imindhowwelayinjune:

…Yes.

Celegorm is good with kids, because kids are kind of like animals; he speaks their language. (Read: as Celegorm is a giant wolf puppy with thumbs, so too is he a giant child with the ability to consume large quantities of alcohol.) Celegorm is the babysitter that children love, and that makes parents go ‘Well, I don’t know…’

He can be a little intimidating to small ones, for sure. He’s big, and he’s loud, and he comes back into the house smelling of blood and with animal skins on his back and a long knife at his waist. Once, as a joke, he put a bearskin over his head and roared at tiny Tyelpe, who screamed and ran, and Curufin came out of the forge and hit his brother with a hammer. ‘What, it’s all in good fun, he knew I was jok- ouch, stop, ouch, you’re worse than the bear!’

But he’s also tremendous fun. He will always swing you up onto his shoulders and take you on adventures; usually to places other people have told you you’re too young to go. He’ll toss you in the air and swoop you around and show you how to shoot a bow and arrow. He’ll let you hang on him while he skins and guts the animals he brings home, and you’ll cling wide-eyed to his sunburned, blood-stained, tattooed arm as he shows you where the liver lives, and the stomach, and the heart.

Curufin is a tough, didactic, exacting, and endlessly proud father. He expects a lot from Celebrimbor because he has endless faith in his son’s brains and ability. But when Celebrimbor wants to escape from expectation, it is Celegorm he seeks. Celegorm will ruffle his hair up, kiss him on the ear, toss him an apple and tell him to ‘Get on the horse, bitch, we’re going hunting.’ Celegorm gives big, rib-cracking hugs, and is roughly affectionate and physically demonstrative where Curufin is more distant in his affection. Many times, on the sea crossing, the crossing that almost killed Tyelpe with sickness and sorrow, Curufin would search for his son only to find him curled up in Celegorm’s lap, Celegorm’s rough brown hand smoothing down his tangled hair. 

Celegorm is warm, if not fuzzy (unless he’s in a bearskin); exciting and a little scary; an adventure, a risk; a slap on the back and a jovial cuff around the ear. He’ll teach your children things you wish they didn’t know but that you’re glad didn’t fall to you to explain. He’ll laugh and tease you for a torn-up knee, but he’ll clean your cut and bandage you up in the time it takes him to say ‘You’re supposed to be hunting the boar, not dancing with it!’ He’ll teach you hunters’ curses, and prayers. He’ll get you drunk on his moonshine and will at least hold your hair back when you throw up afterwards. He mock your hangovers, and recommend ginger root for your stomach. 

He’s the best uncle. He’s the worst.