Nicole Field's Blog, page 33
December 15, 2015
Oh my goodness, is it that time of the month already?!I don’t...
Oh my goodness, is it that time of the month already?!
I don’t know whether it’s due to the Christmas season, or whether this is the standard that @the-yachronicles are setting going into next year, but WOW. What a box! Last month’s box was honestly a little lack-lustre for me, but this box was just packed with things I could use, and then the gifts just kept on coming.
I think one of the wonderful things about this box is that it introduced me to so many wonderful Australian Etsy shops that I didn’t know about. My box included the Mary Poppins and Pinocchio watercolour prints from Digital Aquamarine on simply gorgeous card stock. I only wish we’d been given the downloads somehow as well cause I want to pin these all over my house!
I now have a silver coloured multi-fandom necklace including the Mockingjay which I haven’t taken off since it arrived, and the fairy lights are just perfect for a space that I’d been considering needed just a little bit more light already.
I’d been looking at the Look Human website and wondering what we’d be getting from there every since this December sneak peak was posted during the week, but little did I know that that seem to have put together a sticker sheet just for us! At least, it’s not one I found on the website, although there too were a whole bunch of present ideas for the coming year!
As far as I was concerned, I had got my $30 worth at this point even without the book! Not only did we get a book, however, but we got a signed card and two amazing Trick themed magnetised bookmarks from The Wood Avenue, and at a time when I’d just been thinking I needed more bookmarks too!
I just… This is the best box yet. I honestly thought they couldn’t top the October box, but I was wrong. I couldn’t be happier with everything these guys are doing. I’m telling everyone I know about them, and I even got an extra box this month to give it to my sister for her Christmas present.
polynbooks:
belblake:
Feyre. Why? You dislike our kind on a...
Feyre. Why? You dislike our kind on a good day. And after Andras … So why?
Because I wouldn’t want to die alone. Because I’d want someone to hold my hand until the end, and awhile after that. That’s something everyone deserves, human or faerie.
Celaena and Dorian made sure that I was completely uninterested in Sarah J. Maas’ writing.
But Beauty and the Beast retellings combined with faerie lore? Guuuh. Guess Feyre and Andras will pull me back in.
Holy crap, I finally got to this book, and it’s GOOD. I’m having the feelings, and I’m laughing out loud… And I’ve almost read half of it just today alone.
This is a stunning reversal from what I’ve read of Sarah Maas before. Oh, some of this authors tropes are still present in the characters Feyre, Tamlin and Lucian, but the writing is rich, the story is filled with plot, the love interest is believable and interesting…!
I just reached the part that’s quoted above. It was completely different to how I’d imagined it, and signals such an important turning point for the characters, particularly Fayre.
I don’t regret it so far. I’m just hoping that the second half doesn’t disappoint!
December 14, 2015
me @ every straight couple w/ a family on TV: 80% of your problems could be solved by having an honest, patient conversation with each other oh my god have you literally never communicated in your life??? why are you married? how did u have 2.5 kids togeth
me @ every straight couple w/ a family on TV: 80% of your problems could be solved by having an honest, patient conversation with each other oh my god have you literally never communicated in your life??? why are you married? how did u have 2.5 kids togeth
me @ every straight couple w/ a family on TV: 80% of your problems could be solved by having an honest, patient conversation with each other oh my god have you literally never communicated in your life??? why are you married? how did u have 2.5 kids togeth
me @ every straight couple w/ a family on TV: 80% of your problems could be solved by having an honest, patient conversation with each other oh my god have you literally never communicated in your life??? why are you married? how did u have 2.5 kids togeth
'Where Have All the Butches Gone?'
“In today’s terminology, their gender expression is masculine, and their gender identity is female…
One of the mistakes that we made as lesbian feminists was combining sexual orientation and gender expression into an androgynous dyke ideal: short hair, no makeup, able to fix a car or bake bread with equal ease, frequently accused of being in the wrong public restroom (much to our outrage). ”
Man, yay for @thehuffingtonpostpost!
I remember growing up with this imagery that lesbians fit into the above description, which was one of the reasons I remember being surprised in my adolescence when I found out an older, very feminine, cousin of mine was a lesbian. It just didn’t fit. The way she looked put her in the bracket of ‘bisexual’ as far as I thought, which is ridiculous because both lesbian and bisexual describe sexuality, not looks.
This article also does another thing I love, and acknowledges one of the very real reasons that stopped me progressing or examining my own gender queer status any further in my early 20s, only 10 years ago: “the idea of becoming a man – with all the unearned, unexamined privilege that the idea suggests – is especially incomprehensible; it’s a betrayal of trust”
I’m okay with that now. I’m happy to wear my skirts and identify with female pronouns. But, hell, this article spoke to me.
This is an amazingly written article from beginning to end. Everyone has different stories, but this is a conscientious analysis of some of them applying to sexuality and gender from a certain generation.
"You’re perfect,” he said, finishing his thought as if she hadn’t interrupted...."
-
Winter, by Marissa Meyer.
I’ve been waiting for this completion of the series since three years ago when I picked up this little book called Cinder.
Sometimes when I’m reading, I see this amazing quite that makes perfect sense to be exactly right there in the narrative it’s part of but, out of context, is the most perfect commentary for ordinary world mental illness.
And then I wonder, did the author tell this story, write this character, that way on purpose??
December 13, 2015
Polyamorous Speed Dating
We went to polyamorous speed dating the other night. I’ve always wanted to do speed dating, because the rom coms would have you think it’s the funniest thing and it seems fantastic fodder for writing.
It was amazingly run by two facilitators who lined up a series of promoting questions.
Those questions almost made me forgot that the night was poly speed dating. What it became for me was honest-truth-hour-with-strangers. Because when I’m standing in front of someone and asked to describe my perfect kiss, I want to giggle and shy away from such naked intimacy. But when someone else opens themselves up, you realise that there’s this amazing strength and freedom in admitting to the unexpected.
But as the night came around to a close, and people were ticking down names, I realised that this little idea of speed dating is *made* for poly people. Cause what happens when you’re monogamous and you get three “matches”? You go on a couple of dates with each before deciding on “the only one”.
People asked if there would be an expectation of dating, or if we could tick people we wanted to just see again, people who seemed fun. Of course it wasn’t just about dating! Even monogamous friends acknowledge that one person can’t be “the only one” to other person.
Polyamorous speed dating vs The One
We were on the way to polyamorous speed dating the other night. I’ve always wanted to do speed dating, because the rom coms would have you think it’s the funniest thing and it seems fantastic fodder for writing.
It was amazingly run by two facilitators who lined up a series of promoting questions.
Those questions almost made me forgot that the night was poly speed dating. What it became for me was honest-truth-hour-with-strangers. Because when I’m standing in front of someone and asked to describe my perfect kiss, I want to giggle and shy away from such naked intimacy. But when someone else opens themselves up, you realise that there’s this amazing strength and freedom in admitting to the unexpected.
But as the night came around to a close, and people were ticking down names, I realised that this little idea of speed dating is *made* for poly people. Cause what happens when you’re monogamous and you get three “matches”? You go on a couple of dates with each before deciding on “the only one”.
People asked if there would be an expectation of dating, or if we could tick people we wanted to just see again, people who seemed fun. Of course it wasn’t just about dating! Even monogamous friends acknowledge that one person can’t be “the only one” to other person.
On the way to polyamorous speed dating, we were talking about how hard though, even with poly, it is to make people feel equal. We went into a business together and were both chosen as part of the bridal party in another couples’ wedding, and my other partner at the time needed to be part of those things to feel equal. While the latter obviously wasn’t an option, I was left with the feeling I could at least change the things that were in my control.
I finally opened up about the small instances of day to day jealousy, my inwardly acknowledged need to give less to one partner and more to my other partner so that he would feel things were equal. During his darkest times, he would cling and say I was the only thing keeping him here. The only one. This made me sure of what I was doing, something I had planned to only maintain for a short term.
I gave all my time that wasn’t to my first partner to my second partner to come along, to the exclusion of friends simply because they had to be less important at that time. Logically I knew that one person couldn’t fix another, but if I could just to the end of an imagined list, get as many road blocks out of the way… And I may be small but I am fierce when I come up against the universe!
The second partner finally got two other partners, partial remission, a job he didn’t hate. He was in a house big enough for all of his things, where he felt like he lived in a home, rather than just paying rent. He and i ended up with one or two nights of the week that were just ours .
Despite my own autonomy, I’d gradually become used to living as two people who were one, fighting the same battle, so much so I’d forgotten what I liked doing before that. The short term became the long term. The habit became part of the relationship and the relationship was the habit.
His interests suddenly changed so that different things were important to him. Living. Just… that. Living in a different house. Living with different people. Mortgages for five. Children and long term were back on the table. Remission.
There’s a part of me that’s sad he didn’t end it sooner, when it first became evident that I couldn’t make the same mental 180, and spared us both months of pain. It wasn’t just his fault. He’d asked for and needed certain things, but I’d chosen to give. And then I got stuck. Wasn’t part of the plan, but it happened anyway. As soon as that relationship was gone, my own thing suddenly rushed back like something that had only been held back by a dam that had disappeared. Pottering around the house, spending time without anyone but my cats. Writing and ignoring anyone else. Library trips. Creative time with friends. Sleepovers that have nothing to do with partners. As I finished grieving, mental health replaced my mental illness, giving me more time to do all my things and regaling over my own ridiculousness in forgetting that no one person can be everything for another.
I never wish for things to change because you never know how the butterfly’s wing will reshape things on the other side of the world. And things are good, really good, for the first time in too many years. But damn.
I wish he’d found all these loving relationships with people who were good to him sooner. I wish people found the right words when it mattered. I wish life and work didn’t get so on top of people. I wish people came with a handbook so we didn’t have to assume the right way to act.
I’ve never understood regret, just like i never understood anger. I still don’t think I express it like I should be, but there are fewer current unfair things that cause rage and express as sadness. It’s giving me time to reflect. I’ve learned so many things this year, and I reckon there may be more to come and I say: bring it. Bring the best of it, bring the worst, and I’ll get through it. A lot of this year’s been shit for a lot of my people, and a lot of it’s probably going to become fodder for my writing anyway, just like the poly speed dating, so I’m gonna to say that I’m grateful.
