Day one of the december talking meme (and there are still plenty of spots open if you want to hear me babble on anything at all, so go tell me what to do already). Today belongs to ![[profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
kudwora who asked me to post about All the Dean Winchester Feels. Of which I have A LOT OF THEM.
Which. Okay. This is deeply funny because if you had asked me, not even a year ago, 'Eunice, why have you never really connected with Supernatural and only sporadically catch up on some episodes when visiting Zen?' Well. Sitting somewhere in the top five reasons would be, 'Because I cannot deal with Dean Winchester's bullshit.' Fast forward to now, and even a hint of criticism lobbed at Dean's bullshit will provoke an internal reaction that makes it difficult for me not to go all Maury style YOU DON'T KNOW HIM throwdown, before falling to the ground in an overwhelming cascade of emotions. Sometimes my rational self will be all, 'But you know that really was some bullshit, right? You do know that?' to which the rest of me starts punching Rational Self in the face while howling 'I DON'T CARE. LEAVE MY POOKIE ALONE OR I WILL CUT YOU'
How and why this happened comes down to a shift in how I was contextualizing Dean, a process which occured when I decided to rewatch the entire series in one big marathon from start to present, without skipping any episodes. Full realization of just how much it had shifted hit me when I got to What Is And What Never Should Be in the rewatch and ended up having to pause the episode when Dean mowing the lawn set me off into a crying jag so intense that I was actually hyperventilating. And what it all comes down to is coming to the conclusion that Dean was so fundamentally and irrevocably broken and traumatized by his childhood that it's not just that I can understand why he behaves in a Dean like manner when he does or says the things Dean says that would ordinarly either piss me off or have me rolling my eyes so hard they fall out of my head. It's that I actually can't figure out how he even could be different or make different choices. Like, if, say Sam or Cas pisses me off or makes poor life decisions I have no issues grabbing my tv screen and shaking it while shouting 'WHAT ARE YOU DOING, LOOK AT YOUR LIFE, LOOK AT YOUR CHOICES'. Dean. I just. It's like getting mad if a traumatized puppy pees on your carpet when the doorbell rings. Sure, it smells and that stain is never coming out...but getting angry is just unecessary and cruel, because of course he peed on the carpet. Of course he did. And it just makes me deeply sad when he does. No one hates Dean Winchester as much as Dean Winchester does. No one. Piling on more is just redundant, really.
'Cause the show has been remarkably consistent on this one point...that from the age of four years old on Dean has had, not just his self-esteem (which is essentially nonexistent), but his entire sense of self systematically destroyed, salted and burned. It's not even just that he didn't have things. It's that he wasn't even allowed to want things (and this is not just the result of one factor but a combination of them that is the interaction of external events and people and Dean's own basic personality). And when you do get glimpses of what Dean would have wanted if he was allowed to want...it's just. A bowl of lucky charms and an hour to play video games? A school dance? A bedroom of his own? A family that voluntarily wants to spend time with him? A mother to mow a lawn for? The life of a small town mechanic with a solid girlfriend and maybe a kid? Like, these are not the things of legendary epics or big dreams. It's so heartbreakingly small and ordinary that I cannot deal. And it's not like you even could fix any of this now as an adult. You could banish all demons and angels and ghosts and whatnot from the face of the earth and set him up with everything he ever might have wanted, and it wouldn't matter because at this point he is so, and I repeat, fundamentally broken that he'd end up peeing all over the carpet anyway.
It's goddamn tragic on a scale that I can barely wrap my mind around, and so I cope by essentially forgiving him everything and denying him nothing. I will roll my eyes at and make fun of myself for being willing to let shit slide because I'm too busy sobbing 'OH, DEAN, you poor tragic motherfucker' at my tv screen...but not at him. Never, ever at him. Because, Oh Dean, you poor tragic motherfucker. *SOB*
kudwora who asked me to post about All the Dean Winchester Feels. Of which I have A LOT OF THEM.Which. Okay. This is deeply funny because if you had asked me, not even a year ago, 'Eunice, why have you never really connected with Supernatural and only sporadically catch up on some episodes when visiting Zen?' Well. Sitting somewhere in the top five reasons would be, 'Because I cannot deal with Dean Winchester's bullshit.' Fast forward to now, and even a hint of criticism lobbed at Dean's bullshit will provoke an internal reaction that makes it difficult for me not to go all Maury style YOU DON'T KNOW HIM throwdown, before falling to the ground in an overwhelming cascade of emotions. Sometimes my rational self will be all, 'But you know that really was some bullshit, right? You do know that?' to which the rest of me starts punching Rational Self in the face while howling 'I DON'T CARE. LEAVE MY POOKIE ALONE OR I WILL CUT YOU'
How and why this happened comes down to a shift in how I was contextualizing Dean, a process which occured when I decided to rewatch the entire series in one big marathon from start to present, without skipping any episodes. Full realization of just how much it had shifted hit me when I got to What Is And What Never Should Be in the rewatch and ended up having to pause the episode when Dean mowing the lawn set me off into a crying jag so intense that I was actually hyperventilating. And what it all comes down to is coming to the conclusion that Dean was so fundamentally and irrevocably broken and traumatized by his childhood that it's not just that I can understand why he behaves in a Dean like manner when he does or says the things Dean says that would ordinarly either piss me off or have me rolling my eyes so hard they fall out of my head. It's that I actually can't figure out how he even could be different or make different choices. Like, if, say Sam or Cas pisses me off or makes poor life decisions I have no issues grabbing my tv screen and shaking it while shouting 'WHAT ARE YOU DOING, LOOK AT YOUR LIFE, LOOK AT YOUR CHOICES'. Dean. I just. It's like getting mad if a traumatized puppy pees on your carpet when the doorbell rings. Sure, it smells and that stain is never coming out...but getting angry is just unecessary and cruel, because of course he peed on the carpet. Of course he did. And it just makes me deeply sad when he does. No one hates Dean Winchester as much as Dean Winchester does. No one. Piling on more is just redundant, really.
'Cause the show has been remarkably consistent on this one point...that from the age of four years old on Dean has had, not just his self-esteem (which is essentially nonexistent), but his entire sense of self systematically destroyed, salted and burned. It's not even just that he didn't have things. It's that he wasn't even allowed to want things (and this is not just the result of one factor but a combination of them that is the interaction of external events and people and Dean's own basic personality). And when you do get glimpses of what Dean would have wanted if he was allowed to want...it's just. A bowl of lucky charms and an hour to play video games? A school dance? A bedroom of his own? A family that voluntarily wants to spend time with him? A mother to mow a lawn for? The life of a small town mechanic with a solid girlfriend and maybe a kid? Like, these are not the things of legendary epics or big dreams. It's so heartbreakingly small and ordinary that I cannot deal. And it's not like you even could fix any of this now as an adult. You could banish all demons and angels and ghosts and whatnot from the face of the earth and set him up with everything he ever might have wanted, and it wouldn't matter because at this point he is so, and I repeat, fundamentally broken that he'd end up peeing all over the carpet anyway.
It's goddamn tragic on a scale that I can barely wrap my mind around, and so I cope by essentially forgiving him everything and denying him nothing. I will roll my eyes at and make fun of myself for being willing to let shit slide because I'm too busy sobbing 'OH, DEAN, you poor tragic motherfucker' at my tv screen...but not at him. Never, ever at him. Because, Oh Dean, you poor tragic motherfucker. *SOB*