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You are a legendary blacksmith, sought out for your ability to fix anything. Talking swords, obsidian breastplates, staves made of crystal, daggers forged from dragon scales, you've done it all. The real challenge today is a young hero asking you to fix what they call their 'plot armor'.
I paused for a long time. He waited. That was good.
"What's wrong with it?" I asked, eventually.
"I... don't really know. Things keep happening that shouldn't, and... I guess, not happening, that should."
The hammer goes back on the rack, in its place among its brothers. I tug the fingers of the right glove until it slips loose; switch hands, repeat. The gloves go in the apron pocket. He keeps waiting.
"Have a seat," I tell him, nodding at the bench along the wall. I get the tin kettle, slosh it to check how full it is, and set it on the edge of the forge to heat up. Then I go over and settle myself on the bench next to him. He politely pretends not to notice the groaning.
"All right," I say. "Tell me everything." That usually works.
"Well," he says, "I'm a hero. There's always something going wrong and I'm always there to help. There were those fires last year, up at the capital; I was there. Helped get people out of the buildings, carried kids, you know, that kind of thing. During the war, the king hired me on for the irregulars, and I did some behind-enemy-lines work; helped bring down that general — you hear about that? Anyway, I'm always busy and I always come through."
"You don't get hurt?" I ask him.
"I mean, sure, I get hurt sometimes, of course. Mostly it's not serious, and when it is, there's something else that comes out of it. You know: I meet someone important, or I learn something, or, like, it suits the narrative that I have some serious setback right then, and it makes the eventual victory better."
"Suits the narrative," I echo.
"Yeah. Plot armor, right? That's what I mean. I see other people get absolutely crushed, you know, really terrible stuff. Nothing really bad ever happens to me."
"Except now it's broken," I ask him, "somehow, yeah?"
"Yeah."
He leaves it there, one word, and then two breaths. He needs prompting. "What happened?"
"Well, nothing. I mean — I mean, yeah, nothing happened. It's been eight months since I had anything like an adventure, and that was a short gig that was supposed to turn epic but didn't. Bad guys gave up, we handed everything back over to the locals. And before that, eighteen months. Haven't had a real quest for... over three years, now."
"Are you lookin' for a quest?" I ask.
"Constantly. It's — it's fucking exhausting. And: nothing. Doesn't matter what I do, where I go. Nothing. It's like I'm in the wrong story or something. I'm — I'm out of ideas."
The kettle's probably hot. I stand up to check; it takes me a bit to get the bones rearranged. Hips, lower back.
He doesn't say anything else while I pour: my mug — the old one with the cracks that I put back together — and the "guest" mug that matches the set from the house. I go back to the bench and hand over the one for him; he takes it with a polite nod. I get settled again, carefully, not spilling.
I take a sip, and a breath. "All right. Gonna see what I can do here. But mostly it's you who's gotta do somethin', so listen to me."
He looks up at me, half hopeful, through the steam from the mug. He's cupping it in both hands, like his fingers are cold, even though it's a warm day.
"What you've had before — what you think of as the 'big quests' — those were handed to you. Things happened and you reacted, right?"
He frowns, but he doesn't interrupt.
"And you've been lookin' for somethin' like that again, and not findin' anything. And I got bad news here: I can't fix that. Neither can you, or anybody else. What you can do, see, is you can — well, you can shape the narrative."
"What, 'make my own quest,' that sort of thing?" he says, tired and hopeless. He's heard that a thousand times.
I shake my head, "No, that's bullshit. The only people who actually make their own quests are assholes. And it's not what I mean, anyway: that's tryin' to fit your new situation into the same narrative you had before. I mean: shape the narrative."
He isn't stopping me, so I keep going. "This chapter ain't about topplin' the evil empire, or killin' the dragon, maybe, yeah? Maybe this chapter is about travelin' to the next town. Not even that: settin' up camp for the night. Or not even that: just buildin' a fire to cook over. Look closely at whatever you're doin' right that moment, and do that one specific little thing to the absolute best of your ability. Build the best damn campfire you ever saw."
He snorts a little bit at that. I've got him following, at least. "Ain't none of us get to choose our circumstances, kid. But we're all tellin' ourselves the stories of our lives, all the time. And we can change the way we tell it. If the big stories ain't working, tell little ones."
He sips his tea, and makes a face.
"This tea is terrible," he says.
"There you go," I answer. "Go make some fuckin' tea."
On of the less intuitive things about love, I've found, of any kind, is the importance of needing things.
I didn't realize it until recently, but I've always seen love as something requiring sacrifice, selflessness, patience, and generosity- to ask for nothing is to be the best person I can be, small and quiet and never in the way, always happy and helpful, self-sufficient and present when desired.
It's only as an adult, now, that I'm beginning to see the selfishness of wanting nothing.
I cut my friend's hair in my kitchen the other day. They wanted a trim and I had the skills, so I offered, and was genuinely excited when they stopped hesitating over "bothering me" and took me up on it. It was a peaceful afternoon, and we had tea and chatted for an hour or more.
My brother and I shared popcorn at the movies a while ago. When I came time to pay, I pulled my card out like a wild western sheriff and slapped it on the machine before he could fight me for it first. The satisfaction was delightful.
Someone called me crying on the phone the other day. Kept apologizing for disturbing me at work, talking about how they were bothering me on my lunch break. I was telling the truth when I told them that really, I was flattered and honored and relieved, knowing that if they were hurting I would know, that I didn't have to worry in silence. It felt good to hear them slowly come down, and to know that they knew it would be better soon, and to hear them laugh wetly on the other end. We're getting together for a visit next week.
It's hard to need things, if you've trained yourself not to. It's hard to want things, when you don't know how to want anymore. Trusting people is difficult, and so is relying on them, but I don't know where I'd be without the people who rely on me.
I've heard a lot of people say, "Nobody will love you unless you love yourself". I've had a lot of thoughts about it. It's not right, but it's not wrong, either, I think.
"Nobody will love you unless you love yourself"... I've always taken that to mean, "You will not be lovable until you develop a positive view of yourself as a person".
Now, I think it's sort of inside-out.
"Nobody will love you unless you love yourself"... because nobody can show their love to you in a way that you can accept until you treat yourself kindly, and learn what you need, and what you want, and how to ask for it, and then give that vulnerability away.
Love, for me, is someone I ask for a ride to the airport. Whether they end up doing this or not is irrelevant.
It's not needy, or selfish, or taking up energy. It's giving the gift of being wanted, and needed, and thought of. It's giving someone the security of being part of someone's life.
(Image description for the above: a frame from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," showing an agitated librarian, Rupert Giles, sitting in front of a computer. There is nobody else visible. Giles is speaking to the computer: "Who said you could interrupt, you stupid, useless fad?")
(Image description: a cropped screenshot from Adobe Acrobat, showing a message for the user that reads: "This appears to be a long document. Save time by reading a summary using AI Assistant.")
When I open a PDF, I want to read the document. I want to read what it says.
I'm using a PDF specifically, in fact, because I want to read what the author wrote, and I want to see it in the format that the author provided, to the best of our mutual capabilities.
That is the intent of a PDF; it's a Portable Document File that allows different users on different hardware and different software to be reasonably sure that they are both looking at the same thing.
Adding a non-deterministic black box between the document and the audience defeats the purpose of using a PDF in the first place.
If it made sense, it would just be irritating and I would deal with it. This makes me actively seek alternatives.
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headcanon that a ferengi tradition is putting your new baby up for sale at a ridiculous price to show how valuable they are to you (everyone has to be polite and not actually buy them or hands will be thrown, people will be sued, etc etc)
So, this is related to a headcanon I have. There's a kind of ritual sale of childhood goods as part of the Ferengi coming-of-age, which was featured in an episode of DS9. The ostensible purpose is to raise capital for the young Ferengi male. But, like, if the Ferengi were approaching this in their usual capitalistic mindset, you wouldn't really get much from what's basically a glorified garage sale
My headcanon is that it is the accepted practice to buy those goods at much higher prices than you would normally pay, serving as a culturally acceptable way of effectively giving financial support
Oh I love these, especially because of the spoken and unspoken meta-traditions around the tradition! Maybe they work similarly to the “speak now or forever hold your peace” thing in human marriage ceremonies. Everyone at a human wedding understands you’re not actually supposed to say anything at that point, it’s just a formality—but you see characters do it all the time in literature and entertainment, because it makes for such a juicy plot twist.
I bet “newborn gets purchased by evil jealous ex-business partner” is a classic plot hook in Ferengi soap operas. It’s their version of getting sold to One Direction.
If your solution to some problem relies on “If everyone would just…” then you do not have a solution. Everyone is not going to just. At not time in the history of the universe has everyone just, and they’re not going to start now.
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Happy Moon Landing Eve! Remember to leave out milk and cookies for Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong, and don’t let Michael Collins convince you to prank NASA!
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i’ve invented a new microwave its called microwave 2. it randomly makes your food colder 9% of the time. don’t worry i’ve already entered your home and replaced your old microwave with it. im very good at technology
researching the history of education in japan and learning that, pre–Meiji Restoration, peasants/commoners formed their own schools to become educated because it was the best way of fighting tax fraud.
That is, when an official told you, a rice farmer, that you owed more taxes than you really did, it was very useful if you were good enough at math to know he was lying (and could prove it) and if you were good enough at writing to write a letter to your government defending your case.
all of which is to say it's crazy that mega-corporations are now pushing education to be "what if you paid us whatever we tell you to for the rest of your life and never do math or write anything ever again"
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