Pass the happy! 💛 When you get this, reply with 5 things that make you happy and send this to the last 10 people in your notifications.

aw cute!

my gf, who is visiting me right now and has soft hair and a good nose
talking to people i care about but especially @literalliterature and @biosweg who are my boon companions in both jokes and VERY bitchy gossip
my new short gay/androgynous haircut and its associated fringe benefits, such as being able to make it take on a shape using a product, or being able to wash it in the sink, or not needing to set aside four to eight hours of drying time
the fact that it only took me until day 2 of my developmental mechanisms class to get the “does anyone who hasn’t spoken yet want to answer the question” line from the professor
i have an envelope with several prints of my younger brother’s artwork ready to frame and put up on my wall. this is special both because it’s really good art and because he often gets very anxious about family members looking at/passing judgment on his work, so the fact that he offered the prints to me is a sign of a lot of trust from him

9, 20, 41?

answered 9 but i’ll cheat and also brag about this beautiful scarf. when i bought it i thought it was going to be a gift for someone else, but as soon as it arrived i realized that 1. they wouldn’t really appreciate it even though i was correct that it would look good on them and 2. i wanted it intensely. so now it’s mine:

20. Did you develop a new obsession?

i went All In on tatterpigs, which i think is the most obvious one– started my first game ever in january of this year and now have played many, run one, and am in multiple different rpg groups of various commitment and frequency. this is on the whole a good thing, i think, even if for some reason i can’t quite figure out why i’m doing it. certainly i’ve met a lot of really great people as a result of this, and i do like playing, and i like playing WITH those people, so that’s probably enough, i just can’t shake the feeling that somehow i’m only pretending to be a(/the kind of) person who plays ttrpgs. ok no, i know why this is, it is because the specific context in which i developed my initial intense devotion to the hobby has since [personal circumstance change redacted during this period of evaluation and quality assurance] and ever since i’ve been on the comedown of just “having fun” as opposed to “being creative-collaborative manic and filled with an extremely stupid version of love”

41. Did anything happen to you that you were sure wouldn’t change you as a person but it did?

er, therapy, actually, which despite consisting of really just me narrating things i already know about myself to my therapist while she frowns and refuses to diagnose me with things, has correlated neatly enough with a significant drop in suicidal ideation that i am at least cautiously willing to connect the two, especially since i don’t think my overall life circumstances changed enough to justify the drop compared to, let’s say, last january.

9, 10, 17, 49, 50

9. What was your favorite article of clothing this year? Post a pic if possible?

i am pretty sure i got my skeleton-hands los campesinos! shirt last october, so that can’t count. quite possibly this jacket, then (topman, grey bomber):

10. What song sums up this year for you?

oh, god. i’ve been trying to answer this question for like three straight days. it feels like it should be a tmg song– “song for an old friend”, but i think mostly my love went screaming through other people rather than the reverse. “pure love” only covers maybe a bitchy 1/3rd of it. “the sign” is a better candidate but should ultimately be disqualified for similar reasons and also because i absolutely did NOT get a new life, i have the same life and i am not even being different in it.

“genesis 30:3″ maybe: i will do what you ask me to do/because of how i feel about you. on the other hand there’s a baby in that and this year contained no babies whatsoever.

or here, fuck it, a tmg-less diptych from most listened-to songs of the year:

“trust”, generationals, so you think that you’re living with a curse + are you staring at a loaded gun, are you gonna give me what i’m asking for + what’s the use of trusting more than you have to

“get better”, mates of state, everything is gonna get lighter/even if it never gets better

17. Did you make any big permanent changes this year?

well, permanent is hard, i’m not convinced i do permanent anything. decided not to go to med school (for only a slightly debatable voluntariness level of “decided”). cut my hair, obviously, but again, “permanent”. i remade my blog about three years sooner than expected. i made certain emotional admissions and/or concessions that would be at least difficult to walk back? i developed a significant immersion in tabletop gaming, about which i might describe my feelings to be “mixed”? i “lived with” people and made plans to “live with” people even further. i am not sure why my scare quotes are being brought out so intensely by this question, but clearly they are.

49 & 50 are answered!

47-50

47. If you make resolutions, what will your resolutions be for the coming year?

i usually make a standalone resolutions post at the end of the year, and presumably will again, but here’s some, randomly, as i think of them:

i’m going to spend less time trying to extrapolate, from no information, ways in which i have been fundamentally wrong and in which i could become more correct
i will feel obligated to fewer people, such that do not i let people whom i do not even love screw with me simply out of a feeling that it would be unreasonable for me to object to such treatment. ideally i wouldn’t let people i love do that either but that’s maybe more of a 2019-level aspiration
i’ll figure out how to do the strength training/flexibility work that i want to do on my body in a way that’s actually sustainable and not harmful to me in other ways

48. If you could go on an adventure during the remaining days of the year, where would you go and what would you do? Who would you go this?

i assume the end of that is supposed to be “who would you take with you.” my first thought is some kind of multiple-day hiking trip with a distinct, goal-oriented beginning and end and minimal to no internet access, somewhere snowy with forest. thought the second is a train-based trip through some part of europe, again a lot of movement is essential, which isn’t usually so much what i look for in a vacation but which is apparently essential for an “adventure” in my mind. thought the third is my bizarre desire to do some kind of large-scale, multi-day collaborative art project/installation with a bunch of other people. for the first two things i would bring like four or five friends (roommate/[names redacted]/my gf). for the third…… roommate, [redacted], my two favorite people from this quarter’s poetry class, my favorite person from last year’s art class… basically as many people whose thoughts i love as possible, in this insane fantasy in which we all could work together on a thing in a thoughtful excited way.

49. What do you wish for others for the coming year?

well, for people i love specifically i want more kindness to themselves, and more ease and comfort in their ways of being, which are good ways. i wish them more love from everyone they’d like to love them, and less attention from anyone they wish would go away, and the opening of more opportunities

for a few people– mostly the people who have abused others, especially but not limited to people i love– i wish revelation, and loss, and genuine remorse that grows just as their victims’ pain is diminished, and whatever else their victims wish on them specifically which i am not personally equipped to wish.

50. What do you wish for yourself?

more kindness, more activity, more art. less impulsivity per se, but more willingness to act on desires, and to have desires. less eternal acquiescence, and even willingness, to be hurt. a better memory, both in the sense that would improve my studying ability and in the sense that would allow me to maintain a coherent overall picture of my relationship with someone else over time.

uh, mildly more concretely– a finished-enough research project, classes i love as much as i anticipate loving them, the deepening or extension or stabilization of a couple of relationships, the final merciful release from a few sources of psychological torment.

End of Year Meme

tina-warriorprincess:

First things first, did you have a good year?

How old did you turn this year?

Do you feel your age?

Did your appearance change in anyway?

Post your favorite selfie.

If you traveled, where did you go?

Which fashion trends did you love?

Which fashion trends did you hate?

What was your favorite article of clothing this year? Post a pic if possible?

What song sums up this year for you?

What album came out and has been on heavy rotation since then?

What was your favorite movie of the year?

Did an actor/actress catch your attention for the first time this year?

Favorite new TV show?

Which new ship/fandom has taken over a lot of your time, attention, and tears?

What food did you try for the first time?

Did you make any big permanent changes this year?

What was one nice thing you did for someone else?

What was one nice thing you did for yourself?

Did you develop a new obsession?

Did you vote?

Did you move?

Did you get a job?

Did you get a pet?

Do you regret not doing anything?

Do you regret doing something?

Have you done anything that scared you?

Did anyone/thing make you so mad it stayed with you for days?

Did you lose anyone close to you?

Did you fall in love?

Did you fall out of love?

Did you start a new relationship?

Did you go through a break up?

Did you have to cut ties to someone?

Who was important to you this year but wasn’t important last year?

Who wasn’t as important to you this year as they were last year?

If you could have a do over on one thing you did, would you take it?

What was the best moment of the year for you?

What was the worst?

Did anything happen that you were sure would change you as a person but it really didn’t?

Did anything happen to you that you were sure wouldn’t change you as a person but it did?

What are you most proud of accomplishing?

What have you learned about yourself this year that you didn’t know in the years prior?

Did your opinion of anyone change for the better?

Did your opinion of anyone change for worse?

If you make resolutions, did you complete them this year?

If you make resolutions, what will your resolutions be for the coming year?

If you could go on an adventure during the remaining days of the year, where would you go and what would you do? Who would you go this?

What do you wish for others for the coming year?

What do you wish for yourself?

66

you have excellent taste in lotr/silmarillion content and reblog some really great animal photos as well. we also have very clearly similar experiences/attitudes about judaism & jewishness in ways that make me feel less alone in it and also are a real delight to discuss with you. your passion about your research/field(/really i guess our shared field if you zoom way out) is deeply admirable, and it’s obvious in everything you do that you approach the work with compassion and enthusiasm as well as clear talent.

i think you have beautiful hair. i love the palette of blues/teals/greens that you often seem to center outfits around, and how you wear things that seem very comfortable and practical but still clearly point to, dare i say, “elven” aesthetic sensibilities.

1514210

i admire you & your blogging tremendously! you are a very thoughtful, incisive person who discusses serious topics in a thoughtful and responsible way. i admire the ways in which you discuss your own experiences on your blog and i very much admire your commitment to sourcing and citing claims, especially given that tumblr is, ime, a context in which citation can range from difficult to actively discouraged.

i deeply appreciate the ways you talk about butchness and gender, both in how you’ve offered me specifically support and advice with my efforts at androgynous/masculine lesbian presentation, and also just generally in how you document your butch presentation and experiences–– you put together some really fantastic outfits! i really like your taste in jewelry.

your bugblogging is also fun and interesting; for all that i’m ostensibly a biologist i know very little about insects or arachnids and i occasionally fall down an entertaining research hole because of one of your posts about a particularly exciting centipede.

7

yes, still answering these! i loved meeting you that time, i hope we can do it again at some point because it was tbh too brief and you are, as one would expect, both charming and cute in person. you have a way of presenting your experiences that is both very honest and, often, deeply funny– i especially really like the parts of your comics that you’ve posted, you have a talent for conveying a lot of emotion in a single image.

you have really gorgeous hair, and you take fantastic selfies, and i am so glad that we’ve stayed mutuals for such a long time!

1111

oh, i love your blog! you are one of my favorite people on tumblr for art/fashion reblogs– you have a distinct curatorial eye and a good sense for the beautiful-but-interesting in an image. you talk in a very relatable (or likely to-be-relatable) way about your experiences with academia, which i appreciate! you also take excellent selfies.

i also really love tumblr as a way of seeing people be passionate about interests i know nothing about– i’m in no way a historian and know less than nothing about gymnastics, but it’s really fascinating to get snippets of your thoughts on history (in your field and your not-field) & really fine-grained gymnast opinions.

28,980

listen, i’ll be honest here, i sort of thought this meme was going to involve making short pleasant posts about each other/’s blogs, so i don’t exactly have a speech prepared.

oh, for the love of god. i still think you’re a funny and charming and generally deeply appealing person; i have no understanding of the events of the last eight months, on any front, with anyone, and unless someone decides to tell me about it in small direct words then i definitely never will– that doesn’t mean that you should feel that you need to, i just want to be clear that i don’t know what’s going on, and therefore am using wild guessing to guide my behavior, and am sorry if that causes problems somehow. this is probably a terrible medium for any of these conversations to be happening in but like i guess we’re here now!

uh, i’m entertained by your bird jokes, you’re an extremely fun d&d player, you also have great fashion sense, i’m jealous of your talent for biology research but like in a positive way where really i just think your work is cool, i’m glad you like my hair, your blog is good, it’s a nice blog. i don’t know, i don’t have any deep counter-analyses of your character here, i mostly just think of you as an overall lovely person who i spent a while being overly extroverted at, and i’m sorry if that was at some point too weird.