I Think That The Love We Lost Always Come Back To Us Eventually.

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ﾟ。　 march prompts

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¹⁾ a two-person tent

²⁾ a pearl brooch

³⁾ hands stained with blackberries

⁴⁾ peach soju 

⁵⁾ an ex boyfriend 

⁶⁾ northeast 

⁷⁾ green eyeliner 

⁸⁾ power lines 

⁹⁾ a fire exit 

¹⁰⁾ jazz at midnight 

¹¹⁾ three broken fingers 

¹²⁾ little dipper 

¹³⁾ bottom lip 

¹⁴⁾ freshly turned earth 

¹⁵⁾ a blue leather sofa 

¹⁶⁾ salty tears

¹⁷⁾ wishbone 

¹⁸⁾ a wild daisy in a buttonhole 

¹⁹⁾ crystalised honey 

²⁰⁾ a two-way mirror

²¹⁾ a faded library card 

²²⁾ animal tracks 

²³⁾ the sting of antiseptic 

²⁴⁾ a biker’s leather kutte 

²⁵⁾ old romance novels

²⁶⁾ smeared lipgloss 

²⁷⁾ father’s day

²⁸⁾ gravel stuck to skin

²⁹⁾ vivid oil paints 

³⁰⁾ motel vending machines 

³¹⁾ wingmen

Here’s my two frames from the recently released @unicornframes project

Go give it a watch if you can (linked on their acc), it turned out pretty fantastic!

and if you don’t love me now, you will never love me again

ignoring how emotionally devastating the episode was I love how once joel accepted he was a Dad again he went from reluctant father figure to full blown dad mode. did not hold back. found ellie’s favorite food and a board game for them to play. took her to the zoo (the giraffe feeding scene). asked her if she was ok in the most gentle way possible. told her stories about sarah. compared her to sarah bc they’re both his daughters. told ellie how proud he was of her / how much he cared for her. opened up. said “we’re going home”. murdered dozens of people for her. brought her on a hike. you know. normal dad stuff 

The opposite of a mansion murder mystery where everyone present is a bounty hunter who really wants to take credit for the murder and the detective has to find out who really did it

Depicting Real World Religions Alongside Constructed Religions

Maya asked:

Hi WWC! Thank you so much for this blog, it's an infinitely wonderful resource! Do you have any suggestions for how I can balance representation of real religions with fantasy religions, or should I avoid including these together? Does the fact that certain things bleed over from our world into the fantasy world help legitimize the appearance of real world religions? I feel like I can come up with respectful ways to integrate representation in ways that make sense for the worldbuilding. For instance, no Muslim characters would practice magic, and both Jewish and Muslim characters would conceive of magic in ways that fit their religion (rather than trying to adapt real religions to fit my worldbuilding). I also have some ideas for how these religions came about that fit between handwave and analogous history (though I realize the Qur'an is unchangeable, so I'm guessing Islam would have come about in the same way as IRL). BTW—I'm referring to humans, not other species coded as Muslim or Jewish. I may explore the concept of jinns more (particularly as how Muslims perceive fantastical beings), but I definitely need to do a lot more research before I go down that road! Finally, I saw a post somewhere (*but* it might have been someone else's commentary) suggesting to integrate certain aspects of Judaism (e.g., skullcaps in sacred places/while praying, counting days from sundown instead of sunset) into fantasy religions (monotheistic ones, of course) to normalize these customs, but as a non-Jewish person I feel this could easily  veer into appropriation-territory.  *One of the posts that I'm referring to in case you need a better reference of *my* reference: defining coding and islam-coded-fantasy

[This long ask was redacted to pull out the core questions asked]

"Both Jewish and Muslim characters would conceive of magic in ways that fit their religion (rather than trying to adapt real religions to fit my worldbuilding)."

Just a note that while having religion be part of magic is a legitimate way to write fantasy, I want to remind people that religious characters can also perform secular magic. Sometimes I feel like people forget about that particular worldbuilding option. (I feel this one personally because in my own books I chose to make magic secular so that my nonmagical heroine wouldn’t seem less close to God somehow than her wizard adoptive dad, who is an objectively shadier person.) I’m not saying either way is more or less correct or appropriate, just that they’re both options and I think sometimes people forget about the one I chose. But anyway moving on—

Your decision to make the water spirits not actual deities is a respectful decision given the various IRL monotheistic religions in your story, so, thank you for that choice. I can see why it gets messy though, since some people in-universe treat those powers as divine. I guess as long as your fantasy Jews aren’t being depicted as backwards and wrong and ignoring in-universe reality in favor of in-universe incorrect beliefs, then you’re fine…

"I saw a post somewhere (but it might have been someone else's commentary) suggesting to integrate certain aspects of Judaism (e.g., skullcaps in sacred places/while praying, counting days from sundown instead of sunset) into fantasy religions (monotheistic ones, of course) to normalize these customs, but as a non-Jewish person I feel this could easily veer into appropriation-territory."

That was probably us, as Meir and I both feel that way. What would make it appropriative is if these very Jewish IRL markers were used to represent something other than Judaism. It's not appropriative to show Jewish or Jewish-coded characters wearing yarmulkes or marking one day a week for a special evening with two candles or anything else we do if it's connected to Jewishness! To disconnect the markers of us from us is where appropriation starts to seep in.

–Shira

To bounce off what Shira said above, the source of the magic can be religious or secular--or put another way, it can be explicitly granted be a deity or through engagement with a specific religious practice, or it can be something that can be accessed with or without engaging with a certain set of beliefs or practices. It sounds like you’re proposing the second one: the magic is there for anyone to use, but the people in this specific religion engage with it through a framework of specific ideas and practices.

If you can transform into a “spirit” by engaging with this religion, and I can transform into a “spirit” through an analogous practice through the framework of Kabbalah, for example, and an atheist can transform through a course of secular technical study, then what makes yours a religion is the belief on your part that engaging in the process in your specific way, or choosing to engage in that process over other lifestyle choices, is in some way a spiritual good, not the mechanics of the transformation. If, on the other hand, humans can only access this transformative magic through the grace of the deities that religion worships, while practitioners of other religions lack the relationship with the only gods empowered to make that magic, that’s when I’d say you had crossed into doing more harm than good by seeking to include real-world religions.

Including a link below to a post you might have already seen that included the “religion in fantasy worldbuilding alignment chart.” It sounds like you’re in the center square, which is a fine place to be. The center top and bottom squares are where I typically have warned to leave real-world religions out of it.

More reading:

Jewish characters in a universe with author-created fictional pantheons

–Meir

even more job ideas for your western/cowboy oc that are not outlaws, bounty hunters, or sheriffs

wanted poster sketch artist - try your darnedest, some of the descriptions folks will give you will be really... something

owner of a small inn/old trading post in the middle of nowhere - days are slow, but ever so often you get travelers stopping by to rest or replenish their things

stablehand for a traveling wild west show like "Buffalo Bill's" - working with performers is tough (they always think they're the main character ugh), you prefer the company of animals and enjoy watching shows from behind-the-scenes

a small town's local barber... and dentist... and surgeon...

saloon piano player - inebriated patrons amuse and annoy you

snake oil salesperson - do you brew your own magic juice or are you just a pawn in a larger business?

sunday school "teacher" - you were not quite educated yourself, but you were the only able-bodied adult in town without kids or family, so you got assigned daycare duty

😈 Collar 🪽

He's mostly being silly about it. But he wouldn't deny that a collar in his angel's colours is making him feel pretty spicy ❤️‍🔥

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