[grabs your shirt] listen. listen to me. the practical is holy. the everyday is sacred. the simple act of surviving is divine. do you get it? sanctity begins at home, in the hands that build and the lives we live and the deaths we die and the worms that eat our bodies. if making something by hand is not worthy of veneration then nothing is.
i’m AWARE this is a stupid hill to die on, but like. trope vs theme vs cliché vs motif vs archetype MATTERS. it matters to Me and i will die on this hill no matter how much others decide it’s pointless. words mean things
trope:1) the use of figurative language for artistic effect; includes allegories, analogies, hyperbole, & metaphors, among others. 2) commonly reoccurring literary devices, motifs, or clichés. Includes things like the medieval fantasy setting, the Dark Lord, enemies-to-lovers, and the Chosen One.
theme: the reoccurring idea or subject in a work of art. Death, life, rebirth, change, love, what it means to be human, the definition of family, the effects of war, etc.
cliché: an element of an artistic work that has been overused to the point of losing its original meaning or effect, even becoming annoying or irritating. (Most clichés are tropes but not all tropes are clichés.)
motif: a distinctive repeating feature or idea, such as the green light in The Great Gatsby. May overlap with tropes and is often used to further explore the theme.
archetype: a constantly-recurring symbol or motif; it refers to the recurrence of characters or ideas sharing similar traits throughout various, seemingly unrelated cases in classic storytelling. E.g. rags to riches, the wise old mentor. Again may overlap with tropes, clichés, and motifs, but they’re not the exact same thing.
Still not Christian but *gestures vaguely around to the six churches within five blocks of my house* Why is it always about Jesus’ Suffering and God’s Sacrifice? Where is Mary? Where is the one pure-hearted woman whose reward for goodness and virtue was to have her baby boy tortured and killed as a warning? Do you think Mary the Virgin, Mary the Mother, Mary the human ever regretted being good enough to earn attention of her God? Do you think she ever quietly, privately, resented her faith? Cursed her fate to be raised on a pedestal, carved into history as beautiful, weeping, covered in gold, cradling the body of her child? How would she feel today, to step into a church and see above the pulpit, larger than life, the glossy painted likeness of her boy, thin and bleeding, looking to the heavens to a Father who would not spare him?
Was it terrible for Mary? Did she hate her God, in the end? Or did she stand tall to the last breath, a reluctant but obedient witness, faithful despite everything?
Was as she ever torn between her faith and her heart? Her love and her fear? The choice between loss or betrayal?
It would be terrible if she was in torment, but would be terrible if she wasn’t.
actually i love growing older and learning how i work as a person like realizing what kinds of fabrics feel best on my skin or what brand of yogurt i like best or how I want to be touched. watching myself change, enjoying brussel sprouts when I used to hate them as a child, understanding why I got angry in that one conversation 10 years ago… there are so many mysteries inside me that i have yet to unravel and there will always be more and sometimes i think maybe its all worth it
i literally can’t stop thinking abt that richard siken quote where he falls to the floor crying but all he can focus on is the details of the wall in front of him
“Eventually something you love is going to be taken away. And then you will fall to the floor crying. And then, however much later, it is finally happening to you: you’re falling to the floor crying thinking, “I am falling to the floor crying,” but there’s an element of the ridiculous to it — you knew it would happen and, even worse, while you’re on the floor crying you look at the place where the wall meets the floor and you realise you didn’t paint it very well.”
