a fool's musings

Boreas by Waterhouse
Fool, said my muse to me,
look in thy heart and write...

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10.17.02 - 3:42 p.m.

finito!

Whee!

Porn is finished and off to betas.

I am a happy girl.

What's that you say? A brief excerpt?

Hmm...

Howsabout some set up?

*nods*

Here's the beginning:

When Rogue finally mastered her mutation, the whole mansion held its breath in anticipation.

Everyone thought that Logan would finally make his move, or that she would be so overjoyed at being able to touch that she'd jump on him and they wouldn't leave her bedroom for days.

So it was something of a shock to them all when nothing changed.

That's not true, either. Things did change. They deteriorated rapidly between Logan and Rogue. The sexual tension between them, which had always been sublimated into a close and loving friendship, was suddenly fraught with an edge that got everyone's attention. You couldn't be a in a room with the two of them without feeling the spark and flare of passion.

But still, they circled each other warily, Logan still afraid he was bad for the woman he'd come to think of as his best friend and soulmate (not that he'd ever use that term, of course), and Rogue still afraid Logan was in love with Jean even if his lingering glances warmed her body and haunted her nights.

Finally, after weeks of tension (which, truth be told, neither Scott nor Ororo much minded, as it kept Jean and Xavier both in a constant state of arousal and made their lives a lot more fun, even if they got less sleep than ever), Jubilee decided to take a hand.

Talking to the frustrated pair was as useful as talking to a brick wall, and she'd read enough romance novels to know that drastic action was required.

So one day, after the oblivious pair had their daily Danger Room session (which brimmed with so much sexual tension that even the non-telepaths in the room found themselves scurrying to find a lover afterwards), Jubilee put her plan into action.

Waiting until Rogue was under the shower, she signaled Bobby, who froze the pipes in the men's locker room, forcing Logan into the women's area to shower.

As soon as Logan entered the stall, muttering to himself about the sad lack of curtains on the men's showers and how come all the women didn't have to get naked together, Jubes sent Kitty into the lockers to steal all their clothes.

The stage was set. Now it was up to the players. Jubilee hoped they didn't screw up their parts.

***

What? You thought I'd part with the porn this early in the relationship? Ha!

~victoria
teasing



link

[current mood: accomplished]
[current music: so tired, I'm tired of waiting, I'm tired of waiting for you...]
[random quote: If Woody had only gone to the police, this never would have happened.]

~*~

10.17.02 - 11:08 a.m.

This time, it's NOT personal

Am attempting to write porn. Het porn.

It's been a long, long time.

Am attempting it from Rogue's POV, which is always more difficult for some reason. I'm still wrestling with that.

I've also been thinking about that whole debate over in LJ about taxonomy of posts and reader responses and ... hmm...

See, the thing is, even if no one were reading this, or if the original 6 people I thought were reading were the only ones who were, I'd still be here, pontificating.

I mean, I can't keep my mouth shut. This is a fact of life. The internet gives me a place to mouth off without forcing everyone around me physically in "meat space" (god I hate that term) to listen to my fannish ramblings. The fact that other fans may or may not be interested in what I have to say is gravy.

Do I sometimes write with a specific goal in mind? Sure.

I like inter-blog discussion, and I will often find that my thoughts on a subject brought up by someone else are too long or too sprawling in scope to fit in the comments of the original poster's LJ/blog, so I write here and then link.

That's what blogs are for, right? Linking?

[TAN] In the fannish community, I don't see the difference between journals/diaries and weblogs. We use the terms interchangeably as far as I can tell, regardless of what the 'outside' blogging/journalling (another term I loathe) world considers to be correct (i.e., weblogs as lists of interesting links, journals/diaries as, well, journals or diaries and places to record one's thoughts), so I'm using the terms interchangeably. Get over it. [/TAN]

(Sorry, just got distracted by this: Djinanna asks: What does Fandom mean to you? Will have to come back to that one.)

Quite a number of people have written about blogging as performance art (Jenn, Peggy, and I are just three that leap to mind immediately, since I think we were all responding to each other), and there definitely is an element of that to it.

I don't write a lot about my personal life, though I do share some stuff that is important or is taking up a lot of time.

For me, this is about Fandom and writing and books and movies and television shows and music and connecting with other people who like what I like, but not exactly.

One of the things I like a lot is discussion. I believe I've mentioned the friend with whom I used to argue discuss every topic under the sun, just because it was our way of having fun, of flirting even.

So most of my posts are in the 'category' of being open invitations to discussion, if people feel the need. I think that one can tell if one is supposed to respond by the nature of the post. I don't see this as a big difficulty.

I *do* read other people's responses before I comment, but only if there was a question asked, because if someone else has already answered it, I'm not going to bother. Ingrained habit from newsgroup days, where whole threads could be devoted to one person asking what Tara's last name was and 45 people answered because nobody looked to see if someone had *already* answered. And that's annoying, yo.

(And there you have part of my answer as to "What is Fandom?" I've long thought - well, 'long' in fannish terms, which is like for 2 years now - that people who are mostly fic writers define fandom much too narrowly, or, perhaps, (and this is possibly unintentional) they forget that there are whole other *worlds* of fannishness that have nothing to do with fic, such as discussion groups, role players, etc. and that fandom should be larger than simply *media* fandom (music fans and sports fans and craft people should also be considered part of Fandom as a larger whole). But I digress, as I too often do.)

So yeah, I read comments sometimes before answering, but if it's a discussion, I don't let the tone of other people's comments stop me from throwing in my 11 cents. I admit to not being as sensitive as some people, and also to being far more open and willing to discuss stuff that other people may find... hmm... how to phrase this?

I think that when it comes to a show or a book or a movie or a ball game, there are no limits on what we can discuss. So if someone posts their review of "Red" or their analysis of Game 5 of the NLCS and I don't agree with it, and I care enough about the subject to have a strong opinion, I'm probably going to wade in, regardless of whether I know you and whether the 15 people before me have agreed with you (all "yous" being generic here).

But as I said, I *like* discussion and have been known to play devil's advocate more than once, or to switch sides in a discussion when the opportunity arises if I think the argument is winding down.

Does this mean, as some people may say, that I'm untrustworthy or shifty? I don't think so, but then again, I also think I'm the nicest person I know, so take that with a grain of salt.

I mean, let's face it - our discussions of whether or not Clark belongs with Lana, Chloe or Lex are not exactly up there with finding a cure for cancer, you know? If I want to play both sides of an argument, no one is getting hurt. And I'm being up front with you right here about it. And if you call me on it in the midst of the discussion, I will own up to it there, as well. Caveat lector and all that.

I think I've been fairly consistent on the main points of contention in the fic-writing arena (e.g., good writing, bad writing, 'it's just a hobby', etc.), though I have been known to listen with an open mind and even change my mind on (rare) occasions if someone is convincing enough in their arguments.

Anyhow, to get back to the original point, and I did have one, I don't think the writer of an LJ or diary is responsible for how people respond to her posts.

Obviously, one can write in such a way as to elicit specific responses ("My dog died." or "I'm pregnant! Woohoo!" to use two extremes), but if one is simply presenting one's opinions in a fannish matter, then one shouldn't be surprised if large numbers of people find out about it and come over to comment, both in agreement and disagreement, or some mixture of the two. Just because I disagree with point A of your post doesn't mean I disagree with Points B-E, or that I think you're a horrible person, a terrible writer or anything else *personal*. It just means I have a different interpretation of point A.

And *this* I think is the biggest problem with capital "F" Fandom-at-large as we know it on the internet (meaning mailing lists, newsgroups, discussion boards, LJ/blogs).

Not everything is a personal attack. In fact, I'd wager that MOST things people say in their blogs and on newsgroups/mailing lists in response to you (still generic), are NOT personal.

If you spell something wrong and I point that out to you (preferably via private email, but if it's a funny misspelling, like "ball" for "bawl", as in, "she balled him out," I can see making that correction publicly, gently, and with a laugh [and have in fact seen that very thing done], and if the person who made the mistake gets all huffy, that ain't my lookout), that doesn't mean I don't like you. It means you spelled something wrong. It's considered helpful where I come from to do this, though I *do* have a tendency to take it to extremes by correcting people's grammar in the middle of conversation (for which I've been yelled at a time or two, believe me), but casual conversation/email/LJ posts are NOT the same thing as fiction.

If I correct your grammar in a story, I really am trying to be helpful, not bitchy. Grammar and spelling, unlike characterization and other such amorphous things, do have rules and right and wrong answers, and most of the time, those are not arguable (exceptions made for ESL people, and speakers of, in my case, British, Canadian or Australian English, with their funky extra "u"s in words where we in the US don't use 'em).

And again, I've digressed.

The thing is, if I post something publicly, and there's a little button below it that says "comments" or "talk to me" or whatever pseudo-witty thing I think is cute at the moment, that means, "comment" or "talk to me" or "share your goddamned opinion if you want to." If I didn't want your comments, I wouldn't enable the function.

On the other hand, if I post a bunch of quiz results or the extremely boring details of my pedicure, no one will probably feel any need to respond, and that's okay too. But if you do want to ask about what color my toenails are, or why I got Languid-Sexy instead of Sporty-Sexy, hey, I will answer you eventually. Unless your comment doesn't seem to require an answer, or if I'm swamped or some other reason that I don't get around to answering.

Again, it's not personal.

If I post a long essay like this one, and no one responds, well, hell, I know my moment in the blogland sun is going to pass, so that's okay, too. But if I do post a long essay like this one, and you have something to say, then say it. Because I wouldn't have five ways to contact me on the damned site if I didn't want you to.

In the end, it's about conversation, and connection, and discussion and fun stuff like that. It's not about trying to score points off each other with our presumed wit or high-class educations. But if you can't see the difference there, I can't help you.

~victoria



link

[current mood: thoughtful, cold]
[current music: I Am Mine - Pearl Jam]
[random quote: \"You have not converted a man because you have silenced him.\" John Morley]

~*~

10.16.02 - 12:16 p.m.

dead letter fic

Rough dead letter fic. Jonathan. Written just a little while ago, after thinking about it on the bus this morning.

Kaddish

You can't save everyone.

We all knew this day would come, Clark, and I want you to know, it's not your fault. There was nothing you could have done. You didn't know that kryptonite was dangerous to humans when you fell into our lives. Please don't blame yourself. The day we found you was one of our happiest days ever. You were the answer to our every wish and prayer, and nothing, not the cancer, the pain, or even death, can change that.

You couldn't save me from the cancer that killed me, but I'm trying to save you from a life of bitterness and guilt.

I'm so proud of you. As proud as any father has ever been of his son. Prouder, even.

You're a good man, and you save lives. Don't blame yourself because you couldn't save mine. We all have to die sometime, and while I know it hurts, we'll be together again someday. Trust me on this, the way you trusted me, even when you didn't think I was right.

I'd like to apologize, too, for the times I was wrong. I made mistakes. I was wrong about Lex, and I only saw that once he became everything I thought he was. And I take the blame for that, as much as anyone.

He killed for me, for you, protected your secret more than once, though he didn't know what it was. He saved lives, too, and all I ever saw was his father. And it shames me, that I let my own pride and anger get in the way of helping that young man become everything he could have been, instead of what he is now.

I know you'll do the right thing, both in stopping Lex and also forgiving him. Tell him I'm sorry.

Tell your mother I love her. Take care of her. She's the best woman, the best *person* I ever knew, and you are so much like her that sometimes I just want to explode with pride at how blessed I was. I am.

And you're blessed, too, son, with gifts and family and love.

Don't ever forget that. Don't let the failures make you forget your successes, because you *are* successful. You're one of the most human -- and humane -- men I ever knew, and I'm just proud that I had a hand in raising you.

I'll always be with you and your mother. So, please, let go of your anger and regret. It's better this way. I'm not a drain on you both, and the pain is gone.

Be at peace, Clark. I am.

~fin

***

And for those interested, a translation of the Kaddish:

May the great Name of God be exalted and sanctified, throughout the world, which he has created according to his will. May his Kingship be established in your lifetime and in your days, and in the lifetime of the entire household of Israel, swiftly and in the near future; and say, Amen. May his great name be blessed, forever and ever. Blessed, praised, glorified, exalted, extolled, honored elevated and lauded be the Name of the holy one, Blessed is he- above and beyond any blessings and hymns, Praises and consolations which are uttered in the world; and say Amen. May there be abundant peace from Heaven, and life, upon us and upon all Israel; and say, Amen.

He who makes peace in his high holy places, may he bring peace upon us, and upon all Israel; and say Amen.

***

As always, comments/suggestions are welcome.

~victoria



link

[current mood: creative]
[current music: Hello, Goodbye - the beatles]
[random quote: \"Yeah, don't that just stick in your craw?\" \"I had my craw surgically removed years ago so I could sleep nights.\"]

~*~

10.16.02 - 9:42 a.m.

Absalom, Absalom, or, The Greatest Novel Ever Written

I was doing some shifting around of bins and such in the apartment last night - managed to free up some more closet space (which I promptly filled with a bin of summer clothes and liquor) and get my end table free of boxes, so a lamp can now sit on it. Also measured *again* to make sure that the couch and chair will fit, and oh god, of course they will because I am a measuring goddess. *nods* Two years of ADA compliance checks and you know how to measure a room, people.

Anyhow, opened the box with the liquor in it (the one that got shoved in the bottom of the closet, 'cause I have nowhere else to keep it) and found my dogeared, underlined copy of Absalom, Absalom. Which is only The Greatest Novel Ever Written.

It's about love and war and death and race and incest and miscegenation and repudiation and troths that didn't plight and fratricide and the rise and fall of the South, and how history is written, both by the winners and losers and how the past never lets go... There is nothing that is not in this book, and you should all run out and read it NOW.

I know a few months back I was nattering on about the quote about woman as the eternal Who-suffers, so I went looking for the passage, and in addition, found some others I love, and that could almost (but not quite) be applied to CLex.

Yeah, that's a sad obsession, but last night was So Gay. I mean, the subtext was rapidly becoming text, you know?

So here are some passages I love, from Absalom, Absalom, The Greatest Novel Ever Written.

Henry, the provincial, the clown almost, given to instinctive and violent action rather than to thinking, ratiocination, who may have been conscious that his fierce provincial's pride in his sister's virginity was a false quantity which must incorporate in itself the inability to endure in order to be precious, to exist, and so must depend upon its loss, absence, to have existed at all. In fact, perhaps this is the pure and perfect incest: the brother realising that the sister's virginity must be destroyed in order to have existed at all, taking that virginity in the person of the brother-in-law, the man whom he would be if he could become, metamorphose into, the lover, the husband; by whom he would be despoiled, choose for despoiler, if he could become, metamorphose into the sister, the mistress, the bride. Perhaps that is what went on, not in Henry's mind but in his soul. Because he never thought. He felt, and acted immediately.
(pages 76-77)

Yet he went to New Orleans. He went straight there, to the only place, the very place, where he could not help but prove conclusively the very statement which, coming from his father, he had called a lie. He went there for that purpose; he went there to prove it. And Bon, riding beside him, trying to find out what Sutpen had told him, --Bon, who for a year and a half now had been watching Henry ape his clothing and speech, who for a year and a half now had seen himself as the object of that complete and abnegant devotion which only a youth, never a woman, gives to another youth or man; who for exactly a year now had seen the sister succumb to that same spell which the brother had already succumbed to, and this with no volition on the seducer's part, without so much as the lifting of a finger, as though it were actually the brother who had put the spell on the sister, seduced her to his own vicarious image which walked and breathed with Bon's body.
(page 85)

[...] and Henry, the countryman, the bewildered, with the subtle tide already setting beneath him toward the point where he must either betray himself and his entire upbringing and thinking, or deny the friend for whom he had already repudiated home and kin and all; the bewildered, the (for that time) helpless, who wanted to believe yet did not see how he could, being carried by the friend, the mentor through one of those inscrutably lifeless doorways like that before which he had seen the horse or the trap, and so into a place which to his puritan's provincial mind all of morality was upside down and all of honor perished -- a place created for and by voluptuousness, the abashless and unabashed senses, and the country boy with his simple and erstwhile untroubled code in which females were ladies or whores or slaves looked at the apotheosis of two doomed races presided over by its own victim -- a woman with a face like a tragic magnolia, the eternal female, the eternal Who-suffers;
(pp 90-91)

[...] it was not Judith who was the object of Bon's love or of Henry's solicitude. She was just the blank shape, the empty vessel in which each of them strove to preserve, not the illusion of himself nor his illusion of the other but what each conceived the other to believe him to be--the man and the youth, seducer and seduced, who had known one another, seduced and been seduced, victimised in turn each by the other, conqueror vanquished by his own strength, vanquished conquering by his own weakness, before Judith came into their joint lives by even so much as girlname.
(p 95)

Have you ever noticed how so often when we try to reconstruct the causes which lead up to the actions of men and women, how with a sort of astonishment we find ourselves now and then reduced to the belief, the only possible belief, that they stemmed from some of the old virtues? the thief who steals not for grief but for love, the murderer who kills not out of lust but pity? Judith, giving implicit trust where she had given love, giving implicit love where she had derived breath and pride: that true pride, not that false kind which transforms what it does not at the moment understand into scorn and outrage and so vents itself in pique and lacerations, but the true pride which can say to itself without abasement I love, I will accept no substitute; something has happened between him and my father; if my father was right, I will never see him again, if wrong, he will come or send for me; if happy I can be I will, if suffer I must I can.
(p 96)

"They live beautiful lives--women. Lives not only divorced from, but irrevocably excommunicated from, all reality. That's why although their deaths, the instant of dissolution, are of no importance to them since they have a courage and fortitude in the face of pain and annihilation which would make the most spartan man resemble a puling boy, yet to them their funerals and graves, the little puny affirmations of spurious immortality set above their slumber, are of incalculable importance."
(p 156)

(All punctuation, spelling and italics are copied exactly from the text.)

God, I love this book.

And I think you can see the influence on my writing... the long, involved sentences, the repetition of words, building, building...

At least, I attempt it. I in no way succeed like Faulkner did.

All must bow before him!

~victoria
Faulkner fangirl



link

[current mood: surprisingly cheerful]
[current music: Radar Love - Golden Earring]
[random quote: Turns might break you god forsake you leave you burned and bruised innocence will teach you what it feels like to be used]

~*~

10.15.02 - 11:36 p.m.

Help and Red

Help and Red thoughts up in the LJ.

And let me just say, thank you, Rebecca Rand Kirschner, for that opening scene.

That's what I'm talking about below.

~victoria



[current mood: sleepy]
[current music: Help! in my head]
[random quote: when I was younger so much younger than today, I never needed anybody's help in any way]

~*~

10.15.02 - 4:54 p.m.

William, William it was really nothing - it was your life

Posted a final version of Running to Stand Still this morning. Since tonight is a big television night, I doubt I'll get to coding it, so it's up in the LJ for those interested in reading it.

Meg and Pete whipped it into shape, though they have problems with the basic premise. Problems I generally agree with, I admit, but dammit, sometimes I just want to write the scene or the story I want to write, and good sense bedamned.

I think I managed to cover those bases, though, at least enough for a fic that's not even 1000 words long.

If I ever write a sequel (and the ending leaves it a possibility), well, *then* I can worry about the bits that are problematic.

In other news, Claritylit is making my head hurt with discussing the ramifications of Spuffy on the entire Buffyverse .

(I'm going to reproduce parts of the discussion here, just for ease of reading.)

It started with with the theory behind my poll, but then I made this remark:
It seems to me that there are a whole lot of ethical/philosophical issues that are thrown into massive chaos by Spuffy (or by looking at Spuffy as a good thing for the characters, rather than as an opportunity for drama and torment, if that makes sense. Internally, I think the Spuffy is awful for Buffy and I hope it doesn't come back, even with Spike having a soul now. Externally, well, as I don't like the pairing, I don't read much fic that contains it, and the little I've skimmed has NOT been of any decent quality, nor has it dealt with all the issues the relationship brings with it Edited to add: I am not looking for recs. I am not looking to insult writers of this pairing, as I know there are many good ones. I. Just. Don't. Like. It.), and those must be dealt with both on the show *and* in any fic dealing with the pairing, and I don't see it happening either place.

And Claritylit answered (in part):
Those issues are the reason I'm a half-hearted Spuffy supporter. The relationship as it is now is icky, but I like the way it's forcing both of them to confront their own personal issues. I'm hoping that S7 will continue that trend, so they both grow as characters, whether or not they end up in smooshy-togetherness.

[snip]

Spike, on the other hand, sees both the Slayer and the person. He admires her physical strength and power, qualities that come along with being the slayer. But he also admires, in a twisted way, her victory over most of her baser impulses and the courage that battle requires. Okay, he tries to destroy that morality, but that's Spike's MO. Take what you love and find its limits.

So I find Spuffy interesting, if not the great love thing. Really, it sounds like the most adult relationship Buffy's had, what with the 'actually having to work problems out.'

Then I said,
Ah, see, I'm not so interested in their relationship issues, as what the whole ensouling of Spike means for the series as a whole.

If there's some guy in Africa who can put a soul in vampires, why isn't he being used? Now, let's forget my whole position on why ensouling vampires is morally wrong (believe me, you don't want to hear it); just from a practical POV, it makes slaying a heck of a lot easier if you've just got a bunch of depressed mopey pig's-blood eating vamps than if you've got the regular soulless fiend kind, right?

And what about Spike? I don't personally think he was on his way to redemption prior to getting back his soul, and I don't think that's what he went seeking, despite what he says now.

But let's say it is, that I buy the canon interp. that ME is foisting on us.

Has Buffy just been a serial killer lo these many years? If vampires can change *without* a soul, can seek redemption and try to do good, then what the hell is she doing staking them right out of the ground?

That calls the whole ethical structure of the Buffyverse into question, and honestly, I don't think it's supposed to. I don't think Joss et al. have thought this all the way through.

As you can see, I was once a True Believer in the Church of Joss, but I've since become a Heretic.

I don't believe Joss Is God (not that I'm saying Claritylit does, mind you. I'm just saying that while I once had a great deal of trust in him and the ME writing staff, those days are long gone and have been since, oh, the ridiculously contrived make-up in the elevator shaft scene in Primeval. Possibly even before that in the horrid sexathon that was WTWTA, which was only saved by Xander's heroics and Giles's guitar from being the Worst Episode Ever. [Yeah, Ted still has that distinction, closely followed by Enemies, The Wish, BatB (from when the show was really good) and then WTWTA, Doublemeat Palace, and most of the Initiative arc eps.]).

I certainly don't believe he is as ... rigorous with continuity as his fans are, and well, he's got three shows to get out, so I can forgive some slack.

Some.

It's just that retconning major tenets of your universe 5-6-7 years in just grrr… I wouldn't stand for it in a book and it irritates me to no end on the show. (And let's not even get into the way Angel muddies the waters.)

And really, if vampires can change (and having watched School Hard recently, I have to laugh at the number of things Spike says that are just flat-out contradicted later on in his whole, "We're demons, man! We don't change. You were my sire, my Yoda" speech), then the Initiative was right after all, and chipping and training vampires is the way to go, if you can set them free in "the wild" once they can no longer harm humans. Then, if the Slayer catches them doing something bad, she can stake them.

Of course, that gets even more tangled if they're able to change without a soul, because then you're experimenting not on evil creatures who you'd just kill, but on sentient beings who can change and become contributing members of society.

See, this is why I'm with Xander - Vampires are bad. End of story.

*g*

Now, you (generic) may argue that

1. Maybe the CoW doesn't know what the hell they're talking about when they say vampires are bad, bad, bad to the bone, and that they didn't know about Angel, were wrong about Spike (another retcon on his age. Grr.) etc. and I can't refute that, but when the knowledge is presented as being the basis for the whole damn show, some of it at least must be accepted as truth in the Buffyverse.

and

2. That Buffy has always been sort of a live and let unlive Slayer, only attacking when she saw an attack already in progress (or, in later seasons, only when someone she cared about was being attacked - another pet peeve of mine), but what about all the vamps she's staked right out of the ground? And we know she patrols every night, as did the Scoobs while she was gone, so I'm going to extrapolate and say there have been a hell of a lot of vamps who never made it more than halfway out of the grave before they were dust.

I've run out of gas on this particular segment, so let's leave it at that for now.

Then ClarityLit said:
Spike's generally been the person with the clearest, most basic, vision on the show, monsters and humans. I think to have that character, even if it's not *exactly* him, discard that image is more powerful than having Angel say, "It's not all it's cracked up to be."

And I've just had muddled thoughts on clarity of vision, and how William doesn't have that quality of Spike's, and the suggestion that humans are psychologically/emotionally incapable of seeing reality enough to get to the heart of a situation with such painful precision. And I'm wondering if ME means to do that (if it were Joss I would be sure he did) or whether I'm reading too much into it. Except that Anya's trauma would seem to bear that theory out, since, having been tainted by humanity, she sees the grey areas. Hmm... Get back to me about that, won't you, Vic? I'm sure you can figure it out for me.

See, they do this to me and they KNOW I'll fall for it, even as I try not to.

Sigh.

Anyhow, it's not *just* Spike who has the clear vision. It's the villains. The villains on Buffy always seem to have more insight into the heroes than the heroes do.

Look at the Mayor's speech to Angel in... Choices, is it? About how he and Buffy will never be able to have a real, good relationship.

Drusilla gets inside Angel's head pretty well, as does Darla.

Faith nails some of Buffy's most glaring character flaws, and Anya, as a demon, and Cordelia, as the Queen Bitch, each have their moments of clarity where they point out what *we* as the audience know but seems to be constantly eluding the characters.

Even Evil!Veiny!Willow cut right to the heart of the matter with Buffy and Dawn.

Spike's just around more, and he was a poet (even if an awfully bad one), which means he ought to have some insight into other people, right? So that's why it seems like Spike is the only one who has any idea what the hell is really going on with Buffy, Willow, Dawn, even Anya and Xander on occasion. Also, once he's chipped and 'harmless', people seem to confide in him. "Whisper in the dead man's ear, that doesn't make it real," right?

It may be that the amorality/selfishness of the villains allows them to see those traits clearly in others, to know and speak about the darker parts of ourselves that we all try to hide. Buffy et al. especially.

It may be, in the case of the Mayor and Angelus (who was way better in knowing what makes people than tick Angel is, even if he has a tendency to play around and not get the job done. And there are lots of lovely theories about the relationship between the demon and the soul in Angel and how it seems that the demon is the one who is smart and ambitious and artistically talented, while Liam was just an overgrown fratboy, but that's neither here nor there atm) and Spike and Darla, et al., they've just been around long enough to see people as they really are, whereas most people are still living with their illusions.

I do think that that's deliberate on the part of the writers. I also think that the characters who aren't emotionally involved see things much more clearly, as is the case in real life. Say what you want about BtVS-Wesley, but he was *right* about the Box of Gavrok in Choices and he was *right* about Faith's strategy in GD. I think that rightness, that ability to analyze and weigh lives and going ahead with the 'good fight' even when he knows there are going to be massive losses, is one of Wes's great qualities, and one that got him into the sitch he's in now.

I also think that vampires are far more capable of seeing nuances and shades of gray than 'regular' demons are (whether or not all the demons in 'our dimension' really are all 'tainted' with humanity - the Scourge would have us believe otherwise, but who the hell knows? I try to forget most of Hero except for poor Doyle's demise), and Anya's stint as a human has definitely made life as a demon harder for her, as you rightly point out. But she and Cordelia both had a knack for cutting to the heart of the matter, even if they weren't always correct.

It's an interesting dichotomy to set up, where the villains know and understand more about the heroes than the heroes do.

And in a perfect bit of synchronicity, "Sympathy for the Devil" is on the radio right now.

And because it makes me think of Spike nowadays, some lyrics:

The rain falls hard on a humdrum town
this town has dragged you down
oh the rain falls hard on a humdrum town
this town has dragged you down

And everybody's got to live their life
and God knows I've got to live mine
God knows I've got to live mine

William, William, it was really nothing
William, William, it was really nothing
it was your life

How can you stay
with a fat girl who'll say:
"Would you like to marry me
and if you like you can buy the ring"
she doesn't care about anything
"Would you like to marry me
and if you like you can buy the ring"
I don't dream about anyone
except myself

William, William, it was really nothing
William, William, it was really nothing
It was your life...

~victoria



link

[current mood: thoughtful]
[current music: Sympathy for the Devil - Stones]
[random quote: all the cops are criminals and all the sinners saints...]

~*~

10.15.02 - 10:26 a.m.

a momentary job rant

May I bitch for a moment?

So I do this IR thing as part of my job, right? It's supposed to be minor, a handful of calls a week, just direct them to the appropriate person to handle their question, etc.

There's a 3rd quarter earnings report today, so there will probably be a bunch of calls.

Well, the guy who's the main go-to guy on answering the questions? He's away.

This is the second time he's done this.

He disappears on vacay without giving me the information I need to answer the simplest questions, and then I have to scramble for it while people are on hold and grr... It just pisses me off.

I don't mind doing the job, but I would like to be *prepared* for god's sake.

~victoria



link

[current mood: cranky]
[current music: Heartbreaker - Stones]
[random quote: Beer! Had the earliest morality developed under the influence of beer, there would be no good or evil, there would be 'kind]

~*~

10.15.02 - 1:12 a.m.

bookshelves

Did I mention I found my bookcases at Hold Everything?

I'd share a link, but they don't have any of their merchandise on their site. Nimrods.

Anyhow, after dreaming about shopping for bookcases all night last night (I kid you not), I went this morning and looked 'em over. I'm going to have to figure out how to get 'em home, though, or if they have Saturday delivery, because I can't carry them on the bus, and I can't take another day to wait for delivery. And they have to be here in put together before the couch comes, so I need to do it soon.

Sigh.

I'm going to bed now.

Sweet dreams, y'all.

Night!

~victoria

[current mood: sleepy]
[current music: silence]
[random quote: \"It's devastating. He's turned into a sixteen-year-old boy. Of course you'll have to kill him.\" Giles, BtVS]

~*~

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The painting is "Boreas" by John William Waterhouse. Again, not a muse, but I like her. She suits the color scheme.

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