Just trying to stay alive @magnadementia - Tumblr Blog

blazing heart of gold

so back when my little brother was in high school, my mom went as a chaperone for their senior year field trip to an amusement park. which, you know, brave move to volunteer to supervise a bunch of high school seniors let loose in a wonderland of rollercoasters and sugar

my brother and his friends in this field trip group were truly great kids. but they were not above run of the mill teenage boy shenanigans. it’s the end of senior year, you and all your buddies are at the amusement park, you’re naturally going to want to act like a complete moron

there was one kid in the group who was especially prone to goofing around. committed to the bit, some may say. my mom knew that if nonsense was going to break out, he’d likely be at the center of it

so she goes up to this kid at the very start of the trip and says “hey, i’m kinda worried about this chaperoning thing. this might be a lot to ask, but can you help me keep an eye on everyone? you wouldn’t have to do anything big, just be an extra set of eyes for me.”

friends, this kid proceeded to run their field trip group like the fucking us marines. everyone is at the meet up spots at the designated time. everyone waits in line for the rides like a bunch of boy scouts. the second the horseplay gets too out of hand, this kid is getting it back under control

it’s incredible how differently people act based on the expectations you set. instead of going to this kid and saying “hey, i know you’re trouble, so i’ve got my eye on you,” my mom went “hey, i know you have influence in your peer group, so i think you can help me.”

treat someone like a problem, they’ll act like a problem. but give people a chance to help, make them feel important, and they usually rise far above the occasion. it was a stroke of genius that i’m honestly still in awe of

violetsbookshelf

Pointe Skirt by Darinika Atelier

elodieunderglass

Thank you so much @vicshush it’s amazing!

orteil42

utterly delightful family of words and things

kaychen666

💋

Reference video

what-even-is-thiss

You know as an American born in the late 90s I’ve watched my country blow up foreigners on tv supposedly in the interest of national security since I was a toddler but quite frankly we live on a natural fortress of a continent with friendly nations to our north and south and have been attacked on our own soil literally two times in the past hundred years and we have military bases on every inhabited continent on earth. It’s never made sense to do these things for “national security”. It never will make sense unless you value the shareholders of weapons companies over the lives of children. And apparently a concerning amount of people do.

dragon-in-a-fez

the ashtrays in airplane bathrooms are a fascinating harm reduction metaphor. yes it's illegal as hell to smoke in there. yes there's a smoke detector that will snitch on you the second you light up. so why is there an ashtray? because if there weren't, your single momentary dumbass crime could kill 300 people. it is fucking vital that if someone does have a lit cigarette on a plane, they have a place to safely put it out.