ao3 @ vipertooths

source: New York Magazine

For the purposes of this analogy the child is shit at colouring in, because I only wanted to give the general idea.

So, we can all agree that the child who draws a house probably isn't trying to communicate anything in particular other than “look at this cool house I drew”, right?

Cool.

So… Why is it seemingly in the middle of nowhere, when most children live in houses with neighbours?

Why is the main body a square and the roof a solid triangle when that doesn't look like any house that has ever been built anywhere?

Why does it have a wood-burning stove with smoke actively coming out of the chimney, even though the sun indicates warm weather?

Why is the sun smiling? Why is it yellow?

Answer: because the child has seen picture books, and films, and the drawings of other children, and has on some level absorbed that this is what a house is meant to look like.

Face to face, the child almost certainly wouldn't know where to begin communicating “yellow is a colour culturally associated with happiness and warmth, and two dots accompanied by a curved line symbolically represent a smiling human face, so I have combined these attributes with the sun to convey that it is a very warm and pleasant day”.

Or “historically most houses in my country used fire for heat and cooking, and even though this is no longer the case for the majority of households, most media portrayals of houses are inspired by other, older, media portrayals and therefore include the chimney. I have chosen to follow this trend.”

Or even, “I have poor motor control because of my age, and large, 2 dimensional shapes are easier to draw than anything involving detail and perspective”.

Yet this is all information that you can pick up from detailed study of the house drawing.

Ultimately, it's not about what the writer intended. That's what the whole death of the author thing means.

Felt spurred to advertise my game again. Go play it if you support trans people!

Old Haunts

The tenth annual Dean/Cas Pinefest is officially open for registration!

Now entering its tenth year, DCPF is an annual big-bang style challenge for authors & artists in the Destiel corner of SPN fandom.

Since 2016, this little community has come together to share a staggering 10.6 million words of Destiel fic, and close to a thousand accompanying works of art. It's truly a joy to see what everyone creates every year, and we can't wait for this next round to begin!

Registration will remain open from now until September 30th for authors, with fic drafts & claims information due by November 30th.

Artists may continue to sign up until November 30th, and will have several days to peruse all available fics ahead of anonymous claims on December 6th.

After claims, author/artist teams will have roughly 3 months to complete their fics and artwork before posting commences on pi(e) day – March 14, 2026!

And to mark the occasion of our tenth year, we're introducing themed badges for authors and artists who hit certain milestones during the challenge, as well as the Evergreen Mini-Challenge! This is a series of optional creative challenges that can be filled beyond the usual scope of fic and art. Think of it like a pine-scented, destiel-themed GISH, with more open prompt parameters and a much less stressful time frame.

You can find further details on the Evergreen Mini-Challenge here -- and you're welcome to take part even if you don't sign up for the main part of the challenge!

Full details about the challenge rules, requirements, and schedule can be found via the links at the bottom of this post, and you can register here.

Happy pining, everyone!