This Year's Model of Humanity

This episode always makes me cry. It starts when the look in Buffy's eyes changes, that gorgeous theme starts up, and the sun begins to rise.

There are so many parallels to Prophecy Girl - not in the least because they're both episodes where Buffy dies.
( Things that I noticed this time around )
Something that I've been thinking about recently is velvet over iron. Buffy starts out as the iron fist in the velvet glove, but time slowly strips away the velvet, until all that's left is the iron underneath - which isn't soft and isn't pretty, but it's still the same fist as it always was - still the Hand. The core of Buffy doesn't change, but the softness gets stripped away by the battles she faces and the losses she suffers.

On a slightly different note, some quotes from Nietzsche that seem relevant to the Buffyverse.

"The mother of dissipation is not joy but joylessness." - This one makes me think of S5 Angel, actually.

"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."

"Talking much about oneself can also be a means to conceal oneself."

"If you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you."

"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster."

You know, part of the reason that I love the due South finale (apart from the sheer slashy joy) is for the exact same reason that I adore the Buffy finale. It completes the journey that was started in the first episode while starting a brand new chapter for the main character.

Hey, that's part of why I like the ending of the Children of Dune mini-series.

"A chapter has ended, swept away by the whirlwind. One door has closed, but another has opened, and on the other side: our future."

Monday, May 26th, 2003: Added Point A to the new A Perfect Possible Future page. Added We Don't to Even Heroes (non-shippy fic). Added two BtVS fanfiction recommendations.

"I am not well acquainted with slash but find nothing harmful in sharing fantasies about favourite characters or their interpreters. Within the context of such sites even Real Person stories seem unobjectionable as they are clearly fictional." - Sir Ian McKellen (quote first mentioned by miss_saigon)

Found that report I mentioned. It's actually 'cluttered' not 'scattered'. A bit different.

I've been reading it over. I had it done end of my junior year in high school. Reading through my 'data base' information I ran across "She had straight A's her freshman year at school and had lots of friends. Towards the end of the year her friends ostracized her and since that time she has had increasing problems with self image, mood and weight." Which made me tear up. I don't like to remember that people liked me freshman year. It makes it feel easier if I can just pretend that I was never well-liked. And I was. I wasn't 'popular' but I was well-liked. Which made what happened later feel so much worse.

And this: "When asked what she would want if she had three wishes, she said that there would be no pollution, people would care about animals and that she would have more initiative."

"In spite of a rather rambling and disorganized approach, this is a young lady who has an extraordinary memory and a remarkable capacity to learn details. It is likely that her tendency to be disorganized interferes with the efficiency of her learning."

"On the House-Tree-Person drawing, we find a young woman who has some ambivalence about her sexuality and some feelings of inadequacy."

I really haven't changed all that much. I've become more self-aware over the years and thus happier, but I haven't really changed in any way.

I seem to be... um. wallowing in the joy of due South. It rules mightily.

Paul Gross is just great. Great actor, great singer, great writer.

And I planned on watching the Vecchio episodes first. But Kowalski was irresistable. I did watch the pilot, Some Like It Red and Victoria's Secret but other than that, it's been Kowalski all the way.
( While I'm talking about SLIR and VS... )
And on a slightly different note, Paul Gross also rules as a person.
"I suppose the character is public ground. If you're willing to bring it into people's houses every week, the [fans] are entitled to certain liberties, wherever their imagination is carried by those characters." -- Paul Gross, quote from the Toronto Globe & Mail, August 8, 1998.

'wherever their imagination is carried'

I like that.

"[It's] the occasional romantic dinner. Don't let the romance die."

- Matt Damon, joking about how he keeps his tight friendship with Ben Affleck, US Magazine.

From Conversations with God, an uncommon dialogue; Book Three by Neale Donald Walsch (and God).
Why is there such a taboo against the ending of one's life?
( Indeed, why is there? )