He was a farmer and he loved getting dressed up every year for the local fair and exhibiting his prize chickens. My grandmother would spend the entire year searching through thrift shops looking for silly neckties for him to wear, and she loved finding ones with chickens on them.

After a few decades of this, my grandfather had amassed several dozen neckties, each one with cartoonish images of chickens flying around, laying eggs, and doing other chicken things. I always complimented him on the newest addition to his collection.

When he died a couple of years ago, he bequeathed them to me in his will. When my grandmother handed me the bag full of them, my eyes welled with tears and I smiled thinking about my grandfather looking in the mirror and straightening his tie.

Then I rolled up.  Dressed as Thrust because buttwings, damnit.

“Oh, we’ll go easy on you,” the dude said in the most condescending, smarmy tone.  “Name one of the dinobots.”

I rattled all five off in alphabetical order, and demanded that they tell me all six Constructicons.

There were several guys at the table.  They managed five.

“You forgot Bonecrusher,” I said sweetly and walked off.  I didn’t want the prize I’d rightfully earned.  Their spluttering was all I wanted.

You don’t have to love something in a ridiculously obsessive way that knows every tiny fucking detail for your love of it to bring you joy. If that’s how they get joy, cool, nice for them. But you don’t have to.

You can casually love a thing, cosplay as a thing, go to cons for a thing, without dissecting it into little pieces.

*aggressively sends love to you* YOU ARE SMART, GOOD, AND DESERVE ALL THIS LOVE. ❤️️❤️️❤️️ I can’t give you all the love you need, so you’ll have to learn how to give some to yourself!

YAS GO GIRL ASTRID!