.:propinquity:.

"While I, a mere shepherd of these words, am lost."

[mymalawach]

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oh hi 

[athingcalledbliss]

Maggie Maurer by Nhu Xuan Hua for “Strange Attractors” Dansk Fall/Winter 2016   

[luthien-tinuviel]

the hobbit (1937) // by j. r. r. tolkien

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a few things

My dad spends hours every day reading his new favorite Reddit forum, The Red Pill.

My siblings and I are working to get my mom out of an emotionally-abusive and financially-controlling marriage.

I need therapy.

[shinji--moon-deactivated2017123]

Most of us learn early on to think of love as a feeling. When we feel deeply drawn to someone, we cathect with them; that is, we invest feelings or emotion in them. That process of investment wherein a loved one becomes important to us is called ‘cathexis.’ In his book Peck rightly emphasizes that most of us ‘confuse cathecting with loving.’ We all know how often individuals feeling connected to someone through the process of cathecting insist that they love the other person even if they are hurting or neglecting them. […] When we understand love as the will to nurture our own and another’s spiritual growth, it becomes clear that we cannot claim to love if we are hurtful and abusive. Love and abuse cannot coexist. Abuse and neglect are, by definition, the opposites of nurturance and care. Often we hear of a man who beats his children and wife and then goes to the corner bar and passionately proclaims how much he loves them. If you talk to the wife on a good day, she may also insist he loves her, despite his violence. An overwhelming majority of us come from dysfunctional families in which we were taught we were not okay, where we were shamed, verbally and/or physically abused, and emotionally neglected even as were also taught to believe that we were loved. For most folks it is just too threatening to embrace a definition of love that would no longer enable us to see love as present in our families. Too many of us need to cling to a notion of love that either makes abuse acceptable or at least makes it seem that whatever happened was not that bad. Raised in a family in which aggressive shaming and verbal humiliation coexisted with lots of affection and care, I had difficult embracing the term ‘dysfunctional.’ Since I felt and still felt attached to my parents and siblings, proud of all the positive dimensions of our family life, I did not want to describe us by using a term that implied our life together had been all negative or bad. I did not want my parents to think I was disparaging them; I was appreciative of all the good things that they had given in the family. With therapeutic help I was able to see the term ‘dysfunctional’ as a useful description and not as an absolute negative judgment. My family of origin provided, throughout my childhood, a dysfunctional setting and it remains one. This does not mean that it is not also a setting in which affection, delight, and care are present.

from bell hooks’ All About Love, “Chapter One: Clarity: Give Love Words"  (via commovente)

[iylshowcase]

Eugenia Gorbina - If You Leave Vol II

[danger]

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The double moon, one on the high back drop of the west, one on the curve of the river face, The sky moon of fire and the river moon of water, I am taking these home in a basket, hung on an elbow, such a teeny weeny elbow, in my head. I saw them last night, a cradle moon, two horns of a moon, such an early hopeful moon, such a child's moon for all young hearts to make a picture of. The river--I remember this like a picture--the river was the upper twist of a written question mark. I know now it takes many many years to write a river, a twist of water asking a question. And white stars moved when the moon moved, and one red star kept burning, and the Big Dipper was almost overhead.

Carl Sandburg, 1922

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Lately, early 2017

lots of coffee to combat dreary snowstorms

looking Smug As Hell in dark purple lipstick (and a dirty mirror)

new shoes (WHY did no one TELL ME dr. martens were so comfortable??)

died and went to heaven at Cappella Romana’s Arvo Part Festival

looking Smug As Hell in a Holly Golightly-esque getup for a choir program fundraiser that was ‘Breakfast At Tiffany’s’-themed.

stole wilting tulips from a centerpiece at the end of the fundraiser event because they would have been thrown away anyways

recording session in some truly ideal acoustics (let me live in that blue) 

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bad things: missing work because of ice storm, literally everything happening in world

good things: making pumpkin pancakes for lunch with roommate, cackling at witty tweets

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The world is a garbage can on fire, but I have moments of such dazzling joy and peace that it feels almost sacrilegious to record them, as if I’ll jinx it all.

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I can’t keep stress-eating kettle chips at this rate.

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I’m not sure I’m tough enough or tender enough to get through this awful presidency.

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First earworm of the year is ‘All Time Low’ by Jon Bellion.

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On the morning of New Year’s Eve, I moved into a new house, into a room with turquoise walls and a tiny closet. In the evening, I put on a gold dress with sparkle tights and a faux-fur snood and bright fuchsia lipstick, and went to my person’s house party (and ended up spilling champagne all over myself) and finally, finally after twenty-eight years on this earth, got a romantic kiss at midnight.

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