in it, but because it simply does. the empire will continue to write poetry, and it will continue to devour. mahit, as an outsider, both loves the empire to the point it's painful and resents it, and there's reason for both! this story is not about blind faith and perpetuity, and it's not about revolution either. and i just find it so captivating

[forlorngarden]

my recent sci-fi escapades

[vanglaggle]

fat butch is genuinely the staple . when u say butch i think of a fat butch and it hasn't crossed my mind that this is a new thought for some people

[jay-trekking]

[maemaybe]

I don't know who my intended audience is here, so whoever needs to hear this, I am begging you to learn to participate in conversations that are about things you aren't interested in.

Part of socializing and having friends is being a good listener even when you don't actually give a shit about the subject.

Your are hurting other people's feelings when you bluntly respond with "Anyway..." and then change the topic.

It can not always be about your preferred topic.

You are being rude. Yes, even if you are neurodivergent. You can be both autistic and rude.

[lake-erie]

the rainbow is a well-known symbol of gay pride that originated in the late 1970s in san francisco, when the gay community promised to never again destroy the earth by flood

[elierlick]

There is still time. It's never too late to transition

[antlered-vixen]

I am so tired of short-attention-span, trim-the-fat culture. All writing advice these days is for how to write like Chuck Palahniuk. "Cut 'think', cut 'feel', cut 'wonder' - only action, only pushing forward, show and move and move and move." What if I could emulate this style, and still don't want to? What if I want to write like Henry James, with three paragraphs of introspective musings between each dialogue line? The music advice is, "make it shortform, make it Tik-Tok compatible, make it punchy, hit the refrain as soon as possible." What if I want that 10-minute prog rock piece? What if I want that symphony? What if I want it slow and luxurious and lazy? Movies. Series. Poetry. Bodies. Everything is "trimmed trimmed trimmed trimmed, stripped bare, you have three seconds to win me over, make it airport chic." I don't want to win you over, then, I guess. I want the fat left it. I want the pleasure and the indolence and the indulgence. Fuck this art-advice that's always "your art needs Ozempic."