{^.=.^} whaaaaaaaaa

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Okay so clearly I’ve underestimated y'all

So how about we make this more interesting?

Us:

When I made this post, it was supposed to be a joke

I mean, none of my posts ever get more than 20 notes if I’m lucky, so what are the odds of one reaching 666k? Impossible, haha

But then, something happened, something I didn’t expect

People actually began to… like it? And… reblog? And comment?

Before I knew it, my notifications were swarmed with comments after comments after reblogs after comments all on this one post

Then, still in the mindset of this being a joke, I realised I’d made the goal too easy, so I upped the stakes

But… the notes just got more frequent from there

And it started to hit me just what was happening

For a while, I was overwhelmed with a feeling

A feeling I wasn’t used to

It was like… all of a sudden… I mattered…

My existance was actually noteworthy

People actually… cared?

It wasn’t a game anymore, it was a race to assure a stranger on the Internet that they were actually worth something

Hundreds of people all gathering in one online place to help out

Leaving messages and well wishes

Making me smile

Making me laugh

Funny comments

Jokes

Fun facts

Even simple comments

It all suddenly felt so real

This was never a joke to you

This was important

And I won’t let any of that go in vain

So… stay tuned I suppose

I’ll look after myself, and I’ll post proof of it too

I’ll catalogue every time I put my health first

Physical and mental

I’ll acknowledge my bad days and celebrate my good days

But most of all

I won’t forget this

Any of this

Ever

(Tagging all the people in that screenshot)

If I think about a Derry Girls au too long, I literally pass out. It’s like, what if the Losers were 8 times stupider and more chaotic? It’s all I’ve ever wanted!!

Like I don’t even know how you would even plot this fic out? Literally all 5 of them would encounter Pennywise and immediately scream and try to hit him with the nearest object?? Like Pennywise would starve to death in Derry. All the kids would throw hands the second they saw him.

“Are ye saying you saw a clown, Michelle?”

“Aye, it was a fecking clown, Claire.”

“But, clowns aren’t even scary!” 

“Aye, I know that, and I told the wee bastard as much, then he grew a bunch of fangs, like, total cracker actually if ye think about it.”

“Have none of you considered that a grown man dressed like a clown hiding in the sewers who wants to eat children might be something to take at least a little bit seriously?!?”

“Ach, seriously, fuck off James, go be a craic killer somewhere else!”

“Have ye considered James that maybe the clown is more afeared of us, than we are a him?”

“No, Orla, I hadn’t considered that, thank you.”

“Okay girls, I think we’re all missing the point here! You said that he grew fangs!??! Are you sure you weren’t just a wee bit blackout drunk?!”

“Well to be fair, I was boking all over myself, Erin, to be sure, yeah.”

___

“What’s this I hear about a man dressed like a clown in the sewers?”

“But da you don’t think our Erin is daft enough to play in the sewers do ye?”

“I’m sure it’s just an urban legend, Joe.”

“You watch your tone with me boy! I’ll not have some wee Southern shite tell me what’s real and what’s myth!”

“I tell ya it’s real! As real as my right hand, swear to God!”

“Erin! I don’t want you goin anywhere near no man approachin wains dressed like a clown!”

“But don’t you think the whole affair of dressing up as a clown like, is a wee bit… gay? Uh- I mean no offense son.”

This 1000 year old Katana looks as good as it did the day it was made. [3746x3024]

This is Mikazuki. The Crescent Moon blade.

This sword was crafted by Sanj(y)o Munechika and is older than 1000 years. (The Smith’s oldest signed work is from 987).

There are only 5 of the smith’s pieces remaining and this one exhibits one of the first times in history that the Japanese sword takes on it’s utilitarian curved shape.

This sword was owned by a laundry list of important historical figures including Oda Nobunaga’s general Toyotomi Hideyoshi who unified Japan.

You are essentially looking at a Japanese Excalibur.

They’re still active and still posting, but it’s never getting finished and I’ve accepted it

Because I love the song, have loved it since I first heard it, and held off on looking up the lyrics for singing and the meaning until I could do it myself for JP practice. And also I wanted to explore the song by myself without being influenced by anyone else’s understanding. 

Probably many things will be wrong! and it’s a shitty unclean translation. But it captures the song in the way I feel it, and I do like the way it turned out, so I’m gonna post it for my own benefit. Screenshot of the whole thing up here and text lyrics under the cut.

So.

The song starts off with “Goodbye”, literally, it begins quietly, softly, like the parting is sorrowful but not horrible. Things are transient, futile, but cherished, and the music swells into hope as it speaks of one day reuniting and the strength that that gives you.  For me this reminds me of literally fucking everyone in the series simultaneously. The Zodiac members and the origin of their curse, the original animals having to leave the god they loved but choosing to keep living, even if it’ll be suffering, for the sake of meeting again. Kyo, resolving to leave Tohru behind to go into his imprisonment. Haru and Rin at each other, Akito at everyone, Tohru’s mom at her husband. Hatori, Yuki, Shigure, Kureno, literally everybody in this damn show has left someone behind or been left behind, and they suffer, but they loved them, and it makes them keep walking. 

At the first chorus, it sings about that feeling of knowing that despite your sadness, your fears, no matter when or where you are, that love is worth it. Again literally every goddamn character. Everyone cries in this series!!! Everyone hurts for the love they feel and it makes them doubt but it makes them move ahead too. Hiro for Kisa, Kisa for herself and Tohru, Yuki against his mom and Akito for Tohru and himself and Machi. Hana-chan when she couldn’t help Tohru’s suffering even when she wanted to so badly. Kureno and Arisa. Tohru’s mom for her daughter, and in the memory of her husband. Tohru when Kyo pushed her away. Hatori for Kana, too.  No matter how lonely they get. They keep walking. 

The second verse confused me a lot during translations lmao, tons of phrases I didn’t know. But basically it’s about being lost with your feelings and your direction, struggling with your thoughts and memories. And the music really reflects that; it gets echoey and minor-key, with more sibilance and sharper sounds. But then the prechorus begins with “I am trying to find the reason I was born”, and gradually becomes brighter again; it shifts into acknowledging the struggle and cheering themselves and others on, and bringing it to an entreaty of possibly seeing it together.  I see a lot of Yuki in this, and by association Kyo. Both of them struggle so much with their reasons for existing, fighting what they’ve been told that they are with everything they have from such a young age. Having such limited guidance in so much vitriol, not understanding their own feelings (really having so little ways to learn how to do that, before they met their people), to being the kind of person that can lift others up along with themselves. It’s a really wonderful transition, and that shit hurts so good lol.

This second chorus is so heartfelt. “Because of you, I am able to live. You taught me how to love. Your smile makes me keep living.” god. This is literally everyone @ tohru, seriously. Her unconditional acceptance of every single Juniishi gave them the room to grow as people like they’d always deserved to. Her smile, unreserved, honest, and so full of love, given so freely despite knowing the parts they hated about themselves; yeah. This chorus is full of gratitude and true depth of feeling for someone that you’ve finally managed to live for. And it’s funny because that’s usually your mom, but Tohru’s everyone’s mom, so. But also this isn’t applicable to the older trio Hatori Ayame and Shigure; they have their individual loves that they owe their fullness of life to (Kana, Mine, and Akito respectively) but Tohru is a driving factor in them reclaiming them (in a sense; Ayame’s newly learned love via Tohru was for Yuki, but Yuki’s happiness is Tohru’s smile, so it still fits). But yeah anyway I love this second chorus so much; the melody is exactly the same as the first but it’s so full of joy after the wistfulness and loss and struggle that the preceding parts of the song have. It feels like “finally” even though only the lyrics have changed. But it ends with the same hopeful message from before, “I know it’s hard but it won’t work unless you try”, just the same.

And then the bridge directly references spring and snow and melting, just like with Hatori’s arc, and its just so stable with its wish and determination for the seasons, somewhat contrasted with the first verse, and it’s really just gorgeous. This is the resolve that all of the characters learn over the course of their stories, one of the things that makes this manga and anime so wonderful. You see them struggle and suffer and doubt with everything that comes with living in the world that we do, and then you get to see them grow strong and have hope despite all of it... man. 

Those last two choruses, putting the struggling-but-not-giving-up lyrics followed right by “I’ve found what I want to live for and it’s you” just. Singing it brings a fullness to my chest, and surrounds me with the love that the singer has found; gentle, warm, soft, but sturdy and everlasting. There’s such joy in the contrast, knowing that the suffering lead you somewhere and that place is here, where you have things you never want to let go of. It’s really that wonderful of a song. And it ends so wonderfully too, with “Thank you”, and being together forever, and “I know, I know, it’s never too late”. Like being forgiven, and being loved, and walking into the future hand in hand.