Stand By Me | 1986

stand by me | 1986

Somehow, despite being a main character and despite how much of a devastatingly complex character he is, there is so little Crutchie content in today’s fandom and it actually causes me to go mad.

Crutchie Morris, aged fifteen, who had his newfound hope literally beaten out of him and who accepted the prospect of his own death and accepted that him being able to find a better life was just as much of a dream-like fantasy as Santa Fe was for his brother. Crutchie Morris, aged fifteen, who had to force himself to be twice as resilient as everybody else, twice as dedicated, twice as tough, or else he feared he’d be left behind and forgotten. Crutchie Morris, aged fifteen, who had to hide all of his anger and fear and sadness and resentment under a bright-eyed grin because heaven forbid he ever be anything other than optimistic, heaven forbid he show for a moment that a life of being abused and pushed around and verbally tormented got to him in the slightest. Crutchie Morris, aged fifteen, who convinced himself that he could never hope for more than what was thrown at him, could never strive for a better future (“let’s hit the streets and get our papes while we still can”), and could never show the slightest bit of weakness lest he be seen as a burden and sent away for good.

Crutchie Morris, aged fifteen, who got sent away anyways.

Crutchie, who had the worst possible thing that could’ve happened to him, his worst fear, come true, and who had to pretend he was totally fine with that because he thought his loved ones had bigger issues than him at the time. Who had to endure up to weeks of constant horrendous abuse, beatings, starvation, and who was just so damn out of it when he was finally released that he couldn’t focus on anything except the man who had messed him up so badly that he couldn’t even catch a glimpse of him in a safe, controlled setting without panicking (west endsies). But who, despite it all, still had to plaster on that same grin to show to all of his friends to convince them that he was still the same guy, even if he was irreversibly changed in a way that so many of them would never know. Oh also did I mention he was fifteen-

on icarus.

(Attributed to Oscar Wilde//Sigmund Freud- Interpretation of Dreams//@meanwhilepoetry//Herbert James Draper- Lament for Icarus//Joseph Campbell//Hozier- Sunlight//Rainer Maria Rilke- The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge//Mary Oliver- The Sun//Vincent Van Gogh- The Sower//Matthew Ward- The Collected Stories//Florence and The Machine- Falling//Billy Collins- The Art of Drowning//Renè Milot- The Fall of Icarus//Hozier- I,Carrion (Icarrian)//Virginia Woolf- The Waves//J. Bengt- Icarus Flew//??)

to live is to die

okay think about it -- newsies punk rock band au. THINK ABOUT ITTT

from The New York Times