A commission for Jake The Army Guy
Yona and Sandbar are happily married, but nasty talk around town about their size difference have Sandbar a bit on edge. How can he be the stallion she deserves if he doesn't fit into the traditional role of being the bigger and stronger one?
Luckily, he runs into a stallion who went through something similar and gets a few pointers on what masculinity and love truly mean.
Edited and Pre-read by: Jack of a Few Trades and Soaring
Art by faitheverlasting
Chapters (1)
I praised you in PM, but now I have to praise you publicly. This is a fantastic little piece of fiction. YonaBar is one of my favorite ships these days, and while Little Strongheart and Braeburn is a very old classic, I feel it doesn't get enough love. Once I saw that picture, I knew I needed to see them together. Real deep cuts on masculinity in here, as well as simple, wholesome, Yak-on-Pony snuggle action. Sweet, heartfelt, and uplifting. Great work, my dude!
10531834
I'm so glad you like it!
You're such a positive influence on the site I really wanted to make sure you got the quality you deserve and it means a lot that you liked it so much. I've never written Yonabar before, but it's definitely become one of my fave ships too just from how cute they were to write.
Thanks again, my friend.
Omg 😲😍😍
I'm glad I read this, cause I learned something new out of this.
Aww this was a very nice story all the ship all around 😊 so Sandbar was feeling a little down about not being strong enough for Yona but Braeburn gave him some good advice about it doesn't matter if you're not man enough the only time you are the man is to love your family your friends and your partner no matter what and that was a pretty good lesson right there this was a pretty good story
Aw, very sweet. Definitely a lesson that needs to be learned more often.
Any horrible man-hating women or third-wave man bashing feminists ought to take a lesson from Braeburn. What a great bit of advice he gave to Sandbar!
I don't mind.
I knew I couldn't be the only one to see the parallels between these two pairs. Even more glad that others also remember Little Strongheart, she's so neglected. Great story.
Awwwwwwwwww.
This is absolutely wonderful.
Man, you could start a whole navy with all the ships in this fic...
Yeah, this is pretty darn cute.
Maybe a bit too didactic for my tastes, but I'm guilty of it on occasion as well. And it's pretty well done and rather nice to see the voice of experience give Sandbar some of that reassurance. I wish I could go back and tell my younger self not to worry so much about things that seemed so important at the time.
Never thought of Braeburn and Little Strongheart getting together, not that I mind it. It's a nice parallel to Sandbar and Yona.
I must be seeing things, Little Strongheart and Braeburn? I thought this ship had been long lost, but it finally makes a glorious return!
This was amazing and adorable and emotional and i just love this. Amazing job.
10531853
I'm so glad you liked it and learned something!
10531869
Thanks for reading! I really liked being able to write something with such a positive message.
10531872
Agreed for sure.
10532037
Little Strongheart definitely needs more love.
10532087
Thanks! It was nice getting to relax and write something wholesome so I'm glad you liked it, too!
10532145
I know the feel. I worried about way too many small things when I was younger.
10532149
Thanks for reading! It means a lot to me!
10532165
Yes, it has risen from the dead!
10532464
Thank you so much! I'm so glad you enjoyed it and appreciated the message!
Gonna be honest I was not expecting this to be about masculinity I was sort of hoping it was about the literal issue of physical size difference.
Also the Earth Ponies not being good at smashing? It's always come across as them being exceptionally strong so it wouldn't be much of an issue, unless Sandbar particularly doesn't have the genes for strength a lot of Earth Pony families have.
Anyone else thing that Braeburn looks way better with a beard?
I'm guessing Smolder and Ocellus are a thing now?
10532664
That sounds like a really cute ship, honestly!
Daww, such a pair of cuties. I find it funny that In all the most popular student six ships one of the members is much bigger then their counterpart.
Sandbar feels very relatable in this, I imagine a lot of guys who have larger partners must feel this way at some point in a relationship
10532664
Ship the spares as it were. They are very cute together though
10532470
Well, wholesome achieved.
Just the description itself has me interested. IN for this!
I'm always here for Strongburn and healthy masculinity.
Also I always thought Braeburn and Little Strongheart are so cute together ❤
Good story, well written and makes a good point. As my father used to say "Love goes where it's sent".
That said I have one nitpick.
"I have to actually go on a three day leave next week which kind of sucks, but it’s part of the job."
If you are in the military when you go on leave you have time off duty. It does not mean that you are going on patrol for three days. Really surprised that Jake didn't catch that.
B.D. Vet. USCG
10534659
derpicdn.net/img/2016/2/16/1089763/medium.jpeg
I...
derpicdn.net/img/2017/1/9/1336037/medium.png
I, uh...
Look! An elephant!!
*flees
10535079
10534659
I'm terribly sorry for my wording and any disrespect I inflicted upon your service or experiences with the armed services. I should have done more research before carelessly wording things and I appreciate your kindness in pointing out my error. It won't happen again.
10535094
My god kid all you did was use the wrong word. I'm way to old to get insulted over an honest mistake. I really thought that it was rather funny to see that error in a story written for another vet. Have a funny one from a friend of mine. When talking about triple distilled mercury (both science teachers) he would always for some unknown reason say thripple disseled. When I called him on it one day we must have laughed for twenty minutes.
10535178
Lol, I'm sorry, I just didn't want to provide incorrect information about the military or anything or offend anyone. I definitely should have researched it more, but thanks for taking it easy on me about my mistake, lol.
That's also a funny story! I remember when I was younger, for the longest time I thought that "vitriol" was a kind of car oil. It took until I was like 15 years old for someone to finally correct me, lol.
10535260
Eh, don't sweat it. Like 10535178 said, I really should have caught it, what with me being, you know, and actual veteran.
This REALLY reminds me of that Futurama joke about the crew visiting Amazonia.
10535741
derpicdn.net/img/2019/5/16/2040925/medium.jpeg
images-wixmp-ed30a86b8c4ca887773594c2.wixmp.com/f/42a1b24e-374b-42c4-975a-f17471e364fe/ddc3c87-5afaf8eb-67fa-48c4-a2d6-f5d86945e228.jpg?token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJzdWIiOiJ1cm46YXBwOiIsImlzcyI6InVybjphcHA6Iiwib2JqIjpbW3sicGF0aCI6IlwvZlwvNDJhMWIyNGUtMzc0Yi00MmM0LTk3NWEtZjE3NDcxZTM2NGZlXC9kZGMzYzg3LTVhZmFmOGViLTY3ZmEtNDhjNC1hMmQ2LWY1ZDg2OTQ1ZTIyOC5qcGcifV1dLCJhdWQiOlsidXJuOnNlcnZpY2U6ZmlsZS5kb3dubG9hZCJdfQ.GdoZ1BjK4txOMuU7tSyDsRkR1YGZE2wgFvg61Cr8A00
Hrrrm
Glad to see someone wrote a fic off that nice pic of fanart.
This was really sweet, Famous. Characters were good, ships were cute, and the moral was great. Always nice to see stories that tackle societal expectations in light of what really matters. The site needs more fics like this. Have a fave! 
10555339
Thanks so much! I had a lot of fun writing this one so I'm glad you enjoyed it! Congrats on how well your new story is doing, too. *high five!*
10555382
You're welcome, and thank you! I'm glad folks liked my silly AJ story so much.
This was a good story! Not just one, but three couples shown, all of them happy together? Breaburn giving advice and encouragement with a positive message to Sandbar? Sublime.
This is probably my favorite story of yours to date. I knew it was going to be good hearing you talk about it and listening to excerpts on discord, but I had no idea it would be this good. There are so many happy, wholesome relationships here. That's always something that there should be way more of on Fimfiction. The jokes were funny and the characters were cute, but grounded. All-in-all, a very smile-inducing fic.
10531834 clearly has good taste. In a show with so many strong and well-thought-out female characters, lessons about masculinity aren't common in ponyfic. Which, as a dude, is admittedly pretty alienating. The show sometimes touches upon how it's okay for boys to be interested in things that are considered dorky, girly, and being sensitive, but very rarely do fics touch on traditional aspects of masculinity in such awesome ways.
Ding Dong. Your Amazon package has arrived with the review you ordered. WAR: We Are Reviews presents your fresh, custom-made story review: https://www.fimfiction.net/group/215274/reviewers-mansion/thread/463297/review-of-keep-your-chin-up-and-your-expectations-high-by-famouslastwords
A Sea-ppo-gryffon? SQUEE!
Whenever I find Ice Star in the comment section, I usually know two things. 1) Story's probably gonna be good. 2) He's probably gonna be right with what he said and finds better ways to put to words whatever I would've liked to contribute.
It's weird, but in a nice way, I guess. And it's another hit this time. This story was... wholesome. Teaching a valuable lesson. Could've fit in with the show, honestly.
It also made me think back to my school days, when whe had a trip to Prague for a couple of days and I was joking around with a - back then, at least - close friend of mine. She stood a good one-and-a-half heads higher than me and we got along quite well. Well enough that others would joke about us being an item. In those days, we joked around a lot and I think, in a way, we both considered it? Gave it some thought, at least, and in the end decided against it. Which was fine, really, that's not the point of the anecdote. We were walking down the street, I'm on the sidewalk, she's on the street itself, so there's a little less height difference and she's joking that it wouldn't even really fit - it's weird, holding hands if the difference gets to large. Haven't thought about that for years, but this story somehow dug it up. It's a nice memory, so I'm all for it, I guess.
Anyway, I greatly appreciated your tale.
Thank you.
I'll remember this lesson if I ever do get married. A real man loves and cares for those around him.
Yeah this was a great recommendation. Being a married man puts a ton of pressure on you by society and even changing the norm causes people to raise their eyebrows or make comments. But as long as you make your relationship with your significant other and your kids the priority all the other noise just drowns out. Great story didn’t expect this one at all.