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@langlif-saga
Someday your hands will be old and wrinkled, the skin spotted and bunching over your knuckles. And a child will watch you make something. It's a simple task, you'll have done it a thousand times before. But to that child, the smooth, confident way your hands move will seem like impossible magic. You have to keep living.
prev these tags have me crying. this is absolutely what it's all about
my dad bought a cnc and is going wild
Artist: Tim Brierley
Posting this for my soul cat Kenzie (she passed a few years ago but I still think of her every single day) and for everyone else who has lost someone they love. ❤️
Most experiences are unsayable; they become real to us in a space no word has entered.
Rainer Maria Rilke, from Letters to a Young Poet (tr. Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy)
Love, grief, and magic in the mundane
1- @Bluewmist on Twitter / 2- Roly Poly is Taken on Twitter / 3- About Time (2012) by Richard Curtis, image from Mita Park on Unsplash / 4- Sherri Turner on Twitter / 5- Cold Solace by Anna Belle Kaufman / 6- The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green
whenever I see archeological remains of a human who suffered from a terrible disease that couldn’t be treated in their lifetime but could be fixed now, this wave of sorrow and mourning washes over me. a woman in the 14th century who spent her 35 years of life bent at the waist because of congenital scoliosis. a man from the 18th century who died because of a non cancerous mass on his jaw that made eating progressively more difficult. remains of a woman from the Neolithic who died in childbirth having evidence of peri-mortem trepanation on her skull.
and yet she survived to 35. and yet the physicians in his time tried to strengthen his jaw. and yet someone 4,000 years ago tried to save someone they loved from dying of preeclampsia/increased cranial pressure. we tried. we tried and we tried and we tried. we failed and we learned but we tried. that’s what makes humans so beautiful.
My mom sometimes talks about a child in her neighborhood who was born with hydrocephaly and died of it. His parents strove to keep him alive for years, but he ultimately passed after a long decline. No treatment available. No hope at all, and the parents knew it from his birth.
Several decades later my sister had an MRI, as a long shot, to try to figure out why she was sick and deteriorating with a number of symptoms that were close to being written off as anxiety. She was sent straight to the hospital for adult onset hydrocephaly. Two days later she had brain surgery to put a shunt down her neck into her stomach and drain the fluid out. (No, you cannot usually get brain surgery that fast. Yes, it was that urgent.) Recovery was long and squiggly but it happened.
I think of that boy every once in a while. The one who died. I have no doubt that treatments developed for people like him, and tested on people like him, saved my sister's life.
He never knew he made the world better. His condition was severe, he never knew much of anything, I don't think. I think if I ever track down a God or something like one, that'll be somewhere on my List of Wishes. To make sure people like him know that they helped.
I think about this a lot.
I've been type 1 diabetic since I was about one and a half, and was incredibly sick. If my mother hadn't also been type 1 and recognized the signs I likely would have died.
I was born in 1982. Insulin was first given to a patient in 1922, and he survived. Before that, type 1 meant death, often very slow and agonizing. Before insulin, doctors advised a super strict "keto" diet to prolong life, and it could work for awhile - up to a year, I believe. But it was a miserable existence as the body was literally eating itself as the blood turned acidic until the patient eventually died.
60 years. Only 60 years before my birth did that procedure work for the first time. That's absolutely nothing given the span of human history and I think a lot about the people who died from it throughout time.
But yes, people tried. Healers and doctors of all sorts tried all manner of things to allow these (mostly!) kids to live. The fact that it was accomplished at all is nothing short of a miracle. The fact that I've been alive 42 years is fucking insane considering my body doesn't produce a hormone necessary for survival. If you think that doesn't blow me away on a regular basis you have another think coming. It's nothing short of a miracle.
Every medical advancement is. The amount of work that goes into it and the vast amount of luck necessary to get it right even when all the research and information is sound is just astonishing.
Thank you, humanity. Thank you ingenuity and determination to save lives and make them better. Thank you to every medical practitioner and medical researcher in existence now and through all of time. Thank you to all the people who died so I could live.
Diabetes is one of these illnesses that really throws medical history into perspective. It's so common, everyone knows someone who has it, people live pretty normal lives with it. And yet, a hundred years ago, it was an instant death sentence. And then we were able to treat people with insulin and yet - it was extremely disabling. The insulin was extracted from animal pancreas had severe side effects, even with how similar the hormones are, there is always an averse reaction to proteins from foreign species, especially during long-term treatment. Injections had to be given every few hours, at-home-tests were only available from the 70s onwards. Insulin pumps entered the market in the 80s. Genetically produced insulin - humanized insulin - was first available in the US in 1982, in many countries only around the year 2000.
In 1930, having diabetes type I would basically mean being hospital bound, being woken every few hours for regular injections.
In 1965, you'd be able to live at home and get by with a very strict diet and a few timed injections. You'd struggle with chronical side effects. Having children wasn't done - passing on your genes would be immoral, and it might not even be legal for you to marry.
In the year 2000, you'd have a device clipped to your belt that would measure your blood sugar and distribute insulin, you only need to change the needle a few times a day. You might even be allowed to join in P.E. class
In 2025, you stick on two patches that do the same thing. They're synchronized through your phone.
That wasn't fate. It's not natural development that made diabetes a common chronic illness. It was hundreds of people who cared. It was the people who created the keto diet. It was the people who came up with tests. The ones who went through different species, trying to figure out the closest analogon to human insulin. It was the people who fought in court to get genetically produced insulin approved for medical use. It was people who looked at a rare, incurable disease and said "but what if it wasn't?"
Our Lady of the Ozarks, The Virgin of the Smile
—a pilgrimage site in rural Crawford County, Arkansas, located south of Winslow. It is nationally notable as the first US shrine dedicated to the Virgin of the Smile, a devotion tied to St. Thérèse of Lisieux.
The “Virgin of the Smile” honors the statue that miraculously smiled at a 10-year-old St. Thérèse of Lisieux, curing her of a severe illness in 1883.
Built as a “mountain resort mission” to attract pilgrims, it is Arkansas’s only shrine dedicated to this specific title of Mary.
In Catholic iconography, the snake beneath Mary's feet represents Satan, sin, and evil. This imagery comes from Genesis 3:15, where God tells the serpent that the woman's offspring will crush its head. It symbolizes Mary’s role as the "New Eve." Unlike the first Eve who yielded to temptation, Mary’s obedience to God helped defeat evil. The snake is wrapped around a globe, showing that sin affects the whole world. Mary stepping on it signifies Christ's victory over evil encompassing the earth.
The crown of stars represents Mary's heavenly royalty and her role as Queen of Heaven. This imagery comes from the Book of Revelation 12:1, which describes "a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars." The number twelve symbolizes the twelve tribes of Israel and the twelve Apostles. It represents the entire Church united. It highlights her victory in heaven and her status as the Mother of the King of Kings.
The smile on this statue represents maternal tenderness, healing grace, and divine comfort. It shifts the focus from Mary as a distant queen to Mary as a loving mother. It has symbolizes God's mercy breaking through human suffering and despair. It conveys a message of peace, reassuring the faithful that they are loved and protected. In St. Thérèse's life, the smile was the specific vehicle of her physical and emotional healing. It reflects the Catholic belief that supernatural joy can coexist with deep earthly trials.
We started the traditional Marian pilgrimage month of May visiting Our Lady of Perpetual Help, St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Altus, Arkansas and ended the month here today.
Our Lady of Perpetual Help is the centerpiece on the rosary I inherited from my Grandma and the icon in the little shrine on my altar. Today was also tied to Grandma as I passed this shrine on old highway 71 in the Ozarks hundreds of times over the years to visit Gran—who was named for Mary and whose sister was named for St. Thérèse.
The Novena to Our Lady of the Smile is a traditional nine-day prayer particularly invoked for healing from depression, anxiety, panic attacks, and severe emotional or physical illnesses.
Main Novena Prayer
Gentle Virgin Mary, Mother of God and our Mother,you turned your gaze toward St. Thérèse with a miraculous smile,curing her instantly of her deep depression and suffering.
Look upon me now with that same motherly tenderness. See the sorrows, anxieties, and trials that weigh heavily upon my heart.
Bring your healing smile into the dark areas of my soul,and scatter the clouds of despair with your radiant peace.
(State your specific intention here)
Obtain for me from your Divine Son the grace of healing, a spirit of invincible hope, and a deep trust in God’s love. Help me, like St. Thérèse, to follow the "Little Way" of love and trust, so that I may always rejoice in the light of your smile.
Amen.
Daily Closing Prayers
After the main prayer, pray the following to conclude each day:
Our Father
Our Father, who art in heaven,hallowed be thy name; thy kingdom come; thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us; and lead us not into temptation,but deliver us from evil. Amen.
Hail Mary
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen.
Glory Be
Glory be to the Father,and to the Son,and to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
Invocations:
"Our Lady of the Smile, pray for us."
"St. Thérèse of Lisieux, pray for us."
Includes bibliographical references (p. 289-295) and indexes
Annunciation by Kyriak Kostandi, 1910
Grief is really just love. It's all the love you want to give, but cannot. All that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go
— Jamie Anderson
Rozhanytsia cave, also known as Divocha or Maidens’ cave. Lviv region of Ukraine by the town of Iliv, a site of discovery of Medieval pagan worship.
im watching a little doc on youtube about an 11th century castle, and theres a bit where they are talking to a group of older women who are working on a large hand embroidered tapestry commemorating its nearly 1000 years of history & into the modern era.. and off on the border they show a bit where the women have stitched themselves working on it into the piece itself, and it made me kinda emotional
how amazing to have a visual depiction of the women who spent literal years painstakingly stitching such a wonderful piece of art that historically would have gone uncredited
"In the same way that your heart feels and your mind thinks, you, mortal beings, are the instrument by which the universe cares. If you choose to care, then the universe cares. If you don't, then it doesn't." -- Brennan Lee Mulligan, D20, Fantasy High
agridulceart
I think my favorite depictions of Mary are the ones in which she’s laying into demons like nobody’s business
Like yes queen, kick his ass
EDMUND DULAC (1882-1953), ANNUNCIATION
Studies show that engaging in ritualized behavior significantly improves outcomes on measures of grief and feelings of control, even when the person participating in the ritual has little or no belief in the ritual’s power. Just a reminder for no one in particular.
Research has revealed that, while rituals are universal across human cultures, the content and actions of those rituals vary widely even when they have the same intended purpose. This suggests that it is not the actions that matter, but that you are taking any action at all and naming it ritual. It can be an elaborate ritual with dozens of moving parts and participants, or it can be as simple as lighting a candle alone with the intent to remember someone.
The healing is in the doing.
There are real benefits to rituals, religious or otherwise
PDF | Taking “Guozhuang worship”, a traditional ritual of Pumi people in China, as an example, this study explored the effects of ritual act
