So growing up, my mom was always overly concerned with my nails. It drove me insane. If we were going somewhere nice, they had to be painted. If they started to chip for too long, I had to remove the nail polish. As a girl who hated anything pink, always preferred jeans to dresses, and in general suffered from all the usual aspects of being in a heteronormative world and taking it out on anything feminine, I hated it. I was constantly fighting her on my nails, and as soon as I was older, I stopped messing with them at all. Occasionally I would paint them black if I got bored. Mostly however, my frustration at being forced into such an arbitrary habit has kept me from wanting anything to do with nail care as an adult.
However, watching Anil and Jonny's streams over the last few months, and seeing their nails, and how good they always look, and seeing all the cute, beautiful, and just generally very nice colors they wear, I've started painting my nails again. It's reminded me it's something I can have fun with, and not just a product of forced femininity. Literally went out and bought this purple polish because I loved Anil's nails in the Jackbox stream on his birthday so much. (Didn't end up liking that one that much. The one I found was way too dark. Apparently the polish he was using is only available in the UK and I haven't found a suitable alternative.)
Anyways, this is a long, post, just because I was thinking about it, and wanted to talk about it. And just say how grateful I am for these people. Not just because of the nail thing, obviously. That's not really that important. But just for being so unapologetically themselves, and for being so good and wonderful, and providing me with some much needed seratonin on some of my worst days. I am so thankful that I found The Magnus Archives, so many months ago, and through that RQG, and Rusty Quill Streaming, etc, etc. These people are so important to me, and I hope they're having a great day.