I love you and I want you to live.

Our world map today looks completely different from how it looked a thousand years ago. Nations and empires have risen and collapsed. Wars have been waged over petty bullshit that changed names and borders. Empires that were once thought invincible and perpetual crumbled to dust within a peasant's lifetime as they tilled their fields and worried about crop failure. The invention of flight, motion pictures, and the automobile chased the coattails of WWI and the great depression. Children played mischief games and elders complained about kids these days being too soft and sensitive during the fall of the Roman empire.

I know this, because when I was nineteen and despairing I broke down crying in her arms one day, and I asked her what the point was. Why carry on, when there’s so much wrong in the world? Why keep going, keep trying, when it feels like every battle is insurmountable, and that even when, by some miracle, you win, you don’t get to rest, you just get to fight again? What’s the point, when everything just gets worse all the time?

And she told me, yes, it’s hard. I never thought I’d be forty, let alone fifty. I never thought I’d see retirement. I thought the world would have ended by now. And I thought I had two choices. I could spend whatever time I had despairing, or I could choose to live, in whatever time I had. So I fought, and I lost more battles than I won. But I’ve been happy, too. I’ve had two careers, two children, and a husband I love. I’ve had friends and adventures. I’ve seen the pyramids the coliseum and the place where two oceans meet. I’ve lived. And it was worth it. It’ll be worth it for you, too.

And I thought about that, and what I know about my mum — and you need to know, my mum is cool. She is. She’s a stone cold badass — she protested Thatcher. She went to Pride when it was still a riot because she understood the solidarity even if she didn’t understand the people she was marching with. She went door to door for the Brexit remain campaign.

And, sure. We left the EU. But when she had a daughter who turned out to be a son she showed up for me every time. She toasted Thatcher’s death with a glass of milk and stayed up late telling me stories of her protesting days.

She retired three years ago. She’s in France right now, sending me pictures of hikes she’s taking with my father, and the patisserie she’s going to eat after.

I'm now 36, married to someone great, with one child and another in development. Things did work out for me, but I still have regrets about the career side.

This was a fan cafe that had only previously held an event for TADC. I guess Deltarune must've been super popular or just woefully under prepared (or both) because it seems everything that could go wrong went wrong.

It got delayed by several hours. They apparently ran out of food. The food they did have was cheap and not stored / prepared properly (hence the food poisoning). The food was prepared in what looked like an office space(???). There was an artist alley that was in shambles; pre-orders being unfulfilled, lost sales time and alleged theft. The volunteer(!) cafe workers supposedly worked ridiculous hours with no breaks.