(no subject)

via https://ift.tt/EYFKW8d

trans-cuchulainn https://trans-cuchulainn.tumblr.com/post/709737006665711616/your-nephew-is-cursed-never-to-have-a-wife-of-any :

your nephew is cursed never to have a wife of any race that walks the earth. what do you do:

honestly just leave it. he might be gay anyway https://www.tumblr.com/dashboard/blog/bomberqueen17/709779027899072512

make him a wife out of flowers https://www.tumblr.com/dashboard/blog/bomberqueen17/709779027899072512

she’s technically not his wife if they don’t get married. time to live in sin https://www.tumblr.com/dashboard/blog/bomberqueen17/709779027899072512

invent space travel to get him an alien wife https://www.tumblr.com/dashboard/blog/bomberqueen17/709779027899072512

experiment. what DOES happen if he gets married? https://www.tumblr.com/dashboard/blog/bomberqueen17/709779027899072512 (Your picture was not posted)

(no subject)

via https://ift.tt/wmrEQe8

I think like most things (for me anyway) it’s hardest before you have a word for it. before you know it’s a thing.

I watch my nephew making sense of the world and so much of it is about naming things. naming what it is that he wants, how it is that he wants things to be. when he cries in frustration it’s usually not actually because he can’t have something he wants. it’s because he can’t make you understand what he wants. or how important it is. you become this looming uncomprehending/incomprehensible force that’s not on his side and so much bigger and it’s just unbearable

but if you can name how he’s feeling. if you can say “I know, buddy. I know you really really want to be the one to plug the vacuum cleaner in yourself, and I know you know how. but the outlet can be very dangerous and it’s more dangerous for you than for auntie mac. not because you’re not as good as plugging it in but because your body is so much smaller and things that would only hurt a grownup a little bit can hurt you a lot. so just like you need to let a grownup pick you up and carry you sometimes, you have to let a grownup do a dangerous thing for you sometimes. just for now, while you’re so little.”

he listens! and he doesn’t like it but he gets it. he stops crying and lunging for the outlet. he chills out

and that’s the relief of having a word, a term, a description for what’s going on. you don’t have to be a baby for it to be an absolutely cataclysmic relief when someone says “is this by any chance how you’re feeling?” and they’re RIGHT

and they’re like “understandable! it’s called This and it’s a Thing! we have a flag!”

I’ve always been irritated by how the hans christian anderson story about the ugly duckling gets referenced like it’s a story about being ugly when you’re a child and then turning pretty when you grow up. that’s not what that story is about. the story is about feeling ugly and weird because you’re not like everybody else and you don’t understand why. and when you grow up you realize you weren’t ever actually ugly, or defective. you were just something else. a different kind of bird. that you didn’t know was a thing. you aren’t a weird gross duck. you’re a perfectly normal, actually kind of beautiful, swan. you want to meet some other swans? we have a flag. (Your picture was not posted)