Oh No, We Just Couldn’t Have That Now, Could We?

I forgot how magical trc is. the first book and the recorder and "is that all?" "that's all there is" and the hope and that feeling of things are starting and we're getting there and just magic. this is why I love it so much

Sunrise

by Louise Glück

This time of year, the window boxes smell of the hills, the thyme and rosemary that grew there, crammed into the narrow spaces between the rocks and, lower down, where there was real dirt, competing with other things, blueberries and currants, the small shrubby trees the bees love— Whatever we ate smelled of the hills, even when there was almost nothing. Or maybe that’s what nothing tastes like, thyme and rosemary.

Maybe, too, that’s what it looks like— beautiful, like the hills, the rocks above the tree line webbed with sweet smelling herbs, the small plants glittering with dew—

It was a big event to climb up there and wait for dawn, seeing what the sun sees as it slides out from behind the rocks, and what you couldn’t see, you imagined;

your eyes would go as far as they could, to the river, say, and your mind would do the rest—

And if you missed a day, there was always the next, and if you missed a year, it didn’t matter, the hills weren’t going anywhere, the thyme and rosemary kept coming back, the sun kept rising, the bushes kept bearing fruit—

The streetlight’s off: that’s dawn here. It’s on: that’s twilight. Either way, no one looks up. Everyone just pushes ahead, and the smell of the past is everywhere, the thyme and rosemary rubbing against your clothes, the smell of too many illusions—

Between them, the hills and sky took up all the room. Whatever was left, that was ours for a while. But eventually the hills will take it back, give it to the animals. And maybe the moon will send the seas there, and where we lived will be a stream or river coiling around the base of the hills, paying the sky the compliment of reflection.

I went back but I didn’t stay. Everyone I cared about was gone, some dead, some disappeared into one of those places that don’t exist, the ones we dreamed about because we saw them from the top of the hills— I had to see if the fields were still shining, the sun telling the same lies about how beautiful the world is when all you need to know of a place is, do people live there. If they do, you know everything.

The hills are terrible, they hide the truth of the past. Green in summer, white when the snow falls.

You ever think about how unified humanity is by just everyday experiences? Tudor peasants had hangnails, nobles in the Qin dynasty had favorite foods, workers in the 1700s liked seeing flowers growing in pavement cracks, a cook in medieval Iran teared up cutting onions, a mom in 1300 told her son not to get grass stains on his clothes, some girl in the past loved staying up late to see the sun rise.

Breathe in the sweetness that hovers in August.

sylvia plath // @thisherelight // raymond carver // @fortuneaday // zoë lianne // mary oliver // emily bronte // taylor swift; via @tayricochets // carole king // @deadwatered // eileen myles; via @unchildhood // kent nerburn // sara baume // claude monet

First it was lonely but you get used to it… the silence, then you start to love it. I can hear the wind blowing over the rippling water on the loch… and the birds. I hear the world how it was meant to be heard.

Shetlands, BBC1

the complete works: the diary, virginia woolf // erasure, zoë lianne // dandelion wine, ray bradbury // the unabridged journals of sylvia plath, sylvia plath // the women, kim addonizio // august, mary oliver // incision, yves olade // high bridge park, carlie hoffman.

The Attic Room, 1918

William Ratcliffe (British, 1870 - 1955)

The math cafe is my favourite place to work because it has the best views and biggest blackboards

This I found myself thinking in the years that followed, on nights when my wife and I played the violin together, when we cooked together, when we walked in our fields watching the movements of the farm robots, when we sat on the porch watching the airships rise up like fireflies on the horizon over Oklahoma City, this is what the Time Institute never understood: if definitive proof emerges that we’re living in a simulation, the correct response to that news will be So what. A life lived in a simulation is still a life.

- Sea of Tranquility, Emily St. John Mandel

I don't want a romantic partner I want friends who will go dumpster diving with me, I want neighbors who will knock on my door and ask for butter because they forgot to buy some and it's sunday. I want book shelves in public spaces, food banks and shared tool sheds and community gardens. I want to trade home grown tomatoes for a couple of eggs with my neighbor and I want to bring food over to my friends house when I've cooked too much. I want bicycle only streets and I want people to go on spontaneous walks with. I want people to ask me for help when they need it and I want to be able to ask for help in return. I want community as a safety net. I want people to stop focusing on the vague concept of the one, who will Cure All Isolation and Loneliness. I want every single person to be able to find support and comfort around them, regardless of their relationship status.