K, they/them vel sim.
109 posts
people refuse to understand the concept of "this isn't important to me but i understand why it might be important to other people"
A Brazilian opossum being presented to Queen Isabella of Spain in the year 1500 from The Zoogoer v.15:no.1 (1986).
Full text here.
like, okay, this clearly would have been a better post with excellent hires photos to illustrate it, but like. i'm still thinking about the beautiful rich black-tipped chestnut of the (huge!!) tail feathers and the bronze-and-verdigris of the breast and the way the down trailed up the back of its mostly-naked little neck and head like a tiny turkey mohawk, and the smooth sudden grace with which it flew up to perch on the railing, like a cat gathering itself and then in one smooth sudden motion: transit! only the creature is a zeppelin; and how facing away from me with the wind ruffling its feathers up in great soft ridges it looked like nothing so much as an enormous, astonishing pinecone…
holy shit turkey on the deck. god they’re SO beautiful and SO shockingly large. junoesque
holy shit turkey on the deck. god they’re SO beautiful and SO shockingly large. junoesque
i was just thinking earlier in vague terms about a specific but weirdly prevalent thing which consistently bugs me, namely: when cis men attempt to be self-deprecating about their unfamiliarity with feminine things, except that of course it's not actually self-deprecating to bring up how categorically distant you are and have always been from a stigmatized practice…
and then ran into this post, in which a presumably-white anon attempts to be self-deprecating about their unfamiliarity with the racialized genres of hip hop and rap (specifically by characterizing themself as a[n implicitly uncool] 'blorbo enjoyer,' which of course—as @batmanisagatewaydrug correctly points out—has the knock-on effect of framing fandom as Not For People of Color, which, not to put too fine a point on it, is racist), which illustrates exactly the same dynamic along a different axis…
anyway i guess my point here is just (1) to note that yeah, this really does seem to be a pattern! and given that, (2) to underscore in my own mind that this is probably something for nerds vel sim. in particular to look out for, because we often have insecurity modifiers that makes us feel like we're not ~really~ solidly part of the privileged group, which seems to make us feel like disclosing our ignorance can somehow constitute a self-deprecating self-own, rather than an offputting humblebrag about the privilege that made it possible…
Chameleon by Mansur Mughal, c.1612
spent almost five hours clearing up my floordrobe and excavating my off-season bins and making decisions abt clothes i don’t wear and i’m not even done 😩
Feeling a little fashionable? You simply must check out this dahling little book! Put on your finest frock, your furriest scarf, and oh, mustn’t forget your monocle! The book is bound with blue snakeskin and the front cover is bordered by seed pearls, with an inlaid gem accenting the second E in in “Erté.” The box is made of sterling silver lined with black calfskin with a tassel attached to the hook.
Published in 1984 by Rebecca Press, Erté Maquettes had 200 Deluxe editions made. According to the colophon, this is copy number 15. It contains a selection of 44 creations by the artist Erté, who drew hundreds of covers for Harper’s Bazaar in the early 20th century without a single rejection, using the style of Art Nouveau. Many of the paintings in this book were never reproduced, however, offering a unique chance to get to know another side of Erté.
SMITH NE2233.5.E77 1984b
--Theo P.
"A growing number of people are and have been questioning the more usual representations of gender. Some have had chemical and surgical enhancement, and many have not. Inhabiting a less static gender identification than that of typical transsexuals, they are exploring and experiencing a fluid range of gender embodiment. My own intimate partner, Kayt is one such individual. Ironically it has been through knowing and loving her that I have gained an even deeper understanding of the mutable soul. Her flexible consciousness has encouraged me to be generous in my thinking, and less rigid about the way others self-define, or in fact, when they choose not to" - Body Alchemy: Transsexual Portraits (1996) by Loren Cameron
(as a compulsive sourcer, i feel compelled to note that this is apparently the chapel choir of pembroke college, cambridge, conducted by anna lapwood, and that in 2020 they released an album called 'all things are quite silent' which includes this track and also a bunch of other really gorgeous pieces like elizabeth poston's setting of 'jesus christ the apple tree' my eternally beloved <3)
happy sunday. may I offer you this absurdly beautiful piece of music about it.
thinking abt like. [unfortunately?] i'm really not immune to the thing where somebody does something that bugs you and then you find out they have Condition That Makes Them Do Things That Bug You and you feel more forgiving about it even though like. technically what information do you have that you didn't have before…
Die Mimik der Tethys (The Expressions of Tethys) is a high sea buoy (last was in Pinacoteca Agnelli, Turin, 2024), that is suspended in space and moves synchronously to another buoy in the Atlantic Ocean near Nantes. Continuously transmitting motion data via satellite to its relocated double, the information guides eight electric motors and cable winches, which precisely reproduce the buoy's movement in the ocean. The buoy functions as a hypnotising machine that inevitably leads to the idea of waves lapping around inside the exhibition space, creating an ocean in the minds of people.
Video source
Idea sent by @macfanatic, thanks for it <3
[frustrated? that] i can't seem to encounter comments/attitudes that feel weirdbad* to me without feeling a need to seek reassurance that i'm being reasonable in finding them weirdbad
like yet again this is presumably a leftover artifact of the incessant messaging i got growing up that none of my re/actions were ever reasonable
but it's like. well. (a) it feels like weakness of character to me. like. why can't i just have the courage of my own convictions without needing someone else to reinforce them. (see previous para.) (b) even if we accept that this is an understandable ['if undesirable,' i immediately mentally add, but. table that question for now ig.] urge in the abstract, in practice it's like. well. my social situation lately is such that the various people towards whom i tend to direct bids of this kind will reject them at least half the time. so whether or not it's understandable: it's not viable
plus then of course it also feels like. why do i have to be SO quick to shrug off whatever the weirdbad opinion is, instead of just. sitting calmly with it for a little while. experiencing it. practicing some calm curiosity instead of agitated rejection, like that one post suggested.
unfortunately i think a lot of this stuff is like. well it's about how unsafe and insecure i feel all the time. like it's a bit idiotic to be sitting here going 'huh why am i acting so anxious when. my most crucial social bonds are as attenuated as they are and my current situation doesn't remotely lend itself to forming more.' like. obvious answer is obvious and also quite frankly i'm correct to be anxious about that!! if i were more securely socially enmeshed i could probably Practice Chillness better because these interactions would take up only the tiny fraction of my mental social map they ought to be taking up, instead of looming enormously large in a barren landscape and becoming disproportionately high-stakes as a result!
so like. diagnosing myself with shit life syndrome ig, lol
⸻ * using this as a very broad catchall term for a range of things that spans, like, 'actual bigotry' on the one end and 'someone being imo-too-flippant abt something in a way that makes me wonder if they realize i'm personally impacted by it' on the other end
Preoccupied by the way polyamory is treated with hate. I've gotten hate for even approaching the subject in the past. There's so much violent rhetoric and ideation surrounding it, so much genuine bigotry and prejudice towards people who practice it. But if you mention that, you get met with dismissal. It's not a big deal. You're taking it too seriously. Who gives a shit. Get over yourself. It is something that people respect so little that they refuse to even see it as a legitimate identity. Even left-wing progressive types will make jokes tantamount to thrashing blue-haired SJW snowflakes when it comes to polyamory. They're gross. They're weird. They're always cringe. It's never the people you want to be poly. I would rather kill myself. You'd think simply changing the structure of a relationship wouldn't be a problem, but even the most ardent defenders of equality can begin to say some pretty awful shit. Problem is, fundamentally, it is not seen as legitimate. It's not seen as deserving respect. There's all this handwringing about how these relationships are doomed to fail in order to justify this kind of thought and speech. It's bizarre to watch unfold. Frankly, it's the same sentiment and a lot of the same jokes as those cracked about nonbinary people. We're at a point where we've firmly accepted that everyone has a right to do what they want within the structure of social norms, you can take any side you want and do it with whoever you want. But as soon as you step outside of those norms, as soon as you go beyond the boundaries of social convention to find what suits you personally, everybody becomes a bitter reactionary.
New Project time :)
made it to the transfer station before it closed (task i have been failing at for a week) AND nothing leaked in the car on the way over (despite decomposition of compostables very definitely having commenced) AND there was a hot butch there (presumably my reward from a sometimes-benevolent universe) 👍
a groove-billed ani doodle digital / photoshop 2025
White-crested Laughingthrush (Garrulax leucolophus), family Leiothrichidae, order Passeriformes, India
photograph by Latika Das
"marriage is the ONLY way to get these protections" "there is NO WAY to hack a legal arrangement to cover everything that marriage grants" "kiddos you don't remember what it was like before we could get married, we finally got rights because we could get married" Okay But You Recognize Why That's Bad, Right. Like that is really, really bad that you have to enter a specific type of relationship to get legal rights. That is A Problem. You recognize that that is Not A Good Thing, Right
Oops!... I Did It Again
genuinely wild how often i realize i’ve taken an interpersonal situation where the information i actually have is ‘i’m not having a good time’ and turned it into ‘i’m worried they’re not having a good time with me’
probably ultimately very straightforwardly traceable back to a childhood in which i wasn’t having a good time with my mother and the only variable in the situation that i actually had the power to alter was myself, so that now when as an adult i’m having a bad time with someone my instinct is still to fix myself instead of, you know, removing myself? or alternatively checking in with them about how things are feeling to them and attempting to arrive at a meeting of the minds, or at least a mutually semi-satisfactory compromise?
anyway like. this failure mode probably implies a particular menu of followup actions that i ought to be identifying and instituting, but i’d frankly settle for just ‘recognizing this particular self-abnegating reframing when i’m in the process of committing it’!
tfw you're concerned that you might have been a little gauche, but unfortunately, seeking reassurance abt it would… also be gauche…
[IDs: (1) Nine brands of butter substitute with increasingly desperate names:
is it butter?
isn't it butter
Could it be Butter?
I Think It Tastes Like Butter
You'd Think It's Butter!
What, not butter!
Unbelieveable… This is not butter
who needs butter!
Memories of Butter
and (2) a tag by Tumblr user @stripedtabbycat that reads:
#the emotional journey evoked by reading these in order is beautiful
/end IDs]
This is one of my favorites hand down
[ID: Tweet by @ppyowna that reads:
born to be a hater but forced to understand where you're coming from
/end ID]
kinda funny that my body hair is just like every other aspect of me in being poised precisely between 'will get funny looks' by hegemonic standards and 'pfft, you think that invisible shit counts?' by counterculture ones
Tricycle Gang in Brooklyn, New York City (1930s)