Vibes > Words

[great-tweets]

Beware!

[rayvenreayes]

Avoid sci-hub too👀

[queeranarchism]

From Ask for PDFs from People with Institutional Access

[dowereallyneedthis]

If you want to read an academic article that's behind a paywall just email the author and ask politely if they will send you the article. Most academics will be thrilled that you want to read their work and will gladly send it to you.

[42ds]

PSA

[perfectly-imperfect-9]

one of your favourite quote?

"Hope has two beautiful daughters. Their names are anger and courage. anger at the way things are, and courage to see that they do not remain the way they are"

[machetelanding]

[mbrainspaz]

I keep coming back lately to how f*cked up it was that my dad never let me mess anything up. Oh no, don’t climb out the window and sit on the roof–you’ll damage the shingles. So I put out beach towels and was extra careful, and he still got mad. Some of my best childhood memories were sitting out on that roof with my brother or my friends. Man f*ck the shingles. We sold that house a year later anyway. I waited years for him to fix the toilet paper roll holder in an upstairs bathroom–then one day just broke down and fixed it myself. It took me 5 minutes. And he was mad because I didn’t use the right kind of screws. F*ck the right screws. It looked perfect and it worked just fine, at least until I moved out. Now I’ve been out here living with a bunch of rogue ranchers and old engineers and it’s given me a whole new perspective on life. The first day I moved onto this ranch the owner got out an electric saw and cut a hole straight through a sewer pipe. I nearly panicked! Like–YOU CAN JUST DO THAT?!?! Just break something?! It was a horrible job! But BAM–it was done! And that sh*t changed my whole worldview. Last week I helped remodel a bridge with some spare logs and a pickaxe. I’ve sawed open the roof of my house and glued it back together. I’ve torn wall fixtures off and burned them in a bonfire. 

GO AHEAD! BREAK IT. Wear down the shingles. Cut holes through the wall. Get mud on the sofa. Put stickers on your car. Break the world around you just a little instead of living in fear of losing resale value you rarely get back anyway. It’ll be fine. 

[ahedderick]

   This is excellent advice, and carries through into parenting. I always made sure that when my kids were in a destructive mood or wanted to pick at something, they could just- do that. Here’s a clump of mint, you can smush it, chop it up, pull all the leaves off the stem - no problem. Here’s a piece of wood with the bark coming loose, you can pick it that to your heart’s content. I was lucky, I guess, that on a farm there’s always something expendable that can just be ruined for the fun of it. Toddler’s get SO much enjoyment out of deconstructing stuff - and even more if you make a big fuss over how “well” they did it. Look at all the chopped mint! It smells wonderful!

[lizclimo]

[inkskinned]

something bad happened to you, and you died, and you came back wrong.

not wrong all the way. the little ways. you forget important dates, stopped going out with friends. it's harder to make you smile. you're apathetic towards things you used to love, afraid of places you used to go to cheer up. quieter. flinching. different.

you came back for love. you're still here for love. what pulled you back was a brightness so loud that even death couldn't outshout it. death heard the call and smiled at you and said okay. go home. somebody is waiting for you.

but you came back different. like lot's wife; you've turned into salt. you used to chirp through life in hops and skips; but now you lose skin just standing up. you have to move slower, skimming across this world without-touching-it. most things feel dull - until they're suddenly all-too-much. life, and being alive just rushes up and over you and you get hopelessly crushed.

you try to explain it to them: it is ugly, but this is what you are, now. the huge golden hoop of your halo now a little bronze ring. you are still watering your plants and wearing the same clothes. after all, you worked hard to come home. this life; so odd and off-color, now that you are wrong.

but they waited for you - it's just that they wanted the "you" that happened before this. the "you "that could sing in the show and hug people tight and look at a blade without breaking down to cry. the you with a smile in pictures. god, holyshit, it's like looking at a completely different person, isn't it. that other-you; the one they actually wanted.

you are the consolation prize. you are the body that forgot the ghost. you are the memory of the bad thing, and the death after; like you are wearing that memory as a banner. you are a fragment, an assembly. simulacrum. you don't make eye contact in mirrors, afraid the light will glance off and your true nature will flash back at you.

you hear them talk about it in their hushed, desperate whispers. sometimes they even admit it to your face; harsh and violent, acid thrown at christmas dinner. god, can you just fucking be normal again. you do not remember what normal is. you had to climb so far to get back here; you are far too exhausted. you want to open the glass door of your heart and show all the gears. can you help resolve whatever got messed up?

you try so, so hard. you came back for them. because you believed they would love you, even when you were so horribly broken. because you believed they would be patient. because you believed unconditional meant "without exception." you cannot do things the same way. you just get tired too quickly these days.

you want to put them on a couch and pour them the tea with hands that shake more than they remember. you want to line them up and draw them a map of where you have had to wander. you want to show every bruise in a backsplash; the little helpless ant of your soul carrying all that weight, over and over. you want to say: yes! it is different! but i did it for love!

you want to say: "i'm not the same, but i'm yours and i'm here. can that be enough?"

[give-me-the-ghost]

The tags are beautiful too. Not just the climb out, but the rise after. Healing is just as vital as survival.

[fuckingconversations]

The ‘branches’ comment reminded me of Bonsai.

See, "Bonsai” is a technique of pruning, trimming, shaping, controlling a tree to grow in a tiny pot, in a specific shape. It is supposed to mimic a full-sized tree.

But If you take a bonsai tree from its pot and stop pruning it, plant it in the ground - it may be shocked! It may die! It is used to carefully metered watering and feeding and attentive protection from the elements. 

Because “Bonsai” is the technique of controlling - it has nothing to do with the tree itself. It’s not a miniature tree. It’s a normal tree which has been controlled to stay small.

Every bonsai tree: if you plant it, if it lives through the shock - it will grow like any other tree. It will become massive, with deep-burrowing roots and wide-stretching branches. It will shed the shape it was pruned into and grow into the new environment it has.

I think it’s rather nice when a person can realize how much their current situation has pruned them down and twisted their shape, kept them small and contained.... and simply decide to lift their own roots up from the pot and plant them in deeper, richer soil. Somewhere with good food and space to see the sun through the canopy - where every microbe in the soil whispers: grow, grow! 

But your new roots could never fit back into your old pot.

[inkskinned]

you deserve a more tender tomorrow.

[inkskinned]

yes, even you. reading this, agreeing without applying, hands in front of your eyes. i’ll pass this on, you think, but it doesn’t apply to me.

i know because i have spent the last 2 weeks trying to say out loud: “i deserve good things.” i only get to “i deserve g-” and then i break out into a cold sweat. who am i to deserve anything? there are people out there suffering. there are people out there who need good things to happen. i don’t deserve anything. i am just a person. a filament. if a good thing was supposed to happen to me, i hope it passes over and happens to someone more - deserving.

but just because you can endure the present does not mean it should be something so painful.

you deserve a tender tomorrow for the same reason you deserve water, food, or air. you deserve it for the effort of survival. you are surviving, aren’t you? doesn’t it take a toll from you, staying here?

goodness and kindness and tenderness should not be a commodity; to be doled out in quantities. you should not feel that life exists as supply-and-demand - your happiness does not come at the cost of someone else. it does not take from some gallon of global happiness. it does not promise that a stranger will have an equally-tragic reaction to tip the scales back into balance.

there is just you, deserving. you didn’t have to earn it. there is no calculation of time-enjoyed versus time-spent-suffering.

trust me. you (yes, even you) deserve peace.

[ankle-beez]

my favorite tidbit about Kung Fu Panda is that China saw it and was like "how the fuck did we not think of this before"

[ankle-beez]

China: we love kung fu and we love pandas

America: *makes a film about a panda who learns kung fu*

China: WHAT THE FUCK

[wizardshark]

This triggered a resurgence in Chinese kung Fu movies that continues to this day btw

[urbanfantasyinspiration]

We owe Jack Black much

[what-iz-life]

Be so fucking proud of yourself for passing the hardest moments alone while everyone believed you were fine.

[remanence-of-love]

[flintpunks-mind]

A co-worker of mine was standing outside with me during a break from customers to share a cigarette with me, and told me about how he had lost his brother that he was close with some years ago. He told me about how they used to be in a band together with some friends, and how ever since he'd died, he hadn't played any music because he'd been too scared and anxious. I told him about how I'd lost my brother to suicide some years ago.

I went home and pulled out an old tiny wooden box my brother had given me before he'd died. I'd been using it to store guitar picks I'd collected over the years, including one guitar pick that used to be his. I haven't played the guitar since he'd died, my hands are too small to play some of the chords, so I play bass and piano instead.

I went to work the next day and gifted my brothers old guitar pick to my co-worker. I told him that it'd been sitting in a box for ten years unused, and would probably sit there for longer if I kept it there. Told him that I thought he deserved to have it, because I bet he could put it to better use than I ever would. Told him I didn't feel like it was coincidence that me and him would cross paths with each other in our lives, and that it seemed suiting that we had these similar experiences but split in two halves. That somehow, I felt like he was meant to have the guitar pick. I told him that I knew he'd not played guitar since his brother died, but that if he ever decided to play again one of these days, maybe he'd be able to honor both of our brothers by using that guitar pick.

He almost cried. He thanked me. Then he went home that night and for the first time in years he played the guitar.

I don't know what the meaning of life is or what my purpose is, but I do believe that love and human connection is one of the most important things in life. It's finding ways to tell strangers you love them and share experiences with others. I think it's all just about love.

[resqectable]

“Do not confuse my bad days as a sign of weakness. Those are actually the days I’m fighting the hardest.”

— Unknown

[resqectable]

“When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy.”

— Rumi

[ruhlare]

saying "i adore your mind and way of thinking" is like touching the texture of another one's naked being. it's way more deeper and intimitate than physical touchs. you travel into the mind of another soul, and cannot get out, you are stuck adoring all the rooms full of art. the skin is nothing but a wall you penetrate to surf on a soul level into the being of another soul until you are intertwined.

[wabisabic]

“i’m falling in love with your mind, baby, your beauty is a bonus, but the way you think is impeccable” — he said.

[remanence-of-love]

[brok3np4radise-deactivated20250]

You cannot make everyone think and feel as deeply as you do. This is your tragedy … because you understand them, and they do not understand you.

Daniel Saint

[afloweroutofstone]

Doing some deep reading into Cherokee history for the project that I'm working on and I am continually amazed how fucking funny old Cherokee leaders were