When I was in grade school I used to send emails to biologists and zoologists asking them questions to get answers to include in school projects I was working on, and would cry when they did not respond because I thought I was stupid for thinking that some random kid would ever be deserving of a response from someone who does something as smart and cool and important as *checks notes* studies frog fungus.
Now, at 29, Iâm lowkey having a panic attack because my academic email is filled with middle schoolers wanting me to answer their questions about pygmy raccoons and I keep putting off answering them because Iâm so overwhelmed with all the other raccoon stuff I have to do.
Anyway, greatest apologies to any scientist I ever emailed as a child and also an adult.
was at the corner store getting a few snacks and a 7 year old with a single packet of two poptarts struck up a conversation with me while I was choosing between Chex mix flavors. weighed in on the flavors. They continued ďżźto follow me through the store all the way to checkout and stood there talking to me at the register so the cashier thought they were my kid and I finally said âare you possibly hoping for someone to buy those poptartsâ and they pulled out a WAD of cash and said ânope just talking to ya.â
crazy how i find myself thinking i've got a handle on it all finally and then i see the ways that other people tangle their lives together so easily and live so easily together with their friends and i feel like that girl at the top of the stairs painting by norman rockwell
New Pokemon character idea: old women NPC on a bench feeding Pidgey. Upon trying to talk to her you are instantly thrown into a battle where she has a team comprised entirely of level 100 early-route birds all holding leftovers
there's also this cycle that keeps disabled people isolated socially:
my needs are higher than it is socially appropriate to ask someone to meet when you dont know them well -> i don't know the people running any given organization or program or class at all; i am a stranger to them -> asking for what i need is punished bc it is seen as rude, bossy, or entitled -> this is so aversive to me that i simply stop trying to participate in anything.
like
we've all been there! this physical and social isolation is IMPOSED BY ABLEISM
âI want you to do this with me for one month. One month. Write 10 observations a week and by the end of four weeks, you will have an answer. Because when someone writes about the rustic gutter and the water pouring through it onto the muddy grass, the real pours into the room. And itâs thrilling. Weâre all enlivened by it. We donât have to find more than the rustic gutter and the muddy grass and the pouring cold water.â
â Marie Howe, Boston Universityâs 2016 Theopoetics Conference (via mothersofmyheart)
I ask my students every week to write 10 observations of the actual world. Itâs very hard for them.
Ms. Tippett:
Really?
Ms. Howe:
They really find it hard.
Ms. Tippett:
What do you mean? What is the assignment? 10 observations of their actual world?
Ms. Howe:
Just tell me what you saw this morning like in two lines. I saw a water glass on a brown tablecloth, and the light came through it in three places. No metaphor. And to resist metaphor is very difficult because you have to actually endure the thing itself, which hurts us for some reason.
Ms. Tippett:
It does.
Ms. Howe:
It hurts us.
Ms. Tippett:
You naming something.
Ms. Howe:
We want to say, âIt was like this; it was like that.â We want to look away. And to be with a glass of water or to be with anything â and then they say, âWell, thereâs nothing important enough.â And thatâs whole thing. Itâs the point.
Ms. Howe:
Itâs the this, right?
Ms. Howe:
Right, the this, whatever. And then they say, âOh, I saw a lot of people who really wantâ â and, âNo, no, no. No abstractions, no interpretations.â But then this amazing thing happens, Krista. The fourth week or so, they come in and clinkety, clank, clank, clank, onto the table pours all this stuff. And it so thrilling. I mean, it is thrilling. Everybody can feel it. Everyone is just like, âWow.â The slice of apple, and then that gleam of the knife, and the sound of the trashcan closing, and the maple tree outside, and the blue jay. I mean, it almost comes clanking into the room. And itâs just amazing.
Ms. Tippett:
In some basic level, what theyâve done is just engage with their senses.
Ms. Howe:
Yeah, and have been present out of their minds and just noticing whatâs around them, which is â we donât do. And again, not to compare it to anything. Theyâre not allowed. And thatâs very hard for them. And then on the fifth or sixth week, I say, âOK, use metaphors.â And they donât want to. They donât know how. Theyâre like, âWhy would I? Why would I compare that to anything when itâs itself?â Exactly. Good question.
So then you think, why the necessity of a metaphor? Why do you have to use a metaphor now? Not just to do it to avoid it, but to do it to make it more there. And itâs very interesting.
The words and silences we live by. The rituals that sustain us. The poetry of ordinary time.
I view reading fantasy/sci-fi stuff as "this work of fiction is being translated into english so that I can understand it, meaning some phrases should not be taken literally" lord of the rings style, and then I meet people who nitpick every word or phrase that "shouldn't exist in this story" and I'm like wow you guys are truly miserable and unimaginative. and also you tend to assume that english words all popped up in the 19th century and you never bother to check the etymology of the words you're claiming "shouldn't exist in this universe"
like sorry but in an apocalyptic alternate-universe earth, the phrase "train of thought" is plausible even in a world without locomotives, because the word "train" comes from the 14th century, and it meant "to drag"
that's why we call dress trains "trains". because they drag. the word wasn't invented for locomotives.
y'all say shit so definitively like idk man I think it depends. the english language is OLD AS FUCK. a lot of words you believe are modern just aren't
amandla
yousharknotpass
stormborns
blakekathryn
ellievsbear
vaporwave
gracieabrams
