One year ago, I fell head over heels in love with racketghost's Strange Moons. January 7th was the day I bookmarked the series. I didn't know I could be so utterly destroyed by their particular tale of an angel and demon who can never admit that they love each other.
In the past year I have drawn several things for this series, including my very first fan art, and I can only be grateful that @racketghost graciously accepted them.
In the chapter "The marred shadow of your gift," Aziraphale carries a wounded Crowley through the desert to safety. Crowley realizes that he is in love with Aziraphale. This is my illustration, in graphite on paper.
During the Victorian era, a whole visual hidden language emerged around using your gloves to 'secretly' communicate with your suitor(s). In the opening of 1862, Aziraphale uses his gloves to convey a pair of messages to Crowley. What is he saying?
Glove Language was developed as a marketing tactic by a company who took the idea from a fan maker who had seen his sales go through the roof by making up a similar 'secret' language for fans.
While originally developed for women to flirt, Glove Language also proved quietly popular with queer men. They obviously also wore gloves, if not quite as many different varieties, and almost all of the same messages could be conveyed with gloves just as easily by them-- with the extra bonus that, since men were expected to understand Glove Language rather than perform it themselves, no one would notice if men were using it to communicate with one another.
Even any observers who were fairly with it on Victorian social customs would likely not notice any use of Glove Language between Crowley and Aziraphale, likely making it something that appealed to them to use.
So, what is Aziraphale saying in Glove Language in the 1862 scene?
As 1862 opens, we watch from a distance, slowly getting closer, as Aziraphale emerges and walks up alongside the water to Crowley. While walking, Aziraphale takes his gloves off to use them to communicate.
It's of note here that gentlemen normally wouldn't take their gloves off that much when outside in cooler weather, unless they had a practical reason to do so. As we will see, Aziraphale has built a practical reason into his actions that will make sense to anyone who might be observing them-- that being that he needs his hands bare for a few moments so he can grasp the peas that he's going to feed to the ducks. This gives him an excuse to remove his gloves and use them to talk.
As Aziraphale walks up with his gloves, he loosely curls them over his fingers a bit. As we can see from the key above, this means:
Be careful-- we are being watched.
As we know, Crowley also felt this during the scene, as his "trees have ears... ducks have ears" comment indicated-- even if he'd wind up being less that cautious during the scene.
When reaching Crowley, Aziraphale doesn't put his gloves in his pocket. Instead, he holds them loosely in his left hand during the scene. Per the key, this means:
I am satisfied.
It's the Glove Language way of expressing contentment and happiness when being within someone, and letting that suitor know that you found being with them enjoyable and that they were welcome to stay in your company.
Aziraphale, though, can get away with a smidge more, and he's also come up with another brilliant little way to acknowledge Crowley within the social rules of the very society that claims that he shouldn't do so in this way.
In Victorian society, there were very elaborate social customs around how one was expected to use their hat to greet others, especially women. When it comes to acknowledging Aziraphale, Crowley, as a demon, is getting away with pretty much all that he can in the scene. He is sending messages of his own with his walking stick/cane, as I looked at over here, but Aziraphale, being an angel, can be seen getting away with a smidge more, as he's expected to adhere to rules of polite human society, even in the presence of a demon.
There's just that this polite human society doesn't understand gender and so would find it absolutely scandalous and run him out of town should he acknowledge the very masculine-presenting-in-this-scene Crowley in a way that is socially befitting the Victorian customs of how a gentleman is supposed to use their hat to greet a lady.
Yet, this is exactly what Aziraphale feels is most appropriate to do at the start here. As a way of acknowledging that Crowley is a whole gender constellation, Aziraphale wants to greet him as a gentleman would a lady as is appropriate for the initial beginning of an interaction in Victorian England and then allow the rest of their interaction, in which Aziraphale is wearing his hat, to reflect treating Crowley as a gentleman.
Victorian custom would hold that, to greet a lady, Aziraphale would need to use the hand furthest from the lady to lift his hat high enough that it cleared his head, while looking at her and giving a discreet little nod/bow (kind of like what Aziraphale gave Mr. Sushi in thanks in 1.01, if not even that much movement). Only, Aziraphale cannot actually do this in a public park when the recipient of the gesture is, as Crowley was in this moment, presenting in a very masculine way. What Aziraphale does instead is something subtle that's actually even more romantic.
Really the only other way to greet a lady in Victorian society was what's known as a Coachman's Salute. It's to put that same hand furthest away from the lady to the brim of your hat and do a quick, subtle nod/bow. This was only appropriate if you were a servant, like the lady's coachman (hence, the name), and you were basically just acknowledging that the lady had given you a directive. It's a gesture that equates to your servant, my lady.
When greeting Crowley, Aziraphale combines the two class-driven types of hat greetings for a lady together. He does a very subtle Coachman's Salute but then takes his hat completely off, as a gentleman would to greet a lady, and then hides the fact that he's doing any sort of greeting of a lady at all by making feeding the ducks his excuse for why his hat is off in public.
To this end, he then can stand there for a few moments with his hat off in his lady's presence before putting it back on again and standing with Crowley as a pair of gentlemen for the remainder of the scene. He can greet Crowley within the parameters of their human society, even as that very gender binary society does not understand the limitations of those parameters.
There's one last Victorian thing in play in the scene and that's the rules around the interior of hats. You were always supposed to keep the interior of your hat facing you. The idea was that it was very uncouth to show anyone the inside of your hat, even if it was clean, as it was the part that touched your body during the day. Pretty much no one was supposed to see the interior of your hat, especially in public, but, if anyone could, the only (non-housekeeping) person who could be permitted to see something as intimate as this was your spouse.
While Aziraphale technically keeps the interior of his hat facing him while he feeds the ducks for deniability purposes, it also happens to be within the taller Crowley's line of sight the whole time.
alright I've got to do some quick math to explain attitudes towards AI to my boss.
we're looking to create an AI policy, and when we were talking about this, my boss (older millennial) was genuinely shocked to hear that younger people do not (seem) to view AI positively (a la the recent commencement speakers being booed)
please rb for larger sample size!
Question 1/3
What is your age, and do you feel AI is a net positive or net negative in our lives today?
I have a feeling that beneath the little halo on your noble head
There lies a thought or two the devil might be interested to know
You're like the finish of a novel that I'll finally have to take to bed
You fascinate me so
In a universe where the world was saved and a former angel and a former demon got to spend the rest of their lives in their cottage in the south downs...
Ok, now that we’ve had a week to think about it, here’s another, more S1-ish fix it (as the last one was desperate and had issues…but let’s be honest, so did the “season”.)
In light of the no.1 trending topic on this site, I'd like to inform youse that Kitty Kendall, one of the survivors who bravely spoke out against Neil Gaiman and accused him of rape in 2025, has said here and here that if you are looking to support her and other survivors, you can make a donation to OurVOICE (the counselling service Kendall herself used) or your local rape crisis centre. If you can't make a donation, you can help to ensure people do not forget what Kendall and other survivors have gone through and continue to go through as they pursue legal action, and that Gaiman has already spent a lot of money in the attempt to sue these women for speaking out.
