just one more page

being in the shower: there is no past and there is no future, there is just the here and now, i am alone but i am not lonely, i am calm and one with the universe, existence is sublime

Anakin Skywalker is such a Gordian knot of issues that if you want to have a genuine analysis of his character and where everything went wrong, you kind of have to address all of it:

You have to acknowledge he was a slave child until he was 9. Acknowledge that the dehumanization and lack of control left such a gigantic stain on Anakin’s psyche that he can’t even go to tattooine without getting angry

You have to acknowledge that Qui-gon, who was rooting for him and willing to rush Kenobi through the trials just to teach him, who was always in his corner, died. Not only that, but that Obi-wan wasn’t ready to take him on due to grieving qui-gon, but took him on anyway to honor his dead master.

You have to acknowledge that palpatine was doing his damndest to sink his teeth into Anakin since they met on Naboo. That a lot of Anakin’s behavior can be traced back to the way that palps has been trying to corrupt this kid and subjugate him, that nobody noticed because…well, the Sith have been dead for 1000 years and obi-wan killed the last one, why would anybody suspect palpatine?

You have to acknowledge that, due to all of these factors, Anakin massacred a tusken tribe. Watching his mom die, palpatine’s grooming, hell, even a lack of understanding of the Jedi code you could say, caused him to think murder, even of innocents, was okay. Yes, the decision was made in emotional duress, but also…Anakin still had a choice. He could’ve left the Tuskens alone, keeping that grief on a leash until he could bury his mother, and then let it out in a healthy way.

But he didn’t. He chose the immediate, convenient option: murder.

And then before he can properly process everything, before he can genuinely realize what he did was wrong (which he almost does at the larses), he’s thrust into saving Obi-wan, and then the war.

Part of me wonders if he ever got cognitive dissonance from leading the clones.

Part of me wonders if palpatine nipped that in the bud when he caught wind of it.

The thing is, Anakin has a hierarchy of people he cares about:

Palpatine and Padme on top, obi-wan and Ahsoka in the middle, Rex, the clones, and the Jedi third, and then the rest of the galaxy last.

This comes in clutch when he falls: he listens to palpatine’s machinations because this is the guy that he trusts, right? Palpatine’s never gonna lead him astray, right?

Anakin struggles with being a part of a group, feeling like he can’t be like that with the Jedi because he wasn’t raised from toddlerhood by them (at least, I believe). In the movie:

He feels that he should be put at the same position of respect as the rest of the masters, but they won’t do that because they know he’s not ready for the responsibility

Yoda (due to not having the context that Anakin’s worried Padme will die in childbirth) accidentally invalidates Anakin’s emotions by telling him that if she dies, she dies

Is told by the Jedi that he has to spy on palpatine (his friend!) because they fear he’s gathering as much power as he can (because he is)

It’s just little chinks in the armor.

Then, palpatine swoops in and assuages Anakin that Padme can be saved: all he has to do is learn sith powers, and she can be healed!

Throughout the movie, it’s just a slow roll of isolating Anakin from people he trusts, until by the end, Palp has him desperate to be his sithly apprentice.

But again, Anakin has a choice: he could’ve killed palpatine when the man revealed himself as the sith, he could’ve not killed mace either.

But he did.

Because the moment palpatine told him there was a way to save Padme, he had Anakin hook, line, and fucking sinker.

This is why attachments are bad. They’re not love, they’re desperation, clawing at your feet, sinking their teeth into you and filling your head with fear and paranoia.

Anakin didn’t tell yoda about his marriage because he knew Yoda would consider it an attachment, and scold him about it. He didn’t tell obi-wan about the depth of his dreams in ep II because he thought that as a Jedi, the concern of his mom dying would be considered an attachment and that the Jedi wouldn’t take him seriously.

But again, it was his choice to not give them the full context, because he was embarrassed that he wouldn’t be considered a true Jedi.

And that embarrassment, fear, possessiveness, everything, has left its bloodstains.

I don’t even know why I’m writing this, Anakin’s not even my favorite character, it’s just.

I’m tired of seeing fics where people boil him down to just “annoying idiot that everyone in his immediate vicinity tolerates because something something obi wan something something chosen one”

(And I have my problems with how fandom treats obi-wan so if you wanna hear them, lemme know)

I’m tired of people using the fact that he’s doomed to become darth Vader to just write him off and and do nothing of interest with.

Let him be happy! Let Cody or Rex or the Jedi or bail or whoever be genuinely interested in what he has to say!!! Let him be an interesting character and have him play with the other interesting characters!!!

hollanov x not the one ✨

You are chased out of your village the moment your powers bloom at fifteen years old, and the skies turn black with your fear. A rock hits you between your shoulder blades just as you make it to the main road and you stumble, falling to your knees in a mud puddle at the very moment the skies open up.

“She’s cursing us!” the midwife who delivered you screams over the thunder. “She’s damning us with her!”

Your mother is crying, but she doesn’t raise a hand to help you. She did everything she could, keeping your Role a secret all these years. She won’t risk anymore with another little girl to take care of.

No one tells you that you have a choice. No kind stranger drags you out of the rain and into the warmth of their home where a wise sage tells you it is not how we are born, but what choices we make.

Instead, you take the little pack your mother hid for you in the depths of the forest and sling it over your shoulder. There’s money, provisions, and more wraps to cover the evil mark on your left bicep.

“Your destiny will find you,” your mother told you only hours ago. “I forgive you for it.”

She meant the words as a comfort, but you only heard condemnation in it. Without having killed so much as a fly, she is already blessing you with forgiveness.

This piece has been rotting in my art folder for months now and I finally figured out how I Wanted to color/render Dinraal.

Shane starts getting grays at 35, so by 45 he is a salt-and-pepper kING. It makes for a distinguished photograph on his memoir. He has a ghostwriter, obviously, how do you expect him to just sit and write all day? He writes the chapter about his and Ilya's rivalry though, only at the end of the chapter is he like "And we were married in the summer of 2021 with a honeymoon in Spain. He's the best person I know." after just a dry comparison of all their stats Pre-Centaurs.

One child. Boychild. Shane's genes and a Russian name. Conceived via surrogacy after Ilya retires first due to busted ass knee syndrome. Child enjoys hockey. Not great at it. Looooves playing the oboe in school band. Shane checks it out and AS IT TURNS OUT the oboe is a difficult, competitive instrument. They proceed with characteristic intensity, as if this was athletics. Son, you're gonna win at the oboe.

Ilya needs glasses. He just steals Shane's off his face and it's a whole ritual that ends in them kissing. Boychild is mortified every time they're trying to read a take-out menu.

Shane gets into hockey commentary/podcasting and is notoriously. Um. Not Nice. A lot of "What?? What did I say??" It's never personal though. Just about players' shitty game.

Ilya is Big. Chunky. He's glorious. Muscle that now has fat over it. Arms like tree trunks. Torso: round. 100% Naturalized Canadian Citizen Beef. Hair, everywhere. Shane must BITE to check it all out and make sure everything is in order.

Shane gets really into individual athletics- rock climbing, marathons before he also gets busted ass knee syndrome, biking, swimming, anything where it's like testing the limits of his body against himself. Ilya is like a "fifty push-ups every day keeps me in shape enough to fuck you right" kind of guy, but he joins in sometimes just to make Shane get furious with competition

New rookie/juniors player billeting every year once boychild goes to music conservatory so they build a whole separate wing for the youngsters so it doesn't interfere with empty-nest fucking

Once they hit 50 they do get up stupid early like old men do and have old man coffee shop time with David Hollander (professional boring old man) at their favorite diner. Shane really cherishes this time with his dad and makes it a point to do it as often as they can. Conversely, they build Yuna a mother in law house when David passes away (death comes for us all) and she becomes crazy hockey mom to all their rookies.

Shane is terrorising the local birdwatching community

Ilya is personally if inadvertently responsible for at least four divorces among his kid's schoolmate's parents

every time they attend a Centaurs game they end up on kiss cam (which isn't even a THING Shane is convinced they do this just to fuck with him) and they always pretend to be reluctant and roll their eyes and oh, fine, if you insist *smooch* *deafening cheers*

if you are making something featuring multiple flags and you put in the asexual flag, you better put in the aromantic flag.

if you put in the aroace flag, you better put in the aroallo flag.

^ the aromantic flag

^ the aroallo (aromantic allosexual) flag

& just btw, aromantic erasure is so bad that on pubmed, many of the very few studies that have looked into aspec people specifically, categorize us as a type of asexuality. from this study:

Our findings highlight that aromantic people wish for aromanticism not to be considered a part of asexuality—a practice that has dominated contemporary literature (Antonsen et al. 2020; Carvalho & Rodrigues, 2022; Clark & Zimmerman, 2022; Hall & Knox, 2022; Zheng & Su, 2018). Many participants clarified the distinction between their sexual identity and romantic identity and highlighted that though they may be connected for some, they should be considered independently as unique contributors to an individual’s identity and experience. This aligns with a previous aromantic community survey that showed 72% of the sample did not identify with asexual terminology (AUREA, 2021a). In combination with our findings, this suggests that a tendency to conflate and describe these identities as the same or linked may be to the disadvantage of a significant portion of the aromantic community.

this is why it is so important to include aromantic people as our own group and to specifically include non-asexual aromantics. i hope y'all can understand how frustrating it is to be erased through a group that is already erased.

asexual representation is sparse? all aromantic rep is asexual and most of the time people don't even bother to remember that "aromantic" is its own thing. i can't count how many times i've seen a character talk about not experiencing romantic attraction, only for people to go "wow asexual rep!" even though sexual attraction was never brought up.

asexual community & resources are sparse? when i try to look up groups for aromantics, i get resources on "ace & aro groups" that are literally all asexual-focused. at best asexual-focused with a mention of aromantic people. which isn't really helpful when you are aroallo and don't really want or need a group that is clearly meant for alloro asexuals and aroaces.

asexual history is sparse? i've literally never seen anything even trying to talk about aromantic history. the most impactful thing on aro history is that one tumblr post talking about a woman at a nursing home who heard the term and realized her best friend was likely aro. see above with the character situation as well.

my point here is not "aros have it worse than aces" because we are both aspec and both get fucked over by the same forces and in fact, a LOT of asexual aromantics are also very frustrated by aromantic erasure! i've even heard some people talk about not identifying as strongly as asexual, even though it fits them, because they feel their aro identity is more important to them but gets constantly erased by their asexuality.

my point is that it is so fucking disheartening to be aro even in queer spaces that are trying to be asexual-inclusive, even in supposedly aspec spaces, because it swiftly becomes apparent that people see your entire identity as just a footnote for asexuality. so many people never even realize they are aro because they aren't asexual and don't realize that you can be aro but not ace. i dealt with some really intense arophobia as a teen after realizing i was aro, feeling broken and alone. it hit much harder than any internalized homophobia or transphobia did for me at the time. i did not meet another person who identified as aromantic irl until this year. any resources and community that i had as a queer teen, as a trans teen, did not exist for me as an aro teen and does not exist for me as an aro adult, really.

and big problem is that, because people think of aromanticism as just a footnote of asexuality, they implicitly assume that more asexual rep, more asexual resources, more asexual visibility will automatically serve aromantics too. and when it doesn't work like that, aro people continue to suffer as a result.

• holding ilya’s hand while they cross a busy street full of hazards (potholes, roadworks, etc)

• rescuing ilya from kidnappers (he kicks down the door)

• rescuing ilya from a burning building (bridal carry)

• fighting in a gladiatorial ice hockey arena for ilya’s hand in marriage

• massaging ilya’s bad knee and ilya says with wonderment “wowww wow. shane you’re so good at this… you are better than every physical therapist on earth probably”

• saying “he asked for no pickles” to the mcdonalds cashier

• carrying ilya’s bags

• washing ilya’s hair

• applying o’keefes working hands cream to ilya’s calluses

the gentleness that comes, not from the absence of violence, but despite the abundance of it