LawsofChaos

Suppose that while Shane is uncomfortable with touch generally, his favorite physical therapist has worked with him to the point that Shane actually enjoys getting a full body massage from her (and her only). Like yoga, it’s a time when he can just be in his body without so many thoughts. 

When Shane moves to Ottawa he keeps turning down massages and seems to shy away talking with the physical therapy staff at all. Ottawa’s lead physio is curious what’s going on, since Shane’s medical records from Montreal list regular massage therapy and he would certainly benefit from continuing it. After confirming that Shanes’s permission is on file, Ottawa checks in with Montreal’s equivalent. She compares Shane to a feral cat. You have to ease him into it extraordinarily slowly. He doesn’t like to be touched much. Food and pain are not motivational in either direction. But if you’re kind and patient and start small, eventually you just might get there. Most importantly, do not try to treat Shane or discuss anything remotely medical with other players in the room. Massages are always in private only.  

I wanted the birds to look like they were actually in the space so first thing after doing the draft was to do a lighting study

after that I covered the walls in letters in lieu of a projector/vr headset bc i have neither of those :) Then i take a picture of the section of wall and superimpose the lineart over top of it so I can pencil in the lines

et voila

GIVE IT UP FOR BIRD NUMBUH 5, THE CANADIAN GOOSE, Branta canadensis!!!!

bird 5/14, Bluejay, Cyanocitta cristata

birds 6 and 7: American Goldfinch, Spinus tristis, male and female

BIRD NUMBER 8, (yellow shafted) NORTHERN FLICKERRRRR, Colaptes auratus

genuinely made me start questioning my sanity around day 3, it's half the size the of the goose, WHY did it take me 4 days to finish??

Bird number 9: Red-tailed hawk, Buteo jamaicensis

my chains are broken i am FREE. although i did have a great deal of fun with this, the barring on the wings itself took me like four days and i am READY to move on

this was a week and a half of continuous work so please excuse me for getting a little emotional in the bg 🙏

BIRD NUMBER 10!!! The Male Mallard Duck, Anas platyrhynchos

the male and female ones are gonna be posted separately bc they're taking a lot longer lol but yea! super happy i was able to capture the iridescent green of the head, i found metallic green and blue paint at a craft store that really made his head POP. it looks better in person i promise

ALSO!! As this is the 10th one, BIG announcement. The end is in sight!!!!! I plan to finish within the next 3 weeks and there will be a small dedication ceremony/ unveiling happening at the library to commemorate its completion on the 16th of May. If you live in the Western New York region and want to check it out for yourself shoot me a dm!

aaaand another one bites the duck,

we're movin right along with bird numero 11!! The lady Mallard!! Anas platyrhyncos

power couple that they are, here's bird number 12 and 13,

the Northern Cardinals, Cardinalis cardinalis

and NOW that they are complete, ITS GO TIME, in the next five days (library's closed for mother's day 😭😭) i need to have the GBH fully rendered, the names of the birds vectored, weeded, masked, applied to the wall, and then painted, plus additional cattails throughout. I may be able to get away with just getting the GBH done in time for the unveiling and then just have the names and cattails added later, but i'm gonna really try to get it all done in time. BUT, i have a plan. Part of why i take so long on these is because i really am just figuring it out as I do it lmao. there have been many a time where i am sitting on top of the ladder googling "how to paint birds" but I think if i take the time tomorro to do all that figuring out how to approach it beforehand, this will go a lot faster. I may also recruit some of my artist friends to help with the placing of the names... hrmm we'll see.

Anyways, shout out to the librarian who tracked down exactly the thing i needed so i could figure out where to place the highlights in my birds eyes, ur the real mvp

Bird number 14 out of 14,

The Great blue heron, Ardea herodius

thank you to everyone who reached out or got excited about this project, it genuinely gave me the fuel i needed to keep going. In total, the 480+ total hrs it took me to cover this wall pales in comparison to how long its expected to spend on there, hopefully imparting a sense of beauty and love for the natural world to the next generation and here's hoping i'm only getting started with these.

Shane needs friends who will push him to stretch his wings (something Hayden would never do, as much as I adore the love shared between Hayden, Jacki and Shane). I think the straight forward linguistics of the NE in the US would do Shane a world of good. I think having Marly and St Simon and Conners push and push him to go out and let loose and ACTUALLY MEAN IT, not just so they can make fun of him for "failing" would do him a world of good. I think being further away from his mom (I LOVE Yuna, but we all need time to grow away from the direct supervision of our parents) would do Shane good.

I also just think that there's something about the culture of the US American northeast that would really vibe with Shane's inner chaos demon. Boston is def gay friendly, but no one expects you to be gentle if you're gay there.

Plus! The move to Ottawa wouldn't really raise any eyebrows. Shane, as a veteran, highly skilled player and native Ottowan, would make sense moving there to try to rebuild his hometown team.

I also think Boston would shape him in a way that Montreal never could. He'd be more straightforward, he'd be more brutal, he'd be beautifully obstinate when Ilya tried to pull some bullshit. But maybe most importantly, he'd have other Russian players around in his daily life, so he'd have a much better and much earlier grasp of what it means for Ilya to return home each summer (and probably learning a lot of Russian from his teammates to chirp Ilya in the ice with).

Additionally, Ilya would already have lived in Canada for several years by the time they decided to move closer to one another-- possibly even Ilya has been spending a week or two every summer at the cottage since it was built before going home to Russia-- because people are much less likely to remark on him visiting a nearby Canadian city when he already lives in the country.

"You're lucky to get this locker," he tells Shane before their first practice. "Everyone in this room is always fighting to get it."

"Why, because it's the one next to yours?" says Shane, tugging a curl at the back of Ilya's head just hard enough to pull his head back playfully.

"Well, yes," laughs Ilya. "But this is also the magic locker."

Shane has that look on his face that Ilya knows means he's not sure if he wants to laugh or roll his eyes.

"The magic locker?" he says with a skeptical eyebrow and a fond smile. "I'm scared to ask what that means."

"You'll see. Is very mysterious. Science cannot explain it. You will soon see its power for yourself."

And Shane's laughing now.

"How about you get dressed so that you're not late for practice, Cap? The only power I want to see right now is your ass on the ice."

And Ilya has this stupid grin the whole way through practice that only gets wider when Shane gets back to his locker to find his favourite post-practice protein bar and an ice-cold can of ginger ale. There's a small post-it stuck to the protein bar that says "Welcome to the team, Hollander. Love, the magic locker elves. xx" It's unmistakably Ilya's handwriting.

"See?" says Ilya, delighted at how much Shane is smiling. "Mysterious."

"Super mysterious," he says, pressing a small kiss to Ilya's cheek. "Tell the elves I say thank you."

Ilya wins his first awards and hes got nobody he really wants to thank after his team and coach cause he he hates his family but he knows his speech is too short so on impulse he goes "And I want to thank Shane Hollander for being slightly worse than me this season". Everyone knows it was going to one of those two, so everyone thinks hes an asshole to say that but whats new so it works for him. But from then on it then becomes a bit for both of them to thank each other in their speeches in a snide way as a reason they won.

Shane winning the Art Ross Trophy (Awarded to the player who leads the league in total points at the end of the regular season). and going "special thanks to Rozanov for missing at least 5 shots this season, he was a huge help"

Ilya winning the Conn Smythe Trophy (Awarded to the most valuable player for his team in the playoffs.) "Just want to give a quick shout out to Hollander for getting knocked out in the second round this season. Must hate to see me up here."

Mer!Ilya

This piece was inspired by Splash, the Ron Howard movie.

Mer!Ilya

This piece was inspired by Splash, the Ron Howard movie.

So Shane starts to do it. Like randomly. He'll be doing laundry and fill it up in the basket and walk into their bedroom and Ilya will be on the bed on his phone or whatever and Shane will wordlessly empty the laundry onto him and it's so warm and soft and he understands why Shane looks back at it as a fond memory. And it just becomes a thing. They don't talk about it. But Shane will put the clean laundry on him, leave to do something else and circle back when it's no longer as warm so he can put it away.

the last time I reblogged this post right before I got a great job, in a permanent work-from-home position, with benefits, retirement, and a salary literally 3x what I was making before, doing something I really like. 

So you know.