I am tried, i been going through so much and it never ends.
I question allah to just give me a break, I’m reaching my breaking points.
Like i need a break i don’t know why bad things keep happening over and over and over, I don’t have time to even rest or get help. I just want somewhere I belong but no matter how hard i work, how hard i wake my self up i just can’t seem to catch a break.
My mental health is deteriorating, I’m just so tired to change but it never stops.
I’m just super tired.

Really considering this kite in 12, 10, 8 but can't demo. Did any of you guys have a chance to try one? I am interested in bar pressure, how easy it boosts/catches from loops compared to xr6/7 and if it is a bitch to deal with when lit. Cheers guys 🤙

Hey there, fellow Redditors! I hope you're ready to hop on the opportunity of a lifetime that could have you bossing it like a Billioniare!
We are excited to announce the upcoming fair launch of Billionaire Pepe ($BPEPE) on the PinkSale launchpad! Mark your calendars, folks, because it's all going down on June 2nd, 2023, at 12:00 GMT. Don't be late to this party, or you might miss out on something truly epic!
https://www.pinksale.finance/launchpad/0xD3349510a9DA6E596Bd6DC5aE448e4aE96Aec8A2?chain=BSC
What sets Billionaire Pepe apart from the rest? Let me break it down for you:
No presale, no private sale: We believe in giving everyone a fair chance to become a part of this fantastic project. No special treatment, no shortcuts. We're all about inclusivity here!
Audited by Freshcoins who no risk factors
No buy tax, no sell tax: You heard that right! We're putting the control back into the hands of our investors. No hidden fees, no tricks. Just pure investment potential.
No team tokens: We're in this together! We firmly believe that when it comes to a fair launch, everyone should be on equal footing. No team tokens means no unexpected surprises down the line. Your success is our success!
Liquidity locked for 1 year: Safety first! We understand the importance of a secure investment environment. That's why we're locking the liquidity for a whole year, ensuring your hard-earned funds are shielded.
100% control of your investment: We're not here to dictate how you handle your investments. With Billionaire Pepe, you're the boss!
Now, I know what you're thinking: "There must be a catch?" Well, let me assure you that there is no catch and this isn't your average project. Billionaire Pepe combines professionalism with a hint of wit, creating a unique experience that will leave you wanting more!
So, set your alarms, bookmark the PinkSale launchpad link above, and get ready to start on an amazing and profitable journey with Billionaire Pepe.
The Billionaire Pepe team is buzzing with excitement, and we can't wait to welcome you aboard!
Visit out website, join our Telegram group, and follow us on Twitter to stay up-to-date with the latest news, sneak peeks, and community discussions.
https://billionairepepe.fun/ Telegram - @TheBillionairePepe
We're building a strong, vibrant community, and we'd love to have you be a part of it!
See you on June 2nd, fellow Pepe enthusiasts! Get ready to unleash your inner billionaire and make waves in the world of crypto like never before!

Previous Chapter - Read 10 weeks ahead on Patreon - Read the story so far on Royal Road
*
Chapter Eleven - The Room of Doors
‘Get moving!’
Sara watched the men readying their horses, squinting at the brightness of the stone. The courtyard was full of the sound of boot-steps and creaking leather. Overhead, a thin veil of rippled grey hung over the early winter sky, and the dawn sun tugged gleaming at its edges. Overhead, the dull black shape of an old stormtower bled the sky. Empty, just like the rest of them. There was something very jarring, Sara decided, about the worn jerkins and stubbled cheeks of her father’s men, ensconced in a pillared courtyard of vast stone. They were out of place, and they had been every moment since arriving in Uldoroth, she realised. They didn’t belong here. Her own anxiety was mirrored imperfectly with the relief on their weary faces, and the dark rings under their eyes seemed just a little less deep. There may be Black Hand to deal with, back in the Westmere, but it was home. At least there your enemies had the decency to show themselves. Sara realised she was chewing her lip. At her back, two of the Black Guard waited wordlessly in their gold-touched armour, much more in keeping with the finery of the courtyard, and everything else in the capital. They were waiting to escort her away to the Queen, unaware they found a girl not so eager for the honour as she had been, just a few days before.
‘Father!’ She called out, spying him across the writhing mass of men in their moss green cloaks, but he seemed not to hear her. He was standing near the arched cloister at the far side of the square, cloaked and ready for travel, in hurried conversation with a shaded figure standing beyond the marble facade. She squinted, trying to make out the other man, but there was nothing but a dark shadow to trace.
‘Well then, M’lady.’ A voice said beside her, and she turned to find Halin looking down at her, a kind smile on his broad face. ‘You’ll be a right proper Princess when I next see you, methinks.’
Sara smiled at him and shook her head sheepishly. ‘Uldoroth is not my home, yet, Halin. I won’t forget.’
‘Be careful you don’t, Lady Sara.’ Halin glanced distrustfully at the Black Guard behind her. ‘Lots of fancy folk here. Fancy folk with fancier lies.’
‘I’ll be careful, Halin.’ She told him seriously.
He smiled again, and the sternness dissolved away from his face.
‘Take care, M’Lady.’ He told her, dipping his head politely. She returned the gesture, dropping into a small curtsy.
‘Look after my father, will you?’
‘Always, M’Lady.’
Halin hurried off into the throng in the square, and Sara watched him go, feeling her the knot in her belly tighten. The conversations with her unexpected visitors had left their mark, a nagging uncertainty gnawing at the excitement that had carried her through her first few uneventful days in the capital. The little comfort she had taken in the presence of her father and his men was a loss she could ill afford. She watched her father’s back, frowning softly to herself. Her thoughts were not what she had imagined, when she had thought of him leaving. A hundred different times, and more. Had she expected tears, grief at the parting? Relief? Instead, there was only the fear, a dull, leaden weight in her belly, clammy-cold as marsh-water.
‘Come on, you whoresons! I want to be on the road before lunch!’ Halin roared, and the men quickened their work. Her father had not moved, still deep in conversation, just out of sight. She peered a little closer, and for a moment the pale sunlight crept over the top of the square, flashing against a colourful doublet marked with a silver brooch. The Fox’s lips barely moved as he spoke from the shadows of the cloister, and her father was scowling. Sara frowned.
‘Mount up!’
The ornate wagon that had been her home all those weeks trundled into the square, then, drawn by a pair of stout horses. Sara saw her father turn reluctantly towards it, striding out into the square. Sara peered past him into the cloister, and for a moment Lord Bywood’s sharp eyes caught hers. Then he smiled, dipping his dark, smooth head, and vanished himself away into the shadows.
‘Father!’
Sara hurried out into the crowded square, leaving her escort behind, darting between the shifting limbs of the horses. Her father turned towards her as she approached, and smiled small smile, in two parts, one weary, one sad.
‘Sara.’
She threw her arms around him and pressed her head against his chest for a moment, and he put an arm around her shoulders. She knew her role, and the knowing of it made her safe for a moment. Then she stepped back, looking up at him.
‘I thought you were going to leave without saying goodbye.’
‘I… There was much preparation to do.’
Sara did not reply. His eyes had that same distance that they had had since they arrived in the capital. Uldoroth had worn at him, as if all the brightness and finery had made his skin dull, eyes darkened like the contrast of shadows in bright sun.
‘Will you write?’
He blinked as she spoke, then smiled, and the tiredness fell away from him for a moment. He took her chin gently in one hand, tilting it up to meet his eyes.
‘Yes, I will write.’ He told her, and she saw again that fierce ambition in his eyes, the look she had known so well on their journey from the Westmere. Swollen around the soft, lazy ease of diminished strength. ‘And I shall expect news in return. The Rose of Westmere will show these fools how a real lady charms.’
Sara smiled and lowered her eyes self-consciously.
‘I… I will not disappoint you, father.’ She said quietly, and found, in spite of herself, that there were tears in her eyes.
‘See that you do not.’ He replied. Then he let go of her chin and climbed quickly into the carriage. He leaned out from the window for a moment, before they were gone, banging a hand against the wooden panels of the door impatiently.
‘Move out!’
‘You heard him!’ Halin bellowed in response, holding his horse in check beneath him. ‘Back to Westmere, before your wives go straying!’
With that, her father’s men spurred their horses away into the white corridors of the citadel, bound for the sky-cages and the city below. They had arrived on foot, leading their steeds, but they left by horseback, hurried by grave purpose towards the long road west. She watched the window of the carriage as it trundled away with the horses, but her father did not appear again. She stayed there, staring after them, until the party were out of sight and the great gate of the keep heaved closed behind them, slamming into the distant stone with a resounding thud.
‘M’Lady.’
She turned to find the Black Guard waiting, watching her with dark eyes through the narrow slits of their polished helms. For a moment, the suddenness of the departure threatened to overwhelm her. What was it he had told her, slurring over his unfinished dinner, in the pristine perfection of their lodgings, surrounded by invisible eyes? Power belongs to the strong. To those who take it. Just then, standing in the courtyard, watching alone as her father departed, she realised that he was right. And he wasn’t strong enough. She took a deep breath, smiling for the Black Guard, and followed them out of the ancient courtyard into the halls beyond.
*
The broad, open avenues and garden-ways of the Keep of Eranor closed in to interior corridors rather quickly, when you knew the way, and soon Sara was following her black-gilded escort through pale passageways lined with statuettes and tapestries, ceilings lost far overhead to the flickering light of amber flames. An occasional glimpse of pale sunlight leaped out across the stone floor, shimmering through shifting motes of dust. Sara was her Lady-self again, graceful and poised, gliding over the polished floor after her escort. The giant corridors were a maze of twists and turns, past fragment-views of gardens and libraries and sitting-halls and galleries, but she was dimly aware they were moving towards the Hall of the King. The thought made her a little giddy.
‘Will I be received in the King’s Hall?’ She asked as they walked, but the Black Guards didn’t reply, and their armour clinked in the quiet. Sara frowned, following them. The passage curved, rising, and she found that the wall on her right side suddenly gave way to the hall below. One of the galleries, set high in the rafters of the King’s Hall. She stopped, putting her hand on the balustrade and peering out over the ledge, into the vaulted, silent emptiness of the hall. Some fifty foot below, the patterned black and white marble of the floor gleamed in flashes of reflected amber, quiet and empty. At the far end, pale sunlight caught the Night Throne, setting fire in the mirrored stone. Overhead, the matching nightglass ceiling gleamed like a lake in starlight, and swirling figures swept back and forth across it in the shifting light of the chamber. Sara felt a little thrill run over her neck.
‘Sara.’
Sara blinked, starting, and found Dana standing beside her.
‘Sister!’ Sara took hold of her sister’s hands and rose onto her tiptoes, pressing a kiss against her cheek. ‘Here to welcome me into the fold?’
She was struck again by the strangeness of her sister, the difference in her. Dana wore black, a dress of simple lines and inlaid jet, at once relaxed and taut as a lute string. Her pale hands were folded over her belly, and her muddy dark hair was pulled back into a bun. The Black Guards halted behind her, waiting.
‘I am to escort you to the Queen’s chambers.’ Dana said simply. With that she turned and began to walk away along the balcony, towards a closed door at the throne-end of the hall. Sara frowned, hurrying after her.
‘Do the King and Queen not share chambers?’ She asked as they walked, and the hall below drew on beside them.
‘Their Majesties prefer… to keep their own space.’
The Black Guard fell into step at a respectful distance behind them, armoured heels clicking against the stone.
‘How many others are there?’
‘How many what?’
‘Handmaidens. How many does her Majesty keep?’
Dana did not break stride. ‘Two others, and the Matron.’
‘I suppose we shall not have servants of our own.’ Sara said quietly, eyeing the shadows shifting over the nightglass ceiling. ‘No need to spy on us when we are so close.’
‘Sara-’ Dana began, but Sara cut her off.
‘Father is gone, you know. This morning.’
‘I know.’ Dana replied, looking ahead.
‘You did not come to see him.’
Dana did not turn.
‘I’m sure he will miss you terribly, sister.’
Sara bristled suddenly, grabbing her sister’s arm.
‘I did not ask for it!’
Dana looked down at the hand on her arm, frowning. ‘What?’
‘Any of it!’ Sara told her, angry now, her whisper cracking. ‘I didn’t ask to stay. I didn’t ask him to send you away. I would have given anything to go with you. I thought he would never let me leave.’ She lowered her voice, flicking an eye back towards the waiting guards. ‘I did not ask for the way he… the way he…’
She took a breath, swallowing, and straightened, looking her sister in the eye.
‘There are worse things than being ignored, Dana.’
Dana’s hand folded over hers.
‘Let’s… let’s put it behind us.’ She said quietly. ‘You are here, now.’
Sara blinked at her, nodding. She wanted to say more, but her words would not come, locked away from her tongue by the choked gulping of her breath. She lowered her eyes, and Dana squeezed her hand.
‘Sara, listen to me.’ Dana murmured, leaning close. ‘You must be careful. The Queen-’
The door at the far end of the gallery swung open, creaking on its hinges. The pair fell silent, frozen, and whatever Dana might have said, she held instead.
*
‘Wait here.’
The Matron, the head of the Queen’s Keepers, was an elderly woman with rounding hips and hair the colour of ash tied into a tight bun behind the worn-leather creases of her forehead. She was wearing black, same as Dana, though her smock was somehow plainer, when she opened the door onto the gallery, ushering the sisters wordlessly into the corridor beyond. Dana had bowed her head deferentially, withering under the Matron’s hard eyes, and quickly disappeared into one of the many doors of the hallway. Sara almost asked for her to stay, but instead she steeled herself, remembering her lessons, and followed the stern old woman down the long, flickering hallway. The corridors of the keep were all severe, all lit by weak, flickering torchlight and gleaming the gleam of cold stone, but here they were particularly bare. There were no busts, no tapestries, no mosaics. Nothing but cold, dead rock, lent a little life by the dim thrustings of infrequent braziers. In her own apartments, she had understood the quiet, but here, in the keep proper, there was an eery silence to the corridors that jarred with Sara’s anticipation. Where were the nobles in their gay clothes, where was the music and laughter of a King’s Hall? Sara frowned to herself, and kept walking.
The room at the end of the hallway was broad and rounded, like a kind of circle made out of many flat edges, each holding the low light of a brazier. The marble floors were black and white and patterned like a gamesboard, empty but for a broad nightwood table at its centre, matching the room itself for its odd roundness. On the far side, a wall of shutters opened out onto a large, bare balcony, and over the intricately wrought stone balustrade, Sara could see the City of the Moon below, sweeping away towards the edge of the Heartspire, empty stormtowers stabbing black into the sky. Beyond, the great emerald plains of Valia stretched out into the west, past the fiery line of the river Arq, scored with jagged, dark rock and silver streams. Sara swallowed, realising she’d never been so high up.
‘Wait here.’
‘But-‘ She protested, frowning, but the Matron was already gone, turned on her heel and disappeared back the way she had come. Sara flinched as the door slammed shut behind her, and the silence of the room prickled at her skin. The breeze rustled over the balcony, swirling about the pillared windows, but the air inside was still as the grave. She stepped slowly over to the table, touching the polished wood. This much nightwood would have cost more than a wagonload of gold. She traced the knotted lines across the black surface, trying to ignore the cold weight churning in her gut.
Time stretched on around her, and the minutes dragged by like years. Despite the open air flooding through the windows, the chamber was not cool, warmed by the subtle glow of the braziers, and she felt a little wetness beginning to build under her arms. She looked about herself, trying to calm her heart. There were four other doors in the room, besides the one they had entered through, all dark and heavy looking, and each bore a pattern of silver on its face. There was a cradle, and opposite it, a pendant with teeth like a wolf. Beside the cradle door, a small drinks table, a glass jug of purple wine atop it, with a pair of matching glasses. The two doors closest to the balcony bore a sun and a crescent moon. She looked a little closer, and realised that the markings were not moonsilver, merely an imitation in gleaming silver paint, and the door she had entered through bore no markings at all. Sara watched them, imagining the rooms that lay behind each. Which one was the Queen behind, she wondered, and her heart quickened at the thought, stomach churning. She was stranded, here, now, in the capital. What if the Queen didn’t like her? What if she said something wrong? Would she be sent away again, back to her father?
‘Lady Westmere.’
The crescent moon had swung open, and the Queen glided through, a beautiful shadow in a studded black dress, arms glistening with little sharpened sequins the colour of midnight. Her hair had been contorted into an elaborate maze of raven curls over her pate, and her pale skin took on a translucent sheen in the pale light from the balcony doors. The throat of her dress was open, as it had been in the King’s Hall all those days ago, and she wore the same golden necklace, its myriad points sharp like daggers with their drops of ruby blood.
Sara blinked, then remembered herself, and dropped into a low curtsy, bowing her head.
‘Your Majesty.’ She said quietly, keeping her eyes on the floor.
The Queen did not reply. Sara was dimly aware of her shadow moving across the floor, crossing to the drinks table beside the cradle door. Sara risked a glance up, then, and found the Queen’s slender back to her. When she at last turned, she had a glass goblet of wine clutched in her narrow fingers. Sara lowered her eyes again.
‘You are a pretty one, aren’t you.’ The Queen said quietly, as if to herself. Her voice was cold, like ice leaking over lakewater, deep and still. She took a sip from her cup, and Sara could feel the cut of her eyes against her skin. ‘What did the Weasel of Westmere do to sire such a pretty daughter. Your sister, maybe, I understand, but you…’
Sara forced herself not to frown.
‘Well trained, I see.’ The Queen murmured, smiling coldly. She took another sip of her wine. ‘Your mother’s touch, I assume, not your father’s.’
Sara hesitated. She glanced up at the Queen, then lowered her eyes again, nodding.
‘I hear she is unwell.’
Sara looked up again, braver this time, and found the Queen’s dark eyes watching her over the rim of her glass.
‘She has an affliction, Your Majesty. She does not eat, and rarely sleeps. The Keepers say it is a disease of her mind.’
‘The one thing none of us can escape.’ The Queen sighed, toying idly with her glass and looking out of the window over the city below. ‘Still, there are worse places to be sickly than a Lord’s hall.’
‘I suppose… I suppose that is true, Your Majesty.’
The Queen raised an eyebrow. ‘Suppose, do you?’
Sara squirmed for a moment under the weight of her eyes, but then the Queen turned away, stepping slowly around the edge of the table till she was standing beside the open windows. She took another sip of her wine, back to Sara again.
‘Your sister met you, this morning.’
Sara hesitated, thrown for a moment by the abruptness of the statement.
‘Yes, Your Majesty.’
‘And she came to you yesterday, in the apartments Bywood found for you.’
‘Yes.’ Sara felt the cold weight return in her belly. She thought of what the Fox had warned her. There is always someone watching. She cast her mind back to her conversations with Dana. Gods. What had they spoken of? Had she said something out of turn?
‘Curious, that she did not seek out your father.’
Sara let out her breath slowly. That was not a particularly well-hidden curiosity.
‘Dana must have been very busy, Your Majesty.’
‘She is as busy as I make her, and that is rarely too taxing.’
Sara sighed. ‘They have… sometimes not seen eye to eye.’
‘And you?’ The Queen turned as she spoke, fixing her eyes to Sara’s again. Behind her, the distant sounds of the city drifted lazily up through the air, swirling around far-off columns of wispy smoke. ‘What do you say of him?’
Sara hesitated again, stuttering. ‘He is my father, Your Majesty. I trust that he always knows what is best for his daughters.’
‘In my experience it is fathers who know the least about their own daughters.’ The Queen replied dryly, sipping again. ‘Come, let me look at you, then.’
She came back around the nightwood table, her long, narrow limbs gliding over the polished floor, and stopped in front of Sara, setting her glass down beside them. She took Sara’s chin in two spindly fingers and tilted it upwards so that she was looking her in the eye, only a few inches from her face. Sara realised again how tall she was, as tall as her father, at least, though her slender frame made her seem much smaller. She tried not to squirm, but she found that the Queen’s fingers dug uncomfortably into her chin, dark eyes flitting back and forth across her face like a hungry wolf.
‘Yes, very pretty.’ She said at last, not releasing her chin. Sara could feel her breath on her face, smelling softly of dark wine. ‘No wonder. You look like her, you know.’
‘Who-‘ but the Queen had already turned away, back to the table, picking up her wineglass in one bone-stretched hand.
‘The Matron will meet you outside. She will give you your tasks and show you to your chamber. You will begin tomorrow.’
Sara flinched, realising she had been holding her breath. She curtsied to the Queen’s back, suddenly a little giddy.
‘Thank you, Your Majesty.’
‘You may go, girl.’
Sara turned to go, not at all sure what to make of the encounter. She paused at the door, looking back over her shoulder, but found the Queen looking out over the city silently again, wineglass in hand, black dress glistening with jet. Sara hesitated a moment longer, then hurried out into the corridor beyond the unmarked door, closing it behind her.
*
The night before her father leaves, she wakes in darkness.
She does not open her eyes, but she knows it is not yet dawn. The sounds of the garden beyond her shutters are soft and murmuring, wind-stirred and drip-spotted.
She can feel him over her, the tense stillness of him, closer than shadows. He smells of wine. Sweat. She is cold, but she does not move. She dares not move. She can feel the weight of his eyes, dulled with drink, tracing the lines of her. His breathing sounds like anger.
She does not know how long she waits there, frozen. But she does not open her eyes. Not once. Time stretches out before her in that moment, an eternity of breathless terror.
Then he leaves. The smell of him lingers long after the door has closed behind him. She lays there a while longer, motionless, dead as stone. Then she curls into her own arms, and weeps silently until the dawn.

Series Page - Read 10 weeks ahead on Patreon - Read the story so far on Royal Road
*
Chapter Eleven - The Room of Doors
​
‘Get moving!’
Sara watched the men readying their horses, squinting at the bright-ness of the stone. The courtyard was full of the sound of boot-steps and creaking leather. Overhead, a thin veil of rippled grey hung over the early winter sky, and the dawn sun tugged gleaming at its edges. Over-head, the dull black shape of an old stormtower bled the sky. Empty, just like the rest of them. There was something very jarring, Sara de-cided, about the worn jerkins and stubbled cheeks of her father’s men, ensconced in a pillared courtyard of vast stone. They were out of place, and they had been every moment since arriving in Uldoroth, she real-ised. They didn’t belong here. Her own anxiety was mirrored imper-fectly with the relief on their weary faces, and the dark rings under their eyes seemed just a little less deep. There may be Black Hand to deal with, back in the Westmere, but it was home. At least there your ene-mies had the decency to show themselves. Sara realised she was chew-ing her lip. At her back, two of the Black Guard waited wordlessly in their gold-touched armour, much more in keeping with the finery of the courtyard, and everything else in the capital. They were waiting to es-cort her away to the Queen, unaware they found a girl not so eager for the honour as she had been, just a few days before.
‘Father!’ She called out, spying him across the writhing mass of men in their moss green cloaks, but he seemed not to hear her. He was standing near the arched cloister at the far side of the square, cloaked and ready for travel, in hurried conversation with a shaded figure stand-ing beyond the marble facade. She squinted, trying to make out the oth-er man, but there was nothing but a dark shadow to trace.
‘Well then, M’lady.’ A voice said beside her, and she turned to find Halin looking down at her, a kind smile on his broad face. ‘You’ll be a right proper Princess when I next see you, methinks.’
Sara smiled at him and shook her head sheepishly. ‘Uldoroth is not my home, yet, Halin. I won’t forget.’
‘Be careful you don’t, Lady Sara.’ Halin glanced distrustfully at the Black Guard behind her. ‘Lots of fancy folk here. Fancy folk with fan-cier lies.’
‘I’ll be careful, Halin.’ She told him seriously.
He smiled again, and the sternness dissolved away from his face.
‘Take care, M’Lady.’ He told her, dipping his head politely. She re-turned the gesture, dropping into a small curtsy.
‘Look after my father, will you?’
‘Always, M’Lady.’
Halin hurried off into the throng in the square, and Sara watched him go, feeling her the knot in her belly tighten. The conversations with her unexpected visitors had left their mark, a nagging uncertainty gnawing at the excitement that had carried her through her first few uneventful days in the capital. The little comfort she had taken in the presence of her father and his men was a loss she could ill afford. She watched her father’s back, frowning softly to herself. Her thoughts were not what she had imagined, when she had thought of him leaving. A hundred dif-ferent times, and more. Had she expected tears, grief at the parting? Re-lief? Instead, there was only the fear, a dull, leaden weight in her belly, clammy-cold as marsh-water.
‘Come on, you whoresons! I want to be on the road before lunch!’ Halin roared, and the men quickened their work. Her father had not moved, still deep in conversation, just out of sight. She peered a little closer, and for a moment the pale sunlight crept over the top of the square, flashing against a colourful doublet marked with a silver brooch. The Fox’s lips barely moved as he spoke from the shadows of the cloister, and her father was scowling. Sara frowned.
‘Mount up!’
The ornate wagon that had been her home all those weeks trundled into the square, then, drawn by a pair of stout horses. Sara saw her fa-ther turn reluctantly towards it, striding out into the square. Sara peered past him into the cloister, and for a moment Lord Bywood’s sharp eyes caught hers. Then he smiled, dipping his dark, smooth head, and van-ished himself away into the shadows.
‘Father!’
Sara hurried out into the crowded square, leaving her escort behind, darting between the shifting limbs of the horses. Her father turned to-wards her as she approached, and smiled small smile, in two parts, one weary, one sad.
‘Sara.’
She threw her arms around him and pressed her head against his chest for a moment, and he put an arm around her shoulders. She knew her role, and the knowing of it made her safe for a moment. Then she stepped back, looking up at him.
‘I thought you were going to leave without saying goodbye.’
‘I… There was much preparation to do.’
Sara did not reply. His eyes had that same distance that they had had since they arrived in the capital. Uldoroth had worn at him, as if all the brightness and finery had made his skin dull, eyes darkened like the contrast of shadows in bright sun.
‘Will you write?’
He blinked as she spoke, then smiled, and the tiredness fell away from him for a moment. He took her chin gently in one hand, tilting it up to meet his eyes.
‘Yes, I will write.’ He told her, and she saw again that fierce ambi-tion in his eyes, the look she had known so well on their journey from the Westmere. Swollen around the soft, lazy ease of diminished strength. ‘And I shall expect news in return. The Rose of Westmere will show these fools how a real lady charms.’
Sara smiled and lowered her eyes self-consciously.
‘I… I will not disappoint you, father.’ She said quietly, and found, in spite of herself, that there were tears in her eyes.
‘See that you do not.’ He replied. Then he let go of her chin and climbed quickly into the carriage. He leaned out from the window for a moment, before they were gone, banging a hand against the wooden panels of the door impatiently.
‘Move out!’
‘You heard him!’ Halin bellowed in response, holding his horse in check beneath him. ‘Back to Westmere, before your wives go stray-ing!’
With that, her father’s men spurred their horses away into the white corridors of the citadel, bound for the sky-cages and the city below. They had arrived on foot, leading their steeds, but they left by horse-back, hurried by grave purpose towards the long road west. She watched the window of the carriage as it trundled away with the horses, but her father did not appear again. She stayed there, staring after them, until the party were out of sight and the great gate of the keep heaved closed behind them, slamming into the distant stone with a resounding thud.
‘M’Lady.’
She turned to find the Black Guard waiting, watching her with dark eyes through the narrow slits of their polished helms. For a moment, the suddenness of the departure threatened to overwhelm her. What was it he had told her, slurring over his unfinished dinner, in the pristine per-fection of their lodgings, surrounded by invisible eyes? Power belongs to the strong. To those who take it. Just then, standing in the courtyard, watching alone as her father departed, she realised that he was right. And he wasn’t strong enough. She took a deep breath, smiling for the Black Guard, and followed them out of the ancient courtyard into the halls beyond.
*
The broad, open avenues and garden-ways of the Keep of Eranor closed in to interior corridors rather quickly, when you knew the way, and soon Sara was following her black-gilded escort through pale pas-sageways lined with statuettes and tapestries, ceilings lost far overhead to the flickering light of amber flames. An occasional glimpse of pale sunlight leaped out across the stone floor, shimmering through shifting motes of dust. Sara was her Lady-self again, graceful and poised, glid-ing over the polished floor after her escort. The giant corridors were a maze of twists and turns, past fragment-views of gardens and libraries and sitting-halls and galleries, but she was dimly aware they were mov-ing towards the Hall of the King. The thought made her a little giddy.
‘Will I be received in the King’s Hall?’ She asked as they walked, but the Black Guards didn’t reply, and their armour clinked in the quiet. Sara frowned, following them. The passage curved, rising, and she found that the wall on her right side suddenly gave way to the hall be-low. One of the galleries, set high in the rafters of the King’s Hall. She stopped, putting her hand on the balustrade and peering out over the ledge, into the vaulted, silent emptiness of the hall. Some fifty foot be-low, the patterned black and white marble of the floor gleamed in flashes of reflected amber, quiet and empty. At the far end, pale sun-light caught the Night Throne, setting fire in the mirrored stone. Over-head, the matching nightglass ceiling gleamed like a lake in starlight, and swirling figures swept back and forth across it in the shifting light of the chamber. Sara felt a little thrill run over her neck.
‘Sara.’
Sara blinked, starting, and found Dana standing beside her.
‘Sister!’ Sara took hold of her sister’s hands and rose onto her tip-toes, pressing a kiss against her cheek. ‘Here to welcome me into the fold?’
She was struck again by the strangeness of her sister, the difference in her. Dana wore black, a dress of simple lines and inlaid jet, at once relaxed and taut as a lute string. Her pale hands were folded over her belly, and her muddy dark hair was pulled back into a bun. The Black Guards halted behind her, waiting.
‘I am to escort you to the Queen’s chambers.’ Dana said simply. With that she turned and began to walk away along the balcony, to-wards a closed door at the throne-end of the hall. Sara frowned, hurry-ing after her.
‘Do the King and Queen not share chambers?’ She asked as they walked, and the hall below drew on beside them.
‘Their Majesties prefer… to keep their own space.’
The Black Guard fell into step at a respectful distance behind them, armoured heels clicking against the stone.
‘How many others are there?’
‘How many what?’
‘Handmaidens. How many does her Majesty keep?’
Dana did not break stride. ‘Two others, and the Matron.’
‘I suppose we shall not have servants of our own.’ Sara said quietly, eyeing the shadows shifting over the nightglass ceiling. ‘No need to spy on us when we are so close.’
‘Sara-’ Dana began, but Sara cut her off.
‘Father is gone, you know. This morning.’
‘I know.’ Dana replied, looking ahead.
‘You did not come to see him.’
Dana did not turn.
‘I’m sure he will miss you terribly, sister.’
Sara bristled suddenly, grabbing her sister’s arm.
‘I did not ask for it!’
Dana looked down at the hand on her arm, frowning. ‘What?’
‘Any of it!’ Sara told her, angry now, her whisper cracking. ‘I didn’t ask to stay. I didn’t ask him to send you away. I would have given any-thing to go with you. I thought he would never let me leave.’ She low-ered her voice, flicking an eye back towards the waiting guards. ‘I did not ask for the way he… the way he…’
She took a breath, swallowing, and straightened, looking her sister in the eye.
‘There are worse things than being ignored, Dana.’
Dana’s hand folded over hers.
‘Let’s… let’s put it behind us.’ She said quietly. ‘You are here, now.’
Sara blinked at her, nodding. She wanted to say more, but her words would not come, locked away from her tongue by the choked gulping of her breath. She lowered her eyes, and Dana squeezed her hand.
‘Sara, listen to me.’ Dana murmured, leaning close. ‘You must be careful. The Queen-’
The door at the far end of the gallery swung open, creaking on its hinges. The pair fell silent, frozen, and whatever Dana might have said, she held instead.
*
‘Wait here.’
The Matron, the head of the Queen’s Keepers, was an elderly wom-an with rounding hips and hair the colour of ash tied into a tight bun behind the worn-leather creases of her forehead. She was wearing black, same as Dana, though her smock was somehow plainer, when she opened the door onto the gallery, ushering the sisters wordlessly in-to the corridor beyond. Dana had bowed her head deferentially, wither-ing under the Matron’s hard eyes, and quickly disappeared into one of the many doors of the hallway. Sara almost asked for her to stay, but instead she steeled herself, remembering her lessons, and followed the stern old woman down the long, flickering hallway. The corridors of the keep were all severe, all lit by weak, flickering torchlight and gleaming the gleam of cold stone, but here they were particularly bare. There were no busts, no tapestries, no mosaics. Nothing but cold, dead rock, lent a little life by the dim thrustings of infrequent braziers. In her own apartments, she had understood the quiet, but here, in the keep proper, there was an eery silence to the corridors that jarred with Sara’s anticipation. Where were the nobles in their gay clothes, where was the music and laughter of a King’s Hall? Sara frowned to herself, and kept walking.
The room at the end of the hallway was broad and rounded, like a kind of circle made out of many flat edges, each holding the low light of a brazier. The marble floors were black and white and patterned like a gamesboard, empty but for a broad nightwood table at its centre, matching the room itself for its odd roundness. On the far side, a wall of shutters opened out onto a large, bare balcony, and over the intricate-ly wrought stone balustrade, Sara could see the City of the Moon be-low, sweeping away towards the edge of the Heartspire, empty stormtowers stabbing black into the sky. Beyond, the great emerald plains of Valia stretched out into the west, past the fiery line of the river Arq, scored with jagged, dark rock and silver streams. Sara swallowed, realising she’d never been so high up.
‘Wait here.’
‘But-‘ She protested, frowning, but the Matron was already gone, turned on her heel and disappeared back the way she had come. Sara flinched as the door slammed shut behind her, and the silence of the room prickled at her skin. The breeze rustled over the balcony, swirling about the pillared windows, but the air inside was still as the grave. She stepped slowly over to the table, touching the polished wood. This much nightwood would have cost more than a wagonload of gold. She traced the knotted lines across the black surface, trying to ignore the cold weight churning in her gut.
Time stretched on around her, and the minutes dragged by like years. Despite the open air flooding through the windows, the chamber was not cool, warmed by the subtle glow of the braziers, and she felt a little wetness beginning to build under her arms. She looked about her-self, trying to calm her heart. There were four other doors in the room, besides the one they had entered through, all dark and heavy looking, and each bore a pattern of silver on its face. There was a cradle, and opposite it, a pendant with teeth like a wolf. Beside the cradle door, a small drinks table, a glass jug of purple wine atop it, with a pair of matching glasses. The two doors closest to the balcony bore a sun and a crescent moon. She looked a little closer, and realised that the markings were not moonsilver, merely an imitation in gleaming silver paint, and the door she had entered through bore no markings at all. Sara watched them, imagining the rooms that lay behind each. Which one was the Queen behind, she wondered, and her heart quickened at the thought, stomach churning. She was stranded, here, now, in the capital. What if the Queen didn’t like her? What if she said something wrong? Would she be sent away again, back to her father?
‘Lady Westmere.’
The crescent moon had swung open, and the Queen glided through, a beautiful shadow in a studded black dress, arms glistening with little sharpened sequins the colour of midnight. Her hair had been contorted into an elaborate maze of raven curls over her pate, and her pale skin took on a translucent sheen in the pale light from the balcony doors. The throat of her dress was open, as it had been in the King’s Hall all those days ago, and she wore the same golden necklace, its myriad points sharp like daggers with their drops of ruby blood.
Sara blinked, then remembered herself, and dropped into a low curt-sy, bowing her head.
‘Your Majesty.’ She said quietly, keeping her eyes on the floor.
The Queen did not reply. Sara was dimly aware of her shadow mov-ing across the floor, crossing to the drinks table beside the cradle door. Sara risked a glance up, then, and found the Queen’s slender back to her. When she at last turned, she had a glass goblet of wine clutched in her narrow fingers. Sara lowered her eyes again.
‘You are a pretty one, aren’t you.’ The Queen said quietly, as if to herself. Her voice was cold, like ice leaking over lakewater, deep and still. She took a sip from her cup, and Sara could feel the cut of her eyes against her skin. ‘What did the Weasel of Westmere do to sire such a pretty daughter. Your sister, maybe, I understand, but you…’
Sara forced herself not to frown.
‘Well trained, I see.’ The Queen murmured, smiling coldly. She took another sip of her wine. ‘Your mother’s touch, I assume, not your fa-ther’s.’
Sara hesitated. She glanced up at the Queen, then lowered her eyes again, nodding.
‘I hear she is unwell.’
Sara looked up again, braver this time, and found the Queen’s dark eyes watching her over the rim of her glass.
‘She has an affliction, Your Majesty. She does not eat, and rarely sleeps. The Keepers say it is a disease of her mind.’
‘The one thing none of us can escape.’ The Queen sighed, toying idly with her glass and looking out of the window over the city below. ‘Still, there are worse places to be sickly than a Lord’s hall.’
‘I suppose… I suppose that is true, Your Majesty.’
The Queen raised an eyebrow. ‘Suppose, do you?’
Sara squirmed for a moment under the weight of her eyes, but then the Queen turned away, stepping slowly around the edge of the table till she was standing beside the open windows. She took another sip of her wine, back to Sara again.
‘Your sister met you, this morning.’
Sara hesitated, thrown for a moment by the abruptness of the state-ment.
‘Yes, Your Majesty.’
‘And she came to you yesterday, in the apartments Bywood found for you.’
‘Yes.’ Sara felt the cold weight return in her belly. She thought of what the Fox had warned her. There is always someone watching. She cast her mind back to her conversations with Dana. Gods. What had they spoken of? Had she said something out of turn?
‘Curious, that she did not seek out your father.’
Sara let out her breath slowly. That was not a particularly well-hidden curiosity.
‘Dana must have been very busy, Your Majesty.’
‘She is as busy as I make her, and that is rarely too taxing.’
Sara sighed. ‘They have… sometimes not seen eye to eye.’
‘And you?’ The Queen turned as she spoke, fixing her eyes to Sara’s again. Behind her, the distant sounds of the city drifted lazily up through the air, swirling around far-off columns of wispy smoke. ‘What do you say of him?’
Sara hesitated again, stuttering. ‘He is my father, Your Majesty. I trust that he always knows what is best for his daughters.’
‘In my experience it is fathers who know the least about their own daughters.’ The Queen replied dryly, sipping again. ‘Come, let me look at you, then.’
She came back around the nightwood table, her long, narrow limbs gliding over the polished floor, and stopped in front of Sara, setting her glass down beside them. She took Sara’s chin in two spindly fingers and tilted it upwards so that she was looking her in the eye, only a few inches from her face. Sara realised again how tall she was, as tall as her father, at least, though her slender frame made her seem much smaller. She tried not to squirm, but she found that the Queen’s fingers dug un-comfortably into her chin, dark eyes flitting back and forth across her face like a hungry wolf.
‘Yes, very pretty.’ She said at last, not releasing her chin. Sara could feel her breath on her face, smelling softly of dark wine. ‘No wonder. You look like her, you know.’
‘Who-‘ but the Queen had already turned away, back to the table, picking up her wineglass in one bone-stretched hand.
‘The Matron will meet you outside. She will give you your tasks and show you to your chamber. You will begin tomorrow.’
Sara flinched, realising she had been holding her breath. She curt-sied to the Queen’s back, suddenly a little giddy.
‘Thank you, Your Majesty.’
‘You may go, girl.’
Sara turned to go, not at all sure what to make of the encounter. She paused at the door, looking back over her shoulder, but found the Queen looking out over the city silently again, wineglass in hand, black dress glistening with jet. Sara hesitated a moment longer, then hurried out into the corridor beyond the unmarked door, closing it behind her.
*
The night before her father leaves, she wakes in darkness.
She does not open her eyes, but she knows it is not yet dawn. The sounds of the garden beyond her shutters are soft and murmuring, wind-stirred and drip-spotted.
She can feel him over her, the tense stillness of him, closer than shadows. He smells of wine. Sweat. She is cold, but she does not move. She dares not move. She can feel the weight of his eyes, dulled with drink, tracing the lines of her. His breathing sounds like anger.
She does not know how long she waits there, frozen. But she does not open her eyes. Not once. Time stretches out before her in that mo-ment, an eternity of breathless terror.
Then he leaves. The smell of him lingers long after the door has closed behind him. She lays there a while longer, motionless, dead as stone. Then she curls into her own arms, and weeps silently until the dawn.

A new era is under way in Green Bay, and there's a lot to cover about this offseason. First, let's set the stage.
Key Signings:
KR Keisean Nixon- the return dynamo who renewed my will to live after watching Amari Rodgers play football. Signed again on a 1 year deal worth up to $4m. And he figures to have a larger role on defense this season. This was one of the biggest wishes for packer fans this offseason, as it finally shows a dedication to building the ST unit.
S Rudy Ford- he had himself a nice 2022 and got re-signed for his efforts. It's a one year deal, and he will compete for the starting safety spot as of now.
CB Corey Ballentine- a reserve CB who I will always have a soft spot for due to his tragic draft night story. Ballentine has been re-signed and will compete for snaps in an unsettled secondary.
S Dallin Leavitt- a Rich Bisaccia re-signing. Leavitt was a quiet killer last season as a special teams ace, and he returns in that role this season.
OT Yosh Nijman- a developmental prospect that has blossomed into an serviceable swing tackle, I thought Nijman would get more on the open market than his RFA tender price. He will be back with the Pack in a LT2 and RT2 role for 2023.
Key Departures:
DT Dean Lowry- Lowry gave the Pack his best and we appreciate him, but his ceiling was evident and achieved. Devonte Wyatt was drafted as a high upside replacement. Lowry signed with the Bears on a 2 year deal.
WR Allen Lazard- Aaron Rodgers's latest security blanket, Lazard is rejoining Rodgers on a 4y, 44m deal with the New York Jets. A quiet, consistent performer for the Packers throughout his tenure, Lazard will continue to be a sure-handed possession receiver in New York, transforming the slot position previously occupied by Elijah Moore into more of a big slot. He will also continue to mug people in the run game.
TE Robert Tonyan- Bobby Tonyan heads south to Chicago to be TE2 behind Cole Kmet. Packer fans love Tonyan for bringing pride back to the position in GB, and I honestly feel bad for him. He likely missed on his chance for a big pay day after tearing his ACL in 2021 and having a down year coming back. Now he's pushing 30, but he still provides excellent hands for the position and a great work ethic. Godspeed, buddy.
DL Jarran Reed- the big man returns to Seattle this season on a 2 year deal. Reed was just about what we expected in Green Bay- not great, not bad. He was a placeholder in a spot that Wyatt hopefully can take over.
Free Agents yet to be signed:
WR Randall Cobb, S Adrian Amos, TE Marcedes Lewis, K Mason Crosby
All members of the old guard. Cobb recently had surgery, and is a contender to rejoin Rodgers in NY. Amos had a down year, but could still have some left in the tank. I'm guessing he has an offer from GB and is weighing his options. Lewis also could be weighing his options between retirement, the Jets, or sailing into the sunset where it all began for him in Jacksonville. Mason Crosbys wife seemed to confirm on social media recently that the Packers have little interest in re-signing their all time leading scorer. Crosby made some clutch kicks for us over the years, and if this is the end, the Silver Fox will never have to buy a beer in Titletown again.
2022 season review: Record: 8-9 Oh man. 2022 was the year it all came crashing down. Green Bay tried to keep its veteran core together for a few years, appeasing Rodgers and navigating the salary cap reasonably well. But they never achieved that brass ring. Minus Davante Adams and working with a broken thumb, Rodgers struggled the most he has since his inaugural season as a starter. It's now time to address Rodgers in this post; I could write an entire entry solely on Rodgers and this past season, but I'll leave it at this: Aaron is my favorite football player of all time. He led the Packers to their greatest stretch of sustained excellence since Vince Lombardi roamed the sidelines, often with depleted rosters around him. In my opinion, hes the most talented QB to play the game. It seems a majority of Packer fans were ready to move on from the man and soured on him this offseason. Personally, I think he will be an MVP contender in NY next year and still love him. But it was time. The Jordan Love era needs to happen, if only for the front office itself needing to justify their faith in the Love pick. Rodgers and the Packers were operating on different timelines the past few years, stuck somewhere between going all in and resetting. The front office has put all their chips in on Jordan Love.
The defense was expected to be a top 5 unit, but regressed heavily. Joe Barry was under scrutiny all year long, seemingly incapable of putting his plethora of first rounders in positions to succeed. A late season push did just enough to save his job (apparently).
Favorite win: Dallas Most frustrating loss: Detroit, week 18
Rodgers's exit also raises an interesting thought: will we see the True Matt LaFleur Offense this season? Offensive deficiencies have been blamed on Lafleur himself or Rodgers's hesitancy at transitioning from a traditional west coast offense to a Shanahan-esque, motion based attack. The answer will be uncovered this year, with Jordan Love having 3 years of experience in the scheme and a first round pedigree. As a Love truther in the pre draft season who hated the pick for the Packers, I am fascinated. This pick will make or break Gute's and Lafleur's tenure.
Aside from the quarterback situation, there are lingering questions concerning LaFleur's ability to lead the team in general. The Packers have consistently laid an egg in one game every season of his tenure and have come up short in the playoffs, with some head scratching decisions rearing their head in crunch time of big games (the end of the Bucs NFC championship the most glaring). I also have questions on his staff hirings/retentions. LaFleur hired 2 dogshit ST coordinators before making the obvious choice of Basaccia. He also chose to retain Joe Barry, noted football terrorist, as defensive coordinator. I've read rumblings that Gute has more say over the staff than the head coach, which is unconfirmed but concerning. I don't mean to dump on LaFleur in this piece, only to emphasize how big of a year this is for him. I think his scheme is sound and the guys play hard for him. With Rodgers gone, I think we see less RPOs and inside zone handoffs to AJ Dillon out of shotgun. The offense will have more identity. But if there are 2 more years without the playoffs in Green Bay, the Cheeseheads will advocate for a new coach.
2023 Draft:
Positions of need: S, TE, WR, DT
Round 1, Pick 13: Lukas Van Ness, Edge, Iowa With the world expecting Jaxon Smith-Njigba, Gute stuck true to his type and drafted athletic freak LVN out of Iowa. Van Ness profiles as a Rashan Gary clone, with a high RAS score and unrefined repertoire of pass rush moves. If he works out like Gary, this is a massive hit. In the pre draft process, the only guy who could have realistically been there for GB that I had above Van Ness was Peter Skoronski. He wasn't there, and there was no doubt in my mind Gute was going for LVN afterwards. He'll rotate with Gary and Preston Smith this year, and will kick inside on certain packages. He makes Smith expendable in the future.
Round 2, Pick 42: Luke Musgrave, TE, Oregon State Musgrave has the size and athleticism to be a game changer at tight end. His tape was short but encouraging. His biggest questions are durability and how he will develop, given his late breakout and immediate injury afterwards. My comparison to his playstyle was Travis Kelce, and if he can approach even 70% of Kelce's production in a season, this is a great pick. The biggest hole on the roster was TE, and I have a feeling Gute got the top one on his board.
Round 2, Pick 50: Jayden Reed, WR, Michigan State The process of this pick was nerve wracking. I was one of many fans pounding the table for Brian Branch, the S out of Alabama. When Gute traded down instead, I was telling friends I hoped he took Jayden Reed, and that's what happened. Reed is smaller receiver who plays bigger than his size on contested catches. He carried the Michigan State offense last year after Kenneth Walker jumped to the NFL. My comparison for him is Tyler Lockett. In Green Bay, Reed will take over the slot role, and I expect him to see around 60% of offensive snaps.
Round 3, Pick 78: Tucker Kraft, TE, South Dakota State Another tight end added to a barren room. The former Jackrabbit is similar to Musgrave in a lot of ways- big, athletic, and a willing albeit unrefined blocker. Kraft's addition along with Musgraves could push the Packers into more 22 personal this season, something LaFleur wants to run but hasnt had the personnel for, and I would not be surprised to see him outsnap Musgrave if he develops quickly. I'm really hoping this is the pick that breaks Green Bays 3rd round curse (seriously look it up its so bad).
Round 4, Pick 116: Colby Wooden, Edge, Auburn A former 4 star recruit at Auburn, Wooden collected 17 sacks as a 3 year starter in the SEC and showed inside/outside versatility. He shows an ability to rush with speed and power, but is inconsistent in his pad level and technique. He anchors well in the run game and showed great gap discipline. I don't see him getting many snaps this year, but if he does I think he takes Kingsley Engabare's role on run downs.
Round 5, Pick 149: Sean Clifford, QB, Penn State A perplexing pick until I saw this man somehow has a 9 RAS. Clifford is an experienced college starter who plays with a clear understanding of his role and a passion for the game. My issues with him were accuracy, arm strength, pocket presence, and decision making. You know, playing quarterback. I did not give Clifford a draftable grade and would have preferred Jaren Hall or Max Duggan. But this is really nit picking over a 5th round pick who was drafted to be a career backup. If the staff sees something in him, I'll give it a chance.
Round 5, Pick 159: Dontayvion Wicks, WR, Virginia A 6'1, 206 lb vertical threat, Wicks was inconsistent in his career at Virginia. If he replicated his 2021 production last year, he might have found himself as a day 2 pick. Alas, a new offense and drops led to his availability at this spot. Wicks has a good release package and the ability to stack DBs and get vertical. His tendencies as a body catcher led to drops last year, and he doesn't provide much after the catch. With his profile, he'll be a WR4/5, but could be a special teams ace very early in his career.
Round 6, Pick 179: Karl Brooks, DL, Bowling Green A bit of a tweener, Brooks is a high motor, high effort pass rusher. He flashes great technique and seems to rush with a plan. He can get washed out in the run game, and will need to commit one way or another to defensive end or defensive tackle. He graded very high from PFF, so that's something. To get on the field, he'll have to show more consistency and ability when anchoring down in the run game.
Round 6, Pick 207: Anders Carlson, K, Auburn Apparently, Mason Crosby's replacement. Anders is the brother of Las Vegas kicker Daniel Carlson, who's pretty damn good. There is a connection with Basaccia there, who's known Anders since high school. I wasn't encouraged by his stats at Auburn, but I'm not going to pretend to be an expert in scouting kickers. If Basaccia says he's that dude, then that dude he is.
Round 7, Pick 232: Carrington Valentine, CB, Kentucky Valentine is a WR convert with a long, slender frame. He is at his best in press man, where he has a variety of ways to get hands on the receiver and reroute him. Unfortunately for Vallentine, Joe Barry hates press man and will kill my family if I suggest it again. Valentine's frame can lead him to get bullied by bigger WRs at times, but he is physical at the catch point. He also brings experience as a productive kick returner, something that could be helpful in the future or even this season if the staff wants to keep Nixon fresh for defensive snaps.
Round 7, Pick 235: Lew Nichols, RB, Central Michigan A big back with some intriguing traits, Nichols enjoyed a very productive 2021 before injuries hampered his 2022. Nichols has good vision, contact balance, and power as a north-south runner. He was productive catching out of the backfield, but wasn't asked to run many routes beyond that. His biggest hurdles in the NFL are going to be elusiveness and speed. He lacks both, but should be a decent backup. For the Packers, they used their RB3 less than maybe any team in the league last year. This will be the Jones&Dillon show again in 2023.
Round 7, Pick 242: Anthony Johnson Jr, S, Iowa State Johnson Jr is a converted cornerback who plays with rare physicality for someone of that description. He did his best work in the box or in the slot at Iowa State, and that may be where the Pack will try to get him some snaps this year. He can be over aggressive in his pursuits at times and take bad angles, but that is coachable. Given the state of the safety room, the 7th round rookie may find himself starting some games this season.
Round 7, Pick 256: Grant DuBose, WR, Charlotte DuBose comes from UNC Charlotte, where there apparently is a football team, and he was 2nd team all C-USA last season. DuBose has excellent size at 6'2, and I love his agility on in-breaking routes crossing the face of safeties. He has experience both outside and in the slot, and is an interesting addition to the WR battle at the bottom of the roster, which is going to be highly competitive. It may come down to how good he can be on special teams. Coaches and teammates rave about his work ethic and love of football, and he worked at Walmart while keeping himself in shape during the Covid year. I'm optimistic he can carve out a role for himself and make the team.
Overall, Gutekunst drafted for need at times in this draft, but still stuck to picking guys that fit his type: big, athletic, and versatile. My biggest shock was not taking a safety until the 7th round, but I think it just never lined up with his board. There was an obvious effort to surround Love with talented pass catchers, which is a breath of fresh air from this team. I was surprised that they didn't take a single offensive linemen, given this is almost certainly Bakh's last year in the green and gold and question marks surrounding some of our young guys, but we drafted 3 linemen last year and the staff may have high hopes for Zach Tom to be the next left tackle. The franchise has earned the benefit of the doubt when it comes to scouting and developing OL.
All told, 2023 is the most excited I've been for a Packer season in a few years. There are so many unknown variables surrounding the team, from Jordan Loves development to LaFleur's offense to Joe Barry's pending glue eating scandal. Media pundits have them ranked somewhere between 20 & 26 in the league hierarchy heading into the year. Personally, I'm a little higher on the Pack, and they will shoot up these rankings if Jordan Love delivers. There's a lot on Love's shoulders. This is the season we've been waiting for with baited breath for 3 years, the post-Rodgers era, and now it's here, for better or worse.

I personally would have done it this way :

• Ash use his old Pokemons + the new ones
• The battles are also old rematches like score to settle with Ash , for example like when he lost to Ritchie or Alain , now Ash can beat them on his way to the Masters 8
• Had Ash battle some of the Masters 8 when he was in the Ultra rank , like mention above , he could battle Diantha and Lance. Just like he did with Iris on his promotion battle.
• Have some quick matches between characters like with Flint vs Leon. Examples could be like Lance beating Lucian or Cynthia beating Caitlin (a rematch since they have only a show match at Unova).
• Personally for me , have Gary Oak recover his love for battling and he got inspired after Ash won the Alolan league so this time he was “the challenger”. Imagine a Mega Blastoise vs Ash’s Charizard rematch?
• Finally , I would not make Leon like this “unbeatable” foe as like the show portrayed him. More like he barely clutch out wins because on how close Champions are to each other. Like rather than him showing 6 Pokemons , he had like 9-12. For example , not have a one sided beat down vs Diantha but more like “it comes down to Mega Gardevoir vs Charizard” and he clutched out the win rather. And on that battle he used mons that are not his strongest cuz he wanna save them for finals.

Throwaway account cuz I don't want anyone I know to recognize me. I (15 M) live with my Mom and my Sister (12). My story is basically about us as a family, including my dad. We aren't an unhappy family, but we are very distant from my dad. I love my old man, but I only see him maybe once or twice a year. He's a really nice guy and doesn't do any negative things you would think about like being some sort of addict. But my mom seems to think of him as some sort of villain, as anything related to him she ignores. Of course she loves me and my sister, but when it comes to controlling her anger, she's not really the best at it. I think this sort of passed onto my sister as she has a very short fuse. But anyway, this is really affecting me mentally, and it makes things worse that my mom doesn't have a care in the world about it, to the point that even my sister is ignoring his texts. It's really affecting my dad too, he's had a heart surgery, and high blood pressure related problems because of the stress this is causing. And it's not like this just started happening. My parents have been separated for as long as I can remember, and I have faint memories of things a father and son should do like playing catch or learning how to ride a bike. But I'm finding it more and more difficult to find things to relate with him now, in the present, when I call or text him. It's either all about work or about my sister and mom. And when it is about my sister and mom, he texts how he cries alone, thinking about the way they treat him, which leaves me in a very, pessimistic situation. All my aunts on my mom's side are either neutral or on my dad's side about this, and to add, I don't even know my uncles and aunts on my dad's side all that well, I have a faint memory of talking with them, but I've forgotten them so much that I don't remember their names. I met my cousins on my dad's side a few years back and I couldn't believe how many I had. I had only interacted with my cousins on my mom's side and seeing how I had a lot more on my dads side, just made me feel surprised. But anyways, I don't have anyone I can talk about this with, anyone I can talk about with THIS personally anyway. And it's not like he's not making an effort, he sends gifts, money, etc, everything you can think of. Even as a kid he got me stuff like a 3DS and a Switch (I lost the 3DS but I still have the Switch, and I love it and use it almost every week). But these things were given to me behind my mom's back at my friend's house. My friend's house is where I would ride the bike he got me, or play ball right outside. I did all this because I know what my mom's reaction would be. This was proven further when I got caught with my Switch. I let my sister play on it for the first time, and of course, she didn't put it away fast enough, and my mom saw it and got angry at my friend's mom for keeping it without telling her (she's a good person, she did this out of the goodness of her heart). I then went home, leaving the switch there, where she wouldn't talk with me for a good week before I couldn't take it and apologized. I tried to reason with her that if I told her she would have thrown it away like she's done with other things from my dad. Money? Ripped right in front of me. Water Gun? Cut open and trashed. New phone? Fell asleep with it and when I woke up it was gone. Please do not get the wrong idea, I love my mom, and she loves move, both ways 100%, but I just wish she could see the error of her ways and admit when she's wrong. My sister is no better. She ignores me sometimes as well, but unfortunately my dad gets the worst of it. So Reddit, what the hell do I do? How can I get my sister to talk with my dad? How can I get my mom to not get mad every time he's brought up. In 2021 I only saw my dad once. For 15 god damn minutes. And when I came home, she was livid and just kept saying things like "why don't you go live with him". For 15 god damn minutes. How tf do I fix my family? I'm two years away from graduating high school and I'm blank as to what I'm going to do from there regarding this situation. I need massive help.

Someone posted this weekend wondering about the future of the girls in terms of career choices and how they’ve shown little to no growth with their content. I happened to be catching up on Sophie Suchan, Emma Leger, and even Matilda Djerf and notice how they’ve all grown and branched out so much even over the past 2-4 years. Danielle and Brooke have not….besides moving to NYC. It’s so bizzare to me. I can’t help but wonder what their long term goals really are….

Good afternoon, everybody.
(TL;DR. Ex girlfriends brother disabled my security cameras when they were collecting her things from our apartment. I can only imagine malicious reasons.)
Recently, my girlfriend and I broke up after some long standing issues came to a head. The breakup was ugly and her family is very protective of her.
Yesterday (Sunday), she asked to collect her things today (Monday) from the apartment that we both lease; including the pet rats that we both care for. I had today off for Memorial Day so asked her to delay one day so I would be at work and her family would have an uninterrupted 8+ hours to take things. She declined and we began to argue and I stated that if she wanted her things today I could put them by the side of the road and she could collect them there because I wouldn’t be leaving. She interpreted this as me threatening to put the rats outside for her to collect as well and in that panic decided they needed to come that evening before damage could be done.
Being put on the spot I started trying to figure out how to plan for her being there in the two and a half hours it would take from her parents house. My mother was already there with me to make sure I was okay and I started packing some of her things to get them out of the apartment as soon as possible as well as putting the rats into a prepared travel cage so they would be easier for them to take.
During that time, my two best friends also came over and offered to keep watch over her family to make sure things weren’t being taken that weren’t hers and that no destruction was happening of my property. After explaining the situation, my mother and I left for her house.
Now for the important part. Inside of and around our apartment I have five Blink security cameras that watch my front door, back door, parking lot, kitchen, and living room (no cameras have any substantial view of bedrooms or bathroom). The two facing the living room and kitchen were put in place because our landlord had an exterminator coming and I wanted to have evidence if there were any issues. My ex was aware of and agreed to them being placed.
While the apartment was being gone through by her family, after over an hour of them being there and me getting recordings and notifications from the cameras, her brother (who is very intelligent and tech savvy) noticed the cameras and immediately began going around toppling the cameras and eventually went to my office and disconnected my modem and routers which disconnected the cameras from their base station and stopped all recordings.
I messaged my ex later that night asking if she have given her family permission to touch the cameras and she said she had not. I have recorded proof of him tampering with the cameras. I also have a video of the entire apartment before they came showing the state of everything in it.
My question is, is there any recourse for this? The only good reason I can imagine for disabling the cameras is to avoid being seen doing something untoward that my friends didn’t catch. My instincts say that this is illegal, potentially even if she had given permission to turn them off because they are my cameras protecting my property, but regardless I can’t find any solid information online, so I thought I would ask here.

Hello guys, like the title says, I've been playing for a few years, and I feel like I'm improving very slowly.
I'm ADC main and started to play some ranked few days ago, because I want to know my level.
Currently stuck in bronze, I would like to know what can I do better to be able to carry games, because every game I manage to be even or win lane, but there is a 0/15 mid, top or jungle problem.
I'm not saying "I lose everygame because of my team" or things like that, I know my role is to be constant and be able to carry late game, but it's hard to do that for 2 reasons :
- I'm often not in or near the teamfight (I'm farming bot/top, and my team decides to take a fight mid, or there is a catch or something)
- I have not a good (not a too bad either) positioning in team fights, so I don't have a good pure dps time, and we lose teamfights because of that.
The problem is that I don't know where to begin and how to improve in these two things.
Anyone have an idea on how to get better ? It would be great ^-^

So context, I just bought the game, I'm about to go into the first gym and I was thinking in what ball I want to catch Eternatus, my favorite gen8 mon in, and I wanted to catch it with a beast ball... and then I learned that you get it after beating Leon, so does anyone have a level one pokemon they don't really care about that you can slap a Beast ball onto? P.S. I don't have nintendo switch online, I hope that's not going to be a problem

I’m pretty sure it has been discussed in the past and I wasn’t sure if AI topics were allowed but saw nothing in the rules, so sorry to the mods if this breaks any rules.
Since I can’t get enough of the boys and Trash Taste, I decided to ask ChtaGPT to write me a few episodes. It’s scary how it knows how each one of the boys may respond. Either that or I’m characterizing them in my head.
I’m sure they tried it out a few months ago on an actual episode and decided to try it out myself. Interested if anyone tried it out as well and what was the funniest one you got.
Here’s my favorite:
Title: "The Great Ramen Quest"
INT. TRASH TASTE STUDIO - DAY
The set is bustling with energy as the hosts—GIGGUK, THE ANIME MAN, and CDawgVA—sit comfortably in their respective seats.
GIGGUK Alright, boys, welcome back to another episode of Trash Taste! Today, we're embarking on the ultimate quest—finding the best ramen in Japan!
THE ANIME MAN You know we're all about that weeb life, and what's more weeb than ramen?
CDAWGVA Absolutely! But here's the catch—we can only choose one region in Japan. Which one will it be?
GIGGUK I'm thinking Tokyo. It's the heart of the anime culture, so it's gotta have some top-tier ramen joints.
THE ANIME MAN But what about Hokkaido? The snowy landscape and fresh ingredients make for some amazing bowls of ramen.
CDAWGVA Guys, guys! How about Osaka? The vibrant city, lively atmosphere, and bold flavors. It's gotta be Osaka!
GIGGUK Alright, let's settle this with a taste test. We'll each try a bowl of ramen from our chosen region and then decide.
INT. TOKYO RAMEN SHOP - DAY
GIGGUK sits at a small ramen counter, eagerly waiting for his bowl to arrive. The chef places a steaming bowl of ramen in front of him.
GIGGUK (mouthwatering) Oh man, the aroma is already getting to me. Here goes nothing!
GIGGUK takes a sip of the broth, his eyes widening with delight.
GIGGUK (enthused) This broth is next level! The noodles are perfectly chewy, and the chashu just melts in your mouth. Tokyo, you've got some serious ramen game!
INT. HOKKAIDO RAMEN SHOP - DAY
THE ANIME MAN is seated at a cozy booth, eagerly awaiting his bowl of ramen. The server places a beautiful bowl in front of him.
THE ANIME MAN (excited) Look at those ingredients! Fresh seafood and rich miso broth. Itadakimasu!
THE ANIME MAN takes a bite, his face lighting up with satisfaction.
THE ANIME MAN (enjoying) Oh wow, this is a flavor explosion! The miso adds a depth of umami, and the seafood is so fresh. Hokkaido, you've got something special here!
INT. OSAKA RAMEN SHOP - DAY
CDAWGVA sits at a lively ramen stall, eagerly anticipating his bowl of ramen. The vendor places a colorful bowl in front of him.
CDAWGVA (impatient) I've been dreaming about this moment! Let's dig in!
CDAWGVA takes a slurp, his eyes widening with surprise.
CDAWGVA (amazed) Holy smokes! The flavors in this bowl are insane! The broth is packed with richness, and the toppings add a burst of deliciousness. Osaka, you've definitely won my heart with your ramen!
INT. TRASH TASTE STUDIO - DAY
The hosts reconvene in the studio, each with a satisfied smile on their faces.
GIGGUK Well, boys, it looks like we've had an epic ramen adventure. Tokyo, Hokkaido, and Osaka all have their unique charms when it comes to ramen.
THE ANIME MAN Absolutely! Each region has its own distinct flavors and styles, making it impossible to choose just one winner.
CDAWGVA That's the beauty of ramen—no

I (25 NB) had recently told my best friend (27 M) of 6 years that I still had feelings for him. We dated in 2019, but ultimately parted ways amicably because I moved to another state. We both moved on and had our own lives for a while where we didn't talk as much. He came to visit me and we ended up sleeping together the entire time he was there and it felt as if no time had really passed. It brought up a lot of feeling that I was too scared to communicate so I let him go. He didn't talk to me as much and I figured it had made him feel uncomfortable or confused so I gave him space. I ended up meeting someone and ended up married. I was unhappy in the marriage and found out that that person had been cheating the whole time. Around the time I found this out my friend and I reconnected. He became my confidant and I told him everything. Our conversation after my divorce finalized turned flirty and we talked about the things we left unsaid during his trip to visit me the few years before. I was led to believe that he still felt confused, but he was just scared of the long distance. From August of 2022 to now May of 2023 we had been flirting and I occasionally would send him nudes when asked. I planned a trip to go see him because I had been recently SA'd on a date of which I confided in him. I told him that I missed him and wanted to see him and talk face to face for once. I didn't really see him the whole time I was there because he said he had work.The first night I was there he came to my AirBnB to hang out got a little and when he came in I was in the shower. He walked in washed his hands and said "Hey how are you" and I laughed and was like "Hey, nice to see you sorry I'm in the shower otherwise I'd hug you, but im almost done" and he laughed and said "I like seeing you like this" and then leaned in real quick to give me a kiss on the lips and said he'd just wait on the couch for me.We cuddled and watched Tv and we were laughing and he kept groping my breast and kissing me. He left because he had work the next day, but as he was leaving kissed me a few times and then lifted my shirt and kissed my breasts a bunch and said ill talk to you later i missed you. I asked him on a dinner date for when he was off work and he didn't text me until it was super late so we just drove around town. The next day we go exploring for museums and at dinner he's talking about this fwb situation he has with his coworker and asking if it makes him a bad person for intentionally stringing the person a long. I said yeah kind of I think you should be honest with people about how you feel about them or what you want from them. It was a bit of awkward silence, but I knew I had to say it otherwise the whole trip would feel like a waste. So, I told him how I felt and had been feeling for a long time and asked him what he thought. He was like a deer in headlights and just kept repeating "I don't know" and "yeah that's a lot that you've given me to think about". So, I told him well look I know this is a lot, but like just talk to me tell me what you're thinking and let's figure it out together. He just clammed up and it was awkward the rest of the dinner. He came back to the AirBnB I was staying at and we cuddled on the couch and I asked him if he wanted to talk more and again gave me the deer in headlights look. So, I just told him "It's okay dude you don't have to have all the answers right now just know that I love you and care about you and first and foremost your my best friend we can take our time yknow". So, we just kept cuddling, but that turned to kissing and he got horny. So, we ended up having sex and before we started I kept asking "are you sure" "please don't continue if you think you're gonna regret it" "for me this means something" and he just replied "I won't regret it I promise". Immediately after I could tell something was wrong and he asked if I had like hand sanitizer to put on his penis. I just stood there and I started to tear up and said "Do you regret it already?" and he said "What no I'm just really scared about catching something because the guy that raped you" and I started fully crying and he tried to get me to look at him and kept saying "oh God did I say something wrong" "Please look at me I'm sorry". We sat on the couch and he hugged me and kept trying to get me to talk while I cried. I finally told him that he made me feel dirty and like I was damaged goods and I just don't want him to regret it all or inadvertently push him away somehow because I was scared of losing my best friend. That I didn't wanna be just another one of his fuck buddies that he's intentionally stringing along. He kept saying "I would never do that to you" "I've always been honest with you" and "Im sorry I don't have the answers you need right now it's just a lot to take in and think about". Then he had to leave because he had work the next day. I asked him if I'd see him again and he was like yeah of course. I didn't see him the next day and he barely talked to me which only added to the anxiety that I had somehow fucked everything up. Then the next day, since it was my last day there, he asks if I wanna go to dinner at some fancy steakhouse he likes. We go and eat after he gets off. We joke around, but deep down I feel like something is off but I try to swallow that feeling. Then we went back to my AirBnB and cuddled up on the couch. He ended up falling asleep laying on my chest while I was playing with his hair. He woke up and said he had to go because of work the next day so we hugged and kissed, but before he left I asked if we were okay and he said "yeah why?" and I said "well, did you think anything more about the stuff we talked about and again the deer in headlights look and he said "um... no. I kinda put it on pause in my brain and tucked it away. I'm sorry" and I just said "it's okay I promise, but like please don't just pretend it never happened because that'll hurt" and he was like "of course not". So, he texted me that he got home safe and he said "Cuddling with you felt really nice" and I said "Yeah, is there any chance I'll see you before I have to go to the airport?" and he was like " um.. probably not I don't see being able to see you before I have to head to work because I usually don't get ready until a few minutes before" so I said "okay was just wondering if I'd get to say an actual good bye so I guess this is the good bye lol" and he said "I'm sorry we didn't get to talk more and see eachother as much" and I said "I promise it's okay I'll just have to back up some other time". So, I get home and I'm still feeling like sad and confused. I get a random anonymous message telling me to "back off of him" so I freak out and try asking about it. I ask again "are you sure you're not seeing anyone?" and he said "no I just have fwb I don't even know how they would know you were here I didn't even tell anyone except my coworkers and idk anyone vindictive like that" and as I'm trying to go through and figure out who it might be myself I come across an engagement announcement... from September 2021. I scroll through and some of the dates on their announcement are times that we were definitely flirting back and forth. So, I panick and say "well, hold on wtf is that dude you never told me you got engaged" and he says "oh God yeah don't message that one let me figure this out on my end" and I said "R... Are you engaged?" and his little chat bubble pops up and dissappear a few times before I get the message back of "I am but it's rocky right now" and I say "are you fucking kidding me wtf do you mean by rocky?" and he says "well I know she's cheated on me" and I say "well does she know you know or know that you've been sleeping with a bunch of other people?!" and he says "No she doesn't" and I say "are you kidding me right now? why would you be with someone if all you're gonna do is cheat on eachother" and he said "that's why I couldn't give you any answers" and I said "R.. how could you? I asked you multiple times if you were with anyone romantically ... so you lied to my face?" and he says "I did" and "I said I thought you were my friend I thought I could trust you I fucking loved you dude like how could you" and he just went on to be like this is the life I chose we're so different now and you're not what I want anymore and I was like well why couldn't you just tell me that and he was like I was afraid of losing you and I was like this is my worst fucking nightmare this is the worst way you could have possibly have handled this and I asked "So you only want me to be your friend and nothing else right?" and he goes "yes and I'm sorry" and I just said "fine but as your friend and someone who cares for you so much I'm telling you right now you need to cut your bullshit. Cut off all these fuck buddies and talk to your fiancé for fucks sake. Don't do what my husband did To me and make that girl look stupid for trusting you just like you just did to me" and he just started begging me not to tell anyone "Please don't tell her please it'll ruin my life and everything I've built for myself the last few years" and I said "honestly you should have thought about that and you should be the one to tell her" and he says "please ill do anything" and I said "be honest" and he begged more saying "it would ruin his family and hers and I just texted back "I can't do this ... I can't fucking talk to you anymore this is literally making me sick to my stomach I'm sorry" and I went through and blocked him on everything. I feel so fucking depressed and nauseous. I was betrayed, lied to, and used by my best friend and confidant of 6 years. I don't know what hurts more that someone I loved so much lied to me for apparently years or that I lost like my only fucking friend. I don't really know what to do now or how to get over this. I just wanna curl up and dissappear because I'm so tired of being used and lied to by the people I trust. I just wanna be able to trust and rely on the people I care about.

​
Hi everyone! This is a complete English translation of the Aniara sequel book by Harry Martinson called Doriderna that was put together after the author died. This translation was put together using various translation programs that can be found online, so I can't guarantee that it is a perfect translation, but it's better than nothing. I will also post the original in Swedish so you can improve the translation or look up words etc. if you want. Hope you enjoy!
I would also like to let everyone know that I am also working on my own Aniara fan fiction short story that I call "The Lost Voices of Aniara". This story tells about the events aboard the Aniara from the view point of another passenger and attempts to add more details to the story. It should be ready in the next week or two.
​
HARRY MARTINSON
The Dorides (Doriderna)
Remaining poems and prose pieces in selection and with preface by Tord Hall Albert Bonniers Förlag
​
PREFACE
For reasons I will not go into here, Harry Martinson did not publish any new work in the last years of his life. There is therefore a very large literary legacy, the publication of which began in the fall of 1978 with "Längs ekots stigar" (Along the paths of the echo), published by Georg Svensson. This collection contains only a few purely scientific poems - the emphasis is on nature poetry. The selection was made from unpublished material - which had nevertheless reached the proof stage - in three previous collections.
It remains to address other lines of thought in Harry Martinson's work: the ideas in Aniara, which in various forms occupied his imagination until the end. To follow the continuation of this great theme - at least in part - is what I am trying to do in this second selection from the surviving archive.
​
The 103 songs in Aniara were part of a larger set of poems, and the author then worked for several years on a sequel, to be called 'The Dorids', the people of the tribe of Doris. Around 1959 there were about 80 songs - most of them in more or less completed drafts. The dominant figure in the Dorids would not be Isagel or the Mimarobe, but Nobia, the Samaritan from the tundra planet and deportation site of Mars. Nobia would be a norna (fate goddess), though not a cruel goddess of fate, but a norna who weaves goodness into the fabric of the world.
But the whole project remained a large-scale endeavor. The reasons were many: illness, world events, which seemed to be moving towards a fulfillment of the prophecies in Aniara, and which gave him an increasingly dark view of life: he told me that "Aniara has become a neurosis" ... I feel like Mima being blown apart'. But the decisive reason was surely his demand for absolute freedom in his creativity. He did not want to be confined, and the result was, as he himself said, 'I have stepped out of Aniara'.
The fact that Harry Martinson stepped out of Aniara, and thus also out of the Dorides, does not at all mean that he left the motifs or ideas found there, which cover the scientific field from atoms to stars. Rather, it means that he was able to write without direct connection to the characters of Aniara and the Dorides in particular.
I have therefore considered it justified to call this entire collection the Dorides, even though the prose pieces and several poems do not have a clearly visible connection with such a title.
In order to comment briefly on the selection, I would like to say a few words about Harry Martinson's attitude towards modern science (it is my intention to return to this subject in more detail).
There are two main lines. One is deterministic, and has its roots in classical physics, founded by Newton, which dominated until the end of the 19th century. It has a philosophical form in the law of causation, which means that if you know enough facts about a certain course of events in the present and in the past, you can precisely specify the course of events in the future. Examples of such events in the 'big world' - the macrocosm - are solar and lunar eclipses.
But in the world of atoms - the microcosm - this determinism does not apply. Heisenberg demonstrated this through his uncertainty relation, also known as the indeterminacy principle. In the atoms, individual events are indeterminate, we cannot discern any causality - there is randomness. But chance can be mastered by the methods of statistics, and we must content ourselves with a "statistical causality", which describes the course of events in the atom with the highest possible degree of probability.
It is this second, indeterministic line that has long been followed by most physicists. But there is one major exception, and that is Einstein. At the 1927 meeting of physicists in Brussels, for example, he asked Bohr, Heisenberg and others with mild irony whether they really believed that God plays dice - "ob der liebe Gott würfelt". Einstein was convinced that the universe follows an ordering principle, a geometric structure, which can be called a world soul. This is a pantheistic view that is reminiscent of Spinoza.
Similar ideas are already present in Aniara, but in this selection the picture has become more sharply defined. Harry Martinson does not believe that chance plays a decisive role in the course of the world, as is clear from several poems and prose pieces. He believes more in Einstein than in dozens of other Nobel Prize winners. Apart from these authorities, he follows his intuition.
His approach to religion has often been quoted: he chooses the Riddler over the God. This belief is reflected in 'The Riddle'. In 'Poems on Light and Darkness', published in 1971, Harry Martinson, with 'The Inner Light' and 'The Bird in the Phoenix Bell', presents the events inside the atom itself. These poems show that - although 'Aniara' and 'The Dorides' are more about stars than atoms - he never lost his interest in the microcosm. In this selection, it is the atoms that are more interesting than the stars.
The bard enters the atom. He describes the course of events in a world which is completely beyond our senses and which, despite the enormous aids of science, we will probably never be able to understand exactly. The story itself probably comes from Gamow's book "Mr. Tompkins Explores the Atom". Published in Swedish translation in 1946, it is, along with "Mr. Tompkins in Wonderland" (also 1946), the versatile Gamow's best popular science books. Harry Martinson rated them highly.
The two poems 'Submerged as in a dream but still awake' and 'Actually, the comprehensibility was slight' depict a journey of thought into the atom, and the same motif recurs in several other places.
The poem "A Cosmic Thickness Lying Boundlessly Spread" poetically depicts a world development related to the hypothesis of the "stationary universe" put forward by Hoyle and others, and to Klein-Alfvén's "symmetrical cosmology". For several reasons - mainly aesthetic - Harry Martinson did not like the theory of 'the big bang', which was celebrated by most scientists. His poem should have been written quite a long time ago, and perhaps he would have changed his mind if he had been given the opportunity to understand what the "cosmic background radiation" - with a temperature of about 3 degrees above absolute zero - means for the credibility of "The big bang". It took natural scientists some time to become convinced that this radiation can best be interpreted as a fading glow after an unimaginable cosmic explosion some 18 billion years ago.
This selection also contains several pieces of prose, which in general do not need any comment. But I would like to mention a few. For "The Figuration Patterns of the Goddancer's Juggling Program", in three sections, there is a drawing by Harry Martinson, reproduced on the cover of this collection. The spread comes from Hindu philosophy: we see 'Siwa's juggling dance before Brama'. The dominant curves are so-called lemniscates, which were already known to the ancient Greeks. The lemniscate looks like an eight and is the mathematical symbol for infinity. It is defined as the trajectory of a point under the condition that the product of its distances to two given points is constant. In the center of the drawing there are several small curves. They are ellipses, and an ellipse - also first studied by the Greeks - is defined as the trajectory of a point under the condition that the sum of its distances to two given points is constant. The result is a geometric pattern, similar to a flower, which at the same time provides a poetic image of the complex interplay of forces in the atom with outward and inward energy impulses The juggler finds it increasingly difficult to work with his ball-particles as he progresses through the periodic table of the elements. In the end, he "dances the spectral theme in the dance of the Phoenix" - a symbol of the indestructibility of both energy and poetry, and a recurring motif in Martinson's poetry.
"Delsaga om tidens ariadnetråd" (Part of the saga of the Ariadne thread of time) is almost a fantasy about four-dimensional space, where you have to be careful not to get on the wrong track. The selection of prose pieces ends with "Some fairies dancing in the summer night near a quiet lake". It is a cheerful tale where the author combines a love of the Swedish summer with a love of light.
​
I made this selection at the direct request of Harry. He even said several times that I should have all his scientific poems and prose pieces. But I think I judged this offer correctly when I saw it as an expression of his great generosity towards his friends. I always replied that he himself should complete and select what was to be published. But in his last years he did not want to publish anything. I therefore promised to make a selection if he did not change his mind.
​
He did not, and this collection is the result.
Finally, I would like to thank Ingrid Martinson and Georg Svensson for the understanding and assistance they have given me in bringing this selection to fruition.
​
Tord Hall
​
​
The Dorides (Doriderna)
The book you hold was written in Mima's hall.
Now, on a secret wavelength, it is sent home to you, my friend, who for some years inhabits a spherical beach called the Valley of Doris.
In other words, it was written so close to your own being that nothing could be closer to you than those described here. You are one of them.
​
Over the graves, the indifferent wind spreads
the whisper of the immortal gods
that no loss is foreseen in the grand scheme of things.
But what do the gods - those wasteful billionaires of the heavens - know about the beautiful and wonderful Doris?
how she was worth saving forever
and that whoever loved her
can never be comforted by the gods' continued waste.
About her a bird sings now alone in the tree of the grave. Of her as she was, the glorious one, if no other, the Dorides' thrush sings.
​
The window was full of stars,
The Leonids' swarm of stars came, then you know the time.
Autumn was gone, its yellowing burnt.
The lookout tower, closed on the wooded mountains.
I stood as a child of a time that saw the stars detach from the roofs towards a room where novas frightened a more distant valley, I found other myths than those I was used to picking hurled at me from the space of the Leonids.
I stood in the cathedral of fear of dreams.
The great copper woman who lay there with her back soldered to the lid of the sarcophagus drove horror into me, cast my foot with lead.
That the copper woman knew who I was, I immediately sensed as a deadly weight, and that I had been summoned here by herself, by the queen of copper, of that I was certain.
In empty benches sat forgotten years, from the emptiness of the auditorium the organ pipes shone like stalactites in the vault of a cave and there was nothing, no light, no hint that gathered my crumbling courage.
For everything was fulfilled as it was written in stone once when the water abandoned the green and it was said that man will go away and become the dead slave of the dead dust.
And as I stood there gripped, filled with horror
for this judgment and epitaph
which was predetermined and rehearsed
in the mute trumpet of the seraphim of the stones,
bells fell suddenly from the towers to the earth that rocked with an ore-broken thunder, and the copper woman rose, a scream of remembrance drawn from afar to her lips as she drew me in close to her copper body in terrified death.
He woke up. There was light. It was day.
And the Samaritan Nobia sat silent, but still heard the echo of the screams his dreams had squeezed out of his fear.
She searched for words simple enough for a stranger to grasp, but not so simple as to drive away his trust, hardly won yet.
In simple action she finally found them.
And she stood up and smiled with milk
From the moors of Gondrin to the mouth of this fugitive.
​
​
It is no exaggeration to say that space gave us long winter evenings rolled into one - the one that lasts. Our leisure time finally became a grim question with ice in our eyes and a frozen flame.
It became necessary to tell stories from reality - as it can be taken. I chose to tell about King Basii, who, supported by Chefone, forcibly turned himself into a god and magician in a celestial drama.
The Goldonder King felt like God and determined to live up to the gods he built himself a city in the sky.
It was a global world city of goldonders assembled into a kind of hive heaven.
But Basil's space-city, though it contained twelve million men in his service, was not enough for him; he had another built, and the greatest city in the world was soon in space. That city was a marvel to behold: a mighty golden dome, surrounded by three bionomically serving drabants, one of which was called the Vegetable City, one the Fish Drabant, and the third the Sting.
​
The names reveal their role and purpose.
So Basii sits in his heavenly land. The aquarium dragon orbits faithfully and Stings follows it with fattened animals and the vegetable moon amounts to the redwood.
The golden dome was the city of retreat for all climbers and celestial rebels, for gamma was a poison to all alike and all poor and rich alike had to choose between death and escape.
So many preferred the city of Basil.
But although he rules over twelve million
inhabitants of the great city of space, he is still very rarely happy.
And although the dragons in a faithful circle
raise animals and grow fish and wheat
Basil's only pleasure is when he gets
with Vulvis, the royal slave, to bathe in Lethe.
But all the deliciously good virginity
that can be enjoyed in Basil's harem
is in its nakedness a skin of fear.
of frightened dissimulation. And his love story
...is but a tale to be seen from the outside..,
and all his lust a forced voluptuousness.
​
Thus in The Night of Aniara I draw a little picture that everyone can understand from the rich treasure of reality.
And every time I make an arabesque in the hall of Mima about this space grotesque that Basil's space city can probably be said to be, I can for an hour or so make people sigh: the best is here anyway.
From Basil's false heaven we preserve. No, I'd rather travel with Aniara.
But soon the alarm goes off. The bells proclaim that the images of the fairy tale are overtaken by visions here that distress ignites.
And quickly to the halls I return.
​
The Goldonder's garden bubbled with glamour. A party was being held there and Chefone was there. He showed us a picture of the smith of happiness: the goldonder king Basii, a portrait jubilantly taken on the day the fifteen thousandth goldonder lay in the field ready for the wave of endlessness.
Then we were each seized by thoughtfulness and went to our own in solitude.
For in every ship of this number there was a Mima locked up in its cage.
The Rapid criminal was much loved and could operate as he pleased under the protection of the admiration he aroused. He always appeared at great speeds and abducted women whom he brought to Chefone in light blue rapid rockets.
Of course it was criminal, the people of the valley thought, but the charm was so close to the deed that the rampart was breached by sheer admiration and open worship soon followed the advice of restraint at the murder pedal.
​
Tucked away in a corner of our gondola, I pretend to smile at some rough fellows who spend their evenings with mockery and violence, with a devilish flutter as their sole aim.
They look at me and find me mortified,
- The clear approval is what they expect...
and I'm close to being squeezed badly
every time they jokingly glance at my grave door.
The brute is approaching, his dull face with many a foolish whim weighing on his mind.
And many a scowl missed by pigs from the worst corners of the soul he throws at me.
And when, full of fear, I strike with depleted strength in the dull face, the troll is only amused by my blow and raises his eyebrow with interest.
Then I flee between the troll's legs and out the other side of the danger of death.
How this happened can only be fully explained by the light of the gopher and the fourth tensor theory.
​
Here came the sober, composed and sober man who always kept his soul in trim and stuck to the dry, honest maxims of life.
Now he went into the fire with his imagination.
His cool reason was completely burned His sober composure was fried in seconds when the photo turbo in Xinombra exaggerated the cold matter.
And yet I can't help but admire the man as he made his way to the office where he had been employed for many years
and where, despite offers to flee to the tundra, he provided punch cards for thousands who broke up every day.
There died a man who never raised his voice, who always remained true to his calm tone, the martyr of calm composure who was burned when the cruel fires of excess were lit.
​
One is often chilled to the rock crystal by everything one hears before the ear falls like gray-white ash into the cremation hall.
And the girl from Rind who sees nothing is often heard to ask beyond the eye: how is the world of such torment visible? What is to be seen in this madness, where eeriness against eeriness is heard to answer?
Cultivating insight seemed futile
and many fell away from the faithful crowd.
and its program which was to see through
so that with the transparency of evil
as lens and instrument
try to find new signs
and new ways for the land of Gond.
Most people grew tired and withdrew from the room of the Truth Service, and Nobia sat for long periods almost alone, trying to hold on to her looms, always tormented
by the blood moisture of evil memories, the echoes of horror
surrounded her days
and made the Mara a bedfellow
who tore the fabric of the noman
and raped Nobia's dream
and the mood of life over the moors of Gondria.
It is as important to us to have friends
in the houses of distant worlds as at home by
the familiar road of the green earth.
You are reflected in endless eyes, watched by immense spectators.
They never interfere, but they watch the sewing and the mining,
the nurse and doctor on the rounds and the weapons in the shamelessly cruel wars.
Your own position under their eyes may be likened to the position you take with one whom you do not wish to grieve, but to share joy and to please.
So spoke the old astronomer, and then laid his head down to rest.
And he went smiling to the eternity that had been waiting by his side all his life.
His forehead shone with its ideas, even in the dead of death in the years of space.
He was among those who know the fairies of everything, those who get to comb Berenice's hair.
​
But for the longest time I still want to believe that this is the torment of an evil dream and the ship Aniara a phantom from which I will wake up in the Valley of Doris.
Perhaps everything is a nightmare and I want to wait with poison and a knife. They say there are dreams of a kind that seem as long as a man's life.
Out of the dust you were born, from its gifts you were supported.
You did not manage the gift, many a meadow you made desolate.
What is beyond this sea is called Going down deep among riddles too great to be found in a grave.
Faith can never cover more than what you see in spirit.
​
All the other things are too much to bear.
Do you hear the sound of the rescue team calling from an emergency station that is one of a thousand others, regardless of faith?
Now guess where the road leads and what Paradise is.
One of a thousand rescue stations scattered along the coast here.
Now I want to sing to my ear and ask it to listen to a voice that descends not to destroy the language I have collected for comfort. For the comfort of life and death, I whisper the price of sensitivity every time the sinful flow of language storms the breeze of the spirit.
​
One night Heba lay awake in the city of Aniara and heard the painter's joyful painting.
The skilled varnisher was varnishing the years that would one day end on a stainless steel stretcher.
And suddenly from Heba there was a shout against the smooth roof.
The skilled varnishers know their business well.
Too hard to become joy, too happy to become sorrow. The painters paint everything in Aniara's castle.
​
We know that we have been left out of the higher insight of the ocean of mystery and that we lack the tools to reach the depths of clarity that Mima once gave. But since Mima's death, the average of what we achieve of truth is not very high average is what is required if the choice of new paths is to be avoided.
A small number reach the values that should be the average to reach.
The others are satisfied with the flow of thought,
the rattle with which time is made to pass.
A daughter of my mother, called Tovi, was born in the night of space. Alas, dear ones, where can the crowd's demand for sensation and wonder lead us?
First came, as it should be, the blissfully sweet and indescribably pure birth, when the mimicry lay naked, uncovered and panting in the golden bed of the formula.
To her camp now came the mimicry and winged it
the naked one, as when the butterfly flies the honey chalice of its flower, in Dori's meadows. The description is not given (much to my regret) because there is always the possibility of a wave of miracles taking place in secret, to the great disappointment of many who wish to see how the mimagyne makes love, and from what angle the picture of the goddess's love life should be taken in order to really reach the audience.
Can it not be enough that Tovi gave birth to an allegorical child whom Isagel happily suckled at her breast and practiced miracles and consolation You may think so yourself, but others think otherwise.
For not even a mimagyn can defend the fruit of her womb against the human hyena who demands a clear answer on every point of what precedes it all: the prelude to sowing,
with the insides of the thighs well described in a clear image that gives the "public" a feeling that it was in the bed.
​
Yes, it has happened that I have sometimes asked myself (in private silence, of course) whether the smooth ice of superficiality does not have enough joy, and that the great swallows in these spaces are only terrible wakes which, compared to the agile princess and heartlessly threatening with superior power, will in the end become the cold room of beauty.
So small a strip bears, the other breaks, and all the incomparably large gapes with the same dark death which, unchanging with cold upon cold, only imitates itself.
To raise one's hand then with a light-year pound and demonstrate the fugue of eternity on terrible organs, while the girl in the icy distance dances, hardly greater to see than a fly flown away towards the light, it is to chill with the great weapon as when the superpower with the powers the element hides coldly makes its rows in the land of Gond against unsuspecting cities and, although itself dismissing all talk of sin punishment and trial, nevertheless treats the human with such terrible flame that this terrible torrent of loose gamma released by those who do not mean sin punishment nevertheless cruelly destroys both Yaal and Gena and melts down to ashes the wonder Heba
With the same fire they turned on Chebeba.
​
Posterity does not understand you so easily.
It judges according to the image of posterity
and counts up the time you lived in
as rows of negligence, as offenses
against the spirit of foresight, the duties of thought.
To this it adds the work of suffering
and piles up, as blind as a judge
as you were blind as a criminal, case by case.
Can those who have killed the foundations of joy and destroyed the great city of joy have the right to the joys of life?
Does Cain have the right to be happy?
Can those who strangled the joys of Xinombra and burned the valley of paradise have the right to heights of heaven other than Aniara's daily agony?
I ask but never get an answer. I have to arrange for pastimes
for the hordes of Aniara and manage its entertainment.
​
A wave of newly awakened hatred swept through the mountains where Nobia lived in deep mines and ghostly white lights illuminated every thread of life in the fabrics she wove.
She had sought and found the thread of life - a discovery of how healing rays are empowered by the inner council of things and fused with the heart of the atom.
And while hatred swelled around the mountains
and wounds screamed in the valley of time.
she wove day and night until the color of victory
and the skin of life rose in the hall of death.
Of her beauty little can be said. It was lost in a wave of radiation but the clear purity of the soul could be weighed; in healed wounds we saw her reflection.
​
Then I will throw you out of your chair. I will break your armchair view, because it is false and holds a convulsive security in a time that has slipped out of its rooms, but also the other way around: that it becomes a view without deep insight.
From this world, I shall send you happiness today to the kingdom of love, to the evil shore where the Samaritan Nobia and others spread works of love from country to country.
Figuring out the ways of evil and tracking down all the poison in the city of hate was futile, for hate stood there with heavy blocks united row by row.
Within its walls there was life and movement in the birthing centers and squares where human beings were conceived and human beings were born and human life in the human gap was destroyed. It was best to pretend that this city of self-righteous evil existed as nothing more than a devilish childhood that would mature, grow tired of itself.
We resolved to keep on sending saints there for the longest time.
from the saints' camps as long as the funds lasted
and as far as the need still aroused the heart.
This plan was tried for nine years, during which the Rind camp of saints bled to death: an act of self-sacrifice based on faith in the powers of good. But the heavy wall of hate stood just as hard, and the fatigue of leadership followed the act of hate; only too great was the throne of victory we had.
A single city consumed the power which we had thought sufficient for the transformation of the world.
​
On a rare occasion, the happiness of being free from desire also came.
Then the emptiness suddenly became populated by a kind of spiritualized mystery.
We walked the spirit's path of happiness along the beach, exchanging thoughts, making fortune cards.
It was evening and sunset in the sea.
Night fell, but the land of thought stood firm.
He woke up. She said: guess where.
I can't, he said. How did you get here? The same way you did: up the gravel path and then straight to the left among the cypresses. There was a dewy path the moonlight itself went there with light steps which I tried to imitate.
And when everything was past and the path was over
I managed to become a clear crystal and find you, my friend, on this path.
It is so transparently wonderful here.
We no longer exist. All that was is over.
Neither god nor devil here reaches us anymore and the end is the cruel parody of life.
​
Where is the plain text?
This is what I'm looking for.
The one that fits but still gives song.
After thanking God that he was a wasp and not something else, he continued between the leafy branches and stung the farmer.
Laid out by spiritual mobs, the truth becomes worse than the lie. When the mob washes the barley, it is never clean.
The rabble always wash in the dunghill from the Augean stables.
​
​
Matema's camel bells ring in the deserts of speech where the caravans of unfinished quarrels
never reach their oasis, only become more camels.
Immersed as in a dream but still awake, I found myself changed and so naked that no dream has words for what it was like when, transformed by the stone, I cut down towards the inner realms and while this was happening I became smaller, smaller and even more stripped of layers and layers of time and space as I sank further and further into the stone, deeper and deeper into things.
Who undressed me, wore me down so much that no conceivable smallness so small on this earth can be imagined unless one is long since beyond what every comprehensible thought wants to deny.
And yet I was being stripped and reduced still further in no direction.
So sunk, unceasingly sunk in
towards even more breathtaking reduction
I retained in my dream a way of seeing
and understand that I was traveling into
to the dimensions, the innermost
who with their interior work with their interior
and whose interiors compose the world.
They scare children with darkness, criminals with punishment and sinners with realms beyond death where the vengeful desire to torment has transported its arsenal of tormenting images.
But sorrow follows us every day, and joy follows us every day.
We ourselves are the sorrow, we are also the joy, everything human is rooted in humanity, and no human being can escape humanity, not her hatred and her self-degradation, nor the joy she spreads, nor the love she forms.
There is a third land that is not death and not life, but the reality that pervades all realities, and spins the very thread of the fabric from which dreams are woven. Yes, I had come to the rooms where these threads are spun. When I arrived, I stepped out and saw no longer surprised the smallest fairy, who herself was not at all surprised to welcome me to her inner land.
And although we were both unimaginably smaller than two grains of traveling dust on a suit on earth, we thought we were big here in this smallest room to which I have now come and which nevertheless encloses with its vault a separate world of realities formed.
On the contrary, I cannot describe what I saw of strange things, but that will follow when the habit of telling stories has been practiced for other habits than what life offers,
and other things than those called death.
For though beyond all I have known
this was not death
and though within all I have known
this was not life.
​
Actually, the comprehensibility was slight, as when multiples arranged in layers, and layered in the directions of space, make the fabric of the dream omnidirectional structural and become a fabric consisting of paths where the thread is only thought of as a path as a sign that here the shuttle has gone, but where is the thread? The thread is the path. I saw how the gnome was in a quandary as to which of two different possibilities to give clarity.
Then came formulas of such an elusive nature that the gnome was again gripped by the anxiety
which arises when the explanation is attempted but little response is felt by the pupil.
And with a look that shone as if with sorrow, he signaled a break in the dilemma. And with a formula more magical than comprehensible, we left the atom.
We expanded to other contexts and sat on a leaf next to a bee eagerly searching for honey in a meadow.
​
The Dance
Around the great star of the day we shall orbit the years we have been given to live, and our family for a few thousand centuries, perhaps more, perhaps less, no one knows.
But the time that we are orbiting is so small compared to that of the suns where they wander around in orbits in the galaxy our family named the Milky Way, luminous to behold.
What can our eyes see, our hearts cry out at the thought of atoms going around in the same way with waves and particles.
Some have called this the dance of the gods - it is always being danced by everything in the universe.
All indications are that among the arts of the muses
the art of dance is the first and the last,
and we are in it, dancing out
our role in the dance, it is already being danced
in other worlds separate from our time,
in other dance theaters,
yet one thing is clear
that we are dancing our turns.
Our role in it
is ours and no one else's.
Our own role in the dance art of all worlds.
​
Economic overview
Our earth wanders alive alone, around the sun our dear parent.
As far as the giant tubes reach no living neighbor to see.
Desolate and empty on the one who received the name of the god of war, burning hot and desolate on the one who received the name of the goddess of love.
Jupiter, planet of Zeus
ice-clad to two hundred times the height of the Himalayas.
The others are death's door.
Beyond that, light years to the next planetary village.
So each sun has only one living person, and that one is a leased farm, indefinitely and to an unreliable and dangerous race.
​
Here is a world of light distributed in the mystery of things.
Here is the salvaged light in the innumerable rooms of the stone.
Wands point with poles directed to their rooms inside mountains and stones, spinning mystery.
Deep in her fairy tale, she lives for the sake of the tale.
the norn who has learned to spin the yarn from the wool of the riddles.
​
The spirit of Ideema from space in endless lines gathered the seeds into the durable wood of the suns.
From far beyond time the hydrogen came in modest garb and built for its God the ingenious nests of the atoms.
Come, let us nurture the foundation of our life. The green sphere we have been given to live on in the universe's lottery system.
When the next lucky draw can get rid of the Milky Way's big tombola we do not know and can never reach.
But we do know one thing for sure: the next draw will not include us.
​
A stranger called chance shuffles the cards and deals them to the local players.
Every single poker face keeps a straight face.
There are plenty of goldfish in the tureen here.
According to the law, the silent coincidence itself is the last to raise its hand, with ice in its stomach.
Soon jaws of granite are chewing the cigar.
Where is the bundle of happiness among the starlings?
That question is answered when chance wins.
Then the shot goes off, chance's life disappears. His house of cards collapses, but soon everyone at the counter thinks it was a nice fish, that no one won, that chance herself was told by Smith and Wesson what chance was.
by Smith and Wesson what chance should do.
( translation to be continued )

I am trying to create a ProductCell which takes the informations about product from the database by using a getAllProduct function. getAllProduct makes a call to a Node.js server which, in turn, takes data from the database and sends it back.
ProductCell is then used in HomeView to display the products.
The problem is that i don't quite understand how to use the data fetched by getAllProducts inside ProductCell, because I keep getting various errors regarding the use of Decoder.
The code is the following:
ProductCell:

import SwiftUI struct ProductCell: View { var product: Product var body: some View { VStack(alignment: .leading, spacing: 4) { product.image Text(product.title) .font(Font.system(size: 15, weight: .regular)) Text("€\(String(format: "%.2f", product.price))") .font(Font.system(size: 15, weight: .regular)) } .aspectRatio(contentMode: .fit) } } struct ProductCell_Previews: PreviewProvider { static var previews: some View { // Dati di anteprima let previewProducts: [Product] = [ Product(from: <#Decoder#>), Product(from: <#Decoder#>) ] // Creazione di un ambiente di anteprima con i dati dei prodotti let previewEnvironment = ProductEnvironment(products: previewProducts) // Inizializzazione della visualizzazione di anteprima utilizzando il primo prodotto if let product = previewProducts.first { return ProductCell(product: product) .environmentObject(previewEnvironment) .alert(isPresented: .constant(false)) { Alert(title: Text("Alert")) } } else { return Text("Nessun prodotto disponibile per l'anteprima") } } } struct ProductEnvironment { var products: [Product] } 

getAllProduct:

func getAllProduct(products: Binding<[Product]>, completion: @escaping (Bool, String) -> Void) { let url = URL(string: "http://127.0.0.1:4000/getAllProduct")! var request = URLRequest(url: url) request.httpMethod = "GET" let task = URLSession.shared.dataTask(with: request) { (data, response, error) in if let error = error { print("Errore nella richiesta: \(error.localizedDescription)") completion(false, "Errore nella richiesta") return } guard let httpResponse = response as? HTTPURLResponse else { print("Risposta non valida") completion(false, "Risposta non valida") return } if httpResponse.statusCode == 200 { // La richiesta è andata a buon fine if let data = data { do { let decoder = JSONDecoder() let decodedData = try decoder.decode([Product].self, from: data) DispatchQueue.main.async { // Aggiorna i dati dei prodotti products.wrappedValue = decodedData } completion(true, "Richiesta completata con successo") } catch { completion(false, "Errore durante il parsing dei dati di risposta: \(error.localizedDescription)") } } else { completion(false, "Nessun dato ricevuto dal server") } } else { // La richiesta ha restituito un codice di stato diverso da 200 print("Codice di stato non valido: \(httpResponse.statusCode)") completion(false, "Codice di stato non valido: \(httpResponse.statusCode)") } } task.resume() } 

HomeView:

import SwiftUI struct HomeView: View { @Binding var products: [Product] @Binding var cart: [Product] @Binding var favorites: [Product] @State private var isLoading = true @State private var loadingError: String? var body: some View { var prods: [[Product]] = [] _ = (products).publisher .collect(products.count % 2 == 1 ? (products.count / 2) + 1 : (products.count / 2)) .collect() .sink(receiveValue: { prods = $0 }) return NavigationView { ScrollView(.vertical, showsIndicators: true) { if isLoading { // Mostra l'indicatore di caricamento ProgressView() .padding() } else if let error = loadingError { // Mostra il messaggio di errore Text(error) .font(Font.system(size: 17, weight: .semibold, design: .rounded)) .foregroundColor(Color.gray) .padding() } else { // Mostra i prodotti HStack(alignment: .top, spacing: 10) { if prods.count > 0 { VStack(alignment: .center, spacing: 8) { ForEach(prods[0], id: \.id_product) { prod in NavigationLink(destination: ProductDetail(product: prod, cart: self.$cart, favorites: self.$favorites) .padding(.horizontal, 16) ) { ProductCell(product: prod) } .buttonStyle(PlainButtonStyle()) } } } if prods.count == 2 { VStack(alignment: .center, spacing: 8) { ForEach(prods[1], id: \.id_product) { prod in NavigationLink(destination: ProductDetail(product: prod, cart: self.$cart, favorites: self.$favorites) .padding(.horizontal, 16) ) { ProductCell(product: prod) } .buttonStyle(PlainButtonStyle()) } } } if prods.count == 0 { VStack(alignment: .center, spacing: 4) { Spacer() Image(systemName: "bag.fill") .resizable() .scaledToFit() .foregroundColor(Color.gray) .frame(width: 40, height: 40, alignment: .center) .padding(.bottom, 20) Text("No Products To Display") .font(Font.system(size: 17, weight: .semibold, design: .rounded)) .foregroundColor(Color.gray) Spacer() } .padding(.bottom, 10) } } .padding() } } .padding(.bottom, 50) .navigationBarTitle("Catalog", displayMode: .inline) .navigationBarHidden(true) } .onAppear { // Effettua la richiesta getAllProduct all'apertura della vista getAllProduct(products: $products) { success, message in if success { isLoading = false loadingError = nil } else { isLoading = false loadingError = message } } } } } struct HomeView_Previews: PreviewProvider { @State static var items: [Product] = [] @State static var cart: [Product] = [] @State static var favorites: [Product] = [] static var previews: some View { HomeView(products: $items, cart: $cart, favorites: $favorites) } } 

And the errors are the following:
ProductCell, line 16: "Static method 'buildExpression' requires that 'String' conform to 'View'",
lines 31 and 32: "Call can throw, but it is not marked with 'try' and the error is not handled",
line 40: "Instance method 'environmentObject' requires that 'ProductEnvironment' conform to 'ObservableObject'"

The thing I will miss about Succession was the world-building and character development was so deep! Everyone was so well-fleshed out, in small ways that told you so much about them —like how Caroline NEVER had food in the house/her meals were "meager" as a metaphor for her inability to nourish and support her children (though in her own way, she tried).
Whole Substacks have been devoted to Shiv's hair and clothes and the stories she was telling about herself with them. She was trying on new identities throughout: political operator, wife, corporate drone, dutiful daughter, sister, mother...
The way the family had a shared way of speaking (yeah/uh huh) and a "secret" language that dated to their childhood, "nut-nut" was extremely true to life. Yet at the same time, they didn't perceive the same events in the same way due to differing ages and genders ("Moe").
One of the most intricate television shows I have ever watched. I'll probably start an immediate re-watch to catch all the stuff I missed (people are constantly acting in the background and it is relevant, regular tiny callbacks to earlier situations, like Greg and the gong in the finale).
What will you miss?

I've been meaning to do this for awhile as I've found the info regarding backpacking without a car in the NYC area lacking, half-baked, or in practice, untrue. The thread in the sidebar is excellent, but AT focused. I'll see a post that say take this bus service to a certain town and taxi to the trailhead, but what it may not say is that there is no service to call a taxi on arrival or that line only runs on weekdays that direction. Not to say I won't be repeating common knowledge as I definitely will, but hopefully you'll find something in my logistics useful for planning your own ventures sans car.
A little bit about me: I am a lightweight backpacker (slowly working on dropping my last few ounces) living in Queens, NY. I generally love the public (and private) transit in NYC metro area, although it always could be improved and there are aspects that are deeply frustrating, large and small. In addition to not having a car, I also work a 9-5 job; this and future trail reports will reflect that I often only have a weekend to enact my plans.
The Escarpment Trail

• AllTrails
• Direction: SoBo
• Miles in total: ~26
• Nights: 1

Buy a ticket on the Trailways bus line from Port Authority to Windham, NY. On Saturdays, there is a bus that departs at 8am. That is the one you want. The Trailways' stations are in the bottom of Port Authority, terminals 28-34. Double check your bus is correct with the attendant as the what is on the directory and what terminal they're actually leaving from may be at odds. When boarding, tell the driver that you want the Escarpment Trailhead Parking lot, which is slightly before Windham; in between Windham, East Windham, and Hensonville; after Cairo; on route 23. If you pass Smitty's Nursery & Landscape on the left you've gone too far. I didn't know you could ask the driver to drop you off at a non-designated stop, but he said it was okay as long as its on route. I'm assuming this is a driver by driver thing, but as long as you're not an ass about it, I bet they'll say yes. However, I did not know this perk until a woman request to be let off before Windham, and I got off with her and proceeded to backtrack to the trailhead on route 23. If you have to walk the shoulder, maybe you can hitch a ride, but you'd be luckier than me.
Make sure you have water. At the trailhead there is a stream. There is no water after that until 0.4 miles past Dutcher Notch, which is ~12 miles away.
Starting from the first sign off 23, the trail is very well marked (until North South Campground), simply follow the blue markers. A commenter on Alltrails writes:

If you can get Wyndham and BlackHead out of the way on the first day the second day is pretty smooth after the initial climb out of the notch. Amazing view after amazing view.

Views translate to ascents. Climbing Blackhead was confirmed steep and arduous after already hiking 9 miles. But this is the hardest climb during the trip, so once summited, it's all smooth sailing. Day 1 clocked about 11 miles (excluding walk to the trailhead).
I camped somewhere on the backside of Arizona Mountain overlooking the valley. It was gorgeous, but unexpectedly buggy for no water nearby and a slight breeze. If you're hiking this in two days one night as I was, you need to get to around the Notch. In the notch, there is an intersection between the Escarpment trail (straight), the Colgate Lake Trail (right), and the Dutcher Notch Trail (left). A short ways down the Dutcher Notch Trail there is a spring (a pipe in the rock) where you can filter water. This is the last place to filter water before North Lake.
Not much to report for the first half of the day; the Catskills are beautiful. There is a very cool plane wreckage. The Escarpment trail gives views to the NorthEast, and often times you can see the Green Mountains, the Whites, and the Berkshires, depending on the clarity. Eventually you'll reach North Point on North Mountain. Here, you'll start to encounter day hikers staying at NorthSouth Campground. I was fairly alone for most of the path; some families at the start, a few day hikers going to Windham High Peak, but very few backpackers. Which imo is preferable; I like the solitude. The frequency of day hikers increased the closer you get to the campground, but most of them were heading out as I was heading in, and only one had a bluetooth speaker.
Reaching North Lake, you are a jungle person breaching civilization. People are grilling and getting stuff out of their SUVs, while you smell and swim in your skivvies. Or at least, that's what I did. After a nice dip, find the blue markers at the back of the campground. There is no more markings for the Escarpment Trail although you're still on it. The signs will say to Catskill Mountain House Site and to Boulder Rock. Stay on the blue markers.
Eventually you'll come to Kaaterskill Falls. I only went to the lookout not the base, as I was unsure how much more walking I'd have to do and I was anxious about the time (around 2pm, the bus back was 5:55pm.) Also Kaaterskill Falls was overrun by tourists, which are different than day hikers. I can't complain as Kaaterskill Falls has been a tourist attraction since the mid 1800s, but after two days in the peaceful woods, I wasn't keen about been around all the activity.
Instead of finishing the Escarpment Trail at Schutt Rd. Parking Lot, take the Kaaterskill Rail Trail to the Haines Falls Train Station. Its about a 1.5 miles of pathway that brings you back to route 23A. At 23A, take a right and walk along the shoulder for about 2 miles into the town of Tannersville, NY. On 23A, stop at the Twilight General Store for an optional ice cream, however the key stop is Bear & Fox Provisions in Tannersville. Great selection of beer and cider, one of which the proprietor brews from apple trees from the side of the road.
Catch the 5:55pm Trailways bus from outside the pharmacy (5980 Main St.), which after a brief stop in Kingston, returns to Port Authority. I would recommend buying both ticket ahead of time as I had varying degrees of mediocre service the whole trip. Day 2 clocked about ~14 miles (including walking to Tannersville)
The Escarpment is great trail for the experiences hiker. Like other Catskill hikes, it's as beautiful as difficult. It's very possible to do it in a weekend, but a slower paced individual or group may want to do it in three days, two nights which may affect bus times and accessibility. Enjoy a carless excursion and remember to bring an eye mask and ear plugs for the bus ride.
imgs

Purpose

This guide is to explain how to get every Pokémon game from Gen 1-7 onto your CFW 3DS. The information is a compilation of references I’ve collected during my own efforts of 3DS modding. I’m creating something I wish I had when I started down this process, and I hope you find it useful.
Please let me know if any of the information is incorrect or should be elaborated on.

Note: This assumes you have already completed the CFW 3DS guide on your 3DS. This will not work without completing that process.

Part 1: Useful Tools & Sources

I will be making reference to the same handful of sources over and over again throughout this guide.

• H Shop. How to install
  
• GodMode9 - this should already be installed on your 3DS if you followed the CFW guide
  
• How to rip game cartridges via GodMode9. Video about it.
  

Part 2: How to get every Pokémon game on your Home Screen

Gen 1 & 2 (RBY/GSC)

• Download virtual consoles through the Hshop.

Gen 3 (RSE/FRLE)

• Download CIA’s here and run them in the FBI app.

I can’t find the original reddit post where that Google Drive link came from. Here’s a post that also links to it.

Gen 4 & 5 (DPPt/HGSS/BWB2W2)

1. Download roms or rip your cartridges via GodMode9, put them in the correct rom folders.
2. Use NDSForwarder OR just open the Universal Updater app and you can find it in there (there's two different ones, I'd use the one by MechanicalDragon)
3. Put DS games in /ROMS/NDS.

Note: Do not rename them after you’ve installed forwarders as that will break them. Also: LIMIT 40 DS GAMES INSTALLED AT A TIME - You can however use the data management menu to move the shortcuts you aren't using to the SD card to make room (where they disappear from the home screen and become unusable till they are moved back)

1. Open the app via homebrew launcher to select which to install to your homescreen, and you may uninstall them one by one through the main 3DS data management menu, the DSiWare section.

Source

• Alternatively, you can use TwilightMenu++ but I don’t like using that on the 3DS.

Gen 6 & 7 (XY/ORAS/SMUSUM)

1. Download games from the HShop
2. or Rip the game from the cartridge via GodMode9

Part 3: How to migrate saves into 3DS

Reference
Gen 1 & 2 (RBY/GSC): Godmode 9
Gen 3 (RSE/FRLE)

• Rip from cartridge via a DS or DS Lite
  
• Migrate via Godmode 9
  

Gen 4 & 5 (DPPt/HGSS/BWB2W2)

1. Rip saves from cartridge via GodMode 9
   
2. wherever you store your rom files, there should be a folder labeled saves.
   
3. Move saves files into the roms folder.
   

Gen 6 & 7 (XY/ORAS/SMUSUM)

1. Rip from cartridge via GodMode9 & inject into virtual version

Part 4: How to cheat in each game

1: Checkpoint

Note: Cannot access GBA or NDS games, only 3DS and original VC games. Causes the game to crash often, especially in gen 6&7. Always save before activating a cheat.

2: PKSM

• Like PKHex but you can do it all on the 3DS.
  
• How to get the GBA VC game into PKSM:
  

1. get ahold of your Title ID by going to FBI → Titles → take a picture of your relevant Title ID for the game you need. 2. in PKSM, go to settings (hit X) and go to Misc → Title ID’s 3. input your title ID for your specific game from step 1 

• GBA event items
  
  • When you're in the Scripts menu in PKSM, press X to swap to SD-based scripts, and Y to swap to universal scripts. There is a script called “RSEFRLG Event” or something like that.
• You can work on gen 4-5 games in PKSM but it’s a different way to access them.
  

1. in pksm, go to settings (hit x) → misc. → Extra Saves → find your save for your specific game within your SD card. For gen4-5 it’s probably in /ROMs/nds/saves 2. go back to the main PKSM screen, then hit Y, then choose your save to open. 

Source

3: NDSForwarder (DS games only): hold Y while loading the game then press X
4: PKHeX Desktop App

Part 5: How to migrate Pokémon up and down generations:

1. PKSM
   
2. PKMN Chest can also work, though it works better on a DS/DSLite/DSi. It cannot access 3DS games, so no gen 6 or 7. Nor can it access Virtual Console games, like how it was instructed you install gen 1-3 above. It can access non-virtual console roms if you’ve installed them on the 3DS a different way. So at most you could access gens 1-5.
   

^{Edit: formatting}