"Elrond Raised His Eyes And Looked At Him, And Frodo Felt His Heart Pierced By The Sudden Keenness Of

Music by treelight, at the House of Finwë.

Foreground: Turgon playing a flute, Galadriel annoyed by Fëanor, Finrod and Maglor singing a duet, Aredhel playing a tambourine. (Aredhel and Galadriel are the same age, and maybe the elven equivalent of 13-14 years old here.)

Background: Eärwen and Finarfin dancing, Celegorm objecting to Huan's singing, Fingolfin with baby Argon and Anairë, Fingon and Maedhros more interested in each other's company than in music.

I did a thing during quarantine!!!

(Ok, I did a lot of things, but this one was helpful and I’m proud of it so I’m sharing!)

I made a list of foods!

Did I base it on suggestions for parents of picky eaters? Yes. Am I a little salty about how everything that helps is designed for toddlers? Yes. Salty enough that I won’t use it? No.

But let me explain.

My Gentleman Caller has been staying with me during quarantine and he really likes cooking. I don’t. So he does the cooking and I do the dishes, because fairness. Problem is I’m finicky about foods and he’s trying to find stuff that is 1) healthy 2) tasty and 3) that I’ll eat! (He is a lovely and majestic man and I’m so grateful for him omg!)

But what this means is that he kept asking me about a whole bunch of recipes in cookbooks and magazines and internet and was getting frustrated by my continual responses of “eh? I think so? Maybe?”

I would go on to explain any hesitation I had about stuff and how I have a hard time seeing a list of ingredients and knowing what they would taste like together. And how I was basically just glancing at the ingredient list for any NO foods.

Then we realized a list would be helpful for him! (Because we are both apparently stupid sometimes it took us a few conversations to get there!)

So I looked up lists of foods and picky eating and found this!

It is for parents of toddlers and small children, but it had a good idea! I liked the Always/Sometimes/Never divisions, but it wasn’t quite right. So I fired up the Excel and started my own list!

I decided my list worked best in 5 categories: Always, Often, Caution, Never, and Unknown. Always is rather self explanatory. Often is my shorthand for I’ll likely eat it unless I’m just not feeling it that day, but it’s probably fine and go ahead and plan on yes.

Caution is for when I only like things on certain foods or prepared in certain ways. On my spreadsheet, for example, one got olives in this category. I only like them on pizza. Also bananas. I only like bananas in banana shape. Not in smoothie form. So if it’s got one of these, basically just check with me first or prepare for substitutions.

Never is for, well, never. I will not eat that. Sometimes it’s a taste, sometimes a texture, sometimes I just plain don’t like it! Point is, not gonna eat it. Ever.

There are a few things in this category I listed in bold (not on the screen caps) because I have an actual horrendous involuntary reaction to them! (It’s stuff like applesauce, grits, oatmeal, etc. anything that can be classified as “gruel” triggers my gag reflex and I end up nearly vomiting with tears and snot running down my face. It’s ugly. Double hard no!)

Then there’s the Unknown category. I joke that I’ve got the flavor palette of a 5 year old, but really there’s just a lot of stuff I haven’t tried. Or haven’t tried often enough to come to a conclusion about them yet. Hence, unknown! I put this in to explain the thought of he can try this stuff, but I literally have no idea what my reaction to it will be. I could love it, could hate it, could love it in one thing but hate it in another! I don’t know yet!

I also in the second screenshot separated them into categories for ease of finding and shopping. Makes it easier for people who aren’t me to find what they’re looking for.

But the interesting thing for me is that I made the list first and separated into categories later. So I found out things about myself I didn’t know! Like, I just don’t seem to like any fruits and berries consistently! None whatsoever! Never knew that! Also makes sense why I’m not keen on pie!

But I’m very proud of my list and my self-reflections and wanted to share! Hopefully it helps others who are particular about their food to explain their preferences to others!

when people talk about writing ‘the next Lord of the Rings’ they think it’s all about the wars and the languages and the histories, and Aragorn brooding in the corner of an inn and the Balrog roaring in Moria and the ruins of Isengard, and that’s how we got Game of Thrones and several dozen cheap fantasy knock-offs every year, not to mention whatever nonsense the Amazon show is going to produce

but Tolkien’s wars and languages and histories stemmed from his love of creating - of words and history and mythos - and that love infuses into everything he writes, and if you miss that then there’s no way in hell you can replicate it

and the people who want to write the next Lord of the Rings because they want to write the next epic don’t get that the story is about the hobbits’ soft and simple lives and Bilbo’s poetry and Sam’s love language being food and Eowyn discovering hope after depression and Gandalf making fireworks for hobbits even if he is a literal angelic being, and Aragorn weeping over Boromir’s body and Theoden’s kindness to Merry, and Beregond betraying his most prized orders to save Faramir, and the unlikely friendship between Gandalf and Pippin, and the even unlikelier friendship between Legolas and Gimli, and Sam and Frodo singing to each other in Mordor, and Boromir sacrificing himself for the hobbits, and Sam’s simple love for Rosie, and the restoration of the Shire, and the friendship of the Fellowship surviving down through the ages, and peace after war and hope in darkness, and the love between a gardener and a gentleman pacifist being literally the only thing that saves Middle Earth

and that is why people who try to recreate Lord of the Rings by starting with war always get it wrong. you have to start with the love, or it’s nothing: just another empty history

I'm approaching parenting age and I've been thinking back on all the stuff I put my parents through as a kid. Only thought now is "oh no, God help me"

Whenever my day is going bad, I remind myself my name is not Maedhros and I don't have brothers named Celegorm and Curufin. It works very well.

Please consider: If Tolkien wasn't a coward Feanor would have been female and it would have been way cooler. a) Gives some real weight to the idea that Feanor was worried the crown would go to one of Finwe's other kids. b) More ladies in Tolkien, always a plus. c) You'd better believe Feanor's the greatest craftsperson of the Noldor- she made 7 of them! (Also the sheer drama of newly single mum Feanor and her 7 boys in Middle Earth) d) Silmarils as kids2.0 e) Blacksmith lady hot

Lady Feanor would indeed be awesome. The historical part of my brain can't help but think that critics of the time would have unfortunately interpreted ambitious kick butt single mom Feanor as a prime example of the "monstrous woman" type, ala Medea or something, who "got what was coming to her" in the end, so in a way I'm glad that the Prof. decided to write Feanor as a man so that we didn't have to deal with that nonsense.

I can't help but wonder if he'd lived at a later date if he might have considered female Feanor, I mean, this is a man who took one look at one is Shakespeare's most famous plays and said, "the answer to the prophesy is a C-section?? Booooo! Macbeth should have been killed by a woman! (And also the trees should have actually come alive)" and "its bogus that Orpheus turned around after all that and Eurydice had to die! Rip to them but if i were trapped in the underworld my wife would be different!"

And then proceeded to write his own genderbent fix it fic of both of those perennial works x)

So yeah, I think if the character had come into his head as female then Tolkien would have 100% been down with it

breaking news: local british magician collapses from exhaustion after carrying the entire fantasy genre’s gaslight gatekeep girlboss representation since 2004. “mr norrell is such a #icon,” our sources report. 

this looks like love

~ This was Beleg’s knife. It was more beautiful than any knife he had seen before, the blade covered with intricate designs of leaves and stars and the crossings of rivers and trees.

‘This looks like love,’ his father would have said. He said that about beautiful things wrought with care: knives and swords, baskets, shawls, quilts, jackets. His broken harp. Túrin still didn’t know what it meant. Not entirely. ~

***

Túrin woke to find himself alone. Beleg’s bed was made up, so were the others'. He got up and washed. He was close enough to Menegroth that there was no real danger if he did not run off alone. He drank sweet water and ate lingonberries and cheese and bread.

Beleg had not woken him early, so he would not study to hunt that day. Beleg had let him rest. Perhaps Beleg had gone to hunt without him. Túrin stepped out onto the small porch of the cabin in his nightshirt.

There Beleg sat, making arrows.

‘You’re awake,’ he said. Túrin nodded. He sat cross legged beside Beleg and stared at the sun. It was midday.

‘I slept a long time.’

‘You were tired.’

Túrin nodded again. He bounced his fingers on the bruises on his knees. He liked how his fingers felt as they bounced off his skin. Beleg did not ask him why he did it or call him strange. Túrin swept his hands up and down, turning his hands in the air, so that his fingers came down first facing his knees and then turned from them, again and again.

‘Do I go back to Menegroth today?’ he asked. He reached for mint leaves from the ground and pressed three into his mouth.

‘No,’ Beleg said. Túrin turned his face up to the sun.

‘When then?’

‘In two days.’

‘And then you will go far afield?’ Túrin said. ‘For all the winter?’ He let his hands fly again, bouncing off his knees. He chewed the mint leaves and swallowed their taste.

‘Not for all the winter, I don’t think,’ Beleg answered. ‘I would miss you.’

Túrin stopped bouncing his hands to pick mint leaves for Beleg. He handed them to him. Beleg took them and nodded his thanks. He ate them and kept making arrows.

‘Do you want to speak of which you dreamt?’ Beleg asked.

‘No,’ Túrin said. He waved his hand, letting it spin at his wrist. ‘I think everyone was dead. I was dead.’

Beleg patted Túrin’s knee gently. Túrin brushed the spot when Beleg had pulled his hair back. He didn’t like the lingering touch that seemed to tingle on his skin, even from those he loved. He tried to do it when Beleg wasn’t looking. He had brushed off his father’s touches and kisses. Sometimes he let his mother’s stay, but it agitated him to have a part of his skin even a little wet or a bit different from the rest. He didn’t know why being touched left an impression of the touch on his skin, but it did. He had asked Beleg if he could feel a touch after it was gone. Beleg had said yes, but he hadn’t been bothered by it.

Túrin looked at the yard. It was green and damp. Mud was spreading though. It must have rained a little when he slept. It was quiet, and it smelt like cold rain. Soon the leaves would change colour.

‘Are we alone?’ Túrin asked.

‘Yes,’ Beleg said. ‘The others left last night. They are needed farther North.’

‘Where you will go.’

‘Yes, where I will go.’

Túrin shoved his bare feet down onto the ground. It was soft enough that they sunk a bit into it. It was cold. The grass tickled his skin. Túrin stood and took a large step into the yard. His foot sunk down again, the ground giving a bit beneath him. He walked the yard around like that, in long strides, watching his feet leave impressions in the wet earth, feeling the cold of it.

He liked that the grass was green and not brown. He liked that the ground was wet and not frozen. He ran back to the porch and stood on it with his muddy feet.

‘Wash up,’ Beleg said. ‘You can’t go inside like that.’

‘I know.’ Túrin stood on his tiptoes to touch the very top of the porch where the two slanted roofs met each other.

Beleg patted his leg. ‘Wash. Then put some clothes on. Thingol and Melian will not be pleased if I bring you home ill.’

Túrin wrinkled his nose but threw some cold water from the rain barrel onto his feet and wiped them clean with a rag. He went back inside and came out dressed and with shoes on.

‘Don’t you look darling,’ Beleg said. Túrin had put this underneath ‘strange things that Elves say to each other and sometimes to you but that don’t need a response’ so he tramped off without a response to pee.

He came back to Beleg after and stared at his muddy footprints on the porch where he had been sitting. Beleg gave him a pointed look. Túrin wiped them up with the same rag and hung it over the side of the rain barrel to dry. He sat down again and took the knife that Beleg gave him.

This was Beleg’s knife. It was more beautiful than any knife he had seen before, the blade covered with intricate designs of leaves and stars and the crossings of rivers and trees.

‘This looks like love,’ his father would have said. He said that about beautiful things wrought with care: knives and swords, baskets, shawls, quilts, jackets. His broken harp. Túrin still didn’t know what it meant. Not entirely.

‘This looks like love,’ he said, for maybe Beleg knew the answer.

Beleg studied him. Beleg’s face was ancient but barely lined. It was his eyes that made it ancient. They were like the night sky and all the stars in it – maybe just as old, or maybe younger, but not enough that it would it matter to Túrin when he thought of the ages of the world.

‘Yes,’ Beleg said. ‘Care is love.’

Túrin said no more.

I like to think that Fingolfin made a big point of making sure that all four of his kids got exactly the same amount of hugs.

He never made a big declaration of it or rubbed it in Finwe's face but it was rather important to him to not repeat that particular mistake

Perhaps there was one kid that he found slightly easier to talk to (maybe Argon since hes the first one to tragically die, or Turgon as they were both on the "stay in tirion" team during the debate) and though this never affected his actions he may have carried the slightest twinge of low level guilt for it

I really hope the Amazon show picks a side in the Gil-Gadad debate. Just for the drama. I think it will be funny to watch.