Nahika

a lil doodle compilation of the SDV Bachelors i’ve done through the year.

Shane, Harvey, Elliot

Sam, Sebastian, Alex

a lil doodle compilation of the SDV Bachelorettes i’ve done through the year.

Emily, Haley, Leah

Abigail, Penny, Maru

The strangest thing happened after a few days post my watching of S2. I got a wave of real, bittersweet sadness.

Not due to the obvious – I was dealing with that too, but with more excitement than anything – but because I realized something, as a writer and consumer of media. I realized that it’s unlikely I’ll ever get a media experience close to what I experienced at the end of Good Omens 2. Because really, its setup was absolutely unparalleled – in general, and for myself personally.

me a machine built to solve problems: great here’s the solution

loved one: im so fucking emotional about the problem

me: i have the solution

loved one: i get so angry. i’m frustrated

me: i am holding the solution in my hand and showing it to you

lloved one, yelling now: the universe is indifferent

#and counterintuitively you have to take care of that second part FIRST #because otherwise—as you point out—they won’t be able to absorb the solution #so step one is going ‘i love you i’m so sorry this is happening to you i love you’ and listening to them for a while

#and then once they remember that they’re not an island of misery in a sea of nothingness #you hit them with the solution (proposed gently so that it doesn’t seem like you’re trying to shut them up about the problem) #it’s probably going to feel weird to do it but I guarantee you it works

#tl;dr: when someone’s complaining about a problem it’s about an 85% chance that they actually want attention sympathy and kindness #and the actual problem is something they can solve—but only once they’ve fulfilled the immediate need

I started watching Violet Evergarden back in March, and it didn’t take long for me to notice a pattern with her behavior. As an autistic person, I don’t often get to really connect with people, or fictional characters. There’s almost always a communication barrier, to some extent, that makes it hard for me to be comfortable around people. And fictional characters always lack something and rarely strike a chord. But with Violet? I felt a kindred spirit, almost immediately.

I’ve always felt pretty isolated from people, and media almost always feels like it’s speaking to someone else. Even as a cis white dude, there’s just so much media that doesn’t speak to me even among the stuff that’s aimed at the demographics I fit into.

But this show? It was not like that at all. I finally got to see someone going through the struggles I’ve had to deal with. Someone being confused in all the ways I’ve been confused, when dealing with other people. It feels really amazing and validating to see it on screen. It was a breath of fresh air.

So, naturally, allistic (non-autistic) people feel the need to argue with me almost ever single time I’ve ever brought this up. Because god forbid autistic people get good representation, I guess?

So, I decided to compile a list of things she does throughout the show that all fall within the spectrum of behaviors and issues that are known to manifest with autistic people much more than allistic (non-autistic) ones.

And if you attempt to argue with me on this by telling me “she’s just bad at social stuff because she grew up in the woods”, SO HELP ME.

But anyway, here are some issues that come up a LOT throughout the show in general.

- Being bad at understanding feelings. This can apply to your own feelings, or those of others.

- Having difficulties working and interacting with allistic people (non-autistic people) due to communication breakdowns.

- Frequently speaking in technical language, even when talking about mundane things like eating or sleeping.

- Taking people too literally. - Being honest to the point of being unintentionally rude.

- Relying on routines in daily life. (It takes Violet a while to stop applying military terms to everything she does).

- Obsessive interest in a small number of activities.

- Being totally oblivious to social cues that most people use to communicate things nonverbally

- Seldom expressing emotion in obvious ways; Both characters in her own show and reviewers of the series describe Violet as being emotionless, when she really never is at any point in the show. She’s just not obvious in the wya she expresses it.

Here are some examples that come up in specific episodes.

(Episode 1)

- Becoming deeply unsettled when established routines are disrupted. (Claudia is about to leave her behind, and she has no idea what to do with herself)

- Mouthing objects (Teddy bear)

- Sometimes being very perceptive of others people’s intentions when interacting with them.(Telling Tiffany Evergarden “I can’t replace your lost child” after she offers to let Violet stay)

       The above example is a thing that be pretty armor piercing for those who aren’t self aware. I’ve dealt with this myself a variety of times, and have had to learn to NOT do this in order to avoid causing issues.

- Having a poor understanding of physical boundaries. (Undressing in front of Benedict)

- Focusing on tasks to the point of neglecting other needs well beyond what is required. (working all night without eating)

- Taking people too literally. (working all night)

- Mouthing objects again. (the Brooch)

(Episode 2)

- Being oblivious to how loud you are. (the typewriter)

- Being oblivious to other poeple’s hurt feelings. (telling a crying client to stop crying)

- Having a poor understanding of physical boundaries (restraining the angry client)

- Having little to no understanding of how words communicate indirect meaning. (Violet’s hilariously bad letter)

- Taking people too literally (she says “Her name is Erica” when an angry client shouts “Who do you think you are?!” at Erica.)

(Episode 3)

- Extremely good memory. (Violet says she remembers the introductions of all the doll students early in the episode)

- Expressing intense feelings with subtle body language and gestures, rather than with words. (squeezing her letter as the instructor explains that what she wrote is not acceptable as a letter.)

(Episode 4)

- Doesn’t understand deception.(She immediately corrects Iris several times in front of her family, when Iris attempts to exaggerate her popularity at work)

- Struggles to cooperate with requests that she doesn’t understand.(She doesn’t listen when Iris asks her to not write an invitation to the boy that turned her down, because Iris wouldn’t tell her why she didn’t want him to come.)

- Doesn’t understand discretion.(Telling Iris’s family what Iris told her about her past, not realizing she was expected to keep this private.)

In this post I’m going to talk about why I personally believe that Bella Swan is autistic. As an autistic person myself, I really relate to Bella and I see a lot of autistic traits in her.

Disclaimer: This is just a headcanon- I don’t think Stephenie Meyer intentionally wrote Bella as autistic, and she or the movie producers never confirmed it, so I’m not saying to everyone that she is CONFIRMED to be autistic and that every one has to see her that way, I’m just saying that I personally think she is, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Autistic people hardly have any representation in the media, and with the representation that we do have, it is almost always stereotypical, inaccurate and offensive. You do not have to agree with me on this, but just please be respectful in the comments and don’t hate :)

Ok let’s go:

1. She always felt different from everyone/she felt like nobody truly understood her and that she never really understood anyone either: this is what basically all autistic people feel, myself included. Feeling like nobody understands the way your brain works and the way you see the world. (And this is true, because autistic people do see the world differently than non- autistic people and autistic peoples brains are wired differently from non- autistic brains). Bella mentions this multiple times in the books and movies, at one point in the first book in the car with Edward, she tells him that she thinks he can’t read her mind because they’re a probably a glitch in her brain and that it’s not like other people’s. There is also this quote from the 1st chapter of twilight which sums up how she feels: “ Facing my pallid reflection in the mirror, I was forced to admit that I was lying to myself. It wasn’t just physically that I’d never fit in. And if I couldn’t find a niche in a school with three thousand people, what were my chances here? I didn’t relate well to people my age. Maybe the truth was that I didn’t relate well to people, period. Even my mother, who I was closer to than anyone else on the planet, was never in harmony with me, never on exactly the same page. Sometimes I wondered if I was seeing the same things through my eyes that the rest of the world was seeing through theirs. Maybe there was a glitch in my brain”.

2. Her motor skills: She’s constantly tripping over her own feet, has bad balance, doesn’t realize that she’s walking into things, constantly dropping things ect, a common thing for autistic people is to have poor motor skills and find it hard to navigate their body.

Another disclaimer about autism: not ever autistic person is the exact same, every autistic person expresses their autism in a slightly different way, for example, some autistic people are overly sensitive to sound, and some are under-sensitive to it, these are just the specific things I’ve noticed for Bella in this post, it’s not supposed to be a generalization of autism in any way! :)

3. Social disinterest and difficultly: all throughout her childhood and her time in forks, she wasn’t very interested in making friends or hanging out or going to parties, and she found that she could never make friends with someone easily, she just never fully clicked with someone. She did have some very nice friends in forks, however she never related to them too well or was very attached to them.

4. Dresses for comfort and not fashion: Bella typically dresses in what feels most comfortable for her, not what is the most fashionable thing, this is a common thing with autism. A lot of autistic people like myself are quite sensitive to clothing and fabric and will not tolerate uncomfortable clothing.

5. Limited interests/special interests: Bella doesn’t really have many interests, but the ones she does have, she’s very passionate about. A special interest is an autism-specific term used to describe interests and hobbies that autistic people have that are very important to them. They help regulate emotions, calm people down, provide escapism ect. Autistic people can hyper fixate on these interests for hours and hours and not get bored, they can get so engrossed that they forget to do basic tasks to take care of themselves like drinking or going to the bathroom. These interests can last for years, sometimes a lifetime and they are very important to autistics. Bella swans special interests would be reading, wuthering heights, and vampires. Bella says in midnight sun that she has loved reading all her life and it is one of the few things that bring her intense joy. She said she could read for hours at a time and would try to sneak books into her lessons and read any chance she could get. Bella says that her favorite book is wuthering heights and she has read it so many times that it is beaten up beyond repair and the spine is so cracked that the book lays flat. This would clearly be her special interest. Her other special interest is clearly vampires.

6. Burnouts and meltdowns when Edward leaves: when Edward left in new moon, Bella obviously fell into a huge depression, but I also think she fell into an autistic burnout (if you don’t know what that is pls research or ask me cause this post is already too goddamn long). And in eclipse, when Edward leaves to go home in the afternoon or to go hunting, she can barely focus without him and gets very anxious (this is obviously because she loves him and is literally obsessed with him lol, but I also think it could be a meltdown from separation anxiety and also a change in routine (a lot of autistics get very upset when their usual routine is disrupted or changed))

7. Sensitive to sounds: In the book, often Bella cannot concentrate or fall asleep because of little sounds like the rain, sometimes it takes ages for her to sleep because the rain or tapping is too distracting. (This is a common autistic struggle).

8. Stims & facial twitches & stuttering: in the movie, she is constantly stuttering over her words, and her face and body twitches a lot. She also stims a lot in the book by playing with her hair or sleeves or the zip of her jacket, or her hands or edwards hands. She also covers some of her face with her hair, this could be to do with sensory overload, seeing too much in her field of vision may be overwhelming for her, like a lot of autistics.

9. Trouble expressing feelings/ thoughts: bella struggles a lot sometimes with communication and telling people how she feels. You can see this in her relationship with Charlie. They both love eachother very much but they never say it and when they do it comes out very awkward and sometimes they use the wrong words. You can also see this when she is hesitant to tell Edward in eclipse when she doesn’t want him to leave for the fight, it takes her ages to work up to telling someone how she feels. She also tends to be quite private. This is common for some autistics to feel.

10. Sensory experiences: bella loves the sun and heat, she says that she loves feeling the sun seep into her skin- a lot of autistics feel the sensory world very strongly and love certain sensations and detest others. When Bella moves to forks, she hates the sudden change in weather and gets anxious and upset at the feel of the cold, and the rain against her skin. This links back to my other point where I was talking about how autistics fear sudden changes in routine. Bella is very relieved when there’s a sunny day in forks and goes and sits outside, savouring the weather which reminds her of home.

11. Not too concerned with how she looks: obviously not every autistic person is like this, but quite a few autistics don’t really focus on how they look/present and what they wear. They don’t really know about the social norms and what other people wear so they do what they want. This is something I often see in Bella in the books especially.

12. More quiet/ reserved and socially withdrawn and awkward: this is basically self explanatory. Bella is very well known for this. I touch a bit more on this in point 3.

If you made it this far then thank you so much! This took a long ass time to write and I’ve been thinking of making this post for months. There are more things that make me headcanon her as autistic, but these are just from the top of my head. When I re-read the series (for like the 100th time lol) later this year, I’ll annotate the book so that I can update this post in the future with more supporting this).

Again this is just my opinion and my personal headcanon, it is not factual (but I’d obviously want it to be canon) so please no hate :)

More recently, some scenes in “Wolf Hall” were also shot with period live-flame lighting and IIRC until they got used to it, actors had to be careful how they moved across the sets. However, it’s very atmospheric: there’s one scene where Cromwell is sitting by the fire, brooding about his association with Henry VIII while the candles in the room are put out around him. The effect is more than just visual.

As someone (I think it was Terry Pratchett) once said: “You always need enough light to see how dark it is.”

A demonstration of getting that out of balance happened in later seasons of “Game of Thrones”, most infamously in the complaint-heavy “Battle of Winterfell” episode, whose cinematographer claimed the poor visibility was because “a lot of people don’t know how to tune their TVs properly”.

So it was nothing to do with him at all, oh dear me no. Wottapillock. Needing to retune a TV to watch one programme but not others shows where the fault lies, and it’s not in the TV.

*****

We live in rural West Wicklow, Ireland, and it’s 80% certain that when we have a storm, a branch or even an entire tree will fall onto a power line and our lights will go out.

Usually the engineers have things fixed in an hour or two, but that can be a long dark time in the evenings or nights of October through February, so we always know where the candles and matches are and the oil lamp is always full.

We also know from experience how much reading can be done by candle-light, and it’s more than you’d think, once there’s a candle right behind you with its light falling on the pages.

You get more light than you’d expect from both candles and lamps, because for one thing, eyes adapt to dim light. @dduane​ says she can sometimes hear my irises dilating. Yeah, sure…

For another thing lamps can have accessories. Here’s an example: reflectors to direct light out from the wall into the room. I’ve tried this with a shiny foil pie-dish behind our own Very Modern Swedish Design oil lamp, and it works.

Smooth or parabolic reflectors concentrate their light (for a given value of concentrate, which is a pretty low value at that) while flatter fluted ones like these scatter the light over a wider area, though it’s less bright as a result:

This candle-holder has both a reflector and a magnifying lens, almost certainly to illuminate close or even medical work of some sort rather than light a room.

And then there’s this, which a lot of people saw and didn’t recognise, because it’s often described in tones of librarian horror as a beverage in the rare documents collection.

There IS a beverage, that’s in the beaker, but the spherical bottle is a light magnifier, and Gandalf would arrange a candle behind it for close study.

Here’s one being used - with a lightbulb - by a woodblock carver.

And here’s the effect it produces.

Here’s a four-sphere version used with a candle (all the fittings can be screwed up and down to get the candle and magnifiers properly lined up) and another one in use by a lacemaker.

Finally, here’s something I tried last night in our own kitchen, using a water-filled decanter. It’s not perfectly spherical so didn’t create the full effect, but it certainly impressed me, especially since I’d locked the camera so its automatic settings didn’t change to match light levels.

This is the effect with candles placed “normally”.

But when one candle is behind the sphere, this happens.

 It also threw a long teardrop of concentrated light across the worktop; the photos of the woodcarver show that much better.

Poor-people lighting involved things like rushlights or tallow dips. They were awkward things, because they didn’t last long, needed constant adjustment, didn’t give much light and were smelly. But they were cheap, and that’s what mattered most.

They’re often mentioned in historical and fantasy fiction but seldom explained: a rushlight is a length of spongy pith from inside a rush plant, dried then dipped in tallow (or lard, or mutton-fat), hence both its names.

Here’s Jason Kingsley making one.