domarzione | three things make a post

1) I wrote a fic for the first time in a year, in a fandom I'm not 'in' and with a topic that... The 911 fandom, near as I can tell, exists for one pairing and one pairing only despite having a really remarkable set of main characters. And here I am writing genfic that fandom can't squint and call pre-slash because it's also pre-series. It's a character study and I think I did okay because my goodness, if there's one thing I can do is write a military backstory that makes sense of canon developed without a military advisor. But it has a readership of six. I can write stuff that fandom will like and call pre-slash because if I can write Steve and Bucky as brothers I can write Buck and Eddie as platonic soulmates, but.. what do you do when you like a designer but none of the clothes fit? Or is it the other way around and I'm the designer without a clientele?

But It Often Rhymes
2k | Eddie Diaz

He has no idea how to be a civilian anymore.

During the day it’s trying to get used to being responsible for his own plans and actions – getting used to a life without a routine outside of PT appointments three times a week. He doesn’t have a work purpose anymore, a set of professional expectations, and it’s not freeing at all. He doesn’t see “possibilities” (his mom’s word) or “opportunities” (his dad’s), he sees a void where his sense of accomplishment used to be and no way to fill it. Trying to find jobs that don’t require a college degree or vocational training but that somehow still pay a living wage...

It would be hard if it was just him and his failures, but it’s not. Everyone wanted him to get out, but now that he’s out the goalposts have moved and he’s letting them down all over again. He’s around but he’s not “present” according to Shannon and his parents. He’s out all the time for a patchwork quilt of jobs, but he’s still missing while he’s actually in the room. He’s not a father to his son even if he’s no longer a stranger to him. He’s not a partner to Shannon, whose frustration is no longer something she bothers to hide. She’s kind to him in the darkness of night, when his nightmares and flashbacks wake them both and he can’t hide what has been done to him by war, but her patience fades with the dawn.

He can see the man she wants him to be, that his parents expect him to be. He wants to be that man, too. It’s not that he wants to be a selfish husband or a shitty father; it’s that he isn’t any more whole during the day than he is in the dark and he needs some time to get himself back in one piece. He’ll get there, he will, but it’s not fast enough for anyone including him.

(He misses being around people who understand what slithers beneath his skin because they feel it, too. Who get that the bullets that hit him were merely an exclamation point on a statement that began with the first time he’d breathed in the talcum dust of Afghanistan. But despite El Paso crawling with guys who’d once had Property of the Department of Defense stamped on their asses, he’s cut off from the communion of faith. He’s out now.)

2) I am still living the car-free life, which is occasionally frustrating but honestly only really stressful when I consider how the hell I am going to get to work when actually go back to the office some time next month (they think). I live by good highway access, but Google Maps says it takes 2.5 hours and 3-5 buses to get from my apartment to my place of employ and that's... a lot. Speaking as someone who lived for a very long time in a Two Fare Zone in NYC. I'm good for food between delivery from Weee! and the supermarket because Giant is much more generous and available than Stop & Shop/Peapod despite literally being the same company, but I guess this is what happens when you live in car country.

I would like to get a car. I have money saved to get a car. But getting the actual car is proving to be the problem. Used cars are now essentially the same price as used cars -- a 2018 Kona with >50k miles is $2k less than a 2022 Kona, which is obscene and absurd. The local Carvanas don't have anything less than $20k for used vehicles. New cars don't stay on the lot a week and I've encountered one dealership that won't sell me a car at all without an MD license even though I am a MD resident. (And I need a car to go to the DMV to flip my NY license!) And I'm wary of ordering stuff online that I haven't at least sat in because this is a bit more expensive than risking a dress online from a place with a shitty return policy. But I can't get to dealerships without a lift. So exhausting.

3) It's baseball season! Well, almost because the Mets-Nats game keeps getting pushed back for rain. I find it deeply amusing that I am affected by the local weather delaying the game instead of turning on the game and wondering why it's not there. (The Rangers are playing, I can multitask, but it's Opening Day.) The Mets are starting the way the Mets always start, full of hope and also full of harbingers of what happens when you are Mets fan (hint: it's never good). I am paying for MLB Audio this year so I can listen to Howie and Wayne; I can *ahem* the TV side, but radio's harder and Audacy won't let me listen legally anymore.