new ds story: already confessed

Hey! Remember way back when, that thing I used to do, where sometimes I would, like, write stuff about fictional characters? And then post it to other people to read? That was fun, wasn't it? Maybe I should try that again!

Heh. This was written (after several aborted efforts) for vecchiofest. justbreathe80 made me sign up, so it's only fair she had to beta as well.

Already Confessed
by Pearl-o

Let's take a walk on the bridge
Right over this mess
Don't need to tell me a thing, baby
We've already confessed
And I raised my voice to the air
And we were blessed
It's hard to give and it's hard to get
Everybody needs a little forgiveness
--"Forgiveness," Patty Griffin

( 'You gotta do what you gotta do.' Ray Vecchio, gennish het, pg-ish, 1500 words. )

one more thing about ray/ray, PLUS stuff that is aweomse!

Dudes, there is SUCH good fic being posted over at vecchiofest! All of you who like him at all owe it to yourselves to go check it out, because HEART. There's gen, het, F/V, F/V/K, Ray/Ray -- all sorts of flavors. The Ray/Ray is good enough it makes me wish I liked the pairing so I could appreciate it fully.

Earlier I was talking to justbreathe80 and she was making sad noises over her inability to convert me to Ray/Ray (never mind that brooklinegirl has been trying for almost three years now with no progress). And seriously, it DOES make me sad! So many of my friends get so much joy out of it and it makes me feel like a cranky evil person!

Here's part of an email I sent to her. ( How to convert me to this particular pairing )

Heh. So, uh, that's that! Obviously after writing that, I need to balance this post out with POSITIVITY, right? RIGHT.

Things That Both Me and Lots of Other People Really Should Write More of:

1) RayK/Frannie. They have so much chemistry, dude! And they're both in love with Fraser! And they make sense! They're a little like Ray/Ray would be if they were together for more than five minutes of canon!

2) RayK/Maggie. I don't know why I have a secret fondness for this, but I totally do. I think it's the Fraser woobie thing I mentioned above.

3) The Mountie and His Boyfriends. I like F/V/K a lot, but mostly I like it in this configuration -- even if it does end up being an equal threesome, I like it to get there from a F/V and F/K place.

4) RayV het. ALL OF IT. *GRABBY HANDS*

4a) Vecchiocest. STOP JUDGING ME.

5) Backstory. I am such a sucker for any of them as kids or teenagers or even just in their 20s. Heart. Fraser's early experiment with sexuality = my favorite thing in the world.

6) I still want someone to write a Fraser/Newbie crossover. I don't remember whose idea this originally was, but I still think it is BRILLIANT. Especially if was during Planet of the Cats.

7) Fraser-has-always-been-a-girl fic! I think girl!Fraser and Vecchio would date for like two episodes worth, and then fall into a really easy natural brother-and-sister like relationship. And with Fraser and Kowalski all the tensions of their partnership would be, like, quadrupled by the fact that RayK is a total ass around women.

8) Frannie/Maggie! Frannie/Thatcher! go femslash go!

9) Fraser/Thatcher that evokes the awesomeness of their sexual tension during s2. I don't know it's possible to actually get them to fuck without ruining that beyond repair, but it would certainly be cool.

10) There is no 10.

If you're going to comment on this post just to say you hate ray/ray and it is stupid and makes no sense, don't, okay? I try really hard to keep this about my issues as a reader and why it doesn't work for me in particular, and not make it slagging on the pairing itself, or the people it does work for. Slagging on pairings = no fun for anyone! Unless it's McKay/Sheppard.

Oh! Also! Check out the new icon I got from troyswann. The keywords here are "ds: oh god i love these boys", for obvious reasons. I LOVE THEM SO MUCH IT MAKES MY HEART HURT, PEOPLE.

(I originally typed that last sentence without the comma, so it sounded like my love made my heart go around, like, punching people in the face. So I changed it.)

"Do you know you are very strong?": Rethinking identity and monsterhood

The Monster at the End of This Book by Jon Stone is a classic text in Muppet studies, standing out as one of the seminal works in the genre. The story, as such, consists of "lovable, furry old Grover" breaking the fourth wall to conduct a conversation with the reader. Since the title frightens Grover, he begs the reader not to continue on with the story -- a desire that obviously never be fulfilled, as the pages continue on, nonetheless. In a way, then, the entire book can be seen as a sadistic exercise; in order to engage with the text, it is necessary for the reader to indeed actively torture the helpless Grover, even as he goes to extraordinary lengths to avoid his fear.

This is far from the most disturbing aspect of the book, however, as a closer analysis shows. Of The Monster at the End of This Book's twenty pages, eighteen are devoted to Grover's fear and anxiety of monsters. The final two pages conclude the story with a seemingly happy ending, as Grover is relieved to discover "[he], lovable, furry old Grover [is] the monster at the end of this book. And you were so scared!" (Stone 19). Instead of bringing the story to a satisfying conclusion, however, these pages instead seem to recontextualize the entire work. Grover is himself a monster, and yet the first thing he admits to us is that "Oh, [he is] so scared of Monsters!!!" (Stone 1). In this light, the entire work seems to be an obvious exploration of Grover's internalized self-loathing. One can imagine the same story told from the perspective of a gay person, or a Jewish one, or a member of any other minority group towards its other members, and the result is equally disturbing.

Grover's lack of identification with his monster self is not only evidence of his prejudice, but also raises questions about his level of assimilation with the larger, non-monster community. The audience for the book is clearly intended to be solely made up of non-monsters, and Grover joins himself immediately to this group and denying his own heritage as he allies himself with the majority. The greater social prejudices towards monsters, then, do have huge personal effects on the individual Muppet, and Muppets studies definitely requires further analysis into this promising field.

fox1013 made me.