Katherine Frances's Blog, page 374
April 18, 2015
Aftermath
People like writing about war, but they rarely like writing
about the aftermath. And I think that’s a shame, because sometimes writing
about the aftermath can be at least as interesting. There’s a lot you can do
with what happens after the fighting is done, when people need to rebuild, when
they need to find who they are and where they fit in a world that is different
than it was when they began.Write about interpersonal
relationships, and how they changed.Write about how
people view themselves and the actions they needed to take.Write about rebuilding—physically,
socially, mentally, emotionally.Write about the choices
people made because they thought they were never going to need to face the
consequences.Write about the emotional
toll that war takes, that constant violence takes, that never being able to
relax takes.Write about the physical
toll that war takes, about the people who come back missing limbs or
neurons.Write about the people
who lost everyone they knew and still have to live with themselves.Write about the people
who lost everything, their homes, their land, the cities, about them
finding new places to call home, or not.Write about the people who are tasked with creating a new world, and the decisions
they have to make.Write about the people
who only knew war, who were born after the war started and grew up with
only that, who now need to figure out who they are in a world that has no place
for them anymore.Write about the people
who were heroes, who know how to be heroes but don’t know how to be people.Write about the people
who weren’t heroes, who were hated, who were disgraced.Write about the people
who didn’t fight in the war because they couldn’t, because they weren’t
physically capable or because society said they weren’t suitable.Write about the people
who fought on the losing side, who sacrificed everything and still lost and
now need to rebuild with nothing, who are painted as monsters when they need no
worse than the side that won.Write about the trials,
for people who committed war crimes, for people who took advantage of what was
going on to do what they wanted.Write about the weapons
that are finding their way into the hands of children, cheap and easy to use,
because they were left behind when the soldiers packed up and left.Write about the landmines,
the unexploded ordinances, the things that governments forgot were there or
just didn’t care.Write about ten years
later, or twenty, or thirty, or one, or six months, or the next day, about
what people do when the adrenaline of victory or defeat subsides and they’re
left with a world that they no longer understand, that they no longer know,
because they spent so long trying to destroy the old world that they forgot
that they would have to live in the new one.Write about the next
generation, who grew up with parents who flinched at loud noises and cousins
who could remember air raid sirens, who grew up doing drills they didn’t
understand because the people who made the drills couldn’t forget that one day
they might have been necessary.Write about the women
who stayed behind because they had no choice, about the women who stayed
behind because they wanted to, about the women who couldn’t stay behind because
there was no behind, because everywhere was a warzone and they were soldiers
because everyone was a soldier.Write about the children
who trained for a war that ended before they were old enough to take up
arms, where all they know is violence, not peace, how to destroy a city but not
how to build one or how to run one.Write about career
soldiers who no longer have a career because the war is over, there’s
peace, and so they find work for the highest bidder, for the person most
willing to give them a knife or a gun and throw them wherever a little muscle
and a lot of violence is needed.Write about the people
who did research on things nobody should ever research, who discovered
things they could never speak about, who rationalized what they did as science
while knowing it wasn’t.Write about everyday
people coping with everything that happened, with things they saw and
things they did and things they knew that they wouldn’t wish on their worst
enemy.
"You are hurting, but the fight doesn’t end in finding your strength in this world, it ends when you..."
- Jenn Satsune (via thelovelyloner)
"She takes her skin off every night. She lays it in front of her and breaks her own bones. Would..."
- Yara (via wnq-writers)
Dream Journal Entry #6 - 3/8/2015
Pod Jumper
I was sitting in
the airplane, elbow to elbow with...
Dream Journal Entry #6 - 3/8/2015
Pod Jumper
I was sitting in
the airplane, elbow to elbow with the others. It was noisy and rattling, like
the metal tin tube we traveled in was held together by nothing but a few rusty
bolts and luck. The seats, which were made of a nylon army green fabric, lined
the round walls of the plane, forcing me and everyone else to stare across at
the travelers on the other side. I shifted in my seat and glanced over at Tom,
with his dark hair hanging over his eyes that were cast down stoically. He didn’t
notice me, so I shift my attention down the line at the other boys, all seated
one after the other beside me. I wanted to make light of things, ease the
weight on my chest, but I didn’t say anything. I don’t really know if they’re
the chatty type or if they’d rather it stay silent, so I just kept my thoughts
to myself.
Before long it was
time to board the exit pod. I stood and did the best I could to keep my footing
as I made my way slowly down the wide, rubber floored isle, following Tom and
the other boys. They made their way to the hatch door, now open with a
uniformed flight attendant standing beside it, hand firmly clasped around a metal
bar beside the doorway. As I drew near the sounds of air whooshing by the plane
grows impossible to hear over, and the light pouring in from the clouds and
into the dimly lit metal plane through the hatch is blinding.
Finally I stood
before the hatch, air wiping around the small spaces between the hatch doorway
and the pod entrance. The pod reminded me of a Ferris wheel ride I’d once gone
on back home. It was completely round with a band around its upper center made
of glass, creating a 360 degree window. Everything inside save for the windows
was teal. There weren’t any individual seats, but the floor and the siding up
to the window level was cushioned, and contoured to a human shape, so that a
person could put their feet in the very center of the round pod and lie on
their back or side, and be in a sloped angled upright position. The 4 other
boys where already doing this, and now it was my turn.
I climbed into the
pod and lie down beside Tom. There was plenty of room in the pod so that we all
had space to lay comfortably. Now that I was here, securely lying in the pod,
my anxious nerves were starting to diminish. The loud sounds of the wind were
becoming less of a howl and more of a hum, and if I turned to lay on my side I
could look out the window and see the vast ocean bellow us, shimmering in the
midday sun. Then there was a light jolt
as our pod began to move, detaching from the plane. It wouldn’t be long now
until we had reached out destination. The trip was short from here. But through
the wind I could hear a scuffle from the plan, the sound of hurrying feet and
an uttered cry.
“No, don’t forget
about me,” wailed a boy who I didn’t recognize. As he said it he emerged into
the light of the outside from within the plane. I watched, wide eyed as he
hesitated for only a moment at the lip of the opening, and jumped. I thought I
should have screamed, should have yelled at him to stop, but I was so in awe
and shock I couldn’t think to say a thing. The boy hurtled through the growing
distance between the plane and the pod. I watched him as he flew, and I
silently hoped he would make it. Dear god
let him make it.
"if something is there, you can only see it with your eyes open, but if it isn’t there, you can see..."
-
Norton Juster
(via observando)
Attention anyone who needs hairstyle references
I want to introduce all of you to this amazing place called the ukhairdressers style gallery.
It’s basically a massive database full of high-quality images of different hairstyles. I mean, look at all the options in that sidebar (and part of it’s cut off):
In total they have 976 pages of hairstyles with about 17 styles each, that’s about 16592 hairstyles to look at.
Look at all the stuff they’ve got! Long hair:
So if you need help with designing a character or you just want to practice drawing hair, this is a fantastic resource.
"Real life is only ever just real life. Messy. What it means depends on how you look at it. The only..."
-
Patrick Ness
(via observando)
"You hold me like waves, and I, the ship. I try to hold you,
but like water, you slip away from my..."
but like water, you slip away from my fingers”
- bluebloq (via wnq-writers)
