THEY WERE JUST MEANT TO BE

Petra voli banane ja volim petru

the signs as aesthetics

aries - dirty high tops, varsity jackets, sunrises, graffiti, pins and patches, lightning, live concerts, wide grins, lollipops, skinny jeans, matches, the moment before the drop on a roller coaster

taurus - flower crowns, oversized sweaters, mom jeans, mugs, leather, log fires, sunlight peeking through the window, leaves, succulents, journals, sleeping in on the weekends, messy buns

gemini - bright eyes, bicycles, overalls, new friends, art museums, iced coffee, infectious laughter, pastel colors, bubblegum, new books, speakers, yellow highlighter, singing in the shower

cancer - the beach, hair blowing in the wind, bath bombs, conch shells, balloons, the moon, soft serve, the sound of raindrops against the window, knee high socks, running barefoot, inspirational quotes

leo - gold stars, sparklers, mascara, romantic poetry, mirrors, sunflowers, running through a meadow, glitter, fairy lights, hot baths, monarch butterflies, sunny days, bright eyeshadow

virgo - french braids, calligraphy, bookstores, collared shirts, to-do lists, teacups, watercolors, mason jars, dainty hands, cuffed pants, fresh linens, classic literature, potted plants, bullet journals, clear aviators

libra - cotton candy clouds, bubble baths, cherry blossoms, lace, lip gloss, ferris wheels, gentle eyes, holding hands, pink lemonade, candy hearts, novels, birds chirping, strawberries, vintage cars

scorpio - sunsets, midnight conversations, driving on an empty highway, listening to the radio, rainy days, crescent moon, tv static, all-nighters, white sheets, the ocean

sagittarius - road trips, beanies, doodling, maps, getting lost, stargazing, forests, fireflies, polaroids, cameras, paint-stained jeans, light bulbs, messy ponytails, traveling the world

capricorn - architecture, silhouettes, sheet music, mountains, old books, coffee shops, high ceilings, history museums, skylines, nude lipstick, spiral staircases, neat handwriting, cobblestone

aquarius - combat boots, neon signs, geodes, starry skies, pool water, song lyrics, bulky headphones, space, telescopes, multi-colored fairy lights, smoke, activism, 24-hour gas stations, dyed hair

pisces - daydreaming, umbrellas, finger paint, sketchbooks, getting lost in your thoughts, ice cream trucks, earphones, leggings, sweatshirts, paint chips, swing sets, daisies, milkshakes, bubbles, scented candles

some thoughts on ONE and his themes

i’ve been sitting on this for a little bit bc it’s a more personal thing and super tough to articulate besides, but here goes.

Most shounen mangaka center their stories around superpowered teenagers and children, which is just fine! I like wish fulfillment just as much as the next person. But I have to give a shoutout to ONE for doing what I haven’t yet seen another mangaka do, and capturing the particular mid-to-late-20′s sort of mini crisis a lot of people get after college, where they’ve been working justt long enough that they’re starting to stare down the barrel of “is this what i’m going to do forever and ever until i die oh god” and “I have a job and checked off all my ‘accomplishment’ boxes but now am floundering without the structure of childhood and academia”. As someone who went through a complete 180 career change in my early 20s, it means so much to me to see a young-20s character like Reigen, or Saitama, be disillusioned with their careers and switch tracks, or be depressed and unable to find fulfillment in their “same-old” routines, and have that be an important, central point of the story. I relate painfully to Reigen sitting at his desk and thinking about how he was bored and unfulfilled at his old job, and i feel like I can really appreciate the fact that he left it and made a change for himself. I relate to Saitama, if not to his godlike powers then to his feeling of “is there all there is to life? what is there to live for besides just my accomplishments?” It sounds dramatic, but it’s easy as a young adult, especially a financially struggling young adult, to ‘work to live’, and neglect everything else to the point where when you finally stop to take a look around you, you realize you’re not sure what you’re actually living for. What did you dream of doing as a child? What do you want, on your deathbed, your life story to be? your memories to be? 

What does fulfillment even mean? 

With Saitama, ONE answers this question first by pointing out that challenges and obstacles give life meaning. When we watch OPM, we’re not rooting necessarily for Saitama. We root for Mumen Rider, or Genos, or any of the myriad other heroes that we know don’t stand a chance. Saitama’s punch might give catharsis, but the pathos is all in the side characters. And Saitama knows this! the manga is all about Saitama struggling to find meaning in a world without those obstacles. And this leads to ONE’s second answer, through King: life is not just about maxing out your level- it’s also about exploring the game. it’s about collecting every outfit, or talking to every NPC, or befriending all the companions, or completing every side quest. ONE shows us that once you look up from your single minded drive to climb the ladder, there’s a ton more to see! friends to make! hot pot to cook! cool new stuff to investigate and explore with those friends! And this is so comforting to me, as a young adult, to have a piece of media show me that not only is struggling okay and good, but that it doesn’t and shouldn’t consume everything and that there’s more to explore.

With Mob Psycho- god, where to start with Mob Psycho. First of all, I was expecting a typical ‘everyone’s 12-14 years old and OP as fuck’ shounen. I was not expecting one of the central characters to be Reigen “I’m almost 30 and I’ve switched careers and am not succeeding in the traditional sense” Arataka, or that another central character would be Serizawa “I AM 30 and I  d e f i n i t e l y  switched careers and have doubly not been successful in the traditional sense” Katsuya. Both these characters struggle with the same question in different ways. Serizawa has a more straightforward narrative: he shows us that it’s never too late to turn your life around. At 30, socially anxious and with nothing on his resume besides “dropped out of middle school to become a terrorist”, Serizawa gets a haircut, gets his act together, goes back to get his degree, and by the end of the manga is not only well on his way to academic success but is really becoming his own person, with a supportive friend group, self confidence, and his own hobbies and interests. Reigen struggles to find meaning in his life beyond just being a boring salaryman - to “become someone” - and eventually through lifting his head up from the daily hustle and opening himself to others, realizes that he HAS become someone, though perhaps in a different way than he expected: he has become a very important person to all of the esper kids and to Serizawa, and through influencing them he becomes the backbone of the manga itself. Reigen shows us that personal growth can be nontraditional, and responsibility can be scary, but both lead to fulfillment. 

I never truly thought about these kinds of things when I was younger, because I wasn’t living them. and the beauty of it is that both OPM and MP100 can be read by an audience without them; they can be enjoyed just for their comedy and their crazy nuts action scenes. But ONE put in characters struggling with these young-but-not-SUPER-young-adult issues, and it makes me, at least, feel seen. It makes me feel like I’m not alone in worrying about these things, in fearing the mundanity of routine, in struggling to find meaning in life while I’ve got the strength to grasp it. And it makes me feel like becoming an adult doesn’t have to be such a bad thing, after all. 

i completely understand what you’re saying but as a person with a low self-esteem issue and imposter syndrome, as someone who always feels she’s lacking, i cannot express to you how incredibly satisfying it is to watch or read a well-written “chosen one” trope , specially if it’s a female protagonist 

there are so many movies and books which use the chosen one trope and i can’t get enough of it.

Moana? Hit me with that puro. Princess diaries? Slap me one of those. Harry freaking Potter? not a female protag but damn what a series. Equal Rites by Terry Pratchett? Yes please! Kung Fu Panda? uh? HELL YEAH

Like, as a writer, I get why writers think it may not be the best way to tell a story, but as an audience member and a reader, I straight up love that shit. I love seeing someone who is seemingly extremely bad for the job be the only one who can actually do the job, I LOVE to see them struggle with their self-doubt, fumble through all the things they have to go through despite being massively underprepared, question their abilities and be all like “But you’ve got the wrong person” and all the while their destiny is telling them “You stuck up bitch, you ARE THE ONE.” 

It is simply gratifying to feel that no matter how unequipped and incapable i think i am, there’s something bigger than the material world, who thinks i am fucking meant to get this job done

- Why must you hurt me like this, Illumi?…♠

Some of you are saying that the citizens of Hasetsu probably think Viktor is just Yuuri’s eccentric foreign boyfriend and I cannot say how much I agree.

“What a nice young man,” says Tamura-san, who used to run the fish shop in town and now usually sits beside the register and chats with customers while her grandson rings them up. She was born before ice skating was declared an Olympic sport and has absolutely no idea who Viktor Nikiforov is. 

“Yes, we’re very glad to have Vicchan staying with us!” Hiroko says of Viktor, who’s standing behind her cradling fifteen pounds of tuna and smiling brightly at Tamura-san. 

“How good of you to follow Yuu-chan home after he graduated!” Tamura-san continues, about ten decibels louder than she needs to. Tamura-san is about 87% deaf in her old age, but nobody has the heart to tell her so. “You must love him very much!”

Viktor, who has no idea what she’s just said to him but who heard Yuuri’s name, just blindly says, “Oh yes!” and grins even brighter. 

“Have you seen Viktor Nikiforov?” demands a rabid paparazzo of some poor fisherman just trying to do his job.

“Who?” asks the fisherman, frowning at the lens of the camera. 

“He’s tall? Foreign? Silver hair?”

“You mean Katsuki-kun’s boyfriend?” says the fisherman. Katsuki-kun’s boyfriend had run by ten minutes before with his poodle in tow, European synth pop blasting so loud from his headphones that it could be heard for a full minute both before and after he ran past. The fisherman doesn’t exactly know where Katsuki-kun found that guy, but he looks at Katsuki-kun like he hung the stars, so the fisherman can’t blame him.

In the end, he tells the paparazzo to go the opposite direction of the one he just saw Katsuki-kun’s boyfriend go.

A girl from Hasetsu graduates high school the summer Yuuri returns from America and is inspired by his experiences to go to college in America as well. She arrives in her freshman year dorm room and is greeted by a poster of Viktor Nikiforov hung up by her roommate.

“Why do you have a picture of Viktor?” she asks, bewildered. Viktor is wearing a pair of black slacks and a bright pink shirt unbuttoned almost to his navel.

“Oh, you know who Viktor Nikiforov is?” her roommate asks, excitedly.

“Do YOU?” the girl asks, incredulous. Viktor is known to her as “That foreign guy that followed Yuuri back from America when he came home” and also as Viktor-Who-Puts-Jam-In-His-Tea-Like-Who-Even-Does-That. Certainly not as Viktor Nikiforov, Five-Time World Figure Skating Champion and definitely not as Viktor-Who-Deserves-To-Be-On-Someone’s-Wall.

Come October, Viktor has started introducing HIMSELF to people as Viktor I’m Yuuri’s Boyfriend. While half of Russia reads articles about Figure Skating’s Living Legend, a sleepy town in Japan wakes up every morning to Yuuri’s Boyfriend Viktor wheeling through town on his bike with Yuuri and Their Cute Dog.

Viktor loves Hasetsu.

hallmark movie

woman: i have a high paying job in new york city that i love and christmas isn’t that important to me

her black friend: you need a MAN

woman’s dad: come to the small town,, we are suffering without a baker for our town festivale

woman: ok dad

man: i harvest maple syrup for a living and make 2 dollars a year

woman: :/

man: will you harvest maple syrup with me…

woman: i’ve decided i hate my job and i’m going to resign myself to making christmas tree ornaments in fuckberg for the rest of my life

Every Period Drama Ever!

Cleopatra

I saw this meme today: 

It’s of course a play on another meme (which is literally the meaning of “meme”): 

I found that meme on Instagram and broke the cardinal rule of social media: never read the comments section. I was rather surprised at how many people not only bought into this, but didn’t know that Cleopatra was:

-Macedonian (not Egyptian, not Greek, not Roman, not Persian) -not beautiful

I wanted to make a post about this to explain these misconceptions and where they (likely) came from.

Cleopatra VII the Macedonian

Cleopatra VII was part of the Ptolemaic Kingdom in Egypt, and the Ptolemys were Macedonian. They had taken power in Egypt after the death of the famous Macedonian, Alexander the Great (who likely died from alcoholism and/or malaria at age 34, just a fun fact). Many people mistook Alexander the Great for a Greek, but there’s a reason for that: Alexander the Great was a Greek fanboy. He started something called a “Hellenistic Period”…you know “period” is “length of time” and “Hellenistic” means “Greek-like” or “inspired by Greece”. It would be like if famous otaku Baron Trump married one of Japan’s princesses, then went into Mongolia to take over and implemented a bunch of Japanese culture…then, a couple thousand years later, some people might think that Baron Trump was actually Japanese because why on Earth would he implement Japanese rule? It’s not really common to assume that a leader is a mega fanboy, but that’s what happened here. I cannot confirm whether he had a Greek goddess body pillow, but can confirm I made this sweet meme in Paint for my PPT: 

The Ptolemy rule came to an end shortly after Cleopatra VII’s rule ended, and it was Rome that had ended said rule. This might be why Cleopatra VII was thought to be Roman by some people in the comments section. 

Cleopatra VII was Not Classically Beautiful

We may not know exactly how Cleopatra VII looked, but we can say she wasn’t a beauty queen (and there’s nothing wrong with that unless you’re in a job being judged on how well you fit in with that standard). How can we be sure? Here is how she’s depicted on her coins and in stone reliefs from the time:

Some sculptures have been made based on these:

I wouldn’t go as far as to say she looked like someone we would consider “ugly”, but she’s definitely not someone I’d be captivated by based on her looks alone. If that’s the case, then how did “She was so beautiful!” start as a rumor? It had to do with the fact that she was able to impress two other leaders. Some of the people in the comments section mentioned her “several affairs”, but we do know that she was involved with two other leaders: Julius Caesar and Mark Antony. The tales of her seduction, as told at the time they happened, involve her wit. Accounts of Cleopatra VII describe her well-educated (including that she spoke seven languages) and very charismatic. Combine this with her being the leader of a kingdom, and she suddenly becomes a very attractive prospect for sex, both in terms of sexual interest and reproductive interest. It appeared to be a mutual attraction for her, as she sought to expand her own power and interact with men who were intellectually, militarily, and politically on her level. In other words, she did was literally every other royal has done in history: had sexual encounters with other royalty for the purposes of strengthening political power. 

So if everyone who knew her knew she wasn’t gorgeous, then why did this myth start? 

After the death of Cleopatra VII and Mark Antony, a rumor had been started by this guy with a long birth name we eventually came to call Caesar Augustus. He and Antony, along with another Mark, were part of this three-part ruling structure called a Triumvirate. The other Mark (Marcus Lepidus),  was exiled, leaving just Antony and Augustus to lead the Roman Empire. Augustus’ great-uncle was Julius Caesar, and his co-regent was Antony, and both of these dudes had been with Cleopatra VII, producing children that could potentially try to claim/take power from him…especially relevant since both of these dudes were dead. He basically had launched a smear campaign against her after her death that talked about her as if she’s a gorgeous, deadly, conspiring woman who seduces powerful men with both her charm and her beauty. 

Writers of the time jumped in on this, and some called her a lot of really crappy things. One Roman historian referred to her as “a woman of surpassing beauty…with the power to subjugate everyone.” 

Kind of reminds me of Rasputin, who was creepy and smelled weird but utterly captivated women. Women explained that it was his intense gaze and what he had to say that kept them interested, but upon his death what did the murderers do? Pulled down his pants, cut off his dick, and preserved it, studied why it could be so appealing to women (they claim the girth and wart near the head are a factor). It’s like “He’s interesting” wasn’t good enough…must be dick power! In the same way, “She’s utterly fascinating, charming, and educated” wasn’t good enough…must be a sexy pout and perfect tits!

As I tell my students: history isn’t just some old collection of names and dates, it’s human drama that still happens today.