This is touched upon briefly at the beginning of the air grows cold around me and you and I’m trying to finish up another thing that also sort of touches on it, BUT here we go:
For Christmas 2014, Lafayette heads back to France a few days before Christmas. The semester ends around 12/17 and Laf’s probably back in France by the 23rd or so. He stays with Adrienne and her family and generally has a good time, but simultaneously really misses the Washingtons and John and Alex. This is basically the start of a pretty rough couple of years for Lafayette–pining for Adrienne while he’s in America, but sort of desperately missing his family while he’s in France. He really wants Adrienne to move to the US and she keeps talking about how much a transfer to MUNJ could be helpful to her research, but at this point it’s mostly talk from her and Laf is, unfortunately, taking it much more seriously and pinning his hopes on it.
But the long and short of it is that Laf is thrilled to be spending time with Adrienne, but FaceTimes with the Washingtons on Christmas because he misses home.
Herc is mostly chilling with his family. It kind of drives him a little crazy–he doesn’t get along with all of them–but he spends the days around Christmas visiting various relatives, holding babies, eating a lot of home-cooked food, and giving various family members gifts he’s knitted for them.
The Washingtons have a much chiller Christmas than Thanksgiving. It’s just family–Patsy and Martha’s son Jack and his fiancée, plus Martha’s sister Liz and her husband–and very traditional. They have a nice dinner on Christmas Eve and bake cookies and wear matching pajamas and on Christmas Day they open presents and all that stuff. Most of these are traditions that have endured since Martha’s kids were little, traditions started with her first husband, but George has fully embraced them too. There’ve been a few years when Laf joined them back when he was in college and couldn’t get back to Paris for whatever reason.
Burr spent the holiday with his uncle, who was his legal guardian after basically all of the rest of his family died. It was formal and quiet and mostly boring. Burr sort of wished he had come up with an excuse to stay on campus, but it wasn’t like he had anywhere to stay in Morristown, and spending Christmas on his own seemed kind of depressing.
Alex and John were invited to spend Christmas with the Washingtons, but ended up passing because it felt weird to just be there with Martha’s family. Christmas wasn’t ever a big thing for Alex growing up. Conversely, it was a HUGE thing for John’s family, and John’s not sure how he feels about missing it because he’s been uninvited rather than because he chose not to join the family. (In the past, he skipped a few Christmases to stay in Geneva.) They end up having a mostly chill few days at home. They decide to buy an XBox as their sort of combined present to each other, so they spend Christmas Eve setting it up. Most of Christmas Day is spent in bed napping and fooling around and reading. They venture out to the living room to make boxed mac and cheese and play video games. They get each other a couple of other cheap stupid gifts–colored pencils, fancy coffee, novelty socks–and call Lafayette to tell him Merry Christmas when Twitter makes it clear he’s missing the States.
von Steuben has a New Year’s party, so Alex and John go to that (the theme is “the best thing about 2014″ and Alex and John switch clothes and go as each other, which everyone thinks is so sweet until John admits to Molly that they forgot about the theme and just switched clothes in the car before coming inside) and everyone else spends the evening at home watching the ball drop.
The first week of classes, after Laf is back in New Jersey, Team Shithead exchanges dumb presents at the Frog. Herc knitted them all scarves with ghosts on them.
is it too soon to ask about a possible team shitheads x ghostbusters crossover?
Only because I don’t know anything about the actual Ghostbuster characters yet. Ask me again on June 7th at 10:31pm or whenever we inevitably walk out of that “midnight” showing and back into a world changed by the existence of lady Ghostbusters.
I’m so pissed about something else I gave myself a headache, so here’s some more Team Shithead ghosthunters AU. John and Eliza, stuck in a room together, bonding while waiting for someone to come let them out.
***
According to Eliza's phone, it's been twenty minutes since she hung up on Angelica's voicemail. Somehow it seems like longer. She blames the dark and the anticipation, the way she's waiting for the phone to ring or someone to open the door or even for the entity in the other part of the house to do something with them now that it's trapped them. Instead, she and John have just been sitting in the dark, periodically illuminating the flashlight on one of their phones, and waiting to be rescued. John is stretched out on the ground, his head pillowed on his bag and balled up hoodie, and Eliza is leaning against the wall next to his shoulder. They're both facing the door, hoping that it will open any second.
"It sort of reminds me of the sleepovers Angelica, Peggy, and I would have when we were kids," Eliza says. It's a tenuous connection--she was never this frightened during those sleepovers, not even the time that Angelica secretly borrowed <em>The Ring</em> from the brother of one of her friends and they had to hang a blanket over the television before they could sleep. But she wants to focus on something happy, something light, and she thinks John might want that too. He's restlessly shifting around. She's pretty sure he blames himself for getting them into this in the first place.
"You had sleepovers with your own sisters?" John asks. "Isn't the point of sleepovers to get away from your own house for a night?"
"No," Eliza says. She frowns. "The point of sleepovers is to sleep somewhere other than your bed and play games and stay up all night and have fun. My sisters and I used to have them all the time, camping out in different rooms of the house even on nights we didn't have friends over." She pauses for a moment and looks over at John. "Was the point of sleepovers for you to get away from your own house?"
John sighs. Even in the dark, Eliza's eyes are adjusted enough for her to see that he's staring up at the darkness of the ceiling.
"I guess?" he says. "I'm the oldest of five. And...decorum was big with my dad. Is big. The house had to look a certain way, you know? He couldn't just have a bunch of kids sleeping wherever. We were supposed to act a certain way, me especially, because I was setting an example for my brothers. He wasn't...mean or cruel, just strict. He had expectations for me. It was nice to get away from them for a night or two every once in awhile, to just...do stupid kid things. Then, of course, once I got old enough I was off to boarding school, then to college where I immediately pledged my dad's fraternity, just like he wanted. There were always expectations. Until I came here, at least."
"That sounds sad," Eliza says. She reaches out in the dark and squeezes his arm.
"It is what it is," John says, then snorts. "Ugh, I can't fucking believe I just said that. My dad says that all the fucking time. Just--I'm not upset about it anymore, not really. I had kind of a rough time this summer over some things and I realized I just need to focus on what I have. I'm doing what I love and it led me here, and I love it here. I have Alex. I have you and Angelica and Lafayette and Herc. I don't even care that I'm broke--it's worth it to be this happy."
"I'm glad you're happy," Eliza says. She knew John came from a rich southern family and she knew he was estranged from his dad, but not much else. John didn't really talk about his life before Morristown. Not to her, at least. Alexander probably knows more--definitely knows more, actually, given the frequency with which he mutters "Fuck your dad" to John. "And I guess--I'm still sad that you couldn't be happy before. And proud of you for getting out to do what you wanted to do. I don't know that I would have had the strength to break free if my father didn't let us choose our own paths."
So, @pearlo tagged me in one of those “write a ficlet in only five minutes!!” memes and three!drink!Kait decided it would be a good idea to write about Team Shithead’s first Thanksgiving. But then slighty!soberer!Kait kind of got on a roll and actually spent like, twenty-five minutes on it? And then fell asleep while writing (I mean like, literally while writing, like I shook myself out of it and I was discovered I had finished) and realized it needed an edit because John “Literally Punched a Man to Avoid Talking About Feelings” Laurens kind of went on an emotional ramble, so I decided to edit it and....
Anyway. Yeah. This is not exactly a five minute ficlet. But it IS about Team Shithead’s first Thanksgiving and probably will not necessarily make sense to people who haven’t been following my weird Hamilton fic posts, but, you know. Whatever. I do what I want. It’s WAY longer than I normally feel comfortable posting on tumblr, but it’s def not ready for AO3 and LJ is dead, so....
This is mostly gen, in that there’s an established Eliza-Alexander-John poly-v in the background, but it factors in to the story about 0%. It is mostly about Eliza having feelings about family and John having her back.
***
Eliza hangs up the phone with a sigh. Twenty minutes of forced smiles and cheer and graciously assuring her parents she and Angelica will be fine on their own for Thanksgiving and she's already exhausted. It's still another two weeks until the actual holiday, and she's sure her mother will call at least a half dozen times to bombard her with apologies.
And she understands, she does. It's a good business opportunity for her father and it would be silly for Eliza and Angelica to fly to England with them for two days to celebrate a holiday that doesn't even exist there. She doesn't begrudge them their trip or blame them for the timing of it.
Still. She hates the idea of spending Thanksgiving without them.
"Was that Dad?" Angelica asks when Eliza wanders into the living room and drops onto the couch. Angelica has her feet resting on the coffee table with her laptop balanced on her knees. On the floor in front of the television, Alexander and John are sitting crosslegged and laying out a series of photographs of the interior of a house, swapping them and switching them wordlessly. "Is everything okay?"
"Yes," Eliza says. Then, "No. I don't know. Mom and Dad have to go to London over Thanksgiving and they're taking Peggy with them."
Angelica stops typing for a moment.
"Oh," she says. "Well...that sucks." She glances at Eliza and offers her a smile, but Eliza can tell her heart's not in it. Thanksgiving has never been Angelica's holiday--she's more interested in the eating and shopping than the parts that speak to Eliza. Because Thanksgiving is the core of what Eliza thinks a holiday should be: cooking a meal together, with love, coming together as a family, sharing something special and communal, reflecting on gratitude and counting blessings.
Eliza knows she's a little old fashioned, and should she forget, Angelica and Alexander remind her fairly regularly.
"Just come to the Washingtons'," John says without looking up from the floor. He hands Alexander a photo and Alexander quickly swaps it and hands a different one back. The tableau has no rhyme or reason to Eliza's eyes, but then, she's not a gigantic parapsychology nerd.
"The Washingtons'?" Eliza asks.
"They throw a big Thanksgiving each year," John says. "Washington's stepkids are there sometimes, but mostly it's people at the school who either don't have family or can't get home. Last year like, twenty people came."
"It's where we're going," Alexander says. "But I still think Thanksgiving's a weird holiday."
"I think your face is a weird holiday," John says absently and in a way which makes Eliza think this is the continuation of some long ago argument.
"You love my face."
"It’s a flaw I’m working through."
"Fuck off."
"I did, last night. You were there."
Angelica snaps her laptop closed.
"Oh my god, shut up before I kill you both, I need to get this reading done!" she says.
"Sorry," John and Alexander chorus, glancing up at her briefly before returning to rearranging photos. Or, Alexander returns to the photos. John looks to Eliza and smiles, the smile that's soft around the edges and genuine, devoid of the bravado and attitude that so frequently colors them.
"You should come," John says to her. "I think you'll like it."
"I'll think about it," Eliza says.
*
Two days later, she's checking her phone on her lunch break and notices a series of texts from John.
> So, I told Washington you guys were coming for Turkey Day and he told Mrs. W and Mrs. W wanted your number, so I gave it to her.
> I know that's a faux pas, but I'm kind of scared of her.
> Plus, I know you guys like, bonded or whatever, so.
> Anyway, just thought I'd give you a head's up.
She taps the screen to expand the keyboard, but all she does is stare at the blinking cursor. She doesn't know how to explain to John that Thanksgiving means something, that it's family and tradition and the bone-deep contentment she feels after doing something for the people she loves, using food to bring them all together. The Washingtons are great but...well, it won't be the same.
In the end, her lunch break ends before she can come up with something to say. She slips her phone back into her purse and returns to her classroom. She'll talk to him about it later.
*
That night, John goes out to do something with Gilbert and comes home sometime after she and Alexander have gone to bed. He's still sleeping when Eliza leaves for work--at least until Alexander goes in and jumps on him--and she means to talk to him that next night, except an unknown number rings on her phone while she's driving back to the house.
She hesitates, then hits "Accept" on her steering wheel.
"Hello?"
"Eliza? This is Martha Washington. Mr. Laurens gave me your number."
Eliza bites her lip.
"Hi, Mrs. Washington," she says. "Martha, I mean. Um. Hi."
"I was very pleased to hear that you and Angelica would be joining us this year," Martha says. "You especially."
"Well," Eliza says. God, she wasn't prepared to talk to Martha about this yet. "I'm still...not sure. Our parents are going to be away and...." She trails off. It feels so silly.
"And?" Martha prompts kindly.
If she can't be up front about this with Martha Washington, there's probably no one in Morristown she can be up front with about it. "Thanksgiving's always been a big deal for me," she explains. "The past few years, I do most of the cooking and it's usually just the five of us and it's...it's hard to explain. There aren't many times that all five of us are together and happy. We're all so busy. And I really...cherish that. Doing something for my family, being a family...I guess I just don't know if I want to do something else, if that makes any sense. If I can't have my Thanksgiving...it might be best to sit this one out."
Martha is quiet for a moment and Eliza turns onto her street. From the corner, she can see John's car in the driveway, though Angelica's is absent.
"It's up to you, of course," Martha finally says. "But I don't think our ideas of Thanksgiving are very different. Since meeting George, I've come to realize that families come together in many different ways."
Eliza's not sure what to say to that. She hums in response.
"It's up to you," Martha repeats. "But I wish you would come. If only because I'd love to have your help in the kitchen."
Eliza pulls into the driveway and puts the car in park.
"I'll think about it," she says.
"That's all I ask," Martha says. "Let me know by the Tuesday before if you're coming. If you don't, I'll be sure Mr. Hamilton and Mr. Laurens bring home plenty of leftovers."
"Thanks, Martha," Eliza says.
They say their goodbyes and Eliza ends the call and turns off her car, but she doesn't get out of it immediately. She tries to weigh what would be worse--sitting at home alone, or going out to a big, busy holiday celebration so different from the one she's longing for.
She's still not sure she has an answer when she goes back inside, but when she sees John lying on the sofa reading, she hesitates in the entryway.
"I think I'd like to go to the Washingtons' for Thanksgiving," she tells him. It was not what she was planning to say.
He looks up from his book and grins at her, another one of those happy, uncomplicated smiles.
"Good," he says. "I'm really glad."
She's still not sure she won't regret it, but John's smile is enough to convince her she's made the right choice for the moment.
*
The week leading up to Thanksgiving, Eliza starts to feel the discomfort building up in her stomach and settling across her shoulders. Alexander notices--he spends more than one night lying in bed and petting her hair until she falls asleep. Angelica notices too, but for some reason, Eliza struggles to put it into words. She goes through most of the week thinking John is oblivious, but on Monday morning, he surprises her in the kitchen by hugging her tightly before he runs out the door for his seminar.
"It's going to be great," he tells her. "I know you're nervous, but Thanksgiving is going to be great. I promise you."
He presses a kiss to her cheek and then sprints out to the car where Alexander is already waiting. Eliza watches them drive off and wonders what she's really gotten herself into.
And then it's Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday morning. And then, with no small amount of dread, Eliza is picking out an appropriately festive outfit and driving over to the Washingtons' with three pies and two casseroles and candied sweet potatoes.
And then she's in the kitchen, and all the apprehension evaporates away.
Eliza's mother is an adequate cook. She went out of her way, in their childhood, to cook a few meals a week instead of leaving everything on the staff, but Eliza knows that it was more out of a perceived maternal responsibility than any real passion for cooking.
Eliza, on the other hand, loves cooking. She loves preparing meals and experimenting with dishes and seeing the look on people's faces as they sample things. Martha seems to share the same exuberance for it. She's clearly thrilled to have Eliza working with her and her joy in throwing things together and joking in the kitchen touches something deep within Eliza. It makes her forget, mostly, about the tradition that's dying, about the family meal she's leaving behind.
And then she leaves the kitchen and realizes that maybe she hasn't left it behind after all.
She recognizes at least half the people in the room--Angelica and Alexander and John, of course, but also Gilbert and Hercules. Dr. von Stuben is there, and she sees Aaron Burr and Dolley Payne. Everyone is gathered in groups, talking and laughing and passing around appetizers. The room feels warm and full and happy, and seeing all of these people--people she cares about, people she'd do anything for--enjoying each other's company is....
Well, it's not her parents and her sisters gathered together, but it's nice.
John spots her from where he's sitting with Alexander, Dr. Washington, and some people she doesn't know. Alexander is talking and gesturing explosively, and John leans over and whispers something to him, then gets up and approaches her.
"Happy Thanksgiving," he says.
"Happy Thanksgiving to you too."
John looks around the room, smiling, and then back to Eliza.
"Come sit for a minute and I'll tell you a secret," he says. "Something not even Alex knows."
And with a tease like that, Eliza can't resist following him out of the living room and into the empty dining room. The table is set in preparation for the meal, but everyone else is out in the other parts of the house. The dining room is comparatively quiet. John pulls out a chair for Eliza and then one for himself, and they sit.
"I didn't think there was anything about you that Alexander didn't know," Eliza says.
"Well, he enjoys forcing me to talk about my feelings so much that I try to keep some things in reserve for the future," John says. "Plus, he wouldn't appreciate this, really."
"I'll do my best, then," Eliza says, and John grins.
"I never bother talking to Alex about Thanksgiving because he doesn't get it," he says. "He focuses on the genocide and the overeating and Black Friday, because he's Alex and because it wasn't a holiday he grew up with. But Thanksgiving was my mom's favorite holiday, and it used to be...insane. There would be so much food. She made a lot of it herself, even though we had, you know, help, and she invited anyone who didn't have anywhere else to go. She made us do all those cheesy things like sit around the table and tell everyone what we're thankful for and all that. And, um."
John casts his eyes to the side and takes a long breath, then releases it. Eliza can see the struggle to speak playing out across his face. She reaches out and squeezes his wrist.
"You don't have to," she says. He looks back to her and manages a half smile.
"No, I want to," he says. He breathes deeply again, staring at some point over her shoulder. "When she died, that all kind of...stopped. Thanksgiving became a lot more formal and stiff and...sanitized, I guess. And then, um, after...after James...." He trails off and steals a look up at her. She nods. She knows how hard it is for John to talk about his dead brother. "Um, after, I was sent away, to boarding school in Geneva, so there was no Thanksgiving. And I haven't been home for a Thanksgiving since because...well, disowned, but even before that, I didn't want my dad's stupid formal Thanksgiving. I wanted the big, messy, happy, communal Thanksgiving my mom loved. I wanted it to be about family and sharing and all that shit and last year, coming here...." He shrugs. "That's what this is. It's the closest I've gotten to those years with my mom. It's the most heart I've seen in the holiday in a long time. And I thought you might appreciate that."
Eliza blinks against the tears gathering in her eyes. She's already cried half a dozen times this morning, watching the parade on television, and it feels incredibly silly to cry over this too.
But still.
"I do," she tells him. "It's not what I'm used to and it's not what I expected but...Mrs. Washington was right. This is a family. You and Alexander are certainly my family, but this whole group--this is people who care about each other. People who choose to care about each other and spend time together."
John nods.
"Yep," he says. "And your cooking and patience and attention to detail are going to make it an awesome holiday for them. The people with no family and the people who can't get to their families--you're making an otherwise depressing holiday great for them. And I know it, because I'm one of them."
Eliza wipes at her eyes and leans forward to pull John into a hug. He holds on to her tightly, and when they finally release each other, John looks a little misty-eyed too.
Alexander chooses that moment to duck into the room.
"That's where you guys got off to," he says. "Did Mrs. W really let you out of the kitchen?"
"There are a million more things left to do," Eliza says. "I'm just taking a break."
"Cool," Alexander says. To John, he adds, "Come on, I want to tell those undergrads the story about the hidden cemetery and you tell it a million times better than I do."
"You know how Mrs. Washington gets about the gross stories at dinner," John says, but he's already getting to his feet.
"It's not dinner yet!" Alexander insists. He turns back to Eliza. "Blood and mud and all kinds of shit started like, bubbling up out of the ground. It was fucked up. But awesome."
Eliza shakes her head fondly. When did her life become stories about bleeding walls and hidden cemeteries? And why does that make her so pleased?
"I have to get back to the kitchen," she says. "Have fun, boys."
"We will," John says. "And, just...all different kinds of families, okay?"
"I know," Eliza says. "Thanks."
Eliza watches them retreat--two men she loves unexpectedly and wholly, in completely different ways and to depths she hadn't imagined--and feels a calm settle into her bones, a contentment.
It's time she gets back into the kitchen and finishes up making Thanksgiving dinner for her family.
Here’s a deleted scene from a fic that I’m not even done writing yet. This bit really doesn’t advance the plot in any way, save for making Alexander and John aware that Burr is going to be joining their meeting, so I’m 90% sure it’ll be cut from the final product. IT MAKES ME LAUGH, THOUGH. So, you know. I figured I’d post it here for posterity. Have some Team Shithead coffee shenanigans.
There's some brief scuffling to gather coats and gloves ("Where are your hats?" "....hats?" "Well, I know what everyone's getting for Christmas."), and then they're all piled into John's car and headed towards the drive-through Starbucks near campus.
"Orders, orders," John says as he directs the car to the short line in front of the intercom.
"I don't know, something with like, five shots of espresso," Alexander says.
"Okay, a heart-attack for Alex, what about you guys?"
"Soy mocha," Angelica says.
"Skim no-water four pump dirty chai," Eliza says and John turns back to her and grins.
"You and my sister would get along," he says. "It's a shame you'll never meet her because of the whole disowned thing."
"Thanks, I think?" Eliza says. She can't tell if that's a dig, but she assumes the best of John, if only because he's shared so much of himself already.
"And I know Lafayette and Washington, do you think Herc'll be there?" John asks.
"Dunno, sounded like he might be 'busy' all day," Alexander says. He puts air quotes around busy. Eliza wonders if it's a shady business meeting or a shady romantic meeting he's slipped out for.
"Angelica, do you know what Aaron might want?" Eliza asks. There's a beat, and then Alexander and John both turn to peer into the backseat.
"Aaron who?" Alexander asks, and Eliza has to roll her eyes.
"Don't be a shithead," Angelica says, and Eliza can see the spark of an argument about to explode out of Alexander, the words building up inside of him. It's the last thing they need right now.
"Alexander, don't," she says before he can open his mouth. She instills it with as much intimidation as she can muster, which isn't much, but is enough to make him close his mouth.
"He's part of this group too," Angelica says. "He didn't even blink before picking up a shovel to help us break Eliza and John out. He stayed up all hours of the night researching with us. He didn't have to do any of that. So yeah, after keeping him out until 5am, I texted him to let him know how all our hard work paid off."
Alexander glares daggers at her. John just sighs.
"I'll get him a black coffee," he says. "I'm not paying for anything special."
"He doesn't deserve anything special, so that's fine," Angelica says, and John pulls the car up to the intercom.
"Okay, this is a long one," he warns the person on the other end. Out of habit, Eliza glances behind them. Luckily, they're the end of the line, at least for now. "I need two grande Red-Eyes, one venti...whatever a Red-Eye with two extra shots is called--"
"Make it three," Alexander says.
"You will fucking die with that much espresso, Alexander, I'm not adding four espresso shots to your coffee--"
"Sir?" the tinny intercom voice calls out, derailing that argument neatly.
"Right," John continues. "A grande soy mocha, a--" He glances over his shoulder at Eliza as he says, "grande skim no-water four pump dirty chai?" Eliza smiles and nods. "And a grande light roast with two sugars. Oh, and a tall of whatever the shittiest coffee you have is."
"Sir?" the intercom asks again. "What was that?"
"Thanksgiving blend, do you have Thanksgiving blend?" John asks.
"Yes?"
"A tall Thanksgiving blend. That shit is vile."
The cashier nervously repeats the entire order and the total back to him--and Eliza knows it's shitty and wrong to feel guilty that the coffee is so expensive and John is usually broke, but that doesn't stop her--and John drives forward to the next window. He glances over his shoulder again and raises his eyebrows at Angelica's flat look.
"What?" he asks. "I agree you should've texted him. That doesn't mean I actually like him any more than I did forty-eight hours ago."
"You're both children," Angelica says, but John just grins and turns to face forward again.
They can paint away, but the songs we sing are stuck in these walls.
2011: The year I got my braces off, the year I got my first ticket, the year I bought my first pop punk albums, and, most importantly, the year I first heard Nature and Nurture.
My life up until that point had been a series of really terrible friendships and feeling out of place in more or less every aspect of my life. That was the year I really started to have a desire to see the bands I’d been listening to on my iPod live. That was the year I got into The Wonder Years, The Movielife, Transit, Fireworks, and this band from Knoxville called On My Honor.
I had just turned seventeen; I didn’t feel like I belonged to any community of peers…until I walked into my first local punk show.
It wasn’t On My Honor, but I saw them for the first time a few weeks later at a Little Heart Record’s anniversary show. A place I would end up interning at in a couple of years. Every single person I call my friend today was at that show—the people I call my family today were all at that show and I literally had no clue, it seems crazy now that I wasted as much time as I did not being their friends. The very first time I met Drew—if I remember this correctly, it may have been a show a year later—he asked me if I was coming to Thanksgiving at his house. That just floored me. I never got invited to things, especially not something like that. I instantly felt loved and wanted and accepted into the group… even today still makes me feel emotional.
2012 came and went, and it was one of the toughest years of my life. I didn’t feel very happy for a lot of it. I graduated high school and moved away from everything I knew for college. Which was fine, and I wanted to do it, but it took me a while to make friends. Toward the end of that year, I went with some friends to Knoxville for the first time. It was probably the best weekend I’d had in my life, up to that point; I finally had people I felt truly comfortable with, I had friends who I didn’t feel like were going to run away for no reason. I was happy.
That next year was, without a doubt, the very best time I’ve had in my entire life.
I went to the east coast for the first time, I watched someone fall through a roof, I started a circle pit…it was just a year of firsts and a year I will love forever, and I mainly owe that to On My Honor, as those dudes were there for all of those firsts.
With all the highs, there were a few lows. But for once, I had people to pick me up and brush me off when I fell. I truly do not have words to express how thankful I am to everyone who ever answered a text at one in the morning, or sat in a bedroom and listened to me talk about my life, or said something that made me feel a little less like garbage. Drew, Molly, Audrey, Serene, Elliott, the list goes on forever. There are not enough ways to say thank you that would truly express my gratitude for everything y’all have done for me.
I Never Deserve the Things I Need still hits home so hard every time I listen to it. And every time I hear those songs, I feel better. There are a few songs on that record that I relate to so much...more than I have with any other song. That album is so important to me. It was so important to my growth in the last year. It was so important to me learning to like myself.
Last month, On My Honor broke up. I’m still really not done processing that. I’ve shed a few tears over it. They were the one band that really, truly helped me through the worst times in my life. They saved me, frankly. They taught me to value friendships, yes, but more importantly, to value myself enough to not let toxic relationships drag me back down.
There will always be a hole in my heart where OMH once was; I don’t think that’s a wound that will ever heal. I also don’t think I’ll ever be eloquent enough with words to truly express what this band meant to me, I’ve been typing for an hour and I still don’t feel like I’ve expressed it properly. Just know that I truly have loved every single moment I had with you guys as a band. You all changed my life. (Well, you and Little Heart Records—which means just as much but which I definitely do not have words to express.)
I am a better person because On My Honor existed. I am a changed person because On My Honor existed. I am happier because On My Honor existed.
As truly heartbroken as I am that they’re done, there’s something that will never go away that OMH created; the friendships we forged singing those songs together. They are forever, because it’s more than just friendship, it always was; we’re a family. A huge, dysfunctional, messed up family, but a family nonetheless.
If you took the time to read this, you’re probably part of that family. So thanks for letting me be in the pictures for once in my life instead of being the one taking them. Thanks for making me laugh. I love you guts.
Team Shithead is forever. Team Shithead will never die.
Team Shithead gives unto you our holiday comp, A Very Shitty Christmas. 17 askew holiday tunes from Germany to the UK, from Arizona to Georgia, from Texas to Ohio.
http://sexandsexandsex.bandcamp.com/releases
I’m od’ing on pride from all the brilliant submissions from friends and strangers alike. We have some very serious lyrical content, silly performances, full band arrangements, soft and severely intimate tracks, male/female/cis/LBGT performers, and various takes on the holiday!
Best of all it’s free to download. If you dig it, please share with friends!
Your dude,
Charles H.
TS & LFT & DVE & ANDI & WIO
1st Gen. Shithead
I've finally answered an age old question for myself from Diatribe or Die days. I said, I live in a world that won't love me back and I don't know how to feel about that.
how should I feel? how do I feel? And what is love? What is the world?
There's no guidelines or normality in expectations of the world. We're best off with no expectations. The world owes us nothing. Its a hard pill to swallow but truer then most broad statements of truth that I can currently think of. People are dying everyday due to lack of clean water or small infections that could be cured easily or all the other blatantly manageable reasons. So to think that we deserve things in a world where this happens is strange and unhealthy. I deserve nothing more than the bit of humanity I can milk from my life of circumstantial relevance.
I think I was speaking more of my expectations of a music career. Not so much as a business model career wise but a thing that involves hard work, money, and art. When I say career, there's no real thought behind it that I could pay a bill with the music I create but what I do does involve work, money, and music. But yeah, you fill a song with your ideas, ideals, love, and emotions. Once that song goes out into the world, the response is the reciprocal. Something that I realize now that I'm older is that art has no reciprocal; aside from other art(whether it be man made or made by the cosmos). As an artist you create and that is the thing. It's done really before it leaves a studio. Most the things that come later are the business parts of being in a band. Even most of the fan interaction at shows or anytime the band is presenting itself to it's audience. It's all PR work or door greeting at Walmart. The younger me didn't see this cause I was being honest which is why we're a confusing band cause our presentation is ever evolving. We didn't know it was all a game and even after we found out we didn't participate much.
To finalize my analysis of this old lyric: I was young, involved, and idealistic once and expected to be rewarded for my involvement and idealistic nature. I now know you're idealistic cause it's something honest and true to your self. It is its own reward. Existing and creating is enough whether people show up or not. You've got to love yourself before you can give love or show love. You've got to love the records you make before anyone else and above all else. You've simply got to make the records you want to hear in spite of the world if that ends up being the case.
empower yourself.
love yourself.
free yourself from expectations of self.
