SMASHFOLD!

I make things.

[smashfold-blog]

Ferret reddit is simply rhe most wholesome place on earth. It's just people posting pictures of their ferrets, and other people commenting "would boop that snoot" and "what a good fur snek" and "what lovely tiny paws".

[smashfold-blog]

OH NOES FERRET. WHAT DID YOU DO.

[smashfold-blog]

Sent home from the adhd clinic with a 40 page form to fill in, and instructions to pay the invoice when it arrives and then make another appointment.

what if this is the real adhd test.

[smashfold-blog]

So weird doing my morning yoga/meditation, getting all relaxed and focus - then starting my to do list and literally feeling the knot in my stomach and shoulders tangle back up. Ah yes, I knew something was missing.

[smashfold-blog]

Pet photography is the greatest. It's all the fun of taking dynamic photos, with none of the social awkwardness of photographing friends or strangers.

A lot of the chaps on my photography forum get Very Insistent that it's 100% ok to photograph strangers in the street because it's legal and fuck crazy bitches who object, if anyone gives you hassle just tell them to call the cops and wait for them to crumple. It's such an awful attitude, so very ugly, people who can't even imagine why a random bloke coming up to you and taking your photo then walking off might be unsettling. And I do mean bloke; I'm a moderately attractive Boho babe who looks like a uni freshman, so strangers come up to me and take my photo then walk away A Lot More Often Than You Would Imagine. Like, maybe three or four times a year? Once in a blue moon someone will ask, and I never say no to that because yay, street art. But randos doing it without permission feels, and well IS violating. It's not the worst thing in the world, but it sucks, it makes you feel crappy, you vaguely wonder if they are planning to put the photo online to make fun of you, etc etc etc. Even the idea of someone making you a muse for his art, framing his ideas about you, instead of being able to define your own image bothers me. Whether it's because they think you're attractive, or you're colourful local flavour for a holiday album, or you're material for their promising street art project, it's not nice to be Made Into something by someone else.

So like I said, I am frustrated by the complete lack of compassion and respect that some online photography bros have about this, but I'm certain it's about experience - they've never been photographed by a stranger before, and they don't have the weird sort of relationship you get to your body/public space/your body being public property that some of us develop under patriarchy, and they don't have the empathy to imagine what thst might feel out.

But pet photography is the bees knees. So far, I've photographed turkeys at the zoo, the neighbours cat, my ferret and a spider. All the photos suck, but at least it's not in an ethical grey zone.

[smashfold-blog]

I do think a lot of stigma does come down to people wanting an illusion of control in their life.

It's very scary to acknowledge that sometimes, you just get into a financial hole you can't get out of or get attacked by a stranger or get an incurable mystery illness. Terrifying. Absolutely terrifying acknowledging the lack of control and power that individuals have over their lives.

Hence the urge to blame the poor's poor moral character for their poverty, to ask survivors what they were wearing, to insist the disabled just to try harder, and so forth.

A lot of people's self confidence is built on the illusion that they are in control of their life and are responsible for the good things that have happened, instead of essentially being pawns of chaos. Of course, they like to imagine that if these things happened to them they would be easily fixed, with a little effort and good character; that by performing magical rituals such as "wearing appropriate clothes" and "not spending money on cigarettes" they can ward off the monsters lying in wait.

Otherwise, if not for these collective blame-people-for-bad-things-in-life actions, they would have to accept that often, shit just happens people. And it is scary. It is unfair. Shit happens and you usually can't do much about it.

I feel a lot of right wing attitudes, and general stigma aimed at victims of bad stuff by everyone, comes from this flawed lawful neutral belief system where everyone gets their appropriate due. I guess also it's the appeal of religion, the idea that people are being punished or rewarded for their behavior instead of everyone on tiny little rafts in the sea of chaos pretending to be mighty admirals so they might ignore the sharks.

[smashfold-blog]

Me: I'm actually not a big fan of mushrooms

Them: oh no worries we will have carrot instead.

VS:

Me: I cant have mushrooms because of my sensory sensitivities

Them: you should really get over that you can't let it hold you back why dont you try some

Me: *ongoing fascination with the way that other people react with shame/embarassment/judgements if they think you're doing something due to disability, when the things are really very reasonable requests which no one would reasonably object to or even comment on under different circumstances. Something here about non-disabled people just not wanting to be around the disabled, or think about disability, or they immediately want to come up with things which contain the disability or make it safe/solvable/explicable, something they can explain away as pickiness or laziness or personal moral failing so they don't have to face the realty that some people just roll all 1s at character creation,and no one knows why and there's nothing to be done about it*

[smashfold-blog]

Dating as a person with BPD feels like being trapped in the world's crappest gothic novel. "This is overblown and totally preposterous. No one really behaves like that," the critics will say. "This is my-first-fanfic levels of melodramatic trash".

[smashfold-blog]

(I am trying to cut down on mentioning my person

But its making me think about how lousy the concept of "codependency" is as talked about online. The way i see it used is often by the same sort of reddity people who decide their exes have BPD as a way to underline what a psycho they are. There's a lack of compassion and understanding, and also people using super medicalised/formal language ("codependent" rather than, say, "clingy") to try and trump an argument, as if those terms give their beliefs more weight. When someone uses those terms, a little alarm bell goes off in my head and I think - there's another side to this story. It frequently feels like people pathologising their ex for having needs, and instead of maturely saying "I'm not able to do that; this kind of relationship isn't my priority", they put it back on the other person: "the fact you even HAVE these needs make you a problem person".

Nowadays I think a lot about how being codependent isn't a problem per se, so long as you're doing it with someone who has similar relationship needs/preferences and who shares your enthusiasm for having that sort of relationship. You know? Independent and codependent relationship styles are only a big problem when you're in a mixed marriage, for want of a better term. All kinds of relationship preferences are valid - it's ok to want texts constantly, it's ok to want texts once or twice a week but no more because you need space. The trick is finding someone who feels equally delighted about sending constant texts, or being generally out of contact.

In any case, I'm a lot happier in myself for being in a relationship with someone who has life goals like "if we open a shop together, and live above the shop, we can spend more time together" rather than people who want to work 8 days out of every 7 to advance a career and also go on dates sometimes. I've moved from a place where "codependency" felt like a problem - to one where I have relationship preferences that my partner shares. It's so lovely.

And in general, I think a lot of disability self esteem comes down to thinking about your problems not as problems, but as preferences. For getting out of environments that make you self-stigmatise your characteristics, and into ones where they are as bland as a favourite ice cream flavour. Whether that's sensory needs or personality traits or accessibility requirements, the esteem, the feeling like a real human being again, that comes when people aren't seeing you as a collection of Problems To Be Fixed.

[smashfold-blog]

A lot of the life problems i have involve a wordless cognitive complexity.

We went shopping at the weekend. My partner asked, shall we walk home or shall we take the train? You would think that, as someone with fatigue issues, I'd want to take the train. But it's not physical fatigue, it's mental. "Walk home just like we walked here, even with heavy groceries" seemed a lot less taxing than "walk to station. Wait for train. Get on train. Get off train. Walk home".

I have so many invisible barriers in my head that nobody else has, and it's definitely better now I'm noticing them and articulating them; and I'm fortunate indeed to have loved ones around me who are polite enough not to tell me the barriers are nuts or try and teach me to overcome them, and are instead cool to help me work around them. Like, I'm currently on a "I will only wear this single item of clothing, nothing else makes me feel comfortable" marathon. It's a nuisance, but bless my partner for knowing and, when asked to pack and bring an emergency flood overnight bag, digging it out.

I'm finding these new 4am starts are really good for me. I don't know why, but I think the knowledge that no one else is awake really helps me focus. If there was any scientific evidence at all for psychic abilities, id believe it. Otherwise, it seems nonsensical to me that being awake when the world is asleep could have any impact at all, unless waking humans transmit some sort of psychic energy I find distracting, and sleeping humans don't. Anyway, that's what it feels like. The calm of the world is calming to me, and makes everything feel possible and easy. Free from barriers.

Then they start waking up, and by 11 or 12 the world is filled with red laser lines, like a jewel cabinet in a heist movie, and all my movements are constrained by trying to carefully step around them, while everyone else can walk straight through and don't understand why I'm moving so slowly by comparison.

[smashfold-blog]

I'm a small business owner!

[smashfold-blog]

"Consumers must also do their part in the fight against modern slavery by asking themselves, why their products are so cheap".

No. False.

Blaming slavery in production chains on consumers who choose, or need, cheaper products is wrong. So is expecting consumers with economic privilege to make any sort of difference at all, merely by buying the Asda £4 dodgy-working-conditions eggs over the £2 ones and imagining thst extra money went to workers, and not company profits. Nike trainers arent more expensive than Primark ones because Nike support their worker's rights, pay fair wages and provide support and aid.

Only governments can require companies to act against their economic self interest. Only governments can introduce the sort of large regulation. Some companies, perhaps, have the sort of social responsibility to voluntarily make changes but then government needs to regulate the rest to prevent them being driven out of business.

Consumer power is a thing, but it's also negligble beside the powers of government and corporations.

Passing on responsibility for slave labour, or recycling/pollution, or any sort of big global problems to consumers is a pernicious tactic by groups with a vested interest in not taking responsibility themselves.

[smashfold-blog]

Things I love about children: how much they love Fur Elise.

By the time you get to adulthood I think most people are totally done with Fur Elise because it's so over used, you get used to it. But kids still find it totally magical.

Ive been teaching the boy at number 24 how to play Fur Elise. I drag my keyboard out onto the front porch and just teach him the next section by rote and muscle memory. There's no one easier to teach than children who really want to learn. He brought Fur Elise up -it's his favourite song, along with a Romanian folk song and also the song from the Fast and Furious 8 trailer.

He is So Freakin Good At That Song now, it's a nice feeling and I don't feel like I can take much credit for it, because all I did was show him the notes - it's the dedication he put in to learn them and get them perfect, the sort of dedication I remember having as a youngling with a song I was desperate to play.

But it also reminds me of the last two kids I taught piano to - my younger cousin, and my younger sister. Both of which also wanted to learn: Fur Elise. My copy of the song is just marked up with pen and pencil notes from like three generations of kids now, who decide they want to learn not only piano, but that particular song.

It's nice as an adult because it helps you rediscover how magical that song is; and I guess also a reminder of how not to be cynical, how to be genuine and delighted and not tired by passé things. Kids don't care that it's a bog standard classic and they haven't heard it a billion times in soap powder commercials - they just hear it, and think it's wonderful.

[smashfold-blog]

Thinking about clothes and distorting the body today. (CN: talking about body shapes and ideal bodies)

To do any sort of historic European womenswear starts with making the appropriate corset, and often hooped skirts, bustles or panniers too. There's an artificial body shape created.

My person is very into Chinese history, so I asked him whether they ever used corsets. He thinks not, but pointed out that traditional Chinese womenswear ALSO distorts the body, this time with huge squares of fabric which produce a different kind of artificial shape:

(Disclaimer that obvs China has a huge fashion history which I know nothing about except vague notions; my ideas are being drawn from heroic era Chinese fantasy movies like Hero and Curse of the Golden Flower, whenever they are supposed to be set)

So now I'm trying to think about the rest of the world's historic dress.

Here's Lady Kaede, from Japanese historic epic Ran, with another tradition of "women with absurdly distorted bodies in history":

My main memories of this unsettling, slightly villainous character is the fabric. She's swamped in it. It affects the way she moves and stands.

And then there are the different trends of middle eastern garments:

Which again, disguises and distorts the shape of the body. In the case of these garments, it's always been clear to me how comfortable they would have been in hot environments as well as having a strong aesthetic. Western historic womenswear is more comfortable than you would expect, when correctly fitted and made from an appropriate plant-based fabric, but is still pretty restrictive.

But all this wondering started while people-watching on the Tube. A lot of the asian young people I see look really fashion forward to me, because they are wearing these unshaped coats or long skirts, I can't describe the look well but you'd know it if you saw it. Hmm maybe like this:

That look reads as really modern and ahead of the fashion curve to me. But it occurs to me that actually, those are just the traditional shapes of Asian fashion. Lots of unshaped fabric falling from the body and cocooning it into a different shape.

So now I'm also wondering about how fashion history continues to influence a) our fashion and b) our perceptions of fashion. Because having nicely defined curvey women is still a goal of western fashion, even though we no longer use corsets; our clothes are still designed to draw attention to the boobs and butt. Our couture uses androgynous models and unshapes precicely because they are challenging to our beauty ideals and therefore striking. So perhaps this young woman wouldn't look so trendy in Shanghai?

Post done. More of a tumble of thoughts than an argument. I think the key ideas were:

1) I'm interested that historic fashion for women seems to distort the body pretty much everywhere, even though different nations have different traditions of how they do that.

2) I'm vaguely wondering why some places in the world developed a focus on the waist and curves and accentuating the body while others chose to disguise the body and create new shapes

3) I'm wondering to what extent each country's historic ideals of fashion continues to influence what clothes are seen as "normal" today, and which are seen as "unusual". This hadn't occurred to me before, and I imagine the answer is "quite a bit", but I want to think more about it. Like, our cultural background gives us ideas of "normal" and "not normal" in pretty much every other sphere of life, so id be stunned if it didn't affect clothes too.

4) can you think of any other clothing traditions in the world that invented the corset? Or some sort of waist shaping? Is that just a European fashion tradition? I think it is. Definitely inbox me if you can think of places I've forgotten.

[smashfold-blog]

What do we say to the God of Housework?

[smashfold-blog]

Trying to restore the ArthurRose Studio to functional today. Trying to find new homes for everything, as rhe leak still hasn't been found. Although we have found a pipe under our bath which just pours water into the crawlspace every time you take out the plug, so I'll add that to the old house damp/bad DIY condensation/built on a marsh and angry lost rivers/upstsirs waterfall list of reasons why this house is 80% water where it shouldn't be.

I'm a victim of the "hoards stuff/can't function in a messy environment/too sad to tidy" vicious cycle; and I'm pretty pleased my biggest box-hoard got destroyed. It was like 8 boxes of various sizes I've dragged from home to home, unable to throw away; but after the flood it was like, if it's wet and there isn't a compelling reason to keep, out it goes. We are currently moving all the displaced house clutter back out of the Studio and back into the splash zone. Fingers crossed we will have another flood, and all this crap will need to be thrown away as well.

[cocainesocialist]

toby young thinks getting into oxford is as easy as having your dad phone up because that’s exactly how he got in

[smashfold-blog]

Oh my goodness, that's so unspeakably ugly 0_0