u/heyheeymymy

i (mostly hetero woman) am very attracted to elizabeth holmes

this morning i went for a run and absolutely ate shit tripping over a crack in the sidewalk. i was directly beside the entrance to a grocery store so plenty of people saw and responded with concern. i didn't smash my teeth in or break anything so really the only thing wrong with me is that i'm an idiot. it took me a second to decide if i was crying or laughing but then an old man rolled down his truck window to make sure i was okay and that was funny and sweet so then i was just laughing while i told him i was fine.

i'd scraped my knee quite badly so i limped inside for a package of band-aids and sat down on the bench outside to put one on. the cart collector came over very worried and asked if i was okay. i told him yes. he was still very worried and brought me a bunch of paper towels and hung out with me while i finished patching up.

when i left i was thinking that i should have been embarrassed, but i couldn't feel embarrassed because i felt so grateful and so connected to people. i really love a world where people interrupt the private suffering of others to be of service. i always try to be as kind and giving as possible but sometimes i worry i'm only embarrassing the people i care for. but it is not embarrassing to be cared for.

i have more stories about the grocery store but i severely overestimated how much time i had to get ready. just know that they're magical places full of love if you let them be.

they're beautiful even if your viewing conditions aren't ideal. we saw five. if you're in the EST zone, now to dawn is a very good time. so much cool stuff is always happening i'm really glad i'm alive

the insertion was incredibly painful and took 3x longer than suggested. what's the threshold for calling things traumatic? anyway it hurt terribly, the procedure went awry, and i cried the whole time. i was on sedative drugs that didn't kick in until i was trying to order a sandwich after.

the sandwich is a mushroom philly cheese. it used to be on the menu but they can still scrape it together. it was perfect in my mind but as soon as the sandwich artist (jersey mike's equivalent) handed it to me, i realized i was far too sick to eat it. so i put in in the fridge and put me in bed. it was such a great nap.

i hate the horrible things that happen to women, but i love being a woman. i love that women are gentle and kind to one another and that my suffering, when it happens, is part of a continuum of shared experience that brings me closer to every woman i know. i just hate that this is what must bring us closer.

for about fifteen minutes tonight my life was perfect. it's still pretty good right now though

last night (author's note: this draft is from march) i dreamt of a chinese novel from the year 833 that was revealed to have been this crazy futuristic sci-fi in its time but was functionally the same as a 2000s high school comedy. someone gave me the English translation to read and said it was the best literature in history and the first page was like, “hi. my name is a——, and my life is pretty sad. my best friend b—— gets ALL the girls, even though he’s as dumb as a box of rocks! he’s dating this girl i’ve crushed on since 4th grade… and c—— the fat guy stole my lunch! this place is a nightmare.“

i just finished it this afternoon--nobody i know has read it, and i'm more interested in your guys' opinions than those of randoms on goodreads. i picked it up on a whim based on the synopsis and cover. it definitely did not disappoint, but my thoughts on it are quite complicated and i want to discuss! (i'm about to spoil the whole thing, look out.)

i found the monotony and repetition really fascinating. the narrator's time in school, deployment in iraq, and crime spree are all indistinguishable save for the nouns being used. every part of his life is the same kind of hell, and he copes with all of it with the same apathy. the psychological statement is also a political one, with the iraq war being as significant and honorable as robbing banks to buy heroin. not exactly a groundbreaking political statement but gratifying nonetheless. the violence is so absolutely grotesque, arguably gratuitous, and totally completely utterly pointless and that is the point. does it serve its overarching role well enough to justify its gratuitousness? arguable, variable person-to-person. regardless, absolutely fucking brutal.

there's a line (i can't find it, but trust i've looked) where he surmises that most of the men he's stationed with were deeply fucked in the head long before ever enlisting, and i think that moment is one of the most interesting, somewhat gesturing at mental determinism (chicken or the egg) without really saying it outright--do these horrible, traumatizing experiences create miserable, apathetic people, or are miserable, apathetic people disproportionately drawn towards risky behavior? both seem to be true, but the novel explores the latter, which was an interesting change.

i will say that the voice is absolutely crucial, i think, and i really doubt the novel would have worked without those glimmering moments of likeability from the narrator. for him to constantly make the 'wrong' choices and approach his (quite privileged, for that matter) life with such utter defeatism requires some comprehensible, charming inner life that can explain his actions--and there aren't many glimpses of it, but every time i was tempted to put the book down, the narrator would make me laugh and i'd be forced to give it another shot.

i liked the lack of resolution. this is a book about pointless things. the war is pointless. life in active addiction is pointless. his crimes are pointless. we're tempted to see the resolution of a plot as its 'point,' and it doesn't have one. the book is pointless. it was a nice let-down, if such a thing can be.

looking into nico walker's background and finding out that the book is largely autobiographical didn't surprise me at all. i find him very interesting and i wish he'd written some more fiction. the novel's early drafting was a fun story to look into, walker seemingly //almost// an outsider artist at the time of its conception. honorary.

anyway, those are my thoughts. i'd be very curious to see what people here think, if you've read it. maybe no one has and i actually just dreamt this book.

very nice when grocery store promos align with my desires

12-year-old me would be so proud of who i am now.

i keep trying to make this a more complex idea but this is the only part that matters

not a revolutionary thought by any means, but i've realized lately how much belonging one must sacrifice to experience freedom. i'm on a big sicilian mob kick at the moment (who isn't?) and i think one of the things i find so consistently compelling about it is the inherent sense of belonging, given as a birthright.

being from an amazingly openminded family in modern america, (who are in no way connected to the mob) i was always taught that i could be whatever and whoever i want. and while i am unimaginably grateful for the amount of opportunity and freedom i've experienced, i'm coming to realize that i have a deep, lifelong yearning for simple belonging. i don't want someone to tell me what to do with my life; i'm very independent, very headstrong, very passionate about the path that i have chosen for myself. but i can't deny it, the thought of having my place within my family and the world prescribed to me at birth is sometimes a very comforting thought.

i'm pretty sure this same yearning often pulls people towards religious determinism, especially now. i generally am very indifferent towards the idea of determinism; if God is real and puppeteering my life, i'd at least like to pretend i'm in control. because i like having control. i like thinking i'm free, regardless of whether or not i am. but sometimes, when i have used my freedom in ways that disgust me, when i have no idea what to do with it, when i do not want it anymore, i think it would be beautiful to have my place in this world prescribed by a God that loves me. sometimes i want to be one cog in a machine operated by an unseen but omnipotent and unendingly merciful force to achieve a beautiful goal beyond my comprehension. when i am happy with myself and my choices, i hate this idea. when i am disappointed in myself, the yearning for a God comes in. the yearning for a God, which is the yearning for unconditional parental love, which is the yearning to belong unquestioningly, which is the yearning to have a purpose, which is the yearning to know what to do.

a lot of words to say that i sometimes question my purpose in life, i guess, but i'd never realized how interconnected the seemingly separate desires for purpose and god and familial love are. it's like, spiritual anemia. a lack of some vital fulfillment that occasionally manifests in these connected longings. when you can be anything, you come view yourself as a blank slate without inherent purpose or traits, only capacity. this is wrong. no human is a blank slate. i am trying to understand what i was before i started consciously being things. or something

kindness prevails, kindness prevails, ties and rails, ties and rails

give it to me straight, doc: is it going to make me go batshit crazy and/or get fat

***i would do copper but my periods are bad enough already

i'm lonely. i love this song

very fun to play on the piano if you're able

i've come to the conclusion that i have too much of both to properly move forwards in life. because i'm not a catholic i can't repent in confession and because i'm not a therapy person i can't repent to a shrink so i need to do something else. write everything down on a sheet of paper and ritualistically burn it? tell all my worst secrets to a stranger and then quickly run away? write everything down on a postcard and mail it somewhere? every option would conclude with me going to the bakery and having a hazelnut napoleon afterwards

not a single morsel. and just when i'd begun to trust again. why even bother