Funny status ideas

So i'm married with my husband (Kevin) since 4 years and our relationship since we get married is very boring. I'm the one always suggesting trips, go to events, go somewhere for a romantic week-end or only a romantic dinner at home. I mean for 4 years i tried to spice up our marriage with easy things like i said before and i never expected to go to expensive places, doing luxury trips or have jewels every single day. I'm a pretty easy type of woman and even a dinner with a frozen dish to me is very romantic and unique cause it's a spontaneous thing or even a flower caught by the street would make me happy and feeled like i'm important to Kevin. So as you see i'm not a very "demanding" woman. I still remember when, before marriage, Kevin brought me a few flowers from the garden and gave them to me and i was the happiest girl of this world cause this simple things are, to me, the things that tells you how much someone cares for you. Or the time when i burnt the dinner cause i was distracted and Kevin, when he got back home from work, reassured me and we bought some McDonald's and stayed there hours just cuddling and talking. But since we got married he acts like i don't exist and just comes home to eat, watch the TV and sleep. Nothing else.
I tried many times to have a talk with him about our relationship, what we (and i) could do better to improve it, if i was doing something wrong, couple's therapy but he always brushed it off saying "i'm nust tired leave me alone". Every single time the same answer so after 4 years of frustrations like this i just gave up.
But then a year ago i made a gym membership cause i wanted to be in shape and because i thought that maybe my body was the problem and in 1 year i got in the best shape of my life but my husband didn't even noticed it and always act like it's all normal. In this year i met a guy at the gym and we started talking and become friends.
Before going on i want to specify that we never did anything physical like sex, kiss or this things and we always only talked like friends. This guy (Martin) apparently could seem like a tough and strict guy but i can guarantee that despise his body size (he is 194 cm for 134 kg) he is the sweetest guy i ever met. He is extremly sweet, innocent and extremly funny. He always talks with everyone at the gym and everyone likes him for his funny character. Since we started talking randomly, before, and then more seriously after i noticed that we have many things in common and we basically have the same character. I still remember that 3 months ago i was of the worst mood ever and he arriving to the gym and seeing me angry took a flower from the plants around the gym and gave it to me making me happy and smiling.
I never felt a connection like this with no one before and not even with my bestfriend. Just to make you understand.
I have no idea of what this guy is doing to me but i feel extremely attracted to him emotionally and physically. I would never cheat on my husband so having sex with Martin isn't an option and i never talked with him about my marriage problems cause it's a very personal thing and i don't talk about this things with everyone so Martin knows only a superficial part of me.
So folks of Reddit is this "normal"? How do i unravel this situation? What should i do?
P.S. i'm working as a secretary while Kevin works for a tech company as a business manager so he is the breedwinner of the couple and i'm doing all the house chores because Kevin is "too tired". We never wanted kids so this isn't a problem and our intimacy is doing it 3 times in 6 months.
TL:DR; I(28F) feel attracted to a guy i met at the gym but i'm married with my husband(28M). What should i do? Advices please!!!

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Ok for starters this is a throw away account since I know they have reddit and I DO NOT want them to see this. Also we are friends online! Don't judge I have a ton of friends in LDR 😭 Anyways. I have no idea what to think and I feel like I can't ask my friends since we are all in a big friend group and I'm afraid they will tell him. Recently, I will call him G, and I have been getting close. I will also start by saying we have been friends since December. There was some drama that happened and he blocked the whole friend group. He ended up only messaging me about coming back and everything and now we are all friends again. Since then we have been getting closer. We were still some what distant but since my boyfriend and I started having issues he's become less distant (I should also note that my boyfriend and I have basically separated after an argument). We started talking a lot more and he even opened up to me about some personal stuff. A few weeks ago I showed him a friend of mine and he decided he liked her. I tried to set them up, but it sort of fell through. I hate to admit it but I'm happy it fell through. This led to us talking even more. We are very similar in music taste, thoughts, and movies. This is where I am now wondering if he likes me or if I'm tripping. He sends me music and songs he likes all the time. He also talks about movies and we even have a list we should watch (admittedly a lot with our friends but there are a few he thinks would be better suited for just us). We also just bought concert tickets together and plan to meet up after I said I wanted to go but had no one to go with. Anytime I talk about how I want to do things he always says how he would do them with me. How he would love to go do this or that with me. But when others mention it, he sort of shys away from the idea. We also stay up late, even after our whole friend group is gone. We play games together even though I'm bad. He sends me funny messages all the time now too. To the point where if he's laughing I know I'll receive the video. He also has apologized to me before about how he wants to not be as rude to me (we make jokes for sure towards each other) and how he feels it isn't right of him to do so. He also likes my Instagram notes and comments a lot on them. I know those reasons may not make it seem likely that he likes me but there are 3 specific instances that I think of. The first is when I was complaining about how I would be bored by myself at this thing I was doing. He said he wouldn't be busy at that time and I joked we would probably just talk in our group chat. He sort of laughed then started to stutter saying, "Well you know...You know...haha" And then said, "Well if you wanted..." and stopped himself. I don't know what he was going to ask. But we spent 2 hours during said boring event talking and he showed me his guitar and how to restring it. The second is the other day we were talking about movies. There is this movie he LOVES so much. We have regular movie nights with the gang and the other day it fell through. I said I was sad and wanted to watch the movie. He started to say "well you know...if you wanted" again. After some time of talking he nervous laughed and asked if I wanted to watch another movie with him just him and I. I agreed. We got off track as we usually do and ended up on the conversation of his favorite movie again. He then asked "We could watch [name of favorite movie] instead...together if you wanted to..". That brings me to my third scenario of the fact we watched the movie together by ourselves. I should also say he almost never stutters over anything and has no issues asking me to do xyz in games we play or to watch this video ect. Those 2 stuttering moments have thrown me off completely. 

ON TOP OF ALL OF THAT, we had movie night today and he turned his camera on and my god He has the most beautiful smile I've ever seen. His laugh is contagious as well. I almost want to be around him The most of all of our friends because he is so kind and has the best laugh. But his smile oh my god and his eyes. That's the first thing I noticed about him. I think I may have developed a crush on him. But do you all think he may have as well?

"Why Did Jesus Die on the Cross?"

The main reason Jesus died on the cross was to defeat Satan and set us free from his oppressive rule. Everything else that Jesus accomplished was to be understood as an aspect and consequence of this victory (e.g., Recapitulation, Moral Influence, etc.).
This understanding of why Jesus had to die is called the Christus Victor (Latin for “Christ is Victorious”) view of the atonement. But, what exactly was Christ victorious from, and why? To find out the answers to these questions, we have to turn to the Old Testament, as that's what the apostles would often allude to in order to properly teach their audience the message they were trying to convey (Rom. 15:4).
The OT is full of conflict between the Father (YHVH) and false gods, between YHVH and cosmic forces of chaos. The Psalms speak of this conflict between YHVH and water monsters of the deeps (an ancient image for chaos) (Psa. 29:3-4; 74:10-14; 77:16, 19; 89:9-10; 104:2-9, etc).
The liberation of Israel from Egypt wasn’t just a conflict between Pharaoh and Moses. It was really between YHVH and the false gods of Egypt.
Regardless of whether you think the aforementioned descriptions are literal or metaphorical, the reality that the Old Testament describes is that humanity lived in a “cosmic war zone.”
The Christus Victor motif is about Christ reigning victorious over wicked principalities and Satan's kingdom, and is strongly emphasized throughout the New Testament. Scripture declares that Jesus came to drive out "the prince of this world” (John 12:31), to “destroy the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8), to “destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil” (Heb. 2:14) and to “put all enemies under his feet” (1 Cor 15:25). Jesus came to overpower the “strong man” (Satan) who held the world in bondage and worked with his Church to plunder his "palace" (Luke 11:21-22). He came to end the reign of the cosmic “thief” who seized the world to “steal, and to kill, and to destroy” the life YHVH intended for us (John 10:10). Jesus came and died on the cross to disarm “the principalities and powers” and make a “shew of them openly [i.e., public spectacle]” by “triumphing over them in [the cross]” (Col. 2:15).
Beyond these explicit statements, there are many other passages that express the Christus Victor motif as well. For example, the first prophecy in the Bible foretells that a descendent of Eve (Jesus) would crush the head of the serpent (Gen. 3:15). The first Christian sermon ever preached proclaimed that Jesus in principle conquered all YHVH's enemies (Acts 2:32-36). And the single most frequently quoted Old Testament passage by New Testament authors is Psalm 110:1 which predicts that Christ would conquer all YHVH’s opponents. (Psalm 110 is quoted or alluded to in Matthew 22:41-45; 26:64, Mark 12:35-37; 14:62, Luke 20:41-44; 22:69, Acts 5:31; 7:55-56, Romans 8:34, 1st Corinthians 15:22-25, Ephesians 1:20, Hebrews 1:3; 1:13; 5:6, 10; 6:20; 7:11, 15, 17, 21; 8:1; 10:12-13, 1st Peter 3:22, and Revelation 3:21.) According to New Testament scholar Oscar Cullman, the frequency with which New Testament authors cite this Psalm is the greatest proof that Christ’s “victory over the angel powers stands at the very center of early Christian thought.”
Because of man's rebellion, the Messiah's coming involved a rescue mission that included a strategy for vanquishing the powers of darkness.
Since YHVH is a God of love who gives genuine “say-so” to both angels and humans, YHVH rarely accomplishes His providential plans through coercion. YHVH relies on His infinite wisdom to achieve His goals. Nowhere is YHVH's wisdom put more on display than in the manner in which He outsmarted Satan and the powers of evil, using their own evil to bring about their defeat.
Most readers probably know the famous story from ancient Greece about the Trojan Horse. To recap the story, Troy and Greece had been locked in a ten-year-long vicious war when, according to Homer and Virgil, the Greeks came up with a brilliant idea. They built an enormous wooden horse, hid soldiers inside and offered it to the Trojans as a gift, claiming they were conceding defeat and going home. The delighted Trojans accepted the gift and proceeded to celebrate by drinking themselves into a drunken stupor. When night came and the Trojan warriors were too wasted to fight, the Greeks exited the horse, unlocked the city gates to quietly let all their compatriots in, and easily conquered the city, thus winning the war.
Historians debate whether any of this actually happened. But either way, as military strategies go, it’s brilliant.
Now, there are five clues in the New Testament that suggest YHVH was using something like this Trojan Horse strategy against the powers when he sent Jesus into the world:
1) The Bible tells us that YHVH's victory over the powers of darkness was achieved by the employment of YHVH’s wisdom, and was centered on that wisdom having become reality in Jesus Christ (Rom. 16:25, 1 Cor. 2:7, Eph. 3:9-10, Col. 1:26). It also tells us that, for some reason, this Christ-centered wisdom was kept “secret and hidden” throughout the ages. It’s clear from this that YHVH's strategy was to outsmart and surprise the powers by sending Jesus.
2) While humans don’t generally know Jesus’ true identity during his ministry, demons do. They recognize Jesus as the Son of God, the Messiah, but, interestingly enough, they have no idea what he’s doing (Mark 1:24; 3:11; 5:7, Luke 8:21). Again, the wisdom of YHVH in sending Jesus was hidden from them.
3) We’re told that, while humans certainly share in the responsibility for the crucifixion, Satan and the powers were working behind the scenes to bring it about (John 13:27 cf. 1 Cor. 2:6-8). These forces of evil helped orchestrate the crucifixion.
4) We’re taught that if the “princes of this world [age]” had understood the secret wisdom of YHVH, “they would not have crucified the Lord of glory” (1 Cor 2:8 cf. vss 6-7). Apparently, Satan and the powers regretted orchestrating Christ’s crucifixion once they learned of the wisdom of YHVH that was behind it.
5) Finally, we can begin to understand why the powers came to regret crucifying “the Lord of glory” when we read that it was by means of the crucifixion that the “handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us [i.e., the charge of our legal indebtedness]” was “[taken] out of the way [i.e., canceled]” as the powers were disarmed. In this way Christ “triumph[ed] over” the powers by "his cross” and even “made a shew of them openly” (Col. 2:14-15). Through Christ’s death and resurrection YHVH's enemies were vanquished and placed under his Messiah's feet, and ultimately His own in the end (1 Cor. 15:23-28).
Putting these five clues together, we can discern YHVH's Trojan Horse strategy in sending Jesus.
The powers couldn’t discern why Jesus came because YHVH's wisdom was hidden from them. YHVH's wisdom was motivated by unfathomable love, and since Satan and the other powers were evil, they lacked the capacity to understand it. Their evil hearts prevented them from suspecting what YHVH was up to.
What the powers did understand was that Jesus was mortal. This meant he was killable. Lacking the capacity to understand that this was the means by which YHVH would ultimately bring about the defeat of death (and thus, pave the road for the resurrection itself), they never suspected that making Jesus vulnerable to their evil might actually be part of YHVH's infinitely wise plan.
And so they took the bait (or "ransom"; Matt. 20:28, Mark 10:45, 1 Tim. 2:5-6). Utilizing Judas and other willing human agents, the powers played right into YHVH’s secret plan and orchestrated the crucifixion of the Messiah (Acts 2:22-23; 4:28). YHVH thus brilliantly used the self-inflicted incapacity of evil to understand love against itself. And, like light dispelling darkness, the unfathomably beautiful act of YHVH's love in sending the willing Messiah as a "ransom" to these blood-thirsty powers defeated them. The whole creation was in principle freed and reconciled to YHVH, while everything written against us humans was nailed to the cross, thus robbing the powers of the only legal claim they had on us. They were “spoiled [i.e., disempowered]” (Col. 2:14-15).
As happened to the Trojans in accepting the gift from the Greeks, in seizing on Christ’s vulnerability and orchestrating his crucifixion, the powers unwittingly cooperated with YHVH to unleash the one power in the world that dispels all evil and sets captives free. It’s the power of self-sacrificial love.

Why Penal Substitution Is Unbiblical

For the sake of keeping this already lengthy post as short as possible I'm not going to spend too much time on why exactly PSA (Penal Substitutionary Atonement) is inconsistent with Scripture, but I'll go ahead and point out the main reasons why I believe this is so, and let the reader look further into this subject by themselves, being that there are many resources out there which have devoted much more time than I ever could here in supporting this premise.

"Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us:"-1 Corinthians 5:7

The Passover is one of the two most prominent images in the New Testament given as a comparison to Christ's atonement and what it accomplished, (the other most common image being the Day of Atonement sacrifice).
In the Passover, the blood of the lamb on the door posts of the Hebrews in the book of Exodus was meant to mark out those who were YHVH's, not be a symbol of PSA, as the lamb itself was not being punished by God in place of the Hebrews, but rather the kingdom of Egypt (and thus, allegorically speaking, the kingdom of darkness which opposed YHVH) was what was being judged and punished, because those who were not "covered" by the blood of the lamb could be easily identified as not part of God's kingdom/covenant and liberated people.
Looking at the Day of Atonement sacrifice (which, again, Christ's death is repeatedly compared to throughout the New Testament), this ritual required a ram, a bull, and two goats (Lev. 16:3-5). The ram was for a burnt offering intended to please God (Lev. 16:3-4). The bull served as a sin offering for Aaron, the high priest, and his family. In this case, the sin offering restored the priest to ritual purity, allowing him to occupy sacred space and be near YHVH’s presence. Two goats taken from "the congregation” were needed for the single sin offering for the people (Lev. 16:5). So why two goats?
The high priest would cast lots over the two goats, with one chosen as a sacrifice “for the Lord” (Lev. 16:8). The blood of that goat would purify the people. The second goat was not sacrificed or designated “for the Lord.” On the contrary, this goat—the one that symbolically carried the sins away from the camp of Israel into the wilderness—was “for Azazel” (Lev. 16:8-10).
What—or who—is Azazel?
The Hebrew term azazel (עזאזל) occurs four times in Leviticus 16 but nowhere else in most people's canon of the Bible, (and I say "most people's canon," because some people do include 1 Enoch in their canon of Scripture, which of course goes into great detail about this "Azazel" figure). Many translations prefer to translate the term as a phrase, “the goat that goes away,” which is the same idea conveyed in the King James Version’s “scapegoat.” Other translations treat the word as a name: Azazel. The “scapegoat” option is possible, but since the phrase “for Azazel” parallels the phrase “for YHVH” (“for the Lord”), the wording suggests that two divine figures are being contrasted by the two goats.
A strong case can be made for translating the term as the name Azazel. Ancient Jewish texts show that Azazel was understood as a demonic figure associated with the wilderness. The Mishnah (ca. AD 200; Yoma 6:6) records that the goat for Azazel was led to a cliff and pushed over, ensuring it would not return with its death. This association of the wilderness with evil is also evident in the New Testament, as this was where Jesus met the devil (Matt. 4:1). Also, in Leviticus 17:1-7 we learn that some Israelites had been accustomed to sacrificing offerings to "devils" (alternatively translated as “goat demons”). The Day of Atonement replaced this illegitimate practice.
The second goat was not sent into the wilderness as a sacrifice to a foreign god or demon. The act of sending the live goat out into the wilderness, which was unholy ground, was to send the sins of the people where they belonged—to the demonic domain. With one goat sacrificed to bring purification and access to YHVH and one goat sent to carry the people’s sins to the demonic domain, this annual ritual reinforced the identity of the true God and His mercy and holiness.
When Jesus died on the cross for all of humanity’s sins, he was crucified outside the city, paralleling the sins of the people being cast to the wilderness via the goat to Azazel. Jesus died once for all sinners, negating the need for this ritual.
As previously stated, the goat which had all the sin put on it was sent alive off to the wilderness, while the blood of the goat which was blameless was used to purify the temple and the people. Penal substitution would necessitate the killing of the goat which had the sin put on it.
Mind you, this is the only sacrificial ritual of any kind in the Torah in which sins are placed on an animal. The only time it happens is this, and that animal is not sacrificed. Most PSA proponents unwittingly point to this ritual as evidence of their view, despite it actually serving as evidence to the contrary, because most people don't read their Old Testament and don't familiarize themselves with the "boring parts" like Leviticus (when it's actually rather important to do so, since that book explains how exactly animal offerings were to be carried out and why they were done in the first place).
In the New Testament, Christ's blood was not only meant to mark out those who were his, but also expel the presence of sin and ritual uncleanness so as to make the presence of YHVH manifest in the believer's life. Notice how God's wrath isn't poured out on Christ in our stead on this view, but rather His wrath was poured out on those who weren't covered, and the presence of sin and evil were merely removed by that which is pure and blameless (Christ's blood) for the believer.
All this is the difference between expiation and propitiation.

The Content of Paul's Gospel Message

When the New Testament writers talked about “the gospel,” they referred not to the Protestant doctrine of justification sola fide–the proposition that if we will stop trying to win God’s favor and only just believe that God has exchanged our sin for Christ’s perfect righteousness, then in God’s eyes we will have the perfect righteousness required both for salvation and for assuaging our guilty consciences–but rather they referred to the simple but explosive proposition Kyrios Christos, “Christ is Lord.” That is to say, the gospel was, properly speaking, the royal announcement that Jesus of Nazareth was the God of Israel’s promised Messiah, the King of kings and Lord of lords.
The New Testament writers were not writing in a cultural or linguistic vacuum and their language of euangelion (good news) and euangelizomai would have been understood by their audience in fairly specific ways. Namely, in the Greco-Roman world for which the New Testament authors wrote, euangelion/euangelizomai language typically had to do with either A) the announcement of the accession of a ruler, or B) the announcement of a victory in battle, and would probably have been understood along those lines.
Let’s take the announcements of a new ruler first. The classic example of such a language is the Priene Calendar Inscription, dating to circa 9 BC, which celebrates the rule (and birthday) of Caesar Augustus as follows:
"It was seeming to the Greeks in Asia, in the opinion of the high priest Apollonius of Menophilus Azanitus: Since Providence, which has ordered all things of our life and is very much interested in our life, has ordered things in sending Augustus, whom she filled with virtue for the benefit of men, sending him as a savior [soter] both for us and for those after us, him who would end war and order all things, and since Caesar by his appearance [epiphanein] surpassed the hopes of all those who received the good tidings [euangelia], not only those who were benefactors before him, but even the hope among those who will be left afterward, and the birthday of the god [he genethlios tou theou] was for the world the beginning of the good tidings [euangelion] through him; and Asia resolved it in Smyrna."
The association of the term euangelion with the announcement of Augustus’ rule is clear enough and is typical of how this language is used elsewhere. To give another example, Josephus records that at the news of the accession of the new emperor Vespasian (69 AD) “every city kept festival for the good news (euangelia) and offered sacrifices on his behalf.” (The Jewish War, IV.618). Finally, a papyrus dating to ca. 498 AD begins:
"Since I have become aware of the good news (euangeliou) about the proclamation as Caesar (of Gaius Julius Verus Maximus Augustus)…"
This usage occurs also in the Septuagint, the Greek translations of the Jewish Scriptures. For instance LXX Isaiah 52:7 reads, “How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news (euangelizomenou), who publishes peace, who brings good news (euangelizomenos) of salvation, who says to Zion, ‘Your God reigns.'" Similarly, LXX Isaiah 40:9-10 reads:

"…Go up on a high mountain, you who bring good tidings (ho euangelizomenos) to Sion; lift up your voice with strength, you who bring good tidings (ho euangelizomenos); lift it up, do not fear; say to the cities of Ioudas, “See your God!” Behold, the Lord comes with strength, and his arm with authority (kyrieias)…."-NETS, Esaias 40:9-10

This consistent close connection between euangelion/euangelizomai language and announcements of rule strongly suggests that many of the initial hearers/readers of the early Christians’ evangelical language would likely have understood that language as the announcement of a new ruler (see, e.g., Acts 17:7), and, unless there is strong NT evidence to the contrary, we should presume that the NT writers probably intended their language to be so understood.
However, the other main way in which euangelion/euangelizomai language was used in the Greco-Roman world was with reference to battle reports, announcements of victory in war. A classic example of this sort of usage can be found in LXX 2 Samuel 18:19ff, where David receives word that his traitorous son, Absalom, has been defeated in battle. Euangelion/euangelizomai is used throughout the passage for the communications from the front.
As already shown throughout this post, the NT speaks of Jesus’s death and resurrection as a great victory over the powers that existed at that time and, most importantly, over death itself. Jesus’ conquest of the principalities and powers was the establishment of his rule and comprehensive authority over heaven and earth, that is, of his Lordship over all things (again, at that time).
This was the content of Paul's gospel message...

Justification, and the "New" Perspective on Paul

The following quotation is from The Gospel Coalition, and I believe it to be a decently accurate summary of the NPP (New Perspective on Paul), despite it being from a source which is in opposition to it:

The New Perspective on Paul, a major scholarly shift that began in the 1980s, argues that the Jewish context of the New Testament has been wrongly understood and that this misunderstand[ing] has led to errors in the traditional-Protestant understanding of justification. According to the New Perspective, the Jewish systems of salvation were not based on works-righteousness but rather on covenantal nomism, the belief that one enters the people of God by grace and stays in through obedience to the covenant. This means that Paul could not have been referring to works-righteousness by his phrase “works of the law”; instead, he was referring to Jewish boundary markers that made clear who was or was not within the people of God. For the New Perspective, this is the issue that Paul opposes in the NT. Thus, justification takes on two aspects for the New Perspective rather than one; initial justification is by faith (grace) and recognizes covenant status (ecclesiology), while final justification is partially by works, albeit works produced by the Spirit.

I believe what's called the "new perspective" is actually rather old, and that the Reformers' view of Paul is what is truly new, being that the Lutheran understanding of Paul is simply not Biblical.
The Reformation perspective understands Paul to be arguing against a legalistic Jewish culture that seeks to earn their salvation through works. However, supporters of the NPP argue that Paul has been misread. We contend he was actually combating Jews who were boasting because they were God's people, the "elect" or the "chosen ones." Their "works," so to speak, were done to show they were God's covenant people and not to earn their salvation.
The key questions involve Paul’s view(s) of the law and the meaning of the controversy in which Paul was engaged. Paul strongly argued that we are “justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law” (Gal. 2:16b). Since the time of Martin Luther, this has been understood as an indictment of legalistic efforts to merit favor before God. Judaism was cast in the role of the medieval "church," and so Paul’s protests became very Lutheran, with traditional-Protestant theology reinforced in all its particulars (along with its limitations) as a result. In hermeneutical terms, then, the historical context of Paul’s debate will answer the questions we have about what exactly the apostle meant by the phrase "works of the law," along with other phrases often used as support by the Reformers for their doctrine of Sola Fide (justification by faith alone), like when Paul mentions "the righteousness of God."
Obviously an in-depth analysis of the Pauline corpus and its place in the context of first-century Judaism would take us far beyond the scope of this brief post. We can, however, quickly survey the topography of Paul’s thought in context, particularly as it has emerged through the efforts of recent scholarship, and note some salient points which may be used as the basis of a refurbished soteriology.
[Note: The more popular scholars associated with the NPP are E.P. Sanders, James Dunn, and N.T. Wright. Dunn was the first to coin the term "The New Perspective" in a 1983 Manson Memorial Lecture, The New Perspective on Paul and the Law.]
Varying authors since the early 1900's have brought up the charge that Paul was misread by those in the tradition of Martin Luther and other Protestant Reformers. Yet, it wasn't until E.P. Sanders' 1977 book, Paul and Palestinian Judaism, that scholars began to pay much attention to the issue. In his book, Sanders argues that the Judaism of Paul's day has been wrongly criticized as a religion of "works-salvation" by those in the Protestant tradition.
A fundamental premise in the NPP is that Judaism was actually a religion of grace. Sander's puts it clearly:
"On the point at which many have found the decisive contrast between Paul and Judaism - grace and works - Paul is in agreement with Palestinian Judaism... Salvation is by grace but judgment is according to works'...God saves by grace, but... within the framework established by grace he rewards good deeds and punishes transgression." (Paul and Palestinian Judaism, p. 543)
N.T. Wright adds that, "we have misjudged early Judaism, especially Pharisaism, if we have thought of it as an early version of Pelagianism," (Wright, What Saint Paul Really Said, p. 32).
Sanders has coined a now well-known phrase to describe the character of first-century Palestinian Judaism: “covenantal nomism.” The meaning of “covenantal nomism” is that human obedience is not construed as the means of entering into God’s covenant. That cannot be earned; inclusion within the covenant body is by the grace of God. Rather, obedience is the means of maintaining one’s status within the covenant. And with its emphasis on divine grace and forgiveness, Judaism was never a religion of legalism.
If covenantal nomism was operating as the primary category under which Jews understood the Law, then when Jews spoke of obeying commandments, or when they required strict obedience of themselves and fellow Jews, it was because they were "keeping the covenant," rather than out of legalism.
More recently, N.T. Wright has made a significant contribution in his little book, What Saint Paul Really Said. Wright’s focus is the gospel and the doctrine of justification. With incisive clarity he demonstrates that the core of Paul’s gospel was not justification by faith, but the death and resurrection of Christ and his exaltation as Lord. The proclamation of the gospel was the proclamation of Jesus as Lord, the Messiah who fulfilled Israel’s expectations. Romans 1:3-4, not 1:16-17, is the gospel, contrary to traditional thinking. Justification is not the center of Paul’s thought, but an outworking of it:
"[T]he doctrine of justification by faith is not what Paul means by ‘the gospel’. It is implied by the gospel; when the gospel is proclaimed, people come to faith and so are regarded by God as members of his people. But ‘the gospel’ is not an account of how people get saved. It is, as we saw in an earlier chapter, the proclamation of the lordship of Jesus Christ….Let us be quite clear. ‘The gospel’ is the announcement of Jesus’ lordship, which works with power to bring people into the family of Abraham, now redefined around Jesus Christ and characterized solely by faith in him. ‘Justification’ is the doctrine which insists that all those who have this faith belong as full members of this family, on this basis and no other." (pp. 132, 133)
Wright brings us to this point by showing what “justification” would have meant in Paul’s Jewish context, bound up as it was in law-court terminology, eschatology, and God’s faithfulness to God’s covenant.
Specifically, Wright explodes the myth that the pre-Christian Saul was a pious, proto-Pelagian moralist seeking to earn his individual passage into heaven. Wright capitalizes on Paul’s autobiographical confessions to paint rather a picture of a zealous Jewish nationalist whose driving concern was to cleanse Israel of Gentiles as well as Jews who had lax attitudes toward the Torah. Running the risk of anachronism, Wright points to a contemporary version of the pre-Christian Saul: Yigal Amir, the zealous Torah-loyal Jew who assassinated Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin for exchanging Israel’s land for peace. Wright writes:
"Jews like Saul of Tarsus were not interested in an abstract, ahistorical system of salvation... They were interested in the salvation which, they believed, the one true God had promised to his people Israel." (pp. 32, 33)
Wright maintains that as a Christian, Paul continued to challenge paganism by taking the moral high ground of the creational monotheist. The doctrine of justification was not what Paul preached to the Gentiles as the main thrust of his gospel message; it was rather “the thing his converts most needed to know in order to be assured that they really were part of God’s people” after they had responded to the gospel message.
Even while taking the gospel to the Gentiles, however, Paul continued to criticize Judaism “from within” even as he had as a zealous Pharisee. But whereas his mission before was to root out those with lax attitudes toward the Torah, now his mission was to demonstrate that God’s covenant faithfulness (righteousness) has already been revealed in Jesus Christ.
At this point Wright carefully documents Paul’s use of the controversial phrase “God’s righteousness” and draws out the implications of his meaning against the background of a Jewish concept of justification. The righteousness of God and the righteousness of the party who is “justified” cannot be confused because the term bears different connotations for the judge than for the plaintiff or defendant. The judge is “righteous” if his or her judgment is fair and impartial; the plaintiff or defendant is “righteous” if the judge rules in his or her favor. Hence:
"If we use the language of the law court, it makes no sense whatsoever to say that the judge imputes, imparts, bequeaths, conveys or otherwise transfers his righteousness to either the plaintiff or the defendant. Righteousness is not an object, a substance or a gas which can be passed across the courtroom. For the judge to be righteous does not mean that the court has found in his favor. For the plaintiff or defendant to be righteous does not mean that he or she has tried the case properly or impartially. To imagine the defendant somehow receiving the judge’s righteousness is simply a category mistake. That is not how the language works." (p. 98)
However, Wright makes the important observation that even with the forensic metaphor, Paul’s theology is not so much about the courtroom as it is about God’s love.
Righteousness is not an impersonal, abstract standard, a measuring-stick or a balancing scale. That was, and still is, a Greek view. Righteousness, Biblically speaking, grows out of covenant relationship. We forgive because we have been forgiven (Matt. 18:21-35); “we love" because God “first loved us” (1 John 4:19). Love is the fulfillment of the law (Rom. 13:8, 10, Gal 5:14, Jam. 2:8). Paul even looked forward to a day when “we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad” (2 Cor. 5:10), and he acknowledged that his clear conscience did not necessarily ensure this verdict (1 Cor. 4:4), but he was confident nevertheless. Paul did in fact testify of his clear conscience: “For our rejoicing is this, the testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we have had our conversation [i.e., behavior] in the world, and more abundantly to you-ward” (2 Cor. 1:12). He was aware that he had not yet “attained” (Phil. 3:12-14), that he still struggled with the flesh, yet he was confident of the value of his performance (1 Cor. 9:27). These are hardly the convictions of someone who intends to rest entirely on the merits of an alien righteousness imputed to his or her account.
Wright went on to flesh out the doctrine of justification in Galatians, Philippians, and Romans. The “works of the law” are not proto-Pelagian efforts to earn salvation, but rather “sabbath [keeping], food-laws, circumcision” (p. 132). Considering the controversy in Galatia, Wright writes:
"Despite a long tradition to the contrary, the problem Paul addresses in Galatians is not the question of how precisely someone becomes a Christian, or attains to a relationship with God….The problem he addresses is: should his ex-pagan converts be circumcised or not? Now this question is by no means obviously to do with the questions faced by Augustine and Pelagius, or by Luther and Erasmus. On anyone’s reading, but especially within its first-century context, it has to do quite obviously with the question of how you define the people of God: are they to be defined by the badges of Jewish race, or in some other way? Circumcision is not a ‘moral’ issue; it does not have to do with moral effort, or earning salvation by good deeds. Nor can we simply treat it as a religious ritual, then designate all religious ritual as crypto-Pelagian good works, and so smuggle Pelagius into Galatia as the arch-opponent after all. First-century thought, both Jewish and Christian, simply doesn’t work like that…. [T]he polemic against the Torah in Galatians simply will not work if we ‘translate’ it into polemic either against straightforward self-help moralism or against the more subtle snare of ‘legalism’, as some have suggested. The passages about the law only work — and by ‘work’ I mean they will only make full sense in their contexts, which is what counts in the last analysis — when we take them as references to the Jewish law, the Torah, seen as the national charter of the Jewish race." (pp. 120-122)
The debate about justification, then, “wasn’t so much about soteriology as about ecclesiology; not so much about salvation as about the church.” (p. 119)
To summarize the theology of Paul in his epistles, the apostle mainly spent time arguing to those whom he were sending letters that salvation in Christ was available to all men without distinction. Jews and Gentiles alike may accept the free gift; it was not limited to any one group. Paul was vehement about this, especially in his letter to the Romans. As such, I will finish this post off by summarizing the letter itself, so as to provide Biblical support for the premises of the NPP and for what the scholars I referenced have thus far argued.
After his introduction in the epistle to an already believing and mostly Gentile audience (who would've already been familiar with the gospel proclaimed in verses 3-4), Paul makes a thematic statement in 1:16: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.” This statement is just one of many key statements littered throughout the book of Romans that give us proper understanding of the point Paul wished to make to the interlocutors of his day, namely, salvation is available to all, whether Jew or Gentile.
In 1:16 Paul sets out a basic theme of his message in the letter to the Romans. All who believed, whether they be Jew or Gentile, were saved by the power of the gospel. The universal nature of salvation was explicitly stated. The gospel saved all without distinction, whether Jew or Greek; salvation was through the gospel of Jesus Christ. Immediately after this thematic declaration, Paul undertakes to show the universal nature of sin and guilt. In 1:18-32 Paul shows how the Gentile is guilty before God. Despite evidence of God and his attributes, which is readily available to all, they have failed to honor YHVH as God and have exchanged His glory for idolatrous worship and self-promotion. As a consequence, God handed them over in judgment (1:18-32). Paul moves to denunciation of those who would judge others while themselves being guilty of the very same offenses (2:1-5) and argues that all will be judged according to their deeds (2:6). This judgment applies to all, namely, Jew and Greek (2:9-10). This section serves as somewhat of a transition in Paul’s argument. He has highlighted the guilt of the Gentiles (1:18ff) and will shortly outline the guilt of the Jew (2:17-24). The universal statement of 2:1-11 sets the stage for Paul’s rebuke of Jewish presumption. It was not possession of the Law which delivered; it was faithful obedience. It is better to have no Law and yet to obey the essence of the Law (2:12-16) than to have the Law and not obey (2:17-3:4). Paul then defends the justice of God’s judgment (3:5-8), which leads to the conclusion that all (Jew and Gentile) are guilty before God (3:9).
Paul argues that it was a mistaken notion to think that salvation was the prerogative of the Jew only. This presumption is wrong for two reasons. First, it leads to the mistaken assumption that only Jews were eligible for this vindication (Paul deals with this misunderstanding in chapter 4 where he demonstrates that Abraham was justified by faith independently of the Law and is therefore the father of all who believe, Jew and Gentile alike). Second, it leads to the equally mistaken conclusion that all who were Jews are guaranteed of vindication. Paul demonstrates how this perspective, which would call God’s integrity into question since Paul was assuming many Jews would not experience this vindication, was misguided. He did this by demonstrating that it was never the case that all physical descendants of Israel (Jacob) were likewise recipients of the promise. In the past (9:6-33) as in the present (at that time; 11:1-10), only a remnant was preserved and only a remnant would experience vindication. Paul also argued that the unbelief of national Israel (the non-remnant) had the purpose of extending the compass of salvation. The unbelief of one group made the universal scope of the gospel possible. This universalism was itself intended to bring about the vindication of the unbelieving group (11:11-16). As a result of faith, all (Jew and Gentile) could be branches of the olive tree (11:17-24). Since faith in Christ was necessary to remain grafted into the tree, no one could boast of his position. All, Jew and Gentile alike, were dependent upon the mercy and grace of God. As a result of God’s mysterious plan, He would bring about the vindication of His people (11:25-27). [Note: It is this author's belief that this vindication occurred around 66-70 AD, with the Parousia of Christ's Church; this author is Full-Preterist in their Eschatology.]

Jumping on the Total Star Wars idea bandwagon, the troop carriers from Phantom Menace would be fantastically thematic support units for the Confederacy of Independent Systems. One of the big limits of Total War is only being able to fit so many troops into a single army and having to deal with supply lines for multiple armies, so low-tier chaff usually gets phased out in order to better condense your armies' combat effectiveness. What this unit does is handle that issue by being the chaff compression. Its own stats are pitiful, but every battle it gets a bunch of uses of a summon ability for the basic B-1 Battle Droids.
What would also be funny-yet-simultaneously-appropriate is if the devs have peeps working on the various parts of the game and like five different people go "4 summons? That's not a lot, I'll add another summon or two in (section they're working on)" resulting in a skill, a research, and an LL effect (faction or trait) that each add two summons resulting in each carrier being able to fart out a half stack in every battle. Ooh, and a building that adds more summons to those units in range, but whether due to laziness, not being concerned about balance, or wanting to reward players who build it everywhere despite balance, it stacks so now every single one of those carriers is a full stack of chaff!

hey, i (f19) am really panicking and worried, so i'm sorry in advance if this is chaotic.
the whole relationship was an online discord relationship
we met in oct '23 and got together a month later 4 months later i slowly lost my feelings, i was going through a really tough time i talked to him, communicated and we thought that maybe some time would fix the problem... but it got worse and i had no romantical feelings for him left i figured that it might be better if we broke up, since staying in a relationship with someone who doesn't love love you anymore, is just unfair. he was going through a terrible time, he was really clingy and i tried to support and comfort him as much as i could. we kept calling and talking and texting, there were so many night where i just fell asleep on the call cuz i was so exhausted from crying and feeling so shit about everything
he claimed that i was his everything, his first and only love etc etc and i felt really bad and guilty...i feel like i had no other choice than breaking up and even distancing myself from him, because he kept repeating how it's all my fault and i just didnt feel ok anymore. i've never felt so shitty and bad in my life before.
well 2 months later, everything got worse. since i was single, i had more time to spend with my friends, and take care of the friendships that i neglected during the relationship. i played with friends, called with them, tried distracting myself from the mess. my ex didnt like that idea, he kept on saying i was cheating (which i cant even if I wanted to, since we werent together during that time), he kept saying im trying to replace him, that i started ignoring him etc etc he kept assuming things and believed them, none of his statements were true, but since he thought they are he hurt himself more and more with it and said that i'm the one hurting him. he kept on lashing out on me, got angry whenever i spent time with someone else and not him, threatened me and i was just scared. the anger he had made me so anxious, that i neither wanted to call nor play with him
a few days ago it was really terrible. i played with a friend again, just trying to have a good time and he stalked me and saw that i was playing. he texted me, spam called me over 60 times in total on 3 different apps and then he kept on assuming different things, insulted me, said terrible shitty things and i honestly just didnt reply at that point. i was hurt, didnt understand what my mistake was.
we didnt talk or text for a whole day since one of his messages were "dont ever text me again bitch" and i just didnt wanna message first after being disrespected like that
a day later he texted, saying he missed me and that he was mad and it's all his fault i told him how shit i felt that night, how anxious i was out of a sudden he felt really bad he said bad things about himself, said stuff like "its all my fault/i dont deserve love/i dont wanna live/i deserve death" i told him to stop saying things like that
a night later he felt really bad, he sounded weak in the voice messages he sent
then he put "its really high up here and i think about taking the last step" in his status
when i saw that i told him to come and calm down, he said it doesnt make sense anymore and told me to stay safe after that he went offline and didnt text again. this was 2 days ago.
yesterday a friend of ours texted me, saying that my ex said good bye to him and that he will end it
since then we both dont know where he is, what happened, no one knows and i'm just really worried and scared that he really did it my friend says he's trying to get attention, since it was a month online relationship and out of religious reasons.
is it my fault? did i do something wrong? can something happen to me? idk how to deal with this, if he really killwd himself... how will i know? im scared

I'd like to share a lengthy and self-indulgent note about my history with the Baha'i community and the impact it had on my family and me. It's worth noting that I'm sharing this using a throwaway Reddit account that I generally reserve for browsing porn. I find funny to imagine a Baha'i apologist reading this, becoming angry and judgmental, and then, investigating my profile and ending up jerking off. With that said, let's dive into my story.
I want to share my experience in case it resonates with someone else, a lot of the stories on this Reddit helped me, and perhaps my story will give some comfort to someone else. It has taken me a while to write this down, and I'm glad I finally got around to doing it.
My parents emigrated from their homeland for reasons of principle and value. Upon their arrival, they were greeted by Baha'is who met them. And so, lovebombed and lavished with love, praise, and celebration for moving countries due to values that they portrayed as being closely aligned with the Baha'i faith, my parents fell for this validation and worked very hard once they became Baha'is in the mid-1980s.
My dad got rid of all of his whiskies, and swiftly, my parents began hosting potlucks and fireside chats, diligently working to integrate into the Baha'i ecosystem. Back then, the atmosphere was fairly light-hearted, with devotional gatherings, prayers, and a somewhat 1960s-esque hippie vibe. There was live guitar music, and joss sticks.
However, I remember Baha'i classes having an interesting edge. We were taught that Buddhists were not following a religion but merely a way of life, and that Hindus had become pantheistic because they had lost the core of their faith and religion, which had become corrupted over time. Thanks to Google, I can discover that yes indeed, this is from Lights of Guidance.
There was a significant emphasis on the importance of gender equality and the oneness of humanity – because, hey, the eighties. I feel sad there isn't anything anymore about the Virtues project - even if the Virtues project was sort of framed like it was created by Bahais.
Even in the 1980s, there was an overwhelming atmosphere that the key to being a good Baha'i was how you presented yourself rather than your actual behaviour. I recall learning an apocryphal tale of a young Baha'i who, while fasting, participated in an aerobics class and nearly fainted (yeah, aerobics, this is a real 80s fable), but was told by another Baha'i to prioritize representing the faith well over completing the fast because *it looked bad*. From a very early age, I learned the importance of putting the right face forward.
My parents then took their relationship with the Baha'i faith to the next level and volunteered at the World Centre in Haifa. As a child, this was a pretty interesting experience. I was suddenly immersed in the Iranian, or rather, Persian community, with its strong culture of martyrdom. Even as a child, every event seemed to feature graphic videos depicting young kids being taken from their homes. It was quite frightening, and I remember being afraid.
I also recall a strong sense of hierarchy within the community. My family lived in a small apartment with a very old, busted-up car from the 1970s, while others resided in nice homes with pleasant views and drove nice cars. I attended a local Israeli school, which was a cultural experience in itself, while my peers my age went to the much fancier American school. It's important to note that, at this point, the conversation about the "great catastrophe" – two-thirds of the world's population dying, leading to a period of peace and the entry by troops – was a prevalent topic openly discussed at the World Centre.
We completed our stint there, even living through the Gulf War. Upon returning to my birth country, my parents chose to live in places with smaller Baha'i communities, as they wanted to support and help establish Local Spiritual Assemblies. Things had changed by this point, not only because I was a teenager but also because the community itself had transformed. There was a significant Iranian presence everywhere, and the focus had shifted heavily towards rules, especially those related to sex, drinking, and drug use. There was also a huge emphasis on financial contributions to the faith, and it was the first time I began to see a somewhat materialistic outlook within the community.
As a preteen and teenager, I engaged in activities like dropping off flyers in mailboxes and soliciting strangers to talk about this great new religion, all in the name of “teaching”. I joined the local choir and sang, inspired by a crush I had on a girl there. This was probably the golden time of the community, with the choir doing outreach and a balance between Western and Iranian believers.
However, things began to accelerate. The Ruhi Institute and teaching became significant focal points. I was encouraged to bring a good friend of mine to a Baha'i camp, and once there, I was pressured to ask him to convert. It was very uncomfortable.
This Reddit loves cringe stories, so here is a winner: I had a birthday party with my non-Baha'i friends, and two older Baha'i girls attended. One of the girls ended up stalking my friend, showing up at his workplace and calling him at home with sexually suggestive comments. The matter was escalated to the Local Spiritual Assembly, but instead of talking to me about it, they basically ended my friendship with this kid. To me, this somehow captures so much of what it was like to be a Baha'i child and how Baha'i adults treat children to this day.
When I turned 15, I signed up for Baha'i membership because it was the expected thing to do. However, by the time I was in my early 20s and studying at university, I had started to interact more with the local, real-world community. This might seem like a small thing, but it was actually quite significant. You see, my parents had always felt a little bit on the outside compared to the average person on the street around them. This sense of elitism was really exacerbated by being a Baha'i because Baha'is would walk around in a cloud of self-assurance, slapping each other on the back and saying , "We don't do drugs. We've got all the answers and solutions, not like you." That was pretty much the attitude. It felt very socio-economic, with a lot of judgment towards working-class people. When the Iranians arrived, the cultural judgments grew even stronger.
But I was working in restaurants and learning about booze from bartenders. I had gotten to know real people. I had lost my virginity, and all that Bahai jazz seemed so much less relevant. I hardly even noticed when the year 2000 arrived without the predicted apocalypse, entry by troops, or any of the other anticipated events. Life went on. I lived in another country and met a girl, and we lived together.
Here is cringe story #2: my girlfriend /fiancé and I hosted a Bahai couple from my hometown. Despite being in my late 20s and engaged, and even though I hosted this gentleman in my house and helped him with his preparations for his business and presentations in the country where I lived, he reported to the Local Spiritual Assembly that I was living with a woman and we weren't married. It was absolutely amazing. The level of judgment still grosses me out.
I started to reflect on what the religion had meant to me and saw how it had changed. The obsession with fundraising was becoming ever more strident and panicked. The gaps in the actual scriptural logic of the religion were becoming more exacerbated as real-world problems still ran rife, and real-time discussions on social media brought these issues to light. It took me a while to start really digging into it, and it was only much later, when I started therapy, that I realized I needed to formally resign from the religion.
Looking back, it's astonishing how this religion, which professes to have such blind equality between the genders, as if other religions have some kind of hardwired sexism, actually had hardwired sexism in how the Universal House of Justice operates. A religion that taught the oneness of humanity, as if all humanity is equal and other religions don't recruit from anyone they can find, places divisors. Although of course, Bahai’s can’t recruit from Israeli Jews, so much for oneness of humanity. But this religion has taught that all humanity is equal, unless, of course, you're gay. Then you can't get married, let alone have sex.
There are other principles I haven't touched on, such as non-involvement in politics, unless it involves things happening to Baha'is or politics in Iran. The principle of independent investigation of the truth doesn't seem to work if you might investigate something that's not in line with the Baha'i perspective. The idea of a universal language? I don't really see any evidence that they're even really thinking about that one. The unity between science and religion? A religion that only allows men to sit on its senior board of a global theocracy probably isn't going to jive with a contemporary scientific perspective…. I mean, apparently you don't need a penis to be a man anymore, right?
In between these moments are my colorful memories of random things, like endless discussions about the boundaries of physical intimacy, people getting married at the age of 16 because they had exemptions for being Persian, and meeting Ms. Khanoom in Israel, feeling some sadness that the lone woman who at least brought some feminine energy to the World Centre is now gone, replaced by 12 boring men.
I've had conversations with my wife where I tried to explain what Baha'is actually do. She just wonders why they aren't doing stuff like normal religions do, like reading to the elderly or supporting schools for the disabled. I explain that's not the target demographic. I remember a wealthy man brought to firesides who obviously nobody else wanted to listen to, but we all sat around and applauded him like he was a great ukulele player and a clever man. He pointed out a hilariously Iranian man who was an alternative healer, and they got into a debate about modern medicine. The wealthy man said, "Well, you should see my daughter and what she studied. She studies Law." And then quickly changed the subject when asked about her name since I studied at the same Law school. Here's this man who's self-aware enough to join the adoration of his crowd but doesn't want his daughter mixed up in it in any way. Absolutely hilarious. Make that cringe story #3.
This reflection was sort of sparked when my wife and I discovered that the writings attributed to Rumi, which Baha'is often quote, is the same guy who started the Whirling Dervishes. We read about Rumi and I realized just how different he is from Baha'u'llah. Rumi wrote poetry, but he didn't pretend to be a prophet of God. He was just offering a different dynamic for how to interpret spirituality. He didn't say he was part of some sort of cycle. There's something beautiful about that simplicity. And needless to say, Rumi lived long before the Baha'is ever started.
It makes me wonder, will anyone ever watch the equivalent of a whirling dervish dance for the Baha'is?
The obsession with appearances sounds like a joke, but it isn't. It wasn't for me. Some bad stuff happened to me on my trip to Israel. When we got there, my parents didn't understand why I was so upset about everything. It was a culture shock, attending a local school, not speaking Hebrew, being lumped together with Russian kids who also didn't speak Hebrew, and getting beaten up in the toilet. It wasn't a very good time for me.
So, I was sent to counsel with a local Israeli counselor. After several sessions, she instructed that I had to sit down with my parents and tell them what I needed to tell them, particularly about the shadow that had come over me since coming to Israel. My parents were enraged when I said, “I wish we never became Bahai”.
And so, we returned from the Holy Land and moved to a tiny community that was struggling to get members. To this day, my parents are still members. I've resigned so I'm never dubbed a "covenant breaker." I'm pretty sure my parents know that I resigned because they literally never raise the topic of the Baha'i faith with me. I wish the religion had some interesting cosmology, something mystical, some interesting new take on the universe, or provided my family with tools to handle being migrants or raising teenagers. At the very least, it could have given us a common language we could have used to bond together. It did none of that.
But to be fair, if it wasn't the Baha'is, some other rinky-dink cult would have love-bombed my parents back in the 1980s. Of course, it would have been so much more fun if it had featured more sex and drugs 😊

Wade held Jasmine in his arms as he flew a low height down the long road to another section of the staryard, Tina on his back and Nathan and F right behind them in the air. Together, the five glided across the base grounds, taking care as to not irritate the aerial security during their search for the meeting room. Being outside for the flight, the group considered it a blessing that Wade's 'enhanced cooling unit' allowed his body to tolerate the breaching sun in the still cloudy sky, which, according to F, was dangerous to drones like her due to the inefficient cooling she and disassembly drones like her suffered from. Given F's physical fault, she had to fly under shady areas in order to safely traverse the base at day.
Originally, Wade and his friends had planned to walk to the meeting zone, but after running into a trooper experiencing a health mishap, the group did what they could to help the distressed officer. By the time he was brought to the medical ward by other soldiers, Wade found that him and his team would be at least a few minutes late if they kept on their way with their walk.
Deciding to speed things up, Wade, understanding the concern for performing such an effort, opted to carry the Fowleys around the base to the meeting area. Reluctantly, F decided to come along, carrying Nathan in a similar manner that Wade was carrying Jasmine. Taking notice of the time on his HUD, which read, "9:47 AM", Wade scouted for the building he and his friends were directed to. "8072" He said to himself, the number being for the building that would house the imminent meeting.
"They said it was down here, right?" Wade asked aloud to Tina before stopping himself in mid-air, the girl holding onto him tightly as he tried to speak over the growing sound of a retrofit Apache flying overhead.
Looking about, Tina nodded as she spotted the target building. "Yes, I believe that's the one over there!" Pointing past his head, Wade followed her finger to a large building ahead at his right. The structure was moderately tall, only about two stories high, with several soldiers and officers going in and out of the building. Wade smiled as he noticed the target number, as well as the big, bold words describing the building's designation. "8072, Briefing Center B"
"Good eye, honey. Hang on!" Continuing his low glide, Wade zoomed towards the building's entrance before stopping just meters above the ground, his two friends close behind as they slowed down as well. The troopers around them initially looked startled by the sudden arrival of Wade and his group, but quickly regained their composure as Wade hovered still above them.
"At ease! Just visitors." One of the soldiers declared as they identified the newcomers, who touched down before Wade let Jasmine down to her feet, Tina hopping onto the ground along with her.
Putting his hands up, Wade apologized for his swift surprise. "Sorry for the scare, we got delayed for a meeting we're invited to."
The soldier gave an understanding nod as he replied to the former worker drone sternly. "I can see that, just be a bit more careful next time, Mr. Carter. You gave the boys here quite a scare."
Wade returned the gesture in embarrassment as F put a hand to his back, chuckling at his efforts as Tina questioned the officer. "Is Mrs. J in there? She's the one who called for us."
The guard gave his reply as Wade and Tina pulled out their IDs for clearance. "Yes she is, Miss. The meeting's set to begin in under ten minutes." Checking the two drones' IDs, Jasmine and the others pulled out theirs as well, the watchman motioning another trooper over to verify the group. Once the guard finished checking the five's cards, he nodded in approval as the watchman spoke once more. "You're clear to enter."
"Thank you Sir, again, sorry about that spook back there." Wade replied with a smile as the trooper gave one of his own, the disassembly drone and his allies making their way towards the office door before stopping upon the call of a voice.
"Hey, Felice!" Wade turned to find the origin of the voice, F doing the same as the two quickly spotted a quartet of soldiers walking excitedly towards F. The disassembly drone glanced to her friends with a smile before turning back to the approaching entourage.
Wade examined the four troops as they got closer: Two human men, one woman, and a male worker drone. One of the male soldiers had short, blonde hair, and a small scar to the right side of their face. The second man bore a tan skin tone and had black hair, with blue strips that went down slightly in a mullet style. The woman bore a set of long, dark green hair, with the hair going down and over her left shoulder. As for the worker drone, he wore the standard green soldier helmet, single eye visor and all. He had no hair on him from what Wade could tell, and bore a pair of whiteish purple eyes on his visor.
As F walked over to the soldiers, the same one that called to her spoke again. "Felicity, I didn't expect to see you around here today! Where you been?"
The girl soldier interrupted his initial chatter. "Hang on Carlos, do you even know if she remembers us?"
"Aye, don't she have one o' them memory locks, or sumthin?" The drone added in a heavy Scottish accent.
F waved her hand as she replied to the group. "Easy, everyone. Thankfully I still got my memories, courtesy of my technician back at Central." Lowering her hand, F let down her usual persona as she gave a wide smirk to the soldiers, clearly pleased to see them. "Good to see you guys around here."
The soldiers gave light cheers to F as they all embraced her, the group having a surprise reunion as Wade and the others watched in surprise. These must've been F's old colleagues from when she was in the service, Wade thought. Quite the coincidence for them to be here at this base of all places.
Not bothering with the convenience of the matter, Wade shook the thought off as he and his friends watched F and her old friends breaking the hug, Tina wrapping an arm around her boyfriend as the second male human spoke to her in what the two discerned as Spanish. "Ay, who your new friends, F?"
"Oh, these guys?" F replied in the same language, quietly startling Wade and the others as they had never heard her speak like that until now. Glancing over to Wade, F motioned him and the others to come over. "Everyone, these are some friends I made in the past few days. Wade, Nathan, Tina, and Jasmine." She pointed her hand to the four as she said each of their names. "I met the boys here during my time on Ceres. Jasmine and Tina here are sisters."
The four soldiers gave various forms of excitement, ranging from hearty laughs to low woops and even a whistle from one of the guys. As F stood next to her old teammates, they each introduced themselves to Wade and his friends. The blonde soldier went first. "Well, it's a pleasure to meet you all, name's Carlos, Lieutenant Marksman."
"I'm Private Alvaros, good with close-range and stealth operations." Said the tan soldier with a salute.
"Sergeant Lucia Vasquez, usually the one who leads this bunch around these days." The female warrior stated with a humorous smirk.
"And Corporal Duncan Wallace, at your service!" The soldier drone stated proudly as he saluted to the bunch in front of him, who gave warm smiles as Wade shook his hand.
"Quite honored to meet you all, seems you have quite the history with F." The former worker drone said as Carlos patted F on her back.
"Oh, we do! She's the one who took charge when we didn't! Did you all hear of the Pasting of Nola VI?" Jasmine and Tina gave nods of affirmation while Wade, not as familiar with such history, held his hand up in a questioning manner.
"I think, wasn't that the battle where the Navy just barely held the outpost in that system? From the Stryker Clan?" Wade asked as Carlos nodded approvingly to him.
"That's right, and if Felice weren't there, WE would've been the ones getting pasted!" Carlos' statement brought victorious cheers and "oorahs" from the group, F letting a blush loose as she chuckled at her team's praise of her efforts.
"Well, that's not wrong." Although she didn't want to break off from her friends and discuss the past few years since they'd last met, F remembered the briefing. Clearing her throat, she continued. "And as much as I'd like to chat about the good times, I've been called to a meeting here, as have Wade and his crew."
The soldier group gave understanding looks to F as Lucia spoke up. "Thought so, Carl here was real eager to see you, though."
"Maybe we can talk after the meeting?" Nathan proposed as the soldiers collectively nodded in agreement, F readying a smartcomm attachment before turning to face her friends again.
"We're probably getting low on time, you all go in, I'll catch up in a sec." Wade nodded in acknowledgement before taking Tina's hand, the lover drones continuing towards the briefing center as Jasmine and Nathan followed behind them.
Passing through the door, the four guests observed a short hallway, which seemed to split into two paths as they came closer to the other end. Looking to a sign on the wall above, they saw arrows pointing to two separate areas, "Primary Briefing Room; Main Lobby + Secondary & Tertiary" Going to the right, they entered the moderately active lobby, several officers walking and standing about in mass chatter. Walking over to the desk up against the wall to their left, Wade and his group waved a hand to the occupying attendant.
"Welcome, what do you need?" The desk attendant asked as Tina raised a finger to reply.
"We're here for a meeting, Mrs. J called us here."
The attendant nodded in understanding before directing an arm towards the other end of the room, where a single door stood. "She should be in the second briefing room down that way."
"Thank you." Tina replied warmly before she and Wade began walking towards the door, their friends behind them as they proceeded into the room.
The room beyond the door was quite sizable, a large circular table occupying the middle with several chairs surrounding it. The walls went up a few meters, with four whiteish blue lights illuminating the room. On the wall opposite to Wade and Tina were three monitor screens, all of which showed the USN in bright blue. In several of the seats were faces both familiar and unfamiliar, several men and women in varying styles of uniforms conversing about quietly or taking notice of the recent visitors. Standing up near the monitors were three people: A decorated officer whom Tina identified as a ship captain, and the so-called operatives, Tessa, albeit as a hologram, and J.
Walking slowly into the room, Wade gave a low wave of his hand as he tried to hide his nervousness. Noticing his shyness in front of the officers, Tina held his hand and rubbed his arm comfortingly while returning a pleasant smile to the staff in the room.
"Ah, Wade, Tina. Glad to see you all here." J stated with a smile as she scanned the group, raising a digital eyebrow as she noticed one missing guest. "Or, most of you, I see. Did F run off somewhere?"
Wade shook his head as he replied to his fellow disassembly drone. "Oh, no. She just ran into some old friends, she should be back-"
"Right now." F finished aloud as she entered the room, seemingly having heard Wade speaking about her absence. The warrior drone fast walked to Wade's team, taking a seat near them as they prepared to do the same. "Not too late, are we?"
"Not at all." The standing officer answered as the group took their seats, Wade and Tina sitting next to each other as they got comfortable. The captain examined the lot for a moment, glancing to J as he asked about them. "So, these are the ones you helped rescue from the Mojave?"
"Yes Captain, and they helped us out greatly in turn. This is Wade Carter, one of the captured drones whom became a disassembly drone before we could mount the rescue. The luckiest one, if you ask me." Motioning her arm over the others, she continued. "And there's his girlfriend, Mrs. Tina Fowley, and her sister Jasmine." Smirking to F and Nathan, she finished her friends' introductions. "And these two are Serial Designation F and Mr. Nathan, whom I've heard were once under your ranks."
The military captain gave a welcoming smile to the five as they returned the gesture, eyeing F and Nathan specifically before speaking to them. "Indeed they were, we still have records on their contributions to the colonies." Eyeing F, he continued. "Though, in Mrs. F's case, I won't blame her if she doesn't remember us. We've been very well aware of JCJenson's 'memory suppression' protocols when it comes to their DDs."
F laid back in her seat with a smug look as she replied to her former superior. "Well, my friend on the station's a good tech gal. She's... waived that hindrance from me."
"I see, that means your still with us, am I right, Mrs. Lee?" Unlike her friends next to her, F was not startled by her original name being said aloud, rather smiling proudly as she saluted to the captain. "Good to see you again."
"Pleased to be here, Sir." F replied as she lowered her arm, glancing to her companions next to her as J spoke up.
"Everyone, I'd like you to meet Captain Preston Mitchell, commander of the USNV Vickers down at the stardock."
Wade gave a respectful salute to Preston as he spoke first. "It's an honor to meet you, Sir."
"Thank you, Mr. Carter. I've heard about your efforts from J, you did an admirable job back there, son." Wade failed to hide an embarrassed blush from the compliment, but it quickly faded as a beep sounded from a small device on the table. It was swiftly silenced by the captain as he tapped a button on the small, pyramid shaped timer, then facing Wade's group before continuing. "Though, as much as we could use some small talk, it'll have to wait till later."
"Indeed, we're running late at this point." Said another officer, a highly decorated member of the base with dark skin, dark grey hair and a thin beard. He immediately won the attention of everyone in the room as he spoke up. "I'm General Hugh Hood, overseer of this base. I'm certain you know some of the reasons you're here with us, correct?"
Wade nodded as he spoke to Hood. "Yeah, it's cause of those rogue agents from the JCJenson corporation." Glancing to J, the corporate drone nodded in affirmation before speaking herself.
"Tessa and I spent the last hours of yesterday evening clearing up the matter with General Hood, along with several other officials stationed here." She stopped as the middle monitor behind her flashed with a banner at the top, reading, "INCOMING TRANSMISSION", and in place of the USN emblem was a textless version of the JCJenson logo. Below the profile image was another two lines of text. "N. Jenson (Company Exec); Comms Source: Yottrite IV"
"And also told our boss about what happened here too, he wanted to give his say on this ordeal." Looking to the general, J asked him, "May I put him on?"
Hood only gave a nod of approval to the corporate drone before she picked up a remote on the table and tapped a button, accepting the call as the picture shifted to show a middle-aged man in a pristine-looking business suit on the screen.
Wade and Tina glanced to each other before J introduced their guest on the screen. "Ladies and Gentlemen, the CEO of JCJenson: Mr. Noor Jenson."
Jenson gave a pleased nod to his subordinate as he spoke to J. "Thank you for the pleasantries, J. I see we are ready to discuss our plans on dealing with this 'recall' disaster I've bore witness to on the news this morning?"
J nodded as she replied to her boss. "Indeed, I've explained to General Hood here about our efforts yesterday, and, as of recent, we've just received a message from a source we believe to be close to the company."
Mr. Jenson looked down to J attentively as he spoke to her. "Well, that's quite intriguing news, J. Do you have this message available for us to view?" J and Hood both nodded in affirmation, but didn't get an immediate reply as Jenson gazed to Wade and his friends. "...And I presume these are some of the drones rescued from one of the factories?"
Again, J nodded to her superior before explaining her colleagues. "Yes Mr. Jenson, the two drones at the front in particular were among those taken by the Administrator and their subordinates." Pointing an arm to Wade and Tina, she introduced the drone couple. "The disassembly drone here is Mr. Wade Carter, a brother to his-technically speaking-owner, the late Ron Carter. The latter helped us recover Wade during an initial raid inside the Nevada facility." When bringing up Ron, J gave an apologetic look to Wade as to show she did not mean to be offending on him and his brother's relationship. "And this is his romantic partner, Mrs. Tina Fowley. I heard she and her sister Jasmine are pilots."
Jenson looked over the two drones as his obedient employee described them to him, quietly sighing as Wade and Tina returned the gaze with nervous smiles. Once J finished, Jenson spoke to Wade. "I... would say it's a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Carter. But, given recent events, I don't hold fault to you for feeling frustrated at me for my... former subordinate's actions."
Wade shook his head lightly, taking Jenson's light apology with a faint smile as he replied to the CEO. "Actually, I don't. The only person I have such feelings put towards is," He hesitated for a moment, his anger at Dr. Halloway returning for a short moment before he eased himself. "..That bastard Halloway."
"The feeling's mutual, Mr. Carter. Dr. Halloway has been trying my patience for years now, especially with you and your fellow disassembly drones." Looking to J, then F, he returned his gaze to Wade before questioning him on his new body. "I don't know if J has told you of this, but if there's one truth my company has admittedly not held up to for a while, it's our quality. Recently, some of my research staff here made blueprints for an upgraded variant of the disassembly drone design. It's intended to fix several faults we expected to be nonexistent previously, most notably that atrocious cooling unit."
As a schematic pulled up on the left monitor, everyone glanced to the improved design before F spoke up about it. "If I may ask, Mr. Jenson, how big of an improvement is this new cooling unit supposed to be?"
"Good question, F. Frankly, it's supposed to do away with the issue entirely. Saves us from sacrificing enormous supplies of oil for the poorly built unit in the previous iterations. We even tested it with a repaired drone just a few days ago, and it worked flawlessly." Then, glancing to Wade again, he questioned the former worker drone on his new form. "Speaking of, how does your enhanced body feel, Mr. Carter? I'm certain it feels better to not have to-"
"Actually, Mr. Jenson," Wade interrupted, pulling out one of his canteens as he answered the CEO on his upgrades. "I guess Halloway changed up the blueprints, cause unfortunately this new cooling unit didn't cure the overheating problem. I... kinda learned that the hard way." Wade glanced to Tina apologetically, still feeling bad from her seeing him eat the corpse of the dead murder drone back at the factory.
The corporate CEO grimaced in frustration as he took in Wade's statement, already intolerant of the head researcher's actions as he replied. "...I was worried about that, Edgar always likes to run things his own way, making excuses for that 'Administrator' he watches over." Taking an agitated breath, he continued on with his spew on the two culprits of yesterday's events. "It was only because of all the very impressive creations and enhancements she and her research team provided that I tolerated them for so long, but this..." Sitting up straight in front of the camera, Jenson finished sternly. "J said the Administrator... Cyn, I believe? She was apparently something worse than we presumed originally, and I'm very inclined to believe so after yesterday."
"As well as the program tied to the Administrator, the AbsoluteSolver." J clarified before receiving an agreeing nod from Mr. Jenson, standing corrected on his placing of blame.
Raising a hand, Nathan asked about the supposed plans. "Yeah, about this "Solver Project", what do we plan to do about that?"
"Good question, Nate." Tessa replied as she crossed her arms before looking to Jenson and beginning her explanation. "Initially, we were going to investigate the other factories spread across Earth in order to get some more info on the Administrator before things get worse. But, just this morning, it seems someone else saved us the trouble." Just as Tessa neared the end of her sentence, J held up the remote again, tapping a few buttons before the left monitor shifted to show a slightly grainy video onscreen.
The video only showed a single being, a worker drone, dressed in a chrome suit and bearing a set of yellow eyes. Behind them was what appeared to be a vacant room, a few shelves holding many books within them standing still in the back. The drone's visage indicated they were filled with immense anxiety, terrified of being caught as they spoke quietly to the camera.
"I can only hope someone gets this in time, they're gonna be on me once they find out the transmitter screens are down!" Turning the camera, he showed what appeared to be a large factory room, several more of the mysterious conveyor belts like at the factory slotted next to each other. It was hard to discern every detail due to not only the window reflection, but also the dark lighting in the inactive conveyor room. Filming the room beyond, the drone continued. "Dr. Halloway's a madman, he's got more of those stolen drones being brought here and he's going to be overseeing it in the afternoon tomorrow! I've seen what happened back in Nevada, I can't take this any longer! I'm at coordinates ##.######, -###.###### Please, send someo-"
The suspicious, partially scrambled transmission immediately cut off to static, leaving Wade, Tina, and their friends with confused expressions as Tessa spoke up. "Yeah, that caught me by surprise too."
"So, that guy says they got more drones being sent 'there', but... where is there, exactly?" Jasmine asked with immense curiosity.
"I was hoping you'd ask that, Mrs. Fowley." The technician replied as she glanced to J, who tapped a few more buttons on the remote before speaking over her boss-friend.
"While the transmission itself isn't much to work off of, our friends from Comms over here managed to intercept the signal earlier, and even better, discern where it originated from." As J started her explanation, the screen shifted once more to show a large city, with one skyscraper highlighted in red as it was zoomed towards on the screen. "That scrambled audio wasn't a simple glitch, it was intentionally done so as to hide key information for us to uncover. Upon cleaning up the message, we managed to recover a set of coordinates, which direct to this structure here, in San Francisco."
Wade and his friends stared at the building in shock, examining the tall structure as it stood over the shorter buildings in the city. Tina broke the silence in her gaze. "So, this is another factory? It looks... terribly different from the one we got out of."
"Not exactly, Mrs. Fowley." Mr. Jenson answered, Tina and the others looking to him as he continued. "THAT is the Administrator's main laboratory, its location was kept on the down low so other authorities and terrorist groups wouldn't find out what the buildings true purpose was." Sighing, Jenson completed his reply. "But, with this recent mistake of Halloway's, that place has lost all purpose for us at the company."
Wade raised a hand to speak. "So, we're going to pounce on that place? Get Halloway before he runs off again?"
"Exactly." General Hood replied as he looked up to Mr. Jenson. "This whole 'recovery/recruitment' effort has gotten out of hand all across Sol. We've gotten countless reports of people being killed because of this, be it the brutal robberies here in Nevada or the bloodbath on Ceres. Even if Mr. Jenson refuses to cooperate, this has become a dire matter for us now. One way or another, this insanity will be stopped with due haste."
The CEO nodded in acknowledgement before explaining his own plans for the mission. "Speaking of cooperation, upon seeing what was happening at Earth, I ordered a detachment of our corporate starships in orbit at the time to depart for Sol in order to help with investigating the situation. They're not warships, but they are well-armed. I'll dispatch them to your authority upon concluding this call." Glancing to Wade and his team for a moment, Jenson continued. "As for the mission, I may not have much of a say, but let it be known that you have my blessing to do whatever it takes to end this madness. I don't care what you do with Halloway or any of his lackeys, or what happens to that facility down there... I want that program shut down."
"Thank you for the extra hands, Mr. Jenson. We'll make sure this Administrator is dealt with." Hood replied gratefully as Wade sat firm in his seat, Tina and the others following suite.
"General?" The former worker drone said aloud, catching Hood's attention before he made his request. "I know I'm not a soldier, but I want to help with dealing with Halloway and his grunts. After what he did, after losing my brother, I can't rest until I see that man stopped."
Tina raised a finger as well. "As do I, Wade could use a hand with those people, and given how we did during our escape run out of that place, I think the two of us make quite the duo." She glanced to Wade with a smirk as she referenced their combat prowess when flying together.
Nathan and F stood up before the latter gave her own request. "Sir, I wish to take part in this mission as well. I can also recommend Wade for you too, as I fought alongside him during the factory raid."
"Wouldn't mind giving a hand myself! And I'm sure my pal Kurtis would love to help, he's here at the base too!" Nathan added with a confident smirk, the group's determination encouraging Jasmine to stand up as well.
"I'd like to help too." She stated simply, a smile on her face as the general and his companions observed the five guests.
Admittedly, Hood knew it would be a bit absurd to allow these people to take part in an operation which would certainly involve bloodshed, especially considering most of them merely had civilian status at the moment. But, upon careful evaluation of the five, their desire to see this problem dealt with, and the fact that some of them had experience on the field...
He paused his train of thought as Captain Mitchell spoke to him. "General? I read up on the Fowleys' files when we recovered Mrs. Jasmine here, they provided service in their early careers." He smirked to the pilot sisters as he finished adding his say. "And to be frank, we need more people like them here. The records we have of them showed them to be damn fine pilots."
Tina blushed at the praise from Mitchell as she spoke to the general. "That is true, we uh... did get discharged for our... 'fancy maneuvering'."
"Sir?" Jasmine said, the general's attention on her as she added to the conversation. "Even if our flying is a bit out of protocol, Tina saved a lot of people on that starjet a few days back. I can promise you, she's an excellent woman to have at the wheel."
Glancing to Wade again, Hood took in his face, one of begging desperation as he spoke once more. "Please, Sir. My brother, the troops he brought from the Coalition, Halloway's gotten them all killed cause of this. I want to do this. I HAVE to do this, at least for them."
The good general took a deep, quiet breath, considering his decision once more before finally revealing it to Wade and his friends. "Mr. Carter, Fowleys? I'm probably making myself a fool for saying this, but you're permitted to assist us in this mission."
The drone couple contained their gratefulness in the form of ecstatic grins as Wade replied to the general. "Thanks, General. We won't let you down."
"And Mrs. Lee?" Hood said as he glanced to F, who returned the gesture as he told her, "You're technically under Mr. Jenson's authority, whatever his answer is, it's mine as well."
Bringing her yellow-orange eyes to her CEO, F awaited Mr. Jenson's answer. "F, yes? I heard Mr. Hood call you by a different name just now, I assume you have some experience with the army?"
The warrior drone nodded as she explained herself. "I once inherited the name of Felicity Lee, Mr. Jenson. I served under the USN Defense Forces before joining the DD Division." Then, glancing to the military staff near her, she finished with, "I had hoped to provide my enhancements to the Force one day."
Jenson gave a hint of a proud smile as he finally gave his decision. "Well, it seems you'll finally get that chance. From now on, even after this mission on Earth is over with, you're hereby dispatched to serve under the USN."
F admittedly couldn't hide her excited smirk as she flung a salute to her now former boss. "Thank you Sir!"
Looking up to Jenson, General Hood asked the CEO, "Mr. Jenson, how long until your ships can reach Earth?"
Jenson glanced down at his communication console as he answered the military leader. "At max speed, their Ion drives should be able to bring them into orbit in as little as one to two days. I believe there should be some ships within the system that could help as well."
"Signal them when you can, Mr. Jenson. We could use all the help we can get from them." The CEO nodded to Hood as he stood firmly to the viewer, the general turning to face Wade and his colleagues. "And Mr. Carter? We'll be mobilizing our forces immediately after this meeting concludes. It'll be a minute, but I want you to gather whatever items and belongings you'll need for this operation. Be ready to head to the flight pads in no more than three hours."
"Understood Sir!" Wade said with a salute, Tina, Jasmine and Nathan giving their own as Jasmine raised a finger.
"What about the area around the lab? That place looks like it's in the middle of the city."
J raised a finger as she told Jasmine and the others about their resolution of the civilian obstacle. "Shortly after reporting our findings on the transmission, Hood told us that they were sending in some teams to clear out the civilian population within several miles of the facility. Once we get there, it should be of no concern."
Jasmine sighed in relief as Tina spoke up. "So the people should be safe from any sort of danger?"
"Correct, Mrs. Tina." Preston answered before continuing. "Given the resistance Halloway and his men showed during the Coalition's raid, they most certainly won't hold back there."
"One more thing, Sir." Nathan asked. "The Coalition's going to help us out with this too, right?"
"You can count on it, Mr. Nathan." The Vickers' captain replied as he looked to J, then to Jenson as he spoke further. "I met the leader of the Coalition's detachment working with us when I was introduced to J and Mrs. Elliott here, they intend to see this conflict finished. I highly doubt they're willing to sit back and let us do this by ourselves."
"And their help will be much appreciated." Hood added, everyone's attention returned to him as he looked to Tessa, curious eyes scanning her holographic form. "And Mrs. Elliott, if I may. Do you mind heading down here to assist us in our investigations later on?"
"Funny you say that, General. I'm almost done with my own snooping around on the JCJ up in orbit, Cyn has some small departments of hers aboard, and I thought I'd gather some more intel before coming down." Glancing to Mr. Jenson, she saw him giving an understanding nod before returning her gaze to the military staff. "I should be down there by the evening, judging by where you're located."
"Do what you must, Mrs. Elliott. We could use whatever you find." Hood replied firmly as he turned once more to the JCJenson CEO. "Thank you for your time, Mr. Jenson. We will get to the bottom of this."
"It's my pleasure, General." Glancing to J and Tessa, he spoke to them once more. "J? Contact me when you've finished with Halloway and his Administrator."
"It'll be done, Mr. Jenson." The obedient servant answered before saluting firmly, receiving a final nod from her boss before he ended the transmission.
With their off-world guest out of the way, Hood looked to Wade and his friends, J, Tessa and Captain Mitchells sharing the gaze with them as the general spoke to them in finality. "Well, you know what comes next everyone. You're all dismissed for now. And remember, landing zone by 1300."
"We'll be there Sir." Wade said with a nod as he and his friends stood up, pushing in their chairs before making their way out to the door.
As they neared it, Wade stopped for a moment as they heard Hood call to one of his friends. "And F?" The soldier drone looked to the general as he continued. "Before we depart, would you mind changing your uniform? I believe it could help with identifying you from the other disassembly drones more easily." Glancing to J, then back to F, he finished with, "I recall hearing about the most formidable drones having clones prepared, yes?"
"Correct, Sir. I'll stop by the nearest barracks while I can." F replied before turning back to the door with her colleagues, Wade opening the door for them all as they passed through. After them, Wade passed through himself, shutting the door to the meeting room as he returned to the lobby.
Walking about together, F spoke to Wade and the others. "Well, that went smoothly. I'll be heading down to the barracks, then head over to your place to help out."
"Actually," Wade replied, raising a finger up as he asked his fellow murder drone, "You think you could bring your friends over? We could get to know each other while we're getting ready."
F glanced to Nathan with a smile before returning her eyes to Wade. "I could see about that. You're gonna like them, I can promise you that."
Taking Tina's hand, Wade walked with his girlfriend alongside Jasmine and the others, nearing the hallway they came through as they prepared for the walk back to the apartment.

Hi there fam!
I have a two nodes cluster that so far is working fine. I added to the mix a Proxmox backup server (PBS) as a VM in my unraid box. I passed a share of unraid to the PBS VM.
I mounted the share in PBS with this line in /etc/fstab

backups_proxmox /mnt/backups_proxmox 9p trans=virtio,version=9p2000.L,_netdev,rw 0 0

Now I configured the PBS in the cluster and I am backing up lxc containers just fine. I can restore them and everything. So far so good.
When it comes to backing up VMs I am getting this errors:
From the node that is trying to backup the VM:

INFO: starting new backup job: vzdump 100 --remove 0 --node gaspar --storage eva01-pbs --mode snapshot --notes-template '{{guestname}}' --notification-mode auto INFO: Starting Backup of VM 100 (qemu) INFO: Backup started at 2024-05-21 09:51:43 INFO: status = running INFO: VM Name: teedybkp INFO: include disk 'scsi0' 'local:100/vm-100-disk-0.qcow2' 64G INFO: backup mode: snapshot INFO: ionice priority: 7 INFO: creating Proxmox Backup Server archive 'vm/100/2024-05-21T07:51:43Z' ERROR: VM 100 qmp command 'backup' failed - backup register image failed: command error: EINVAL: Invalid argument INFO: aborting backup job INFO: resuming VM again ERROR: Backup of VM 100 failed - VM 100 qmp command 'backup' failed - backup register image failed: command error: EINVAL: Invalid argument INFO: Failed at 2024-05-21 09:51:43 INFO: Backup job finished with errors ERROR: could not notify via target `mail-to-root`: could not notify via endpoint(s): mail-to-root: At least one recipient has to be specified! TASK ERROR: job errors INFO: starting new backup job: vzdump 100 --remove 0 --node gaspar --storage eva01-pbs --mode snapshot --notes-template '{{guestname}}' --notification-mode auto INFO: Starting Backup of VM 100 (qemu) INFO: Backup started at 2024-05-21 09:51:43 INFO: status = running INFO: VM Name: teedybkp INFO: include disk 'scsi0' 'local:100/vm-100-disk-0.qcow2' 64G INFO: backup mode: snapshot INFO: ionice priority: 7 INFO: creating Proxmox Backup Server archive 'vm/100/2024-05-21T07:51:43Z' ERROR: VM 100 qmp command 'backup' failed - backup register image failed: command error: EINVAL: Invalid argument INFO: aborting backup job INFO: resuming VM again ERROR: Backup of VM 100 failed - VM 100 qmp command 'backup' failed - backup register image failed: command error: EINVAL: Invalid argument INFO: Failed at 2024-05-21 09:51:43 INFO: Backup job finished with errors ERROR: could not notify via target `mail-to-root`: could not notify via endpoint(s): mail-to-root: At least one recipient has to be specified! TASK ERROR: job errors

And from the PBS I get this errors:

May 21 09:51:43 pbs proxmox-backup-proxy[650]: starting new backup on datastore 'backups' from ::ffff:192.168.0.111: "vm/100/2024-05-21T07:51:43Z" May 21 09:51:43 pbs proxmox-backup-proxy[650]: GET /previous: 400 Bad Request: no valid previous backup May 21 09:51:43 pbs proxmox-backup-proxy[650]: POST /fixed_index: 400 Bad Request: EINVAL: Invalid argument May 21 09:51:43 pbs proxmox-backup-proxy[650]: backup ended and finish failed: backup ended but finished flag is not set. May 21 09:51:43 pbs proxmox-backup-proxy[650]: removing unfinished backup May 21 09:51:43 pbs proxmox-backup-proxy[650]: removing backup snapshot "/mnt/backups_proxmox/pbs/vm/100/2024-05-21T07:51:43Z" May 21 09:51:43 pbs proxmox-backup-proxy[650]: TASK ERROR: backup ended but finished flag is not set. May 21 09:51:43 pbs proxmox-backup-proxy[650]: starting new backup on datastore 'backups' from ::ffff:192.168.0.111: "vm/100/2024-05-21T07:51:43Z" May 21 09:51:43 pbs proxmox-backup-proxy[650]: GET /previous: 400 Bad Request: no valid previous backup May 21 09:51:43 pbs proxmox-backup-proxy[650]: POST /fixed_index: 400 Bad Request: EINVAL: Invalid argument May 21 09:51:43 pbs proxmox-backup-proxy[650]: backup ended and finish failed: backup ended but finished flag is not set. May 21 09:51:43 pbs proxmox-backup-proxy[650]: removing unfinished backup May 21 09:51:43 pbs proxmox-backup-proxy[650]: removing backup snapshot "/mnt/backups_proxmox/pbs/vm/100/2024-05-21T07:51:43Z" May 21 09:51:43 pbs proxmox-backup-proxy[650]: TASK ERROR: backup ended but finished flag is not set.

Any idea that would point me in the right direction would be greatly appreciated.

How do people that don’t have a ca don’t drive get around here? I’m new to the US and a year ago I moved to Puyallup with my boyfriend. He has a car that he mostly uses to go to work and very rarely get groceries since we get almost all of our stuff delivered. I used to work in Seattle and ride the Sounder every day after he dropped me at the station, he would also pick me up in the evening, but after I went unemployed we decided I would stay home and take care of the house keeping and the kids (cats). I am okay with our arrangement because it’s very difficult for me to find a job right now, and not exactly legal while i try to adjust my migratory status. He is working nights cause it pays better so he can supports both of us, but this leaves no time for me to ask him to be taking me here and there. He does a lot for us and I try to be as independent as I can when it comes to recreation.
As a young woman that used to have a lot of friends getting used to my new lifestyle is very challenging. My guy is a gamer so he is totally fine with spending his time off work playing video games and though I can enjoy it for an hour or two is definitely not my thing. I grew up going to the park every weekend and seeing friends all the time, my idea of fun is far away from sitting down for hours and never abandon my house. He is the kind to leave the house as little as possible, on the other hand I was used to go out a lot using the public transport, but there aren’t any buses near me, riding my bike around here requires a lot of energy living uphill. I feel like I’ve lost my independence, I can’t go anywhere and it just frustrates me to see my few acquaintances see all the beautiful places around, going on hikes, and even visiting places out of state, heck even going to the mall would be fun for me, when we go grocery shopping I get super excited to leave the house and het in the car to see people and get the feeling I have a life. What would you guys suggest? I go on walks alone sometimes, or I take my bicycle for a ride but not gonna lie, it kinda sucks. Is there somewhere I can make friends? When im up for a thrill I take a couple ones and walk to the dollar store but thats 50 minutes of walking and then 50 minutes back home. I don’t see many people here having friends to share ordinary stuff with, like visiting just because to watch tv and play cards. I am used to not having to spend money to see friends and have fun, at home friends would take the bus and travel through the city for considerable amounts of time to see each other but here people complain about having to drive to see someone so I don’t see myself making many friends considering It’s really hard for me to get out of my house and they should have to come to me. Where is the young cool motivated people at? I wanna smoke weed with them, I can walk to them! I feel like there’s so much to see and do, even if it’s just ordinary stuff. I’ve never been to the river, or seen the shore somewhere that wasn’t in Seattle. I want life to be exciting for me again but public transit is extremely limited both in the area it serves as in the hours it runs.

Wade's visor beeped to life as his alarm system went off, the murder drone's clock showing the time, "8:00 AM", changing to his green-yellow eyes as he woke up. Tina's visor activated as well, the drone girl's own alarm activating she awakened from slumber with Wade.
Stifling a yawn, Wade looked to Tina as he rubbed her back, easing her as she rose upright. "Good morning, sweetie."
"Morning, Wade." Tina replied quietly as she looked to Wade, the two drones smiling warmly as they took in each other's presence. Noticing they were both almost completely bare of clothing, the two drones blushed as Wade began to move off the bed.
"Well, I should get something on." The former worker drone stated as they touched down on the floor, Tina grabbing her green shirt from the counter as she tried to get dressed as well.
"So should I." Tina said back as she put the shirt on, memories of their recent night together still fluent in her mind as she slowly walked over to the kitchen.
The last hours of the past night had been calm for the most part, Wade and his friends detailing their tragic capture, the loss of his brother Ron, the rescue of the drones, and finally, Tina and Wade's miraculous escape from the factory before returning to the base. After the chatter in the bar, the group split off to go their separate ways for the time being, Jasmine going with Wade and Tina to help them into her place before leaving them to watch it while she went to get some food for the next day. During their quiet stay in the apartment, Wade and Tina made small talk over what to do in the future before having what humans would call a... very pleasant night together.
And now, with the new day approaching, the drone couple had to get ready for whatever came ahead. Walking over to his clothes on one of the vacant chairs in the living room, Wade picked up his shirt, slapping it on him before glancing to Tina, who merely wore her copper brown pants and green shirt from yesterday. Smiling at his girlfriend, Wade spoke to her as he turned back around to continue redressing himself. "Seems Jasmine went out somewhere this morning. I don't see her anywhere."
Tina listened to Wade as she inspected the counter, noticing a small sticky note lying on it as she took hold of it. Tina could tell it was left by Jasmine, given the handwriting. The note said, "Morning you two! Went to get some food I forgot to pick up, I should be back shortly after you wake up. - Jasmine"
The pilot drone smiled as she read her sister's note, then turning to the living room to speak to Wade. "She went to get some breakfast, we should expect her to come back any minute now." Opening the fridge, Tina grabbed two cool cans of oil, one for herself and another for Wade. Setting the cans down on the counter, Tina closed the fridge before taking hold of the cans again, taking them with her to the living room where a fully dressed Wade now resided at.
As Tina took a seat next to Wade on the couch, the disassembly drone examined his built-in smartcomm, trying to add all the still active contacts he remembered off the top of his circuits as he spoke to Tina. "It's gonna be hard, being my own person without Ron." Chuckling, Wade smirked at Tina, finding himself unsure at his own words. "Or maybe I'm just overreacting."
Tina chortled at Wade's inconfidence as she tried to bring him some, handing him one of the oil beverages as she spoke. "I think you'll do fine, honey. I've run into some disrespectful humans in my life too."
Wade nodded in understanding as he took a sip of the oil, the sound of the front door opening catching the drones' attention as Jasmine walked in. Carrying a paper bag full of food items, the human pilot spoke aloud. "Morning, you two! Just had to finish an errand I screwed up last night."
"Oh, it's not a problem for us, Jass." Wade replied as he took a sip of his oil, Tina looking over to the kitchen wall as she listened to her sister.
"How was your night? You lovers passed out on me when I came in, so I just rested on the couch." The lover drones gave looks of apologetic concern as Jasmine walked back into the living room, the woman noticing Wade and Tina's faces as she continued speaking. "It's nothing, though. I slept well."
"I hope so, we didn't mean to take up the whole bed." Tina responded as she gave a blush of embarrassment, Wade nodding in agreement as Jasmine replied back.
"I did, really. Besides, you two deserved the bed after all you put up with yesterday. Gotta have some place to blow some steam."
Wade and Tina smiled at Jasmine's comment, then blushed as Wade questioned about her phrasing. "Wait, you mean that as a euphemism or...?"
A knock at the door shut up the discussion, Wade standing up as he offered to handle the visitors. "I'll get the door." Tina nodded as he walked over to the apartment entrance, checking the small peephole before opening the door. Looking down, he saw two beings: a human and drone soldier whom he assumed were from the Coalition given their specific body gear.
While he took notice of the militia duo, the drone soldier spoke up to him. "Good morning, we're looking for a..." He lifted up what appeared to be an ID card, Wade glancing at the object as he heard the drone continue his question. "...Wade Carter? We heard he resided here since last night." Looking to Wade again, the drone stopped himself upon finishing his sentence, then picking himself up as he spoke further. "Come to think of it, you look like him."
Wade smiled warmly as he spoke to the two guests. "That's right. You need something?"
"Eh, more like the other way around, actually." The drone soldier replied as he handed Wade the ID, the former worker drone taking it in his hands as he glanced over it. The ID showed him from when he was still a worker drone, but was thankfully untarnished from the factory as Wade held it tightly. Before he could speak, the human soldier handed him a pouch carrying what Wade presumed were a few more of his personal belongings. The drone soldier spoke once more as Wade took the pouch. "We found these while scavenging the storage bays at the factory, we've been heading around delivering them back to those they belong to."
Wade smiled brightly before finally speaking in a grateful tone. "Thanks, Sirs. If there's anything I can do to help, just let me know."
The two soldiers nodded as the human one replied. "Just doing our job, Mr. Carter. Have a pleasant morning." With that, the troopers departed the apartment complex, leaving Wade to himself as he shut the door.
Heading back inside, Tina and Jasmine looked to Wade as the former spoke to him. "Who was that?"
"Just some boys from the Coalition, and just like Nathan said, they finally found my ID!" Wade answered before showing the card off, Tina grinned happily as she saw it, Jasmine giving a simple smile as he spoke further. "Feels good to have it back, I think that was what was keeping me down a little yesterday."
"Well, at least you won't have to worry about that anymore." Tina replied as Wade put the card in his pocket, taking his seat again before setting the pouch at his legs. Taking notice of the pouch, Tina asked, "What's in that? Battery candy?"
Wade shook his head as he began pulling out the items inside the bag, speaking to Tina as he examined them. "Oh, no, looks like some more of my belongings." Once he was done, Wade put the pouch on the couch's cup holder, on the space behind the drink holders themselves. The items were other various cards and papers with various personal information of Wades written on them, along with Wade's wallet. Wade found it almost comical that the items were all separated from each other, rather than being inside the wallet after getting cleared out.
Tina seemed to agree with Wade's thoughts as he began reinserting the cards into his wallet. "Well, that's silly. They just put everything in that little pouch instead of putting it all back in that thing."
Wade chuckled as he put his ID into the frontal window pocket of the wallet. "Yeah, guess they had to clear every little part of it before sending it off." As he finished restocking his wallet, Wade glanced to the pouch before continuing. "Besides, that IS a nice pouch."
"It sure is." Tina replied before taking another sip of her oil can, Wade putting his wallet away as she spoke again. "On another subject, however, you think we should go see if Nathan's around? Him and Kurtis could come by and have some small talk."
Wade nodded as he started to speak, but stopped as Jasmine spoke first. "Actually, I ran into F earlier while at the market. I heard from her that Nathan was going to be joining her for a date later this afternoon." Glancing to Wade, she finished with, "So he might be already busy for the moment."
Taking his own oil can, Wade shrugged his arm as he replied. "Eh, no problem with that. Don't wanna kill a growing relationship, now do we?"
Tina chuckled lightly as she agreed with her boyfriend. "Indeed, if it were us, they'd probably do the same fo-"
The chatter stopped as another knock sounded at the door, Wade moving to get up again as he glanced to the ladies in confusion. "Another visitor?"
"You think it could be F?" Tina made a wild guess as Wade approached the door, glancing out the peephole in slight surprise before opening the door.
Wade felt as if their talk about the Ceres couple had been a form of summoning as he saw F and Nathan standing at the door, bearing strangely serious expressions as they were greeted by the former worker drone. "F! Nathan! Funny timing, we were just talking about you. Come on in, have a seat."
As the two walked past Wade, F pat him on the shoulder as she spoke to him. "As much as I'd like to visit Wade, I'm afraid we're not gonna be here long, nor are you and the Fowleys."
Wade raised an eyebrow at her reply as he followed Nathan and F, the two simply standing in front of Tina and Jasmine as Wade returned to the living room. "Oh?"
"We're leaving? Should we get dressed and pack our things ASAP?" Tina asked with mild concern as F replied to her.
"Yep, you're on the ball with getting ready, but we're... not exactly leaving." The disassembly drone's words brought a confused face from Tina as Nathan clarified his crush.
"We got a call from J, just as we were heading to one of the diners here." The two drones paused for a moment, glancing to each other as they almost spewed out about their date, but shook it off as Nathan continued with little hesitation. "She told us that Tessa had intercepted some kind of transmission, one that might help us clear up this situation with the company faster than we initially thought."
F gave an affirming nod on Nathan's explanation before adding to it. "Her and J are playing host to a meeting held by the general stationed here, and she wants us to attend." Glancing over Wade and the Fowley sisters, she finished the explanation with, "They especially want you two to come as well, given what you both went through."
Wade and Tina gave blushes of embarrassment at the news, honored by the invitation but also a little uncomfortable with their elevated status as they glanced to each other. After taking a moment to process what they heard, Wade broke the silence. "Well, I did make that promise at the factory, and to J and Tessa earlier... and I intend on acting on said promise." Looking to Tina, his girlfriend gave an agreeing nod as she stood up with him.
"Glad to hear it. We don't have to be in that much of a rush, though, the meeting doesn't start until 10." F stated, Wade and Tina both glancing at the clock to check the time before looking back to their murder drone friend with nods of acknowledgement.
Standing up from her chair, Jasmine stretched as she announced her goals to the room. "Well, in that case, I should hit the shower."
"Right, I'll get myself fixed up too." Tina replied as she looked to Wade, the two sharing warm smiles before heading to the kitchen. Noticing the still unstored items on the counter, Tina spoke aloud. "Jasmine? You mind if Wade and I help store the groceries in the cabinets here?"
"Sure, thanks!" Jasmine answered in a grateful tone as she went off to the bathroom in the back of the apartment, Tina glancing to Wade as she began to take some food out of the bag.
"I'll get the refrigerated stuff." Wade stated simply as he took some items out of the bag, Tina putting her chosen food stuffs into one of the cabinets as they worked to unload the fresh consumables from Jasmine's errand.

Not sure if this guy is a Reddit user but I’m looking for insight into what his thought process could have been because I still can’t wrap my head around it. This might be kind of long because I have a tendency to ramble but I’m going to try and keep it as short as I can (yeah it’s pretty long sorry…)
For background, I’m a female in her late twenties. I met this guy online and started talking to him about two years ago. We went on one official date. I really liked him but we were both pretty busy since I was working full time while getting my masters and he was pursuing a rigorous/demanding degree, so we’d established that we weren’t really looking for a relationship but that we enjoyed each others’ company and chatting, but maybe we could entertain something casual if it ever got to that point. I think we saw each other 3 times in two months. As we were planning the fourth “date” (a movie night at his place), I suddenly got ghosted.
My ego took a bit of a hit but I recovered and ended up meeting a guy who would later become my boyfriend. A few months into my relationship, the first guy suddenly messaged me on IG, sharing a meme and making a joke about something he’d previously teased me about. I just ignored it and moved on. (Note: I had never publicized my relationship status)
Fast forward towards the end of last year, my relationship ends and, I know this isn’t something to be proud of, but I was looking for someone I knew I wouldn’t get attached to to take my mind off things, so I hit this guy up again just to have someone to message to fill in the void. We chat occasionally but the conversation is fairly sparse, and though I THINK he was flirting, he would also redirect the convo every time I flirted back. We attempt to get dinner a few times, but he kept cancelling and then saying I should just come over instead. At this point we hadn’t seen each other for over a year. While I wasn’t opposed to the idea of hooking up, I wanted to either go for food/an activity beforehand, OR have him directly come out and say that he was just looking to bang, not bail then switch on me. Honestly, at this point I was under the impression that we were just friendly and there was nothing more.
Anyways, come February, I land a job that moves me a few hours away. I posted a story at some point after the move that he responds to and we get to chatting again, and he makes a comment about seeing my bed in my new apartment and I joke about stranger danger since we’re practically just pen pals. He asks if he just got friend zoned, and I, thinking he was making a joke, asked him if this was new news. The following conversation was him saying that he always thought that we’d had something and he only backed off when we first met because I said I wasn’t looking for a relationship.
At this point, I’m really confused. For one, he was actually the one who said he was too busy to date when we had the initial conversation, before he ghosted me. Two, we hadn’t seen each other in a year and exchanged a dozen messages every few weeks. I don’t know about anyone else, but that’s not the frequency at which I speak to anyone I’m romantically interested in. I admit to him that I was interested when we’d first met, but since we could never actually meet up and only spoke sparsely, I stopped thinking in that direction. He proceeds to get a bit passive aggressive so I stop responding and I’m just sitting there dazed and confused (and also hungover lol).
I told my friend about it and she said it sounds like a bruised ego since he’s tall, fairly attractive, and is in a prestigious field, but I still cant wrap my head around it. I feel like if he was interested, he could have said something outright and we could’ve readjusted to our situation, but there was nothing? We haven’t spoken since but can someone shed some light on what the potential thought process might be??

What happend
What happend
Hello guys and girls, i really need some opinions and advices on what the fuck happend.
So long story short, i met this girl on Bumble app. She is a stewardess and was staying in my city for roughly a month in total. We started texting there, i was funny and charming as usual so she gave me her whatsapp (number) and ig. We made plans to go for a date in like week and a half since we both were busy. I texted her on ig to reschedule the date and eventually we went on it. She was staying at a nice hotel 10 min away from me. I met her outside and when she came out i was like dam. Everything started going smoothly almost instantly, we clicked like i never clicked with somebody else before. Made jokes how something is gonna happen to her and she was like just let me have a gin and tonic first and i was like il let you have two of those because im a nice one. Later on we went to a second place to have drinks and i started to make extensive eye contact with her because i was all over the head with this girl (im not a type of guy that something like that happens to often in fact it never did to be honest even tho i see alot of girls and go out alot and usualy i hide myself pretty well like im mysterous and women told me they cannont read me no matter how hard they try and they really like that about me some even told me i have no emotions and im like a stone)
Back to the story, she was like dont look at me like that because you make me nervous and i was like look at you like what? (i knew exactly like what ha) I continued to do that and later while we went back to the hotel ( she wanted to walk) i grabbed her hand and we walked and made jokes all they way back while holding hands. When we came to the hotel she was like im sleepy and i was like then you should go. She wanted to sit outside before she went up so we did. We talked and talked and the story i going with was that we probbably not gonna see eachoter ever again and thats what i stuck with. She said if i wanted to see her i would and i was like i have no time and she said again if you wanted you would. We talked and ifor some reason i had abnormal urge to kiss her like ive known her for idk how much time, i never felt such a strong and weird feeling like that, i basiclly fully fell for her in matter of hours ( crazy i know) I told her listen i dont expect anything from you i just want to kiss you and leave. She was like you are sick since your nose is runny etc ( i i told her before that my voice is funny today) and kinda rejcted me because she has flights almost daily. Eventually we started making out and had an intense session next to the hotel and even on the hotel wall haha ( people that passed by really gave us the looks some even like dam even tho it was late) After 2 days i was like i have to see you again, idk why i just have to. We texted for few days , was going amazing she texted me i text her but she was busy a little. Then she invited me to come with her and her cabin crew friends for a night out so i did , told me i could join them basicly and i was like fuck it.( finally haha) We had one of the most amazing nights ever, i took them to a club, got the best seats because i know the bouncers ( no reservation, nothing).sime girls started talking to me there and she got a little jelous i mean she told me she doesnt like me doing that but later we made it uo by having sex in the club and she asked me there to come to her hotel room after, we made a pinky promise and left the club toilete haha.I paid everything ( cabs and all, not that it matters just saying and she even got mad at me because of that a little).After that she basiclly sneaked me in to the hotel we ran to the elevators and she forgot something at the reception so she got called back then later we laughed that the guy saw us. I did everything perfectly and then we had sex in hotel, talked, cuddled etc. I told her that im never this honest but i just wanted her to know that in few hours she made me feel so alive and that girls in my city couldnt do that even im few months. But i said i dont expect anything from her still but i just wanted to be honest for the first time. Then i left before she woke up because she fell alseep after 15 min after sex. I tought that was a manly thing to do even tho i wanted to stay so bad. I left her a note that said text me and some name i called her ( a song) and P.S you snore a little :). The note was on the napkin, placed on my side of the bed next to her. That same day at nighttime she texted me and i was like oh yes oh yes (i couldnt stop thinking about her because i felt so amazing and alive). We exhanged few text like before i joked about how if i survive the night ( i was out partying) im gonna see her again for the third time and the lucky charm. The she just dissapeard.Completly ghosted me. Didnt respond to my last few messages about that thirdt time, didnt even seen them on wa. (no read status) So after a day and a half i texted her again sending her a picture of a place she wanted to go while she was here (it was closed before, season just opened) and asked her you wanna go?. No response, no read so i tought maybe her wa is broken due to some number thing so i texted her on ig asking is it that or she just ghosted me and whatever it is i think i deserve to know. She seen that like 10h after ive sent it and then after another 10h she just blocked me everywhere and thats it. I dont understand what happend and why would she text me the same day responding to my note if it was just a one night stand for her or if she didnt want to see me or continue to talk with me (side note she had like a week, week and a half left in my city when that happend)

TLDR AT THE BOTTOM.
This might be long, I'm sorry. My ex (23M) and I (25F) dated for an entire year in 2022, and then broke up and for the past year and little bit have not spoken or seen each other once. We met at a local bar and the way he came up to me as forward and sweet, he was younger than me but super confident and it worked. While we dated, we had a pretty great relationship and it was very much best friends/lovers, our whole group was amazing, and my current friend group now was essentially his group of friends first. He was always gentle with me, he let me be 110% myself, and I was his first love/his first girlfriend. He treated me really well.
Why did we break up, you ask? He was in his senior year of college at the time, and when he drank too much he'd get a little aggressive (not with me, like if someone bumped into him at the bar type vibe) and his sister was a fucking menace. She was my age, and so codependent on him she was mean to me because I took up his time instead of her. I was nothing but nice to her and tried to make it work, but she ruined my birthday that year, lied to him about how she treated me when he wasn't around, and was in general just really awful to me every chance she got. What's worse is I was his first girlfriend and that was her first time not having him to herself, and he didn't know any better and couldn't stand up for me when he needed to sometimes. It caused so many problems. Our friends hated her, too. That's the umbrella.
The actual breakup was because he was particularly difficult one night drunk and said something super mean to me, and when I wanted to talk to him about it he couldn't really face what he did. He had plans to go home that next day (an hour away, where his sister also lives) and said we'd talk on the phone later. Well, he called me, and he broke up with me over a 3 minute phone call. He didn't even sound like himself, he was distant and cold and the opposite of how he was with me any other time we'd ever gotten into an argument or discussion, and I KNEW it wasn't coming from him. I got over it pretty quickly because I was over his sister's shit and knew it was for the best regardless of how it happened.
We went this entire past year no contact, not seeing each other, nothing. Our friends saw him probably 3 times but he always left town before anyone went out and I'm 90% sure it was because he was avoiding seeing me.
ANYWAY. There's the back story, here's us seeing each other the first time.
This past weekend, one of our good friends had a really important event, and my ex was in town. My best girlfriend told me he would be, and my attitude toward it was truly whatever, I was fine seeing him and over it. We met everyone at the same bar he and I met at, which is basically our spot, and he was coming out of the bathroom when he saw me. His eyes went huge, he looked shocked. I thought it was a little funny, so I went up to him and gave him a a hug and said hi. He awkwardly said it was really nice to see me, and then went to the bar to get a drink. I went with my two friends to get a drink at the bar a few minutes later, and he was standing across from us literally glancing at me every 2 seconds.
I ended up going up to talk to him because we were obviously in the same group, and he asked me how I was. I said I'd been great, asked him how he was, pleasantries. He then goes, "but how are you really?" and I was like ?? No, like I've been great, dude. From there it was like nothing had changed between us. We were firing inside jokes off to each other, talking and laughing, and we pretty much turned into a unit from there. He was buying my drinks, giving me a piggyback ride to the next bar, arm around my waist the whole night, holding my hand, etc. If something funny happened I was the first person he was looking at.
At the end of the night we were talking and I asked him where he was staying, told him he could stay at mine if he wanted. He said he really wanted to, but he was seeing "kind of seeing someone". I asked him point blank if this was a girlfriend situation because I didn't want to ruin anything for him, then said I was seeing someone casually, too. He said he had no idea and basically brushed it off, was super nonchalant about it and didn't seem worried. I then said it wasn't like I wanted to do anything but it would be really nice to sleep next to him. He said he really wanted that, and we ended up back at mine. I had my head in his lap the whole uber ride to my house, he was brushing my hair out of my eyes, etc.
Nothing happened at my house, we stayed up and talked and laughed and cuddled and slept. The next morning we were up early talking and laughing more, catching up, etc. and went to our friend's brunch. The whole entire day he's looking at me like he did when we first met, watching out for me, at one point even pulled me into him and told me I was "really hard not to look at". It was like we were dating again.
We went back to our friend's apartment and hung out with everyone, and it was him in a being bag chair and me between his legs. He was playing with my hair the entire time, massaging my shoulders, leaning into me to laugh at everything we were the only ones noticing. We didn't even talk to hardly anyone else the whole 3 hours we were there. I left at the same time he did because he had an hour to drive home, and our goodbye was so emotional??
He hugged me so tightly for 3 minutes, said "well one of us is going to have to let go" and kissed me so hard it was like he was going off to war or something. I told him I had no idea what I was supposed to say, and he said he didn't either, and we kissed again really hard and we held hands until I was walked off far enough and had to let go. I got in my car and cried for 5 minutes, but I wasn't sad and I wasn't sure why.
I don't know what to do now. He hasn't texted or reached out and I'm sure he's just as confused as I am. I don't have rose-colored glasses on, I know there would need to be a ton of discussions before we ever revisited an "us", but this weekend just threw me because of how he ended our relationship. He's had a lot of things happen the last year that I know made him grow up and mature a lot, but I just don’t know. Am I delusional or does it seem like he's not over it either? He ended it but he also initiated all of this, so I shouldn't reach out, or should I?
TLDR; My ex (23M) and I (25F) saw each other for the first time after a year of no contact and it was like nothing between us changed, we were electric. He very obviously wasn't over me at all/looking at me the entire weekend like he did when we were dating/taking care of me/acting like he did when we dated. I'm not sure what to do because it made me realize I'm not over it either, even after going the entire last year thinking I was. I don't know where to go from here.
Any input is helpful, I'm sorry this is so fucking long lol

What happend
What happend
Hello guys and girls, i really need some opinions and advices on what the fuck happend.
So long story short, i met this girl on Bumble app. She is a stewardess and was staying in my city for roughly a month in total. We started texting there, i was funny and charming as usual so she gave me her whatsapp (number) and ig. We made plans to go for a date in like week and a half since we both were busy. I texted her on ig to reschedule the date and eventually we went on it. She was staying at a nice hotel 10 min away from me. I met her outside and when she came out i was like dam. Everything started going smoothly almost instantly, we clicked like i never clicked with somebody else before. Made jokes how something is gonna happen to her and she was like just let me have a gin and tonic first and i was like il let you have two of those because im a nice one. Later on we went to a second place to have drinks and i started to make extensive eye contact with her because i was all over the head with this girl (im not a type of guy that something like that happens to often in fact it never did to be honest even tho i see alot of girls and go out alot and usualy i hide myself pretty well like im mysterous and women told me they cannont read me no matter how hard they try and they really like that about me some even told me i have no emotions and im like a stone)
Back to the story, she was like dont look at me like that because you make me nervous and i was like look at you like what? (i knew exactly like what ha) I continued to do that and later while we went back to the hotel ( she wanted to walk) i grabbed her hand and we walked and made jokes all they way back while holding hands. When we came to the hotel she was like im sleepy and i was like then you should go. She wanted to sit outside before she went up so we did. We talked and talked and the story i going with was that we probbably not gonna see eachoter ever again and thats what i stuck with. She said if i wanted to see her i would and i was like i have no time and she said again if you wanted you would. We talked and ifor some reason i had abnormal urge to kiss her like ive known her for idk how much time, i never felt such a strong and weird feeling like that, i basiclly fully fell for her in matter of hours ( crazy i know) I told her listen i dont expect anything from you i just want to kiss you and leave. She was like you are sick since your nose is runny etc ( i i told her before that my voice is funny today) and kinda rejcted me because she has flights almost daily. Eventually we started making out and had an intense session next to the hotel and even on the hotel wall haha ( people that passed by really gave us the looks some even like dam even tho it was late) After 2 days i was like i have to see you again, idk why i just have to. We texted for few days , was going amazing she texted me i text her but she was busy a little. Then she invited me to come with her and her cabin crew friends for a night out so i did , told me i could join them basicly and i was like fuck it.( finally haha) We had one of the most amazing nights ever, i took them to a club, got the best seats because i know the bouncers ( no reservation, nothing).sime girls started talking to me there and she got a little jelous i mean she told me she doesnt like me doing that but later we made it uo by having sex in the club and she asked me there to come to her hotel room after, we made a pinky promise and left the club toilete haha.I paid everything ( cabs and all, not that it matters just saying and she even got mad at me because of that a little).After that she basiclly sneaked me in to the hotel we ran to the elevators and she forgot something at the reception so she got called back then later we laughed that the guy saw us. I did everything perfectly and then we had sex in hotel, talked, cuddled etc. I told her that im never this honest but i just wanted her to know that in few hours she made me feel so alive and that girls in my city couldnt do that even im few months. But i said i dont expect anything from her still but i just wanted to be honest for the first time. Then i left before she woke up because she fell alseep after 15 min after sex. I tought that was a manly thing to do even tho i wanted to stay so bad. I left her a note that said text me and some name i called her ( a song) and P.S you snore a little :). The note was on the napkin, placed on my side of the bed next to her. That same day at nighttime she texted me and i was like oh yes oh yes (i couldnt stop thinking about her because i felt so amazing and alive). We exhanged few text like before i joked about how if i survive the night ( i was out partying) im gonna see her again for the third time and the lucky charm. The she just dissapeard.Completly ghosted me. Didnt respond to my last few messages about that thirdt time, didnt even seen them on wa. (no read status) So after a day and a half i texted her again sending her a picture of a place she wanted to go while she was here (it was closed before, season just opened) and asked her you wanna go?. No response, no read so i tought maybe her wa is broken due to some number thing so i texted her on ig asking is it that or she just ghosted me and whatever it is i think i deserve to know. She seen that like 10h after ive sent it and then after another 10h she just blocked me everywhere and thats it. I dont understand what happend and why would she text me the same day responding to my note if it was just a one night stand for her or if she didnt want to see me or continue to talk with me (side note she had like a week, week and a half left in my city when that happend)

What happend
Hello guys and girls, i really need some opinions and advices on what the fuck happend.
So long story short, i met this girl on Bumble app. She is a stewardess and was staying in my city for roughly a month in total. We started texting there, i was funny and charming as usual so she gave me her whatsapp (number) and ig. We made plans to go for a date in like week and a half since we both were busy. I texted her on ig to reschedule the date and eventually we went on it. She was staying at a nice hotel 10 min away from me. I met her outside and when she came out i was like dam. Everything started going smoothly almost instantly, we clicked like i never clicked with somebody else before. Made jokes how something is gonna happen to her and she was like just let me have a gin and tonic first and i was like il let you have two of those because im a nice one. Later on we went to a second place to have drinks and i started to make extensive eye contact with her because i was all over the head with this girl (im not a type of guy that something like that happens to often in fact it never did to be honest even tho i see alot of girls and go out alot and usualy i hide myself pretty well like im mysterous and women told me they cannont read me no matter how hard they try and they really like that about me some even told me i have no emotions and im like a stone)
Back to the story, she was like dont look at me like that because you make me nervous and i was like look at you like what? (i knew exactly like what ha) I continued to do that and later while we went back to the hotel ( she wanted to walk) i grabbed her hand and we walked and made jokes all they way back while holding hands. When we came to the hotel she was like im sleepy and i was like then you should go. She wanted to sit outside before she went up so we did. We talked and talked and the story i going with was that we probbably not gonna see eachoter ever again and thats what i stuck with. She said if i wanted to see her i would and i was like i have no time and she said again if you wanted you would. We talked and ifor some reason i had abnormal urge to kiss her like ive known her for idk how much time, i never felt such a strong and weird feeling like that, i basiclly fully fell for her in matter of hours ( crazy i know) I told her listen i dont expect anything from you i just want to kiss you and leave. She was like you are sick since your nose is runny etc ( i i told her before that my voice is funny today) and kinda rejcted me because she has flights almost daily. Eventually we started making out and had an intense session next to the hotel and even on the hotel wall haha ( people that passed by really gave us the looks some even like dam even tho it was late) After 2 days i was like i have to see you again, idk why i just have to. We texted for few days , was going amazing she texted me i text her but she was busy a little. Then she invited me to come with her and her cabin crew friends for a night out so i did , told me i could join them basicly and i was like fuck it.( finally haha) We had one of the most amazing nights ever, i took them to a club, got the best seats because i know the bouncers ( no reservation, nothing).sime girls started talking to me there and she got a little jelous i mean she told me she doesnt like me doing that but later we made it uo by having sex in the club and she asked me there to come to her hotel room after, we made a pinky promise and left the club toilete haha.I paid everything ( cabs and all, not that it matters just saying and she even got mad at me because of that a little).After that she basiclly sneaked me in to the hotel we ran to the elevators and she forgot something at the reception so she got called back then later we laughed that the guy saw us. I did everything perfectly and then we had sex in hotel, talked, cuddled etc. I told her that im never this honest but i just wanted her to know that in few hours she made me feel so alive and that girls in my city couldnt do that even im few months. But i said i dont expect anything from her still but i just wanted to be honest for the first time. Then i left before she woke up because she fell alseep after 15 min after sex. I tought that was a manly thing to do even tho i wanted to stay so bad. I left her a note that said text me and some name i called her ( a song) and P.S you snore a little :). The note was on the napkin, placed on my side of the bed next to her. That same day at nighttime she texted me and i was like oh yes oh yes (i couldnt stop thinking about her because i felt so amazing and alive). We exhanged few text like before i joked about how if i survive the night ( i was out partying) im gonna see her again for the third time and the lucky charm. The she just dissapeard.Completly ghosted me. Didnt respond to my last few messages about that thirdt time, didnt even seen them on wa. (no read status) So after a day and a half i texted her again sending her a picture of a place she wanted to go while she was here (it was closed before, season just opened) and asked her you wanna go?. No response, no read so i tought maybe her wa is broken due to some number thing so i texted her on ig asking is it that or she just ghosted me and whatever it is i think i deserve to know. She seen that like 10h after ive sent it and then after another 10h she just blocked me everywhere and thats it. I dont understand what happend and why would she text me the same day responding to my note if it was just a one night stand for her or if she didnt want to see me or continue to talk with me (side note she had like a week, week and a half left in my city when that happend)

First night being out, grateful my uncle and aunt took me in. I have no idea what I’m going to do next uncertain about the next moves but it is what it is I’ll be fine. I think I need to focus on myself I’m tired of everything I’m involved in. It’s funny because when I was looking through my phone to see who I could call to get me. The only answer for that question was an Uber to a hotel to figure out wtf I’m going to do next. I should be solvent for the next little while. I can’t say for certain on where this life is going to take me but hopefully everything works well. I never thought this would be my life in a million years. Apparently, loyalty and self respect don’t align in family. I won’t lose I can say that I’m going to be prosperous and I will make this happen.

Is it still worth it to start a channel in 2024?
I know this question has probably been asked before, I lurk on this sub sometimes and I'd say I love the sense of community on here.
So a little backstory, I've always wanted to start a YouTube channel but I've ultimately been discouraged by one bump or the other in the road of life. But recently my country had elections and immediately went to shit. Price of living skyrocketed, things became crazy expensive and essentially between the span of 2022 - 2024, cour country has lost most of its middle class status. With most people living on one end of the spectrum - either extreme wealth or extreme poverty. With millions in-between loosing their jobs.
My family unfortunately lost our middle class status so things have expectedly tumbled down hill. It's been almost 2 years since our pantry has been full, and it's basically been hand-to-mouth ever since.
I'm a uni student and I've been trying to get a job to support my dad who's carried the financial burdens mostly but to no avail. So the idea of YouTube came back to mind.
Can I start a YouTube to make money in 2024?
I know most people will say do it for the passion unless you'll get frustrated which I totally agree. I've had a pilling list of video ideas in my notes app and even tried making a few videos, I do have passion and I'm willing to weather a few years of seeing nothing...but is it too late to start? Especially with how oversaturated it is.
And considering I'm also not from the US or Canada or Europe - I'm an African - so I'm aware we always tend to get the short end of the stick in revenue, reach etc. I don't even know how I can get around that
Is it all worth it?

Hello,
I have a major problem with Windows Updates installation on SCCM clients. Only about 70% of clients install updates successfully, and the remaining 30% are all over the place.
About 15% are stuck in permanent "Detection state unknown" - no matter what i do, they simply do not detect published updates. Part of these do not see updates at all. Part of these sees 3rd party updates, like Adobe Reader updates, but ignores OS updates.
Another 15% are stuck in "Update is required" state. Part of these actually manages to install the updates, but apparently fails to report it to SCCM. Part of these do not show the available updates, just like the ones in "Detection state unknown" group.
There is no apparent common reason for this behavior. All the affected workstations belong to different locations, different subnets, where 7 out of 10 of their neighbors updating just fine.
Some workstations that were successfully installing the updates before can suddenly stop doing that at random.
There are some random errors in client logs, but i am not sure if these are at fault, or something else is.
For example:

1. ScanAgent.log

There are many messages, like "Sources are current, but invalid. TTL is also invalid." Sometimes it changes to "Sources are current and valid. TTLs are however, invalid." Sometimes the sources are "not current". Sometimes both sources are "Current" and "TTL is valid".
These change at random it seems.

1. UpdatesDeployment.log

There are random "GetUpdateInfo - failed to get targeted update, error = 0x87d00215." in the log.
I've seen some articles on both errors, but none helped. I am mostly sure that boundaries are correct (in fact i've created an additional specific boundary just for tests). About distribution points having problems etc, as i said earlier, 7 out of 10 workstations are fine using the same DP and so on. System restart is enforced after the updates, so it is not like they are permanently stuck in "restart required".
I tried contacting MS support, and they recommended to reset WU components on affected workstations. It did help for some as a short-term solution, but not for all. Compliance rate went up somewhat the previous month. But now, month later, i am back to where i was before, at low 70%.
If i use built-in Windows Update on problematic workstations, or join them to Intune, then they successfully detect and install all necessary updates, so it is clearly SCCM problem. Unfortunately switching everything to Intune is not a solution, as i am also using Task sequences to update some specific 3rd party applications, and TS stop working on Intune-joined PCs.
We are using SCCM 2403 (the same problem was on earlier versions too).
1 primary site, 1 server with Software update point and WSUS, 6 DP servers.
Windows 10 Enterprise 22H2 workstations. (about 1000 clients total)
Fun fact - Windows Server OS-es are apparently unaffected by this problem.
I've tried re-creating ADR and re-deploying the SUG. I've checked Site and Component statuses -- nothing that can be related to my problem. The affected clients are shown as available and passing checks.
I am completely out of ideas.
Any thoughts are welcome, what could be a problem? What else should i check? Any information i should provide?
Thank you.

So, in May 2023, my friend (Em f23) and I (f28) had a conversation that started off friendly. Just chit-chat and funny anecdotes from the day. She brought up a situation with her coworker she enjoyed. It involved tourettes and one of her coworkers' specific tics.
I made a comment that I genuinely didn't think much of at the time. It was just some trivia I knew of and thought was interesting. Specifically that people with tourettes can 'catch' or involuntarily copy tics from other people with tourettes. It's something I learned from watching content made by people with tourettes. She made a comment like, "Maybe it's not like that, in this specific situation with my coworker."
Here's where I should have realised she was not interested in my trivia. What I definitely didn't realise was that it in fact made her mad, but I kept pushing anyways because I felt I was correct, that the coworker had picked up the tic from a well know streamer because it was literally identical. Em then stopped answering, after a couple hours of silence I asked her if she was actually mad about what I said and she responded with "Its fucking fine." Cue her not talking to me at all for 3 days. On the third day, she said we needed to have a sit-down conversation about boundaries because she "is having big feelings." her words, not mine.
I was so confused about what would have triggered her wanting to talk about boundaries when the conversation we had was a mild disagreement at worst. I would understand if I said something offensive, but I literally just said a fact and my opinion on her coworker, I didn't try to force her to agree, and there's proof of the streamer with that specific tic so it wasn't like I was lying to be able to one up her or something? I don't know, this whole part of the situation is incredibly confusing to me because she never talked about why that conversation triggered her to give me the silent treatment in the first place or how it led her to wanting to talk about boundaries. In the end, the boundaries she talked about much much later had nothing to do with this conversation even though it seemed to be what caused her to want boundaries. Idk, I'm still very confused about what actually caused her to want to have the discussion after the three days of silence and a minor disagreement.
At this point, still May 2023, I was in severe pain, but I did not know it was cancer yet. I was barely making it through each day with how much I was in pain. The tumor is in my leg, growing out of the top portion of my tibia in a way that has made the tibial platue hollow, or essentially a whisper thin shell of bone filled with slime, sorry but that's the best way to describe it. At any moment, my surgeon told me this later, I could have broken that thin bone and had a collapsed knee joint. I say this so you you know when I talk about pain here, I'm talking excruciating levels of pain.
So walking specifically and everything else was extremely painful, and that was taking a lot of energy and brain space. I told her I was in a ton of pain. I was exhausted and barely scraping by just to keep working while waiting for my doctors visits to hopefully figure out what was wrong. I said I would try to find a day to have "the talk," but things just kept getting worse. By the end of July I had seen four different doctors, three of which thought I was just trying to get drugs, the last one was an orthopedic doctor and she took two minutes of looking at an xray and another minute of looking at my leg to say I most likely had a tumor.
The official on paper diagnosis came in September because of the waiting time to meet with the surgeon, but we knew it was a tumor in August. I was put on essentially bed rest from august to the day I had surgery September 27th. I told Em about the tumor the day I got the MRI results which I had in mid August to prepare for the appointment with the surgeon. Her response was extremely upsetting to me.
Em: "That's a lot to deal with. The possibility of having a malignant tumor is scary and can make you really question life. When you're put into a situation like that, it forces you to look back on your life and reevaluate. You find out what you really want out of life and what you waisted too much time dealing with. That's really tough. I'm sorry I made you feel like you couldn't talk to me about your pain. Being more supportive of each other was something I wanted to talk about. Hopefully, you have a sweet and easy recovery."
That response hurt, it felt like she was saying I had a lot to regret in life and like I didn't have much time left to live to fix my regrets. But I thanked her for the empathy she tried to give and moved on. After that she never checked in on me, never asked how I was or what the plan of treatment was. My surgery was scheduled for the end of Spetember, the day after her birthday. I wished her a happy birthday. Then I let her know after the surgery that everything went well and that I was going to be in the hopsital for a few days. I was loopy on strong pain meds so i also told her that my nurse drew me a cute doodle on my white board, she said ".That's great! Hopefully you heal fast so you can go on a date with her. 😉" which was totally out of the blue. I havent dated anyone in the time Ive know or been friends with Em. Im asexual, and an extreme introvert, dating is not really my thing and she knows this. So that comment was very weird to me. After that she never even texted to check in on me or tried to visit me in the 5 days I stayed in the hospital after the surgery. Keep in mind, we are supposedly best friends.
I almost considered our friendship over by then, but I reached out to her when I was pretty much back on my feet to see what was going on and asked her what the conversation about boundaries was about. I apologized for being too chicken shit to ask about it earlier because I don't do well emotionally with getting criticism even when it's valid and I know I need to hear it. On top of that I was (and still am) dealing with fucking cancer. Not an excuse, it is an explanation though. So I apologized.
Her responses here, copy and pasted from our messages:
Em:
"First off I want so say that it's very respectable that you are willing to admit what you did wrong. Thank you for the apology.
Secondly, I don't know if the the conversation is still worth having. I'd be lying if I said I was devastated that we dropped off and didn't communicate for months. To be brutally honest, my life has drastically improved in our time apart. I'm so much more effective and positive. I'm very proud of how far I've come.
That's not to say I believed that you were the soul cause of all of my misfortune. In fact one of the boundaries I wanted to set was actual planned dates instead of spontaneous ones. Because I realized that I was using you like a form of procrastination. I couldn't do the things I needed to do because I chose to hang out with you instead. With my main distraction gone I've been able to thoroughly work through my shit, mental and physical.
When we last hung out I remembered feeling dark and heavy afterwards because it was nothing special. It was just a normal outing for us. I remember feeling angry that what we should have talked about wasn't addressed. Annoyed that it seemed like nothing had changed and that I had not changed. And scared that opening up communication could lead to me falling back into the pit again.
I don't know if we should have the original talk because so much has changed for both of us. We both equally walked over our own thresholds of hell. What I had to say months ago, I believe was true then, but I don't think it will be true now. I think it's quite possible for us to start anew and correct and develop as we go. But I think it would be just as easy to admit our friendship was a great experience. We were there when we needed each other. But it might be time to go our separate ways.
I will say, if we collectively choose to merge back together. I WON'T let it be the same. I don't want you to tell me every tiny dark secret. But I do want you to tell me that you want to stop at game stop and ask me to take you somewhere. Without fear of gas. I want you to tell me if it pisses you off that I take you to only crystal shops or that I talk about spiritually. Because I want to improve. I have no intention of continuing a relationship that doesn't inspire growth or bring me positivity."
So she stopped talking to me, because she had no self-control. She abandoned me during the worst medical crisis of my fucking life, because she doesn't know how to manage her time or her motivation. She punished me, for her problems. To be very specific the spontaneous hanging out was nearly 100% on her. I would ask to hang out rarely, because I never had the chance to because she would be asking to see me multiple times a week.
I'm not a social person, so other than work I don't have much going on and she was my best friend. I wasn't going to say no if I didn't have any other plans. She never brought up that she was procrastinating anything by hanging out with me. Never a peep. Never a hint. Nothing. I had no idea any of that was going on. If I did know I would have been 150,000% there to support her by asking how her goals were going, how her chores were going. Hell I would have helped her do chores as our hang out if she had asked. I did help her with some stuff. Painting her head board, rearranging and cleaning her room, working on crafts when she needed motivation to finish a piece for a friend, being a study buddy when she needed to focus on her mental health books, things like that.
Also in what world is learning to be accountable for your own actions and vacuuming regularly the same as going through cancer? I don't like comparing pain or life struggles usually, but this was a crossed line for me. For her to say her dealing with procrastination was an "equal threshold of hell" as my bone eating tumor and excruciating pain and the fear of it spreading to other parts of my body, it infuriates me still to think about that.
So I am now hurt and angry as hell, that she stopped talking to me over seemingly nothing that I did. I had no idea what was going on with the tourettes coworker conversation that ended in "its fucking fine" from her and then her next message was about her needing to set boundaries. And then she says her life is better without me in it.
Friendship effectively over. Or it should have been.
Here's where I'm a bit of an asshole.
I took her back. I said we could try again. That we both needed to improve but that we could do it better this time. At the time I genuinely believed it. For a couple weeks.
Then the more I thought about laying in that hospital bed, alone, wishing I had someone to distract me from the pain and fear, the more I started to realise her reasons for cutting contact was bullshit. Her wanting to have this big talk about boundaries and the boundaries she wanted were literally nothing I could do they were all her issues with her own decisions and there's was nothing I could change about myself to fix the problem she was putting 50/50 on my shoulders. Her saying her life was better without me when that whole time I was crying over missing her and trying to figure out what I did wrong where I fucked up, what I could do or say to fix it. It all just added up too much and so I sent her one last message.
"I've been doing a lot of thinking and going through my emotions and I think I'm going to step back from whatever this friendship has turned into. I'll be honest I feel betrayed that you didn't even try to support me going through cancer. I understand things were rocky when I got my diagnosis, however if our friendship was important to you on any level I can't understand why you didn't even text me to see how I was doing for months at a time when you knew I was going through one of, if not the most, difficult medical diagnosis humans can get. I felt completely abandoned, especially since the reason we even stopped talking and hanging out was because of your own procrastination issues which I had nothing to do with. If you had even just told me that you needed to get things done before we could hang out I would have supported you unconditionally. Instead you gave a vague "we need to talk about boundaries and being more supportive of each other." And then never supported me in the darkest time of my life so far. It's taken me a while to get to the root of why I feel the way I do, but I don't think I can just let this go like I wanted to. I loved being your friend and it always felt like you valued my friendship too, until you were cutting me off because of your poor time management. I know that will sound harsh, I'm sorry, but it's true. I have my own issues that hurt you, I know that and I really am sorry. I am sorry I could never reciprocate financially, I'm sorry you were the one always picking me up and driving. I'm sorry that I never gave you the birthday or Christmas gifts you wanted. Thank you for all the amazing times. Goodbye."
To clarify the gift thing, I have been very poor for a long time. I am neurodivergent and I struggle to hold down a job. But I hand made her gifts, or cooked for her. The last thing I made for her was a crochet mandala blanket, please look up Radiance Mandala Blanket to see how much effort I went to, she picked the colors and I made her a lap blanket version for christmas 2022. It took her less than a month to complain that she wished she could have picked the colors. SHE DID. I told her to pick a pallet of colors specifically for her blanket and did my best to match the colors she picked with yarn I already owned. It wasn't perfect but I got it as close as I could. I don't like to make a big deal out of things I do for people because giving to the ones I love is literally the easiest thing in the world for me. But to have her act like I didnt try to make it as perfect for her as I could hurt so much.
Anyways, back to me telling her I was done. Her reply back pissed me off, maybe because I was already angry. It felt so patronizing and dismissive. But that might just be because of all the emotions I was already feeling at the time I read it.
Em: "Your feelings are valid. I'm sorry I made you feel abandoned in the hardest time. I wish you the best of luck on your way through life. Fall in love, have your farm, raise your kids, craft wonderful creations, enjoy the many YouTube videos to come, and don't forget to live your best self. I'll take this harsh lesson and apply it to friendships in the future. Live long and prosper, my friend, and have many pleasant wanderings."
Harsh lesson my ass. If it was harsh for anyone it was harsh for me to learn my best friend gave absolutely no shits about me and couldnt be bothered to try and support me through this medical crisis. We haven't spoken since. I have her blocked on everything. So, aita for cutting off Em? Even though I'm angry, I'm conflicted because I still love her, she was my best friend for 6 years.