transferring my commonplace book to tumblr...

...so it can live forever on the internet

[commonplacenook]

Great Circle, Maggie Shipstead

Finish: Wednesday July 6, 2022, 1:53am central time, JetBlue flight from SAN to BOS over Illinois

[commonplacenook]

At some point she would have found the edge of her own courage. There is nothing for it but to adjust, be humbled. So she is not exactly who she had thought. So what. She will be someone different.

Maggie Shipstead, Great Circle

[commonplacenook]

Great Circle, Maggie Shipstead

Start: Monday June 13, 2022, 7:30am, Southbound Caltrain at 4th and King station

[commonplacenook]

My Year Abroad, Chang-Rae Lee

Finish: Saturday June 11, 2022, 8:38pm, Palms living room

[commonplacenook]

And although I can conjure her in various moments, those moments have steadily melded into one another to the point that the whole has become this mash, she's become a woman made of her woman-versions stacked in ghosted layers, this final misaligned image that flickers in and out, in and out, in a self-perpetuating cycle. I guess we each construct our own purgatory, so this must be mine.

Chang-Rae Lee, My Year Abroad

[commonplacenook]

If you think about it, most persons, including many of those who say they love you, can't help but question your particular coordinates in whatever you're doing or thinking or hoping for, then want to realign you to function more smoothly in their eyes and thereby calm their fretful souls.

Chang-Rae Lee, My Year Abroad

[commonplacenook]

My Year Abroad, Chang-Rae Lee

Start: Tuesday May 31, 2022, 8:04am, Southbound Caltrain at 4th and King station

[commonplacenook]

Nightbitch, Rachel Yoder

Finish: Sunday May 29, 2022, 6:29pm, Palms living room

[commonplacenook]

I made you, and I destroy you as well. I am your entire world, and then, also, I am the person you leave behind. I will always be with you. You will never understand me.

Rachel Yoder, Nightbitch

[commonplacenook]

Was being free to do what you needed and be who you wanted -- truly free -- monstrous? If so, it was not a wrong kind of monstrous, but a beautiful one. A way of being to celebrate rather than run from.

Rachel Yoder, Nightbitch

[commonplacenook]

How many generations of women had delayed their greatness only to have time extinguish it completely? How many women had run out of time while the men didn't know what to do with theirs? And what a mean trick to call such things holy or selfless. How evil to praise women for gibing up each and every dream.

Rachel Yoder, Nightbitch

[commonplacenook]

How satisfying to summon the strength of her body, to feel her bones jar as her fist contacted the hard wall. Her had would bloody. Her knuckles would probably break. But the give of the wall, the crumble, the damage. There was a relief that could come with violence, she now saw.

Rachel Yoder, Nightbitch

[commonplacenook]

No, the mother finally said. I think working mother is perhaps the most nonsensical concept ever concocted. I mean, who isn't a working mother? And then add a paid job to it, so what are you then? A working working mother? Imagine saying working father.

Rachel Yoder, Nightbitch

[commonplacenook]

That single, white-hot light at the center of the darkness of herself -- that was the point of origin from which she birthed something new, from which all women do.

Rachel Yoder, Nightbitch

[commonplacenook]

Nightbitch, Rachel Yoder

Start: Thursday May 19, 2022, 8:24am, Southbound Caltrain at 4th and King station

[commonplacenook]

The Chosen and the Beautiful, Nghi Vo

Finish: Wednesday May 18, 2022, 6:36pm, Northbound Caltrain between Redwood City and San Carlos stations

[commonplacenook]

Stars didn't talk like people did, and I couldn't listen with my ears, but when I closed my eyes, they appeared to throw moving pictures across the darkness.

Nghi Vo, The Chosen and the Beautiful