introductory mingle: HYGGE

[riverviewmod]

who: everyone in Riverview!
what: Introductory Log and Hygge celebration
when: The month of December.
where: Anywhere around the city.
warnings: please put any necessary warnings in the subject lines

hygge

In the days leading up to December 1st, residents new and old will notice preparations beginning, a flurry of activity getting the city ready for the upcoming celebration: Hygge. This holiday is one of Riverview Quarantine's four yearly celebrations of love, this one focused on familial love and found family. The traditions associated with Hygge involve coziness and warmth with loved ones, as snow begins to blanket the Quarantine. Meals comprised of family favorites are shared together most nights of the month of December, and families both biological and found gather together by outdoor fires to drink hot cocoa and other warm drinks, roast marshmallows, and enjoy the beauty of the short-lived winter season on the moon, especially at night, when both the stars and almost unreal aurora borealis light the night sky.

a celebration of familial love and found family

Winter comes to the moon very quickly every year, as the orbit of the Capitol World crosses between its moon and the sun - the temperature drops to just below freezing in the span of only a couple of days, and the trees often don't even change from green to orange. During this short winter, the celebration of Hygge keeps all the residents warm. The main traditions involve comfort and warmth with those people you think of as family - platonic or romantic, though preferably mixed between the two - groups of people gather together to share meals and exchange gifts. The city sets up a series of cabins, each fronted with a fire pit, along the banks of the river, which has been lined with floating logs to interrupt the rushing water and allow the surface to freeze solid and form a series of skating rinks for the public to enjoy. Throughout the month, anyone can head down to the riverbank to make taffy candy in troughs of cold snow and share the various flavors with other families, or toboggan along winding, circuitous courses that range from easygoing to high-speed for the adrenaline junkies. The Town Square has a large, intricate ice sculpture set up, this year in the theme of a castle, that once entered proves to be a maze with a prize at the center for anyone who happens to make it through.

i. beach treats

The cabins that are set up all along both banks of the river are small and cozy, big enough to provide a comfortable lounging area with piles of pillows in front of a small fireplace where gift exchanges can happen, a kitchen to cook in, and a table for groups of people to share a meal at. Much like hotel rooms but without a fee, they're intended to be claimed at the start of the day and used for a while before being tidied and reset for the next group. Each cabin has a fire pit out front where a fire can be set up so groups of people can cook marshmallows for their hot chocolate and share stories or play music together.

Another major feature on the beach are the candy making areas, each big enough to accommodate a couple groups of people, featuring a bank of burners that keep various flavors of thick sugary syrup hot and ready. Once the syrup is at the right temperature, it can be drizzled into the snow packed in troughs to chill, and then rolled onto popsicle sticks to be eaten as a sweet chewy treat. Many families have their own particular flavor combos that are the go-to every year, and new families gather every year to start their own tradition.

ii. winter activities

After all that sugar, everyone's sure to be pepped up for a little activity! Every year, just before the big freeze, crews set up a grid of floating logs to calm the surface of the river along the banks, and when the temperature drops, those areas freeze into a thick layer of ice. As soon as they're safe to be skated on, booths pop up to fit residents with skates so they can skate around with loved ones, participate in ice dances, and play the ice skating version of almost any sport you can think of.

But skating isn't the only type of activity available! The sloping banks of the river have been set up with a variety of tobogganing courses, where people can share various types of sleds to slide down various set winding paths ranging from slow sloped ones to steeper, higher-speed ones that almost resemble bobsled courses.

Finally, for the more competitive, there is a less-gender-divided variation on a Lumberjack Competition, with various physical events that residents can compete in like sawing massive logs, logrolling, speed climbs, and boom runs.

iii. skygazing

After all that sugar and activity, lots of groups of family will settle down around fires either at the cabin or along the beach to enjoy a cup of spiked hot chocolate, coffee, or tea, and look up at the sky. Throughout the cold snap season in December, the sky is almost unnaturally clear and both the stars and the Capitol World are easy to see. Besides that, large swaths of the sky are bathed in beautiful aurora borealis, or Northern Lights, that paint large swaths of bright, beautiful color across the night sky. Curl up with a lover, a friend, a family member, or all of the above to keep warm and enjoy nature's fireworks show.

iv: ice maze

In the city center, residents can find a large, beautiful, intricately carved castle-themed ice sculpture. From the outside, it looks only about as big as a small house, but once residents enter they will find that the inside doesn't quite match the outside - courtesy of some of Gramarye Magic Research's top magic-users, the inside is massive, at least the size of a stadium. While cheery music plays, residents can traverse the complicated ice maze, each wall intricately carved and decorated with greenery, lights, and translucent watercolor paints. The walls are almost opaque, and the maze generally takes a couple of hours to get through for most residents.

Once they reach the center, they will find wrapped gifts arranged on a series of beautifully decorated tables, along with treats and warm drinks. The gifts are tailored to each individual in the maze, having been magically selected from a stockpile of items that have come through the portal, and consist of one small item from each character's home dimension (or, for CRAUs, from their previous game), similar to the "items from home" bonus reward, but without needing to spend points. The item should be small enough to fit in a shoebox, sentimental, and cannot be something intended for another person's character. Alternately, if there are no special items from home that a particular character would want or be attached to, an item of similar size and value that would make the character happy will be inside the box.

v. roommates or wildcard

Feel free to use this prompt to meet new roommates, for the purpose of getting to know each other, or hit up the mod-posted prompt to create a Communal Housing floor mingle. Or, if you have an idea for a prompt that isn't in this list, set during the Hygge, feel free to write it up!

visual inspiration

click on thumbnails for larger view

Credit: image i: Ryan Woodhouse; image ii: Hjalmar Wåhlin; image iii: David Fortin; image iv: Tzuyu Kao

navigation

Comments

[volitaunt]

[ He shrugs and holds the marshmallows out, waggling them at BB-8. The droid makes an exasperated noise and pops his welding torch out again. A moment of silence, then: ]

You don't have to tell me anything. You don't owe me that.

[ He used to wonder why his mother never liked talking about her own years of service. Why his father always insisted on telling other peoples' stories. He doesn't wonder about it any more. ]

[realists]

[ doesn't she? poe, rey, finn, the lot of them. they're her legacy: their lives, their peace, that is what they were fighting for, some of them for years and years. that's what they all died for on that beach.

these children that were born after her and lived longer than her, they're the end result of a tiny flicker of hope, proof that an ember is enough. ]

You unsettle me, [ jyn finally says after a prolonged silence. ] You're so... good.

[ she feels like she's going to fail whatever unspoken expectation there is and she's already failed so many people. ]

[volitaunt]

[ He's distracted by the marshmallow almost catching fire. He lifts it out of the danger zone and leans forward enough to blow on it a couple of times before Jyn speaks, and then he's just confused. ]

Good at what?

[realists]

At... You're a good person.

[ the idealism and hopefulness and goodness just rolls off him in ways. she doesn't need to feel the force to feel the truth of that. it hits like a bantha. ]

[volitaunt]

[ He stares at her, and lo, the marshmallows do in fact catch fire again. ]

Oh. [ Poe has no idea what to do with that. He's never had anyone say something like that to him, not in terms so blunt. ] I--thank you?

[realists]

[ jyn shrugs, but doesn't say something as absurd as "you're welcome", leaning over to blow out their marshmallow torches. ]

[volitaunt]

[ He studies the marshmallows, not really looking at them so much as giving his focus somewhere to rest. ]

Anything good I am came from my parents. [ He lifts one shoulder in a shrug. ] Anything good I am comes from... [ Trying to make them proud. To honor them. He's not sure how to put that, and not sure he wants to be so open even if he could figure out what to say. ]

[realists]

Comes from your choices.

[volitaunt]

[ The irony is that Poe told Finn more or less the same thing. That courage and goodness are choices, made over and over across time.

Poe... has just never really had a reason to doubt most of his decisions. He's always had a compass in the way he was raised and the people who raised him.

He peels the charred exterior of the marshmallow away, contemplating it for a moment before he eats it. It gives him a second to think.

It gives him a second to consider whether or not he wants to argue his own place on the spectrum of goodness versus evil. ]

It's good like that. [ Said around a mouthful of marshmallow. SURPRISE, HE DECIDED HE DOESN'T WANNA TALK ABOUT IT. ]

[realists]

I know, I'm always right.

[ LOOK jyn isn't going to push, not on this one. other topics sure, but not this, she's happy to let him brush it off on this one. emotions are for chumps. ]

[volitaunt]

[ A slightly-less-marshmallowy laugh as he swallows. ] Does Cassian agree with that?

[realists]

Of course he doesn't.

[ with a dismissive tone as if to imply he doesn't because HE'S FUCKING wRONG. but her eyes drift over to him and the hint of a fond smile plays across her expression before she packs it away. ]

[volitaunt]

[ The two of them r v v cute. That moment of vulnerability is as small and precious as the hint of a smile that Jyn gave before he told her why he'd wanted to climb into a broken-down old museum piece. ]

You two really love each other, huh?

[realists]

What?

[ jyn's eyes dart to poe's face and the confusion is clear on her expression. it's not even outright dismissal like when ivar asked if they were friends or friends. she's genuinely confused.

cassian doesn't love her, she doesn't love cassian, they're just friends. admittedly he is her very dear friend and she maybe has some codependency issues, but she's dead so she thinks she gets a pass on keeping him around. the idea of love is

absurd.

the galaxy has made it quite clear to jyn over the years that she doesn't deserve love, of any kind. ]

[volitaunt]

[ Poe tilts his head, confused by her confusion. ]

What what? [ SEEMS PRETTY OBVIOUS TO HIM, AND YOUR INTERNAL MONOLOGUE IS MEAN. ]

[realists]

We-- [ she shakes her head. ] It isn't--

[ how can she even explain it? the little mosh pit of butterflies in her stomach doesn't help when she glances over at cassian again, swooping gleefully. alright, maybe she feels something, but it isn't that.

everything she loves dies. (he's already dead, the traitorous part of her whispers, sounding irritatingly like chirrut's singsong.) it's irrelevant how she feels anyway, cassian doesn't. they're friends. ]

He was with me on Scarif, at the end.

[volitaunt]

[ Very quietly: ] Ah.

[ He understands that, as much as it's possible for him to do so. Unconsciously, he finds himself looking Cassian's way, too--except he's looking at the man Cassian is talking to. Finn doesn't look as uncomfortable here as he did at Cisco and Eddie's place, at least. He could almost be taken for relaxed, if Finn every really relaxed. ]

Finn saved my life. [ He turns the marshmallow stick in his hands without looking at it. ] When I thought I'd lost everything, he was there.

[ So yeah. He kinda sorta gets it, a little. ]

[realists]

[ he'd held her as the blast of the death star washed over them, he'd ended the nightmare of the man in white, he'd come back for her time and time again, he'd believed in her. ]

He's my best friend, that's all.

[ and if some part of her wants more than that, it knows better. ]

[volitaunt]

[ Poe sits back, tired of fighting the marshmallows. BB-8 pops the welding torch back into its panel and rolls away before the pilot has a chance to change his mind, beeping about being appreciated somewhere else.

Poe's lip twitch, a fractional smile. ]

That's a lot.

[realists]

[ while bb-8 trundles away, jyn steals another glance over at cassian. poe isn't wrong, she's completely fuckstruck, but they're two people raised in war, in the rebellion. the idea of romance, even now in this place, is practically unfathomable.

the idea that she could deserve it, from cassian, is even more impossible to accept. ]

I don't think your salad spinner likes me. [ maybe because she keeps calling it a salad spinner, even if now there is some affection to her tone. ]

[volitaunt]

[ BB-8 is already inserting himself into the next nearest conversation. ]

Nah, BB-8 likes everybody.

[ GEE I WONDER WHERE HE PICKED THAT UP. ]

[realists]

That's dangerous.

[ most people are shitty ok. ]

[volitaunt]

Maybe.

[ SHRUG. ]

[realists]

Cassian's droid hated everyone.

[ she misses him. ]

[volitaunt]

[ That... takes Poe by surprise. ]

Cassian had a droid?