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Seeing you
Posted on May 21, 2022 by David M Willis
The Dumbing of Age Book 11 Kickstarter has 4 days to go! I Excised All my Anxieties into Cartoon Characters Who Definitely Don't Have Feelings for Each Other will collect "Year Eleven," spanning the five storylines that start on September 10, 2020, and complete on August 26, 2021. This includes new commentary, 24 Patreon bonus strips, behind-the-scenes artwork, and new character designs into a 224-page tome with luxurious glossy paper all bound up into a sturdy presentation.   11 character magnets are unlocked, with more to come!  

160 thoughts on “Seeing you”

  1. The Wellerman

    ???

    Joyce is FINALLY seeing a Doctor about this!!!!! YAAAAYYY!!!!

    ✌️? ??⚕️??

    *plays “Dr. Feelgood” by Mötley Crüe on hacked muzak*

    1. Stephen Bierce

      Be glad you’re not hearing what I remember from past doctor’s office visits!

  2. True Survivor

    To be fair, Joyce was sorta of judgmental weirdo at the time. See we can all grow! Except Jennifer who will always be a tiny bit of an insecure jerk apparently.

    1. Agemegos

      Yeah, early Joyce was not much of a prize in the friend market.

      1. Icalasari

        Ok I was thinking Jennifer was being a jerk, but…

        Yeah I forgot just how bad early Joyce was

      2. Decidedly Orthogonal

        The loyalty and moreso the COMPASSION Joyce has always had, gives me the feeling she’s always been a top tier prize as a friend. She wasn’t even at her best (she’s still growing, so we’re unlikely to ever get her *best*) but the “better” she constantly strives for is solid gold.

        Something something, if your friends can’t handle you at your worst¹, they don’t deserve you at your best. — Marilyn Monroe (maybe?)

        [1] Caveat: Double edged sword – If you’re actually an awful human being, then it’s *also* true that no one deserves to have to be around you either.

        If you’re at best an average middling sort, and are occasionally awful that people don’t put up with, that just means they have healthy boundaries.

        “At my worst” shouldn’t be taken as an excuse to be awful to people, but rather that when you are struggling, it’s ok to need some compassion.

        1. True Survivor

          True, Joyce has always had the most important qualities in a friend.

        2. The Wellerman

          Very much so.

          ???

        3. Agemegos

          I think you are overlooking the fact that she used to shout bigoted judgmental shit at her acquaintances in classes and social spaces.

        4. Agemegos

          She used to recoil physically from atheists and Muslims.

        5. Decidedly Orthogonal

          And she learned from those mistakes, which is more than most people.

  3. Kyrik Michalowski

    This is going far smoother than I anticipated, even if they are having an awkward moment. Now the question is, when will Willis strike?

    1. Yet_One_More_Idiot

      Preparing to “Damn you, Willis!” in 3…2…1½…

  4. Thag Simmons

    Ouch. She was already in physical pain, you didn’t need to lay in the emotional pain

  5. Sirksome

    I’m not sure what Jennifer’s end goals are to begin with so, I’m not sure what plot was lost?

    1. alongcameaspider

      She feels like she’s supposed to be “the popular kid”

      She’s gonna get a rude awakening when she realizes Asher is the only person in her current circle who even likes her

      1. brionl

        Does Asher like her, or just like having sex with her?

        1. alongcameaspider

          I mean he said he’s glad she fits in well with their group, if it were just about sex I’m not sure he’d care much about what they think of her

        2. Jon

          So far, Asher’s demeanor feels genuine towards Jennifer. He does truly seem to like her.

        3. Crazy Lou

          I’d love if it turns out that Asher’s actually changed and genuine about everything (even if that’s probably not likely). Let people change for the better for once, darn it.

        4. showler

          https://www.dumbingofage.com/2020/comic/book-10/03-when-it-crumbles/gone-too/

          https://www.dumbingofage.com/2020/comic/book-10/04-is-a-song-forever/blammo/

          That would take some doing.

        5. Needfuldoer

          My read is that he wants to do better, but his past keeps catching back up to him.

        6. Regalli

          Agreed. I think he’s sincere about wanting to change, but he hasn’t run nearly far enough to escape Gramps’ circle of orbit and that can leave him vulnerable to blackmail… and to falling back on the mob to deal with said blackmail, because if Gramps finds out he’s dead or back in.

        7. zaratustra

          He’d replace her with Walky in a second though.

        8. demonmonkey89

          Well that’s because Walky is canonically extremely hot now. He was already hot before, but now he’s hot to the casual onlooker instead of just the people who see his abs. I’m sure even Asher wants in on that.

          I feel dirty typing all this out. I think I will refrain from talking about hot Walky in the future.

        9. DudeMyDadOwnsADealership

          …Or just likes using her for his ticket to a better future, just like Raidah?

        10. thejeff

          We haven’t seen a lot, but the evidence so far is that he’s sincere – at least he wasn’t included in that little Raidah/Carl “keep pretending we like her” bit.

    2. Thag Simmons

      Well she definitely didn’t have the plot when she said that. Whethher she ever had it or if she got it back are less certain, although frankly I lean towards “no”

    3. DailyBrad

      She was really concerned with her popularity (well, still is) and it’d been her realizing she basically had no connections at school at that time. She wasn’t with Ruth yet I think, she was keeping Walky at arm’s length, and she hadn’t really become friends with the others because she was just trying to get drunk and laid at the time, and only managing the former. She was kind of realizing she was a loser, Joyce just kinda was in a mindset of being friends with everybody at that time, more or less, so only she was putting up with Billie and not rolling her eyes when she’d swing around.

      1. Sirksome

        I still don’t get it. To me she’s only switched friend groups, but I don’t know how that makes any tangible progress towards her goals. So “losing the plot” is what exactly? She’s pursuing a journalism profession of some kind and frankly she has still made very little progress in that regard despite her new companions. If you told me Carl or Raidah had some sway over the school newspaper or some news or journalist connections like maybe a relative worked at a local news station, I’d suddenly get it. But Jennifer is actually the most well connected of the group. I’m just not certain what she’s trying to do beyond chasing the concept of being “popular’ which I don’t think means much in general. I know it means something to Jen, but like….is that it?

        1. cbwroses

          I think it’s more along the lines that she thinks her current friend group comes from the type of social circle she’s “supposed” to hang with.

          Raidah is a future lawyer and the daughter of a lawyer herself.
          And since Raidah seems to care a great deal about networking, I think it’s safe to say that Carl comes from an acceptable background.

          Asher is from a mob family, but who knows how well known that is amongst that circle (I think Jennifer just said his granddad is powerful when Sal tried to warn her), and even if they do know, once a crime family becomes polished enough, they can still be acceptable in society (especially if, Raidah’s family are criminal defense lawyers, but that’s just a guess I had and can’t remember if it was ever mentioned).

          And then we have Jennifer who wants to be a journalist and is the daughter of a rich politician.

          Compare that to the previous group who are a bunch of goofballs and/or come from seemingly “regular” families. Either by virtue of their popularity or familial status (assuming this long winded comment is correct), they were not in Jennifer’s league (or at least where she thinks her league should be).

        2. Agemegos

          The ruling classes of Europe, the old aristocracy and royalty, were basically mob families that got polished.

        3. ktbear

          Thank you, I’ll try not to be too offended by that.

        4. Agemegos

          Why you in particular?

        5. JBento

          Maybe they’re part of a mob family and don’t like being compared to the aristocracy. I mean, at least the former aren’t pretending they’re not parasites.

        6. StClair

          “Sufficiently organized crime is indistinguishable from government.”
          Feudalism, in particular, is pretty much a protection racket where the boss actually does provide protection (when he and his boys aren’t shaking you down themselves).

        7. StClair

          Look at, say, Sicily for an example of how such organizations thrive where “legitimate” authority is weak or absent, and sometimes even end up taking on many of the same functions.

        8. drs

          Quote from a forum:

          Having spent a good chunk of my college career studying the years between the fall of Rome and the coronation of Charlemagne, I came to realize that anarchy lasts until some big guy tells some little guy “Do what I say or I’ll kill you,” at which point you have a pre-feudal warlord system. Interestingly, the words in 5th and 6th century chronicles that are usually translated as “lord” and “vassal” are “magnus” and “pueri”… “big man” and “boys”.

          Try reading Liber Historiae Francorum that way. “The Big Man and his boys came into town today. They wanted Odo the Smith to shoe their horses but the Big Man said he did not want to pay him. Odo refused so the Big Man had his boys beat Odo until he bled.”

        9. Agemegos

          In English, too: “baron” is etymologically “the Man” and “knights” are “boys”.

        10. Sirksome

          I guess that makes more sense. But if that’s the case I figure she’d be trying to get chummier with Carla. You can’t really climb higher than the heiress to a billionaire mega company except maybe meeting a member of genuine royalty or the kid of a former president/high ranking politician.

        11. cbwroses

          Excuse me?
          You expect JENNIFER to pursue friendship with the daughter of “new money” SCIENTISTS? Nouveau riche AND nerds?
          Perish the thought.

        12. Regalli

          Also, Carla’s rich, but she’s also really quirky and into petty childish egotism (which Jennifer is COMPLETELY ABOVE thank you very much) and pranks, which offsets her wealth with Sheer Uncoolness. Plus Jennifer still probably isn’t that fond of Carla after she played a role in outing Ruth and Jennifer and their relationship, especially with how it led to Sir getting called. So there’s the personal distaste angle in addition to Carla being childish with her wealthiness.

          Also I’m not sure Billingsworth Sr.’s a politician or just a guy who’s wealthy enough to influence town policy. At a certain point it doesn’t matter as much.

        13. BarerMender

          Furthermore, Carla doesn’t give a rat’s ass about the social hierarchy.

        14. cbwroses

          I was trying to look through old Jennifer strips, but I got tired.
          That said, I did find one strip that says he goes on business trips all the time.
          While it is possible she refers to trips dealing with politics as business trips, or that he is both a politician and a businessman, I’m leaning towards that just being my mistake (him being British doesn’t help with the politician idea either, though it also doesn’t break it).

          https://www.dumbingofage.com/2013/comic/book-3/04-just-hangin-out-with-my-family/hairup/

        15. Regalli

          Jennifer seems to have bound a lot of her identity up in being a stereotypical Popular Girl in high school – she was a cheerleader, she went to all the cool parties, she hung out with popular attractive athletic types. When she couldn’t maintain that in college (mainly due to the DUI,) that appears to have done a number on her ego. When she went over to Forest Quad, she tried to reinvent herself (again, like she did in high school) to once again be the cool popular cheerleader type who totally has her shit together, even going so far as to hide the fact that she wears glasses from her new hallmates. That didn’t work. For this latest reinvention, Raidah and company aren’t football and cheerleader types, but they ARE apparently quite rich, and most of them are sophomores, who are higher in the arbitrary social ladder by virtue of being upperclassmen. Raidah also seems to be much more… casual in how she interacts socially, compared to the intensity that someone like Walky or Dina or Lucy has for things they’re interested in. Her hobbies are socially acceptable for a stereotypical Cool Girl teenager, because Raidah ALSO seems to be deeply interested in arbitrary ideas of a social hierarchy and being at the top of it.

          Jennifer also has a very, VERY narrow definition of what’s cool and ‘normal,’ at least for the Head Cheerleader Alpha Bongo persona she wante to present. No glasses, no nerdy interests, and obviously normal cool people are straight and bisexuals only exist in porn so her attraction to women must be something everyone does and easily downplayed – best friends totally make out with each other sometimes but it’s normal, right? (Alice) or okay, she DID date a woman but that was just a weird phase, and it’s over now, she only seriously likes dudes now (Ruth.) By any meaningful standard, Joyce is pretty popular among their hallmates, but her various hangups mean she can’t qualify for Jennifer’s idea of Cool Popular People. Further, Joyce doesn’t CARE about how popular she is, she just… makes friends. With anyone. Even nerds and people whose parents don’t own law firms. That’s not how popularity works! (According to teen series and movies written by people who are at minimum twenty years older than the teenagers they’re writing, anyway. Has it EVER been the norm for high school cliques to look like they do in a John Hughes movie or Sabrina the Teenage Witch, or is it just an endless cycle of adults copying what’s ‘expected’ of high school experience to be from other high school movies for decades?)

          This mindset seems bizarre, arbitrary, and deeply sad to me, and true Popularity is completely unrealistic on a campus with almost 50,000 students per Google (which sounds like it can’t possibly be accurate but I’m not checking further), but I’ve seen enough teen-focused media to recognize that the stereotypical American Media Popular Clique exists, and Jennifer is very much trying to fit in that mold.

        16. BarerMender

          Technically, sophomores aren’t upperclassmen. That’s juniors and seniors.

        17. Keulen

          Your comment seems to have captured Jennifer’s mindset very well. And I also don’t understand that mindset. Maybe it’s because I was always a weirdo and never part of the “popular” cliques in school, but I think it’s far better to hang out with people who have similar interests as me and (hopefully) like me for who I am, instead of hanging out with people solely because they’re somehow considered “popular”.

        18. Illjwamh

          If you think of Jennifer as a Willy Loman archetype it all begins to make sense.

  6. RassilonTDavros

    My ship senses were tingling for a second there before Jennifer kinda ruined the moment.

    1. Imogen

      it’s gonna happen. keep the faith.

  7. DailyBrad

    Jennifer has had a very wild journey. While I definitely do not like the company she’s keeping these days, I can’t say she’s not in a better spot than she was when she said that, given she was at something of a low spot. This was before she had made a realization, even, after the confrontation with Alice, about not wanting to be “old” Billie. I assume even queen bee Jennifer-style Billie/Jennifer isn’t pickling her liver on the nightly, just, maybe not making good decisions from an emotional health standpoint. She just seems so… repressed lately.

    1. justin8448

      I think the issue is that all the problems Billie had are still part of her. By switching to “Jennifer,” she papered over them and went into denial, rather than dealing with them.

      1. Regalli

        Yeah, as far as we know she has stopped drinking, which is good, and acknowledged she needed therapy, which is also good. But she thinks she’s solved all her issues, she doesn’t need therapy anymore (some people do graduate longterm, but given the trauma and issues we know her to have and the fact that she was DEFINITELY depressed last semester, I’m skeptical,) and she is now Totally Normal! Which means once again downplaying her attraction to women, among other things, and a lot of priding herself and Asher about how they’re so mature and will never have problems again. (As ever, I link this. https://youtu.be/YeGQXqqvvAY It’s not a perfect comparison because it’s less about the relationship and her and Asher seeming to have independently decided to ignore their personal ticking time bombs of Drama, but it’s a catchy song of self-delusion so I link it anyway.)

        Especially since she did this at least three times before that we know of – ignoring Walky to be the Cool Popular Head Cheerleader in high school (ended with a terrifying DUI,) trying to be a cool new COLLEGE cheerleader in the first book or so (ended with a sexy bisexual suicide pact and Jennifer only slightly less acutely depressed than Ruth,) and Forest Quad (ended with her admitting she is not a perfect popular unapproachable cheerleader but genuinely cares about Ruth, and also dumping a LOT of trauma on unsuspecting hallmates as she suddenly started processing ‘wait that was fucked up.’) The reinvention has not worked any of the previous times, but now she’s had therapy and is trying a very minutely different reinvention approach so it will TOTALLY work this time!

        Needless to say, I’m skeptical.

        1. StClair

          I look forward to finding out what form the inevitable takes this time.

        2. thejeff

          That’s she’s (apparently) not drinking is really a huge step and outweighs basically everything else, problematic as a lot of that is.

          Of course it’s all going to blow up whenever what Raidah’s plotting comes to fruition – learning that her new popular friends don’t like her and had ulterior motives (even beyond the expected social climbing ulterior motives) is going to mess her up.

        3. Regalli

          And if Raidah doesn’t utterly crash her facade, the inevitable shit hitting the fan with Asher and HIS denial will.

          The not drinking is huge, but it doesn’t outweigh the rest to me because repressing herself and declaring everything’s fine now, totally fine and normal is clearly unstable. It’s going to crash and burn again, and that could well trigger a relapse. Which is bad.

        4. Laura

          I thought she was still in therapy? When did she stop?

        5. StClair

          When she was cured, of course! Same reason people stop taking their meds; they feel better, so they don’t need them anymore!
          /s

        6. Laura

          OK, but when in-strip? Was there a strip where she said she had stopped therapy?

        7. Regalli

          I was gonna say one of her first appearances post-timeskip mentioned she’d done therapy, past tense, but actually checking the phrasing it was ‘I got’ which is way more ambiguous. Still, the sheer degree of denial – her bisexuality being ‘just a phase’ and the ‘we’re all so settled down!’ scene with Raidah and Carl and Sal that screams eighteen-year-old who thinks they know it all in particular – and the fact that IU as a big campus likely has limited availability for any given student to get counseling because they tend to be understaffed still make me think it is past tense because I would hope a college therapist would push back some on those trains of thought (at the very least, they’d know about Ruth.) Then again, they are reportedly not very good, per Walky.

          So it isn’t confirmed. But if she IS still seeing someone, I suspect they’re missing a few of the signs we have that this isn’t stable growth but Jennifer’s pattern of attempted reinventions, or the way she and Asher were acting like they’re mature and have learned everything they need to about themselves. (They haven’t. They’re eighteen.)

        8. Laura

          Got it. Thanks, Regalli! 🙂

  8. RassilonTDavros

    For reference:

    https://www.dumbingofage.com/2011/comic/book-1/06-yesterday-was-thursday/stall/

    1. True Survivor

      Thank you, thank you very much.

    2. Thag Simmons

      It’s so wild how much the art has improved over the years.

      1. Agemegos

        It’s striking when you see a contrast like that, and reflect that you were perfectly happy with the old art, and then take a close look at the new art and realise how good it got and you didn’t notice.

      2. Cattleprod

        The weirdest thing is that going from the Roomies reruns to DOA always seemed less jarring than going from current DOA to early DOA. It’s probably because it’s basically three different styles and I had been currently accustomed to two of them.

        1. Needfuldoer

          I think there was an effort to visually differentiate DoA from the other comics early on.

          Compare DoA!Amber with Shortpacked!Amber, in these strips from around the same time:

          https://www.shortpacked.com/comic/foot-in-the-door

          https://www.dumbingofage.com/2011/comic/book-1/05-media-rumble/dude/

          As time and the comics went on, the art refined until both styles converged. DoA’s grew cleaner with more proportionate character models, and Shortpacked! loosened up a bit. (I can’t even draw very well in one style, I can’t imagine maintaining two of ’em!)

  9. alongcameaspider

    Even if they aren’t close friends at the moment it’s clear Jennifer still sees Joyce as a friend, if not she wouldn’t bother taking her to a clinic and waiting with her

    1. Ron

      I feel like she’s doing this for karma points though. As if to be able to say “yeah I’m sorry I missed (random activity) I had to take my ex-fundie classmate to the doctor because she’s had horrible menstruations and had never heard of birth control, yeah I care about everyone”

      The question is whether that’s really just for the popularity or she actually cares.

      1. Spencer

        I don’t think Jennifer’s brand of social climbing has anything to do with appearing nice to her old nerd friends she excommunicated herself from.

      2. anonymsly

        Add to what Spencer is saying, the way for Jennifer to win social point with her new circle would not be this. This is taking time out of her day to attend on and help someone that Raidah, the queen bee of Jennifer’s new circle, Does Not Like. If Jennifer was doing thus for points, she wouldn’t have spoken to Joyce at all and chased after Raidah to snigger about how the dumb fundie doesn’t even realize clinics and medicine exist and could help.

        You know, like Joyce’s ‘actual friends’ are kind of doing.

  10. Spencer

    ykw I vibe with Jennifer.

    Being a pill’s a good look for her.

    1. Shitbird

      What is ‘being a pill’?

      1. Spencer

        I have no idea. I just read Yotomoe call her with a deep and abiding affection once, and now it’s stuck in my head.

        1. Leorale

          It means somebody is unpleasant, difficult to take.

        2. Thag Simmons

          I’ve seen Pill used as a derogatory term but I’m not sure the exact meaning. A quick Google indicates “hard to swallow/unpalatable” as the origin but I’m not going to dig any deeper than that

        3. Taffy

          The good news is, you’ve dug as deep as you needed, already.

      2. Agemegos

        According to Wiktionary, the relevant senses are


        3. Something offensive, unpleasant or nauseous which must be accepted or endured.
        4. (slang) A contemptible, annoying, or unpleasant person.

      3. Sam

        It usually is referred to someone that is annoyingly difficult for the sake of being difficult. Often when they are being stubborn in a refusal of something because they have no real MORAL reason they are objecting. They just don’t like you. Or don’t care about your reasons. Or won’t do it unless you do something for them.

  11. Yotomoe

    https://i.imgur.com/8MxPrPS.png (NSFW)
    https://i.imgur.com/QmKuyZy.png (NSFW)

    Ok admission time. I actually don’t know where I’m going from here. I’m just winging it. I apologize if this gets repetitive.

    https://imgur.com/a/9Ob1cy3 (NSFW)

    1. Kyrik Michalowski

      No need to apologize. I’m certain you’ll do great, with or without a few things repeated.

    2. cbwroses

      I mean, sex is made up of mostly repetitive movements, so that’s just being on brand.

      1. Sirksome

        Yeah, I mean you can change positions but at the end of the day the goal is the same.

    3. The Wellerman

      Deep, emotional, plutonic, playful sex between best childhood friends.

      SO BEAUTIFUL!!!!

      ??? ???

      *plays “Memory Music Box” from Sailor Moon S CD on hacked muzak*

      1. cbwroses

        “Plutonic”? Is that an alien slip of the tongue? ?

        1. The Wellerman

          Oh. I am used to using it as a synonym for “non-romantic”. How is it used around here?

        2. Kyrik Michalowski

          It is spelled, platonic. They were making a joke about you calling it “plutonic.”

        3. thejeff

          Except platonic is kind of the opposite – not necessarily romantic, but definitely not sexual.

        4. Agemegos

          Yeah. “Platonic” means “non-sexual”; “plutonic” means “solidified within the interior of the Earth, rather than after coming out of a volcano”.

        5. Zach

          It was solidified in the heat of their passions.

    4. AGV

      It’s ok, it’ll go somewhere

    5. Rose by Any Other Name

      I’m sure it will be fine – particularly if they’re both talkative lays. I love their dialogue.

  12. newlland(Henryvolt)

    Jennifer had to walk that back just so very slightly but it’s fine.

  13. Rakeesh

    ‘Perfectly OK’ and ‘just a landmark’ are steps down from ‘sign of how bad things were’, but they’re still insults.

    1. newlland(Henryvolt)

      I got to wander if she’s more or less generous with the insults these days.

  14. not someone else

    …Yeah, I kinda get it. Sometimes you look at your connections and you realize everything is off and sideways from where you had thought you were or planned to be, and that’s not to say those connections are all bad… You just suddenly realize you hadn’t been paying any fucking attention.

    1. Bryy

      Jennifer’s talking about how everyone else – Joyce included – is inferior, though.

  15. Lucky Winner

    Hm. I prefer Billie, but I can see being Jennifer is a goal and she’s working toward it. I give her that: having a goal and working toward it is admirable.

  16. BBCC

    Ouch. Damn, Jennifer. I’m pretty sure she didn’t mean that as harsh as some of the comments took it but I’m allowed to jokingly go ‘ouch’. 😛

    That said, I do think Jennifer’s got some serious main character syndrome and daaaaamn does that come through. 😛

    I do love the alt text though. That’s absolutely all Joyce took from that.

    1. Regalli

      Agreed. I don’t think she thought about how that would sound to… anyone, really. I like Jennifer as a character but I admit I’m looking forward to her latest attempt to seem cool, mature, and above it all to fail. Her ego’s much more enjoyable when she embraces her petty ridiculous side.

      1. The Wellerman

        Regalli!!! So glad to see you!!!!

        See your spoons are better? ??

        1. Regalli

          Honestly whether or not I comment here on any given day depends as much on whether I have anything to say about the strip and whether or not I’m willing to potentially stay up until 2 AM here working on a single comment rather than get to sleep as anything else. I do better when I can wake up earlier, tend to have a lot of appointments in mornings and early afternoons, and I need a decent amount of sleep because of the whole chronic illness thing. Since the most active comment period is when it first goes live and I’m on the same timezone as this website, that can make commenting… inconvenient.

        2. The Wellerman

          ? Oh. I understand now Regalli, thank you.

          Always a pleasure to see these kilo-paragraphs flow out of your brain though, a very good, assuring thing to me. ?

        3. Regalli

          Yeah, I like writing them, which is part of why I’m willing to keep checking even if it’s not the best idea for my schedule.

          I’ve also been watching a LOT of anime this season so some of my analytic thought processes are devoted to that, too.

        4. The Wellerman

          Anime?!?! ? Always a good pass time in my book!

          Which ones? Subbed or dubbed?

    2. Needfuldoer

      I’m sure Joyce will have an innocent-sounding but deep cutting retort tomorrow. She can be good at that when she wants to be.

      https://www.dumbingofage.com/2017/comic/book-7/04-the-do-list/thoughtful-3/

  17. Cerusee

    This is STILL somehow preferable to watching Joyce play giving tree to Becky and Becky’s proxies for two months solid.

    I’m so relieved to see Joyce actually in an exam room just for the hope it gets her some concrete relief! God I hope she actually does walk out of this with a prescription for birth control, and this does not end with a Doctor ™ telling Joyce it’s normal to be physically wrecked by menstruation to the point where you can barely function.

    If the latter, I hope we have Jennifer here because Jennifer is probably the character most likely and best-equipped to push back against that. (Expecting Joyce to push back against the authority figure of a doctor, especially right now, feels pretty….why would you inflict that on her.)

    1. Taffy

      You’re being very unfair to the people Joyce has been getting hounded by for months on end over the littlest things. They have feelings too, which are inherently more important than Joyce’s, because she had a certain first impression on them and it’s illegal to think about a person beyond that first impression.

      1. Spencer

        This Is What Becky McIntyre Actually Believes

    2. anonymsly

      I agree. I mean, this might be the closest to an actual heartfelt conversation and/or affirmation Joyce has really gotten lately. Like yes, Jennifer just said ‘oh yeah, when I realized YOU were my closest friend it was kind of a wake-up call to how effed I really was’ and that’s… not the greatest. But also! Jennifer cares about Joyce and is sitting there to support her. She’s saying an un-great thing while being a pretty great friend, at least comparatively.

      And I think further that ‘you’re perfectly okay’ probably actually is something that feels good to hear right now, for Joyce. It’s basic, uncomplicated acceptance. All her friends (except Joe) have been heaping judgement and demand on her. She’s a bad person, she made Becky sad, she needs to change. No one’s yet used the phrase ‘shape up or ship out’ but it feels like it could be coming. (Off topic: I bet Jordan heard that one.) And here’s Jennifer, who’s been a friend and supporter or supporter-adjacent since they started college, who knows all the shit, and also now knows Joyce is atheist… and Jennifer says, ‘You’re perfectly okay.’ It’s not nothing.

      1. Cerusee

        Yeah, for all that it’s not, like, a great thing to say, it’s at least sort of…honest? About Jennifer and Jennifer’s priorities and what she wants out of a social group. She likes Joyce just fine, and as you say, she’s here, being a good friend to Joyce by supporting her in a borderline health crisis. But Joyce was Jennifer/Billie’s best friend in college at that point by virtue of Joyce being an incredibly friendly, extroverted, emotionally generous person who could make friends with a rock, during a period when Jennifer was in a decline and not doing well in building a new social circle. They’ve had some bonding experiences, but they kinda don’t feel like they have the deeper compatibility that lifelong intimate friendships are typically built on. Basically, Joyce was her best friend by *default*, and it’s okay to look at that and say “I want to be in a place where my best friend isn’t just the only person who’ll give me the time of day because they’re that nice to everyone.” That’s valid. And if it’s maybe something you don’t volunteer unprompted…Joyce *did* bring it up. Jennifer just chose to address that directly instead of deflecting, or lying and saying oh of course you’re still my best friend. (Although does she even have one? An actual best friend who is the friend she thinks they are? Honestly, I think it’s still Walky, whether she likes it or not.)

        1. Spencer

          Yeah that.

          This really only feels dickish to me in the sense that there’s not really a non-dickish way to tell someone you don’t want to be friends, and then she still says out loud that Joyce herself is Perfectly Okay. Even back when Jennifer first said “oh god, Joyce is my best friend” it was still one of disappointed horror that she wasn’t who she wanted to be.

          And, well, why the hell can’t she be the Head Cheerleader Alpha Bongo, and why can’t she leave behind the people she feels contradicts that person she wants to be? If she wants to stop hanging out with Walky and acting like she’s 35 years old and hanging out with Raidah, why’s that a beef in any way other than that she’s not acting like she’s “supposed” to?

          Maye she’s happier not being a drunken sadsack dating someone who used to kick the crap out of for fun.

        2. BBCC

          Well, yeah, most people tend to be hurt when their friend, especially an old friend like Walky, decide that you’re not who they want to be friends with anymore and ditch you, especially when it’s about something as petty as a high school image of social status. That is a beef because it’s kinda a dick move. It doesn’t have to be inherently morally wrong to be a dick move or be hurtful and something that people are valid being annoyed about.

          But fortunately, most of Jennifer’s friends don’t really care. Either they weren’t that close or they’ve been ditched before and know she’s pretty cyclical (again, Walky). Or they’re just really sweet like Joyce.

        3. Spencer

          I mean, I don’t think it’s just Social Status, I think Jennifer’s saying she didn’t really value those relationships that tightly. Not that they were bad, but that what she wants out of life is more important than them.

          Like yes, her old friends can be bothered by it, I just don’t think that really needs to matter to her, let alone that for whatever it is she’s saying she’s still here because Joyce’s actual best friends are bad at their job.

          I don’t really think Jennifer now is any different from Billie in her lowest, most vulnerable moments, and she hasn’t had the chance to have one yet.

        4. Zach

          We KNOW it’s shallow status chasing. Not networking for the sake of her future, but purely her needing social validation. Because she never got it growing up and she’s wildly insecure.

          We know because Billy has said so, so it makes perfect sense for us to judge her for being awful.
          At her best she can be driven and derive a sense of accomplishment from helping others. She’s not all bad. But this whole book has been pushing the point that she’s backslid on her personal growth in this area. Hard and abruptly. Probably relating to her off panel break up.

          I’m eager to learn more.

          And her name is Billy. Even if she goes by Jennifer for the next 10 years real time, the cast and audience who knew her as Billy will still refer to her occasionally as Billy. We aren’t deadnaming her. She doesn’t get to pick her nickname, and she doesn’t get to decide how others think of her for them after they’ve known her for 6 months.

        5. BBCC

          I don’t think it’s pure status chasing, but I do think that’s a big part of it. Especially given how she’s been prone to giving her friends the brush off when she sees them, and based on past behaviour. Maybe it’s not that, but to her friends, it definitely doesn’t seem to be different than the past cycle of trying to hit the reset button.

          And well, people have feelings. Unnecessarily hurting them (say, by ditching them because you think someone else is cooler on the popularity chain and ignoring them when you do happen to see them) is shitty. Jennifer didn’t have to near totally ditch her friends to make new ones. It may be her decision to make, but we’re allowed to think it’s a dick move. You can be entirely within your rights to do something and it can still be a dick move.

          There’s a lot we aren’t seeing her, but given we KNOW she has a habit of trying to hit a reset and pretend nothing before hand happened, I don’t think it’s unreasonable for us to smell a rat, even if she shows healthier habits in other ways.

  18. michaelinasmeal

    So as the next huge drama plot I’m betting the doctor finds something irregular in Joyce’s hooha. She then relapses and questions if god is real and punishing her for her betrayal.

  19. Derek

    I went back to look at some of the archives and man oh man was Billie desperate to make friends with “sophomores” (still somewhat vague on what that is besides students who are not in their first year); she even told Joyce she would stab everyone if she didn’t make friends
    https://www.dumbingofage.com/2012/comic/book-2/05-saturdays-all-right-for-slighting/freshmen/

    Did Billie clock Raidah as the Mean Girl she needs to attach herself to like a remora or did she just assume older = better?

    Also jeez that’s the most hideous outfit Billie had in the whole comic.

    1. Regalli

      I think at the time of that comic, her thought process was probably upperclassmen = higher up the social ladder. Now I think she recognizes Raidah as the Mean Girl to remora off of, yeah.

    2. MK15

      In US parlance, freshman = 1st year, sophomore = 2nd year, junior = 3rd year, and senior = 4th year. High school and college (undergraduate / getting your Bachelor’s degree) are both four year programs so the terminology repeats between them.

      1. Regalli

        Though these days a lot of students either finish their degree in less than four years (either coming in with college credits from high school courseloads or taking summer/winter classes, and it’s not uncommon for four-year degree students to offset costs by doing your first two years at a smaller, cheaper college and transferring in later,) or take more than four (which has always happened, but widespread college-level courses being taught at high schools is fairly new.) The class lines get blurred as a result and using them as a marker for popularity was pretty meaningless to begin with, but the stereotype is that the older kids are cooler by virtue of being seniors/whatever they’re still a class above YOU.

    3. Taffy

      A sophomore is just a second-year student. That’s it.

  20. Judas Peckerwood

    I always wanted to be a landmark!

    1. Amós Batista

      I don’t know. I’m still deciding if, somebody had said it to me, I could take it as a offense.

  21. Rabisch

    Nice to see Jennifer is with Joyce and don’t leave her alone. I wonder if she can stay during the doctor visiting Joyce or she will have to leave. But she will not leave her because, even if she just said something that sounds very harsh, she’s a good friend and wants to be with her and reassure her ♡. My respect for Jennifer is growing.

  22. Darkoneko

    They let them wait directly in the examination room unsupervised.. uh ?

    1. Lily

      it’s possible the doctor could’ve briefly stepped out, even the few times i went and was out in the waiting room, i still had to wait a bit more in the exam area too despite being one of the only ppl there lol

    2. Taffy

      Hospitals love making you wait. It doesn’t especially matter how long, even if you’re suffering from carbon monoxide poisoning and need to get out on oxygen for a while. (Definitely not bitter about that one)

    3. Lone Duck

      So in American medical offices, the nurse will take your vitals, and ask you general questions. Then it is common to wait 10, 15, 20, 30 minutes for the doctor to come over and basically do the same thing. So yeah, you could have an entire Dumbing of Age story arc in that room, unsupervised.

    4. thejeff

      They don’t generally let friends come into the exam room with you though, from what I recall. (Most of my doctor’s visits have been solo for a long time now, so I could be wrong. And recently Covid made that even more true – for awhile they weren’t even letting other people into the waiting room.)

      1. Yumi

        I’ve had parents come into the exam room with me after I had turned 18, so it could be possible and may depend on the place. (These were at doctors’ office that I knew would have Mr waiting in the exam room for ages, so I appreciated the company.)

        1. Yumi

          Me, not Mr… I don’t use Mr. for my title of address, though I don’t really like the other options either.

      2. Annika

        @thejeff Even in covid, most of the doctor’s offices around me still allow you to take 1 person with you into the exam room, and I was that person for my partner many times because my partner has a lot of social anxiety and is able to talk more easily if I’m there to back them up, advocate for them, and help with remembering important things that the doctor said so that they can get as much out of the visit as possible.

      3. BBCC

        Can’t comment on COVID, but every doctor’s practice I’ve had has said ‘If you’re okay with it, sure.’ Might have to sign a release of information for privacy law reasons but most doctors are okay if you’re okay.

  23. AGV

    How is that any better :/ ?

    1. PhyrexianRogue

      It’s slightly better because of the accompanying admission that she wasn’t in a healthy mind state when she thought it.

  24. Needfuldoer

    It’s not good when the first thing out of your mouth makes you sound like an asshole.

  25. Imogen

    This is such a sad comic, and a great moment for both of these characters. I missed these characters interacting. I hope the next comic follows up.

  26. Bagge

    Ladies, please. You can both be the worst

    1. Eldritchy

      I don’t know about that, I heard that [lighting strikes] There can be Only One.

  27. Taffy

    These two should make out. It’d be really cool and uh… lemme see if I can find a way to tie it in with their character growth without adhering to the classic storytelling trope of “kissing somebody means you’re a better person now”.

    Too much effort, girl smooch girl good.

    1. BBCC

      Girl smooch girl good is a valid principle if ever I’ve heard one.

    2. StClair

      Everyone gets curious, right?

  28. Sombrero

    This Jennifer/Billie internal struggle is becoming my favorite storyline since the timeskip.

  29. Sirksome

    The irony here is that Joyce still is Jennifer’s closest friend. In her current status quo she’s broken up with Ruth, distanced herself from Walky, and even though she is unaware, we the audience know her current friend group d oesn’t like her except Asher, and Asher is clearly hiding things from her. Which is why I don’t trust him by the way.

    Meanwhile, Joyce is still a person Jennifer cares enough about to sit in a walk in appointment with when Joyce’s other friends chose to ignore the problem. Joyce and Jen are still good friends and it actually seems like one that will last.

    1. Cerusee

      Yeah I was having that thought. I think Walky is still really her best friend despite the attempts to distance herself from him—he’s dating her roommate so they’re still interacting, and Walky has not (so far) accepted those distancing efforts and walked away from her. But Joyce is probably still the college friend who genuinely likes her the most and cares the most about her well-being.

      1. thejeff

        Walky’s her near-brother, not her friend. It’s a different kind of thing.

        1. Cerusee

          You know what, that is very on point. They really are much more like siblings than friends. (Siblings can be friends; my siblings are MY best friends, but they were not when we were kids or even in college. That came later, in adulthood.)

          This has got me musing on Jennifer and Walky vs Joyce and Becky, wrt a comment I made a few days about how going to college with people who know you well has some real downsides, because they tend to be invested in who you WERE, not who you might want to become. That is very clearly a complaint Jennifer has about Walky, and it’s a big part of why she’s been trying to put distance between them, which Walky is not really accepting.

          But this doesn’t bug me the way Becky refusing to accept change in Joyce does. I think this is because:

          1) Walky has seen Jennifer do this personal reinvention thing multiple times now. It’s a pattern, and because it tends to be about superficial things and status and popularity, and being seen as a certain kind of person, it never really takes. He has reasons to be skeptical every time Jennifer is like “I’m a different person, why can’t you accept that?” Because…are you, Jennifer? Really?

          2) I don’t think it’s causing Jennifer any harm. It may be *annoying* that Walky is always there remembering all her old history, including the bad stuff, but Walky isn’t really demanding anything from Jennifer besides attention, and he’s not actively trying to sabotage her personal growth. He’s just dubious about her claims to self-reinvention because again, he’s seen this before, and it smacks of the delusional. (And Walky being Walky, he’ll say so out loud.)

          3) “Neat” kinda wrecks me. The way he freaked out when he realized how bad her mental health had gotten, his own guilt, plus his anger towards Ruth over Ruth’s part in all that…it was a very compelling demonstration that underneath all the teasing, Jennifer is Wally’s family and one of the most important people in his life. He knows how fucked up she is, and he doesn’t want anything that bad to happen to her again. Walky isn’t going to accept a lot of distance from Jennifer when he’s not convinced she’s the Totally Healthy And Okay New Version of Herself she’s claiming to be. He loves her and he won’t abandon her.

        2. Spencer

          That strip where Ruth kinda weakly says she can be a better person and Walky goes “neat” is the most raw act of violence in the whole series and is actually just my favourite moment from him.

        3. StClair

          Yeah, that was… damn.

        4. Cerusee

          I just went back and reread some of the relevant strips around all that and was reminded that Walky had, in fact, been worried about Jennifer for awhile before the alcoholic suicide pact thing came out (and had gone to Ruth with his concerns, since she was Jennifer’s RA) while their other mutual friends were dismissing Walky’s concerns as unfounded. Also, that Walky is Jennifer’s emergency contact, or at least he was back then. Excuse me while I go have feelings about both these things!

          Walky’s got an abundance of failings, but there is something very touching and admirable about his steadfastness when it comes to Jennifer, no matter how self-destructive she gets, or how hard she tries to push him away.

    2. Archieve

      Do you know which strip confirms jennifer/billies new friends don’t like her? It doesn’t sunrise me but i haven’t seen one with them talking about her.

  30. Hof1991

    So Jennifer barely knows her parents, lost contact with her surrogate parents (the Walkertons) lost all her high school friends, is a recovering alcoholic, was in a suicide pact relationship, was connected to a kidnapping /murder. Yes, she has lost whatever plot she had. She’s barely sure what friendship means at this point.

  31. goggleman64

    Coming out the other side of their most recent character arcs, Joyce and Jennifer have unexpectedly good chemistry!

  32. Beau Kirin Maysey

    i dont know jennifer that kinda sounds personal…

    1. The Wellerman

      Let us read on and see!

  33. Nicoleandmaggie

    Good save, Jennifer.

  34. ProtoMan

    It sounds dickish but I kinda get what she’s saying. She had alienated a lot of friends, so much so that Joyce was her best friend by default. I mean it’s still rude because that still implies that Joyce is so low on the totem pole that she’s the indicator of rock bottom, and she shouldn’t have said it out loud, but it is a wakeup call when you realize your “best friend” isn’t someone you really like all that much.

    1. Cerusee

      That exactly.

  35. Furubatsu

    In Jennifer’s defence, at that point in time the only other person she was in regular contact with was Ruth. A relationship that started off pretty abusive (Ruth destroying her cheerleading uniform, flipping her over a chair in front of everyone, pinning her to a wall and kissing her and Jennifer trying to report that to the most desperate lesbian on campus etc) and evolved into a very toxic relationship (sexy alcohol induced suicide pact, need I say more?) Joyce being her closest friend was due to Joyce being human puppy dog that said “hi” to everyone in the dorms and stopped to chat.Yeah, they bonded over trying to figure out Amazi-Girl’s identity and Jennifer even offered to give Joyce a makeover, but considering how long they’ve known eachother now (way, 6 months?) that’s pretty shallow.

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