Just a little to the left of sanity...

one: as long as you aren't hurting or, like, being a dick to anyone, just staying in your comfort zone isn't an immoral action. if you just want to read one type of book (or just fanfiction), or just eat one type of food, or just watch one type of movie, or not go to new types of social events, you aren't being a bad person for that, and if people say that, they are soundly wrong and just trying to get a self-righteousness kick.

two: trying new things because you want to expand yourself feels a hell of a lot different than trying new things because you're being forced to. you'll feel better about trying new foods if you know you have a back up familiar one in case you can't stomach the new one, it's easier to read new books if you can experiment with audio versions or reading it in little five-page chunks by yourself, you can breathe a lot easier going somewhere new if you aren't chained there for three hours because your parent is your ride home, etc.

this isn’t to say this will work for everyone, or even most people! i just mean to say that in adulthood, when you have control over yourself, your body, and your company, you can often find out how to expand your own horizons in a fun and controlled way. experiments are much less costly, and failure is easier to shrug off. i’ve added dozens of previously inaccessible foods to my list of things i like now, from mushrooms to coffee, and it’s really improved my life.

Dorothy just wanted something that she could believe in, A gray dustbowl girl in a life she was better off leavin’. She made her escape, went from gray into green, And she could have got clear, and she could have got clean, But she chose to be good and go back to the gray Kansas sky Where color’s a fable and freedom’s a fairy tale lie.

Alice got lost, and I guess that we really can’t blame her; They say she got tangled and tied in the lies that became her. They say she went mad, and she never complained, For there’s peace of a kind in a life unconstrained. She gives Cheshire kisses, she’s easy with white rabbit smiles, And she’ll never be free, but she’s won herself safe for a while.

Susan and Lucy were queens, and they ruled well and proudly. They honored their land and their lord, rang the bells long and loudly. They never once asked to return to their lives To be children and chattel and mothers and wives, But the land cast them out in a lesson that only one learned; And one queen said ‘I am not a toy’, and she never returned.

Mandy’s a pirate, and Mia weaves silk shrouds for faeries, And Deborah will pour you red wine pressed from sweet poisoned berries. Kate poses riddles and Mary plays tricks, While Kaia builds towers from brambles and sticks, And the rules that we live by are simple and clear: Be wicked and lovely and don’t live in fear

       Dorothy, Alice and Wendy and Jane,        Susan and Lucy, we’re calling your names,        All the Lost Girls who came out of the rain        And chose to go back on the shelf.        Tinker Bell says, and I find I agree        You have to break rules if you want to break free.        So do as you like  — we’re determined to be        Wicked girls saving ourselves.

For we will be wicked and we will be fair And they’ll call us such names, and we really won’t care, So go, tell your Wendys, your Susans, your Janes, There’s a place they can go if they’re tired of chains, And our roads may be golden, or broken, or lost, But we’ll walk on them willingly, knowing the cost  — We won’t take our place on the shelves. It’s better to fly and it’s better to die Say the wicked girls saving ourselves.

And I had to think about my safety as a passenger and a woman, but I decided to just tell him: “I was visiting my girlfriend in New York.” And he went quiet, and I was briefly terrified, and then he said, “It’s good here in Canada, for people like us.” AND THEN I FUCKING CRIED OBVIOUSLY.

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These pictures are killing me

This collab was not on my 2023 bingo card