all we did is survive

babes wake up official recording of “Epiphany” just dropped

Earlier today I was thinking about the way that hobbits treat Frodo post-Quest.

The books say that few hobbits know or care to know about Frodo’s adventure, and that is heartbreaking by itself. He suffers all that torment and sacrifices everything out of love for his people, and they react with indifference. And it wouldn’t surprise me if some hobbits treated him with open disdain.

In the first chapter of LOTR, before Frodo himself enters the story, we see hobbits gossiping about Frodo and about his parents’ death. His parents died more than twenty years earlier, but the townsfolk can’t resist speculation that their deaths started with one parent pushing the other into the river. If they use such a tragic event as an opportunity to gossip and cast judgment, then they probably do the same with Frodo’s journey.

I can imagine hobbits staring pointedly at Frodo’s four-fingered hand, gossiping and making false assumptions about what misadventures he faced during his adventure, gossiping about his mysterious illnesses, maybe even whispering about him when he’s in sight and possibly within earshot.

Frodo wasn’t exactly a welcome member of hobbit society before the Quest, and it wouldn’t surprise me at all if that gets worse when he comes back so visibly changed.

wanting to apologize profusely to my coworkers because my ISP is doing work in my area and my internet connection keeps coming in and out which makes it impossible to do any work