pause. read. enjoy. move on.

this is my dumping place for things that flit through the air between my ears, and somehow spew through my fingers. sorry.

[noahther]

I remember being scared of moments of happiness because it was just something else to lose. Maybe it's better to forget.

[noahther]

"Everyone, at some point in their lives, wakes up in the middle of the night with the feeling that they are all alone in the world, and that nobody loves them now and that nobody will ever love them, and that they will never have a decent night’s sleep again and will spend their lives wandering blearily around a loveless landscape, hoping desperately that their circumstances will improve, but suspecting, in their heart of hearts, that they will remain unloved forever. The best thing to do in these circumstances is to wake somebody else up, so that they can feel this way, too."

- Lemony Snicket.

[noahther]

My sister flew with her husband to Wyoming so that they can drive their new soccer mom van sixteen hours back. They left me with their sick two year old son, my beautiful baby nephew. Goodness, he's so adorable. I spent the next two days continuously alternating arms so they could recover from carrying a toddler-sized puddle of warmth, judicially wiping his perpetually bubbly nose every time it leaked. I would manage to distract him for a couple hours before he would miss the fiercely maternal presence that is my sister. He directed me through tears to the nearest window where he pulled open a sliver of the blinds, and confidently babbled that Umma would be home soon. Well, he said "Umma", and I'm paraphrasing the rest. It calmed him, for five minutes of sweet relief, before he remembered that all was not right with the world and emptied his lungs with pure grief. He eventually cried himself to sleep, only waking up every single time I tried to lay him down. I tried several angles of attack, my whole body completely tensed to keep my movements slow and controlled. After many, many failures, I managed to get him horizontal and slowly scooched my arm from under his restless head. The shortest twenty minutes later, I bolted (maybe closer to "stumbled") off the couch and leapt into his room to scoop him up for another encore performance.

Eventually, I heard the sound of a brand new van pulling up on the driveway and excitedly turned to look at my beautiful baby nephew.

"Your umma's here!"

The unadulterated joy on his face was highly contagious. She scrambled with the handle and burst in with joy to match. Neither of us expected him to start crying.

Damn near broke my heart.

[noahther]

List of Heroes (In no particular order)

Grace Brewster Murray Hopper

Dale Schroeder

Arunachalam Muruganantham

Martin Luther King Jr

Gertrude Ederle

Witold Pilecki

Bartolomé de las Casas

Diana Wynne Jones

Richard Phillips Feynman

Fred McFeely Rogers

Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaulti de Galilei

William Henry Gates III

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

Augusta Ada King

Robert Smalls

Desmond Doss

Judit Polgár

John Brown

[noahther]

The irony of having difficulty recalling the word, “lethologica”. 

[noahther]

I’d rather remain as you remember me, instead of who I’ve become.

[noahther]

Ruin shook its head. "I keep trying to explain. This process we are engaged in, the end of all things--it's not a fight, but a culmination of inevitability. Can any man make a pocket watch that won't eventually wind down? Can you imagine a lantern that won't eventually burn out? All things end. Think of me as a caretaker--the one who watches the shop and makes certain that the lights are turned out, that everything is cleaned up, once closing time arrives."

Brandon Sanderson

[noahther]

Nowadays, there are no limits to what we can do, so we set no limits on what we can’t do.

[noahther]

Why Exploring Space And Investing In Research Is Non-Negotiable

If a former Nazi realized its importance nearly 50 years ago, perhaps we all can, too.

The reconciling of two passions is always beautiful.

[noahther]

I think some meals are sacred. And who you're eating with makes it sacred.

[noahther]

"I don't want any children," she said to her lover, several years her junior.

"Whoa, who said anything about children?" he said defensively.

"I was referring to you." she smoothly retorted back.

"Haha, she's a smart cookie," an audience member quips.

His girlfriend snuggles closer, "I like cookies."

[noahther]

All you really need to do in life is breathe and shit.

[noahther]

If they have to ask you twice, it means you didn't answer them well enough the first time.

[noahther]

You gotta be random, man. Normal is everybody else.

Carlos.

[noahther]

Ow, that hurt.

[noahther]

I wish it were as simple as boy likes girl likes boy. But things are always more complicated than that.

[noahther]

If you never do anything that nobody’s done, then you’ll only be better than nobody.