#ilovevanillatea

[itspileofgoodthings]

All of this to say, I hope that you’re ok but you’re the reason KILLS ME ACTUALLY

😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

Fortnight has JUST landed for me—and I love love love this line. What an opener 😭

[ladybeug]

Probably too late for drawing requests but cat!au with Marinette's parents teasing her about her crush on Adrien while she's looking after her 'pet'? P.S. I literally love how you draw SO MUCH I cannot even explain

ah you just missed requests!! im drawing again a little tonight but its for another project. but if i have time ill squeeze this in!! (or if i get bored and need a silly break haha) 

also thank you!? wow!! 

[catie-does-things]

So I just finished ATLA for the first time ever and have also been introduced to the marvellous and yet terrible world of Zutara. Imagine my delight to realise you, one of my fav blogs, specifically mention Zutara salt in your bio... pls assuage my grief and pain by assuring me that I'm not alone ;_; I mean HOW -- WHAT -- WHY -----?!?!!

I KNOW RIGHT???

Welcome to the club, my friend. There is still quite an active Zutara fandom, so hopefully that helps. You are certainly far from alone in wondering how this could have happened.

In fact, @zutaramonth is going on right now, so enjoy that!

[nuttmeg13]

Explain the milk discourse pls I am uneducated

Someone in the swiftie fandom (might have been @imhereonthekitchenfloor lol) decided to make a post declaring their love for milk or something and a bunch of other swifties decided to share their opinions and hot takes on the matter. I kind of came in on it and didn't really participate much but it was fun to watch on my dash 😂

[itspileofgoodthings]

Flu-distracting ask: why do you think Taylor uses the imagery of marriage and a husband in High Infidelity, since presumably she wasn't married to the subject of the song? ☺️ (I feel like I'm writing a GCSE essay question 😂)

I love this so much thank you!!

I really think it’s because in that relationship, more than any other, she DID want the trappings of a wedding/marriage. And as I always say and have said for years, Taylor wants forever. It’s the premise of every one of her breakup songs, from the most intense to the most light-hearted. It’s so inherent to who she is. But the magic of Taylor, the Every Girl nature of her I was talking about last night, is that she always wants it ALL, anything you can think of wanting. And I think in this one she wanted to WIN at having a romantic relationship (something both normal to want and possible to achieve) and so was just all in even when the red flags were there.

Dragged my feet right down the aisle / seemed like the right thing at the time

are just the best lyrics to describe her wanting the exterior signs of success in a lasting relationship as well as an actual lasting relationship. She wanted to prove that she COULD do it, that she could make a romantic relationship last for more than a few months, that it wasn’t doomed to failure. (Anyone remember the one year cake …) And that desire, combined with her natural desire for forever, is best summed up by imagery that evokes the inherently competitive nature of the wedding industry! She wanted the externals because she wanted the reality; but she hung on to the externals even when the reality turned sour in the hopes that somehow it would all be true. This song is seeing all of that in hindsight once the chokehold was snapped; but her past self was absolutely in this space of pushing towards a wedding that was doomed from the start due to the lack of love.

And I just love it so much. It’s also why lavender haze has just bothered me less and less with time. Because songs like new year’s day, lover, sweet nothing …. They are the essence of marriage! And the essence of her heart. But I do kind of think she’s past the stage of wanting the pageantry of it, or at least for its own sake. Her 25 year old self was not and that was so valid of her.

[itspileofgoodthings]

For the Midnights ask game!!!! (because I was rubbish and didn't play the last one) - Lavender Haze, Anti-Hero, and Would've, Could've, Should've 😁😘

Yayy thank you!! Love these options.

Lavender Haze: do you let other people’s opinions of you influence you?

Wow. I feel like both yes and no? No in that my choices are my own and if people thought I was stupid for doing them that wouldn’t stop me (and doesn’t.) But yes on a deeper level because much of my sense of self comes from the things people have told me about myself over the years. Not everything that people tell me, but when my instinct tells me it’s true. There are some virtues I feel like I can’t access until someone else has said it about me! I’m probably too obsessed with the things people say about me and I’m trying to detach myself from needing it as much (which is hard) but I feel like there is no way it will ever have no effect on me.

Anti-hero: What’s an insecurity of yours that you’ve overcome?

I think there’s two, though one is more ongoing than the other. The first is insecurity about my appearance. Of course it’s not fully eradicated. There are still flickers of it that crop up pretty often but I just used to dislike things about my appearance very intensely and specifically and I just don’t anymore. I can see myself more as a whole person now and understand that body isn’t separated from soul or “objective beauty” from the spirit that shines through. I like the specificity of my appearance more and more and feel less pressure to look a certain way. People’s compliments/kind words on this front have really helped tbh. Not discounting the 8th grader who once said “I really like your nose” or Nina the other day saying “your eyes are a wintry blue.” I feel like specific physical compliments (not vague objectifications or cliches) are really important for everyone to hear.

The other one is insecurity about my work ethic which is slowly being overcome by me simply doing more and more work. I’m so lazy and I’m always trying to wriggle out of it so sometimes my brain is like “you have NEVER worked hard” but the truth is that I have and I do and I am. And time’s evidence is just helping me get over that feeling that I’m a fraud who has graduated from college and with my master’s and has taught for over 3 years without doing any work lol.

Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve: Are you haunted by something?

I mean yeah. Most of it is not fun because it’s my ocd brain never letting me let go of some of the more painful/darker sides of being a person and just some memories that are hard to shake that I can never un-remember. But to answer it in a happy way I’m haunted by many perfect turnings of a phrase: song lyrics, quotes, things people have said to me in passing. So so so so so so many words are just a part of me and there are a handful that go right down to my very core.

These hands had to let it go free this love came back to me —for example!

[itspileofgoodthings]

Daffodil and dandelion!

daffodil- what’s your favorite sign of spring? 

Ahh there are so many! Because I love spring so much. If I had to choose, I would say the buds on the trees. But the lengthening days and the first crocuses appearing are so beautiful too.

dandelion- what is your greatest strength?

I love this question so much lol. I would say it’s how all my strengths work together? By which I mean: I’ve been recently more aware of the way that I grow as a person and the way that I am and there’s an evenness to it and a fullness to it that I really appreciate and I think is beautiful.

Even when I was younger, I’ve never felt that one of my attributes outpaced another. My intelligence has never outstripped my maturity which doesn’t outweigh my sense of humor. Such as they were, they all were together. I see it even more now, the way that they all sort of grow together and so there is a fullness to my personality because I’m always all the things. And I want to be all the things. My personality isn’t narrow, it doesn’t come to a point though I think I am specific. And so I’m just always growing and developing more and more sides of myself.

That said, this means I grow slowly because things have to keep pace. I may grow in leaps and bounds but then everything about me slows down and waits for everything else to catch up. In most areas of my life and heart, lots of people are ahead of me—so to speak? Because it’s all developing together in me at the same time. This makes me a very whole person but it does mean that no one looks at me and is, you know, stunned by how [ insert good quality here ] I am for my age. In a positive way, I think I could almost be considered the average. Or a standard maybe? But again in an ordinary way. Not in a “this is the HIGHEST bar” kind of way. I don’t actually think I am particularly gifted but I feel very full as a person, multi-faceted and very grounded. And I’m grateful for that.

[itspileofgoodthings]

Something about stars and Maisie Peters...? Count me in 😘🌟⭐

YES! So glad you did 💗💗💗💗

Your songs are:

1) Enough for You

Especially in a specific platonic sense rather than a romantic one. Because there is such vulnerability to the song and so much openness and longing but also, if this makes sense, a lot of nuance?? My favorite lines of the song are “poured out my heart in the front of your car, kind of funny” and “and I get it, I really do” because they are moments that balance the vulnerability of the main sentiment of the song with these edges of humor and realism and understanding. I love her ability to see the humor in a very painful situation and also I love the way she UNDERSTANDS why she’s been left behind even if she wishes she wasn’t. That ability to hold other views and perspectives alongside a great vulnerability and pain is very very you and one of my favorite things about you. You are always talking about something from multiple angles and seeing that there is always more than just what you’re feeling and/or you are feeling multiple things.

2) Maybe Don’t

Okay so I KNOW this is your song, I saved it for you!!! But I don’t know if I can say WHY. And I have thought about it a lot. Maybe because it’s very romcom meets real life, maybe because it’s so tied to blue walls for me and so are YOU, maybe because it’s about the hard work of making a relationship possible through the quagmire of fears and doubts and you are always so committed to that. But in any case I love it and it is yours. <3

[ Ask Game Closed ]