( Sincere and ramble-y tend to go hand-in-hand with Ian. He keeps himself in check externally to an excessive degree, and never really reflects the amount of over-thinking going on behind the scenes. As soon as you strip out the filter, all those thoughts come tumbling out at once. It never feels simple, almost nothing is ever simple for him. It's analyzing the situation from different perspectives constantly.
In college, one of his favorite teachers gave him advice he's been applying ever since — maybe before, without realizing it:
When you're building something, imagine that it's broken and try to reverse-engineer what went wrong. This will allow you to consider the potential weak points in your design.
Unfortunately, he takes that a few steps too far and applies it to all areas in life. Even, and sometimes especially, the places it shouldn't be applied. )
I know you're not blaming me, I'm blaming me, but it's okay. I'll work on it.
I'm willing to talk about it. I'm just not great at the getting to the talking part. I'm actually really, really terrible at the getting to the talking part. I don't know what it is, but I'll try to figure that out, too. In the meantime, maybe there needs to be like a system or a code word or a check-in shortcut that isn't a big deal or something I don't know I don't even know what I'm saying. That's not a thing people do. Jesus Christ.
( He's slamming that send button before he even reads it this time, because he knows himself well enough to know he'd probably delete the whole damn thing and send back something more shut off. )
No pressure. I said long term, remember? Rome wasn't built in a day.
[ The implication being that he doesn't intend to go anywhere anytime soon. This is already more than he anticipated getting out of this conversation. ]
We can do a code word. [ A soft voice, a pointy elbow nudging his side: Nate? Where are you? ] You want me to ask you how the weather is?
( He's picking up on that implication. It's hitting him somewhere, probably a little too hard. Kind of glad there isn't an empathy bond to embarrass the hell out of him for it. )
That could work. Cloudy, stormy, sunny. Whatever the fuck snow would be.
What if you want to know about the actual weather? It's gonna be a who's on first what's on second thing, isn't it?
[ It's a passable system, something to tide them over. Nate has had his fair share of translations from gestures or subtle sentences, things that made the transition to speaking a much easier thing to practice. Eventually.
He remembers how long it took him. To expect faster progress of Ian would be a fool's errand. ]
Come up with a little shorthand dictionary for me, ok? The difference between annoyed but wanting company, and annoyed but not wanting company. Pissed off. Happy. Horny. Whatever.
Fuck, sorry, I didn't even notice I was doing it It seriously isn't a big deal, I swear. Just a weird one. I'm pretty sure you were trying to make this sincere gesture kind of thing and I couldn't really figure out how to Lock it in That's probably not a thing I couldn't figure out the right way to answer it. Not in a 'there's a wrong answer' way, just a I don't know, man, I couldn't figure out how to meet you there and I fucked up a little in the process and there was this whole
thing that wasn't really a thing, it was just me making it a thing and then trying to make it less of a thing It was just this weird stupid moment
I just meant it would have been awesome to have like a "low humidty over here Walt, back to you" so I could shut the fuck up
( And he is so, so tempted to throw out a 'regret it yet?' joke, or something else to distract from the mild embarrassment that follows showing off the insane way his brain works. Hard not to over-emphasize how innocuous he knows it actually was. )
[ Like, at all. There's a lot of convoluted logic twisting around in there, things that make Nate wonder how Ian's gotten this far and managed to stay as put-together as he seems to look, but then it shouldn't be all that shocking.
Nate was the same goddamn way, once. Still is at times. ]
I'll try and figure out a way to bring things to your attention sooner, but you gotta return the favor
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
nonscriptum) wrote2021-05-14 10:11 am
no subject
In college, one of his favorite teachers gave him advice he's been applying ever since — maybe before, without realizing it:
When you're building something, imagine that it's broken and try to reverse-engineer what went wrong. This will allow you to consider the potential weak points in your design.
Unfortunately, he takes that a few steps too far and applies it to all areas in life. Even, and sometimes especially, the places it shouldn't be applied. )
I know you're not blaming me, I'm blaming me, but it's okay. I'll work on it.
I'm willing to talk about it. I'm just not great at the getting to the talking part. I'm actually really, really terrible at the getting to the talking part. I don't know what it is, but I'll try to figure that out, too. In the meantime, maybe there needs to be like a system or a code word or a check-in shortcut that isn't a big deal or something
I don't know
I don't even know what I'm saying. That's not a thing people do. Jesus Christ.
( He's slamming that send button before he even reads it this time, because he knows himself well enough to know he'd probably delete the whole damn thing and send back something more shut off. )
no subject
[ The implication being that he doesn't intend to go anywhere anytime soon. This is already more than he anticipated getting out of this conversation. ]
We can do a code word. [ A soft voice, a pointy elbow nudging his side: Nate? Where are you? ] You want me to ask you how the weather is?
no subject
That could work.
Cloudy, stormy, sunny. Whatever the fuck snow would be.
What if you want to know about the actual weather? It's gonna be a who's on first what's on second thing, isn't it?
no subject
[ It's a passable system, something to tide them over. Nate has had his fair share of translations from gestures or subtle sentences, things that made the transition to speaking a much easier thing to practice. Eventually.
He remembers how long it took him. To expect faster progress of Ian would be a fool's errand. ]
Come up with a little shorthand dictionary for me, ok? The difference between annoyed but wanting company, and annoyed but not wanting company. Pissed off. Happy. Horny. Whatever.
no subject
no subject
[ Fuck. ]
I'm sorry
about that
no subject
You don't have to apologize, you didn't do anything wrong
That was me being way too me, it's not a big deal
no subject
Cmon, man. I pulled that exact shit on you and didn't think about it.
Tell me. Please
no subject
It seriously isn't a big deal, I swear. Just a weird one. I'm pretty sure you were trying to make this sincere gesture kind of thing and I couldn't really figure out how to
Lock it in
That's probably not a thing
I couldn't figure out the right way to answer it. Not in a 'there's a wrong answer' way, just a
I don't know, man, I couldn't figure out how to meet you there and I fucked up a little in the process and there was this whole
thing that wasn't really a thing, it was just me making it a thing and then trying to make it less of a thing
It was just this weird stupid
moment
I just meant it would have been awesome to have like a "low humidty over here Walt, back to you" so I could shut the fuck up
( And he is so, so tempted to throw out a 'regret it yet?' joke, or something else to distract from the mild embarrassment that follows showing off the insane way his brain works. Hard not to over-emphasize how innocuous he knows it actually was. )
no subject
[ Like, at all. There's a lot of convoluted logic twisting around in there, things that make Nate wonder how Ian's gotten this far and managed to stay as put-together as he seems to look, but then it shouldn't be all that shocking.
Nate was the same goddamn way, once. Still is at times. ]
I'll try and figure out a way to bring things to your attention sooner, but you gotta return the favor
no subject
Okay
I can do that
I look forward to living with you in a hole in the ground proactively talking about our problems
no subject
no subject
no subject