ixieko replied to your post “awww you guys didn’t have to retire! I wanted you to stick around!”
I think, they're just tired. It's the lack of choice, I guess. When you don't have a choice to stop, to quit whenever you want, it makes life you living feel like a chore, like "waiting for a life" instead of actual life.
Yes - but Hunter Husbands (named such because I have temporarily forgotten their names, whoops!) AND Sam and Dean DO HAVE A CHOICE, they could quit being hunters AT ANY TIME (...okay this is perhaps less true for Sam and Dean atm who are in the middle of a thing, but before this Darkness business... and after the apocalypse :p), they just needed/need to realise that, to LET GO of the emotional baggage making them feel obligated to be hunters...
That’s what I’m longing for with Sam and Dean the most overall really - for them to, you know, OWN their actions, to realise that they HAVE A CHOICE and HAVE BEEN FREELY CHOOSING their actions (and thus are responsible for those actions’ consequences) for a long time now (eg. Sam drinking demon blood, everyone’s deals, Dean taking on the Mark, Dean agreeing to let Sam be possessed, Sam curing the Mark).
They are NOT TRAPPED in their current life because of outside forces preventing them from stopping/quitting/acting differently, they are TRAPPING THEMSELVES through their own choices*, so if their life feels like a chore or not actually living then THEY ARE THE ONES WITH THE POWER TO CHANGE THAT, they don’t have to wait until a specific task is completed (like Hunter Husbands did) or whatever, they can change things NOW (or... well... they could if it wasn’t for this Darkness business getting in the way... another reason the plot is kinda bugging me, since it distracts from the emotional development of the boys... although if you take their battle with the Darkness as a metaphor for them dealing with their inner darkness/issues then it kinda works I suppose)
*albeit choices that a made because of various emotional/psychological issues created by various traumas experienced since childhood ofc - which you CAN argue IS something of an external force at work on them, but... at the same time, it is THEIR OWN emotions/psychology, so it is not outside their control in the same way say Heaven and Hell’s manipulation of the boys in the lead up to the apocalypse was... like, it’s something they CAN work on dealing with if they chose to, but as I see it they never... quite... do... hence my frustration! like if they were TRYING to deal with their emotional/psychological issues and struggling I would have all the sympathy (and there have been moments when I’ve felt that was happening and I HAVE sympathised), but often it feels to me like they are NOT trying but more frequently throwing in the towel and saying ‘I can’t act any other way this is just how it is / who I am, oh woe is me’ and....rah!
(wow sorry, this wasn’t even esp. related to your comment I’m so sorry - this just hit a never somewhere along the line! you made a fair point about Hunter Husbands feeling tired xx sorry to have ranted over it!)
