Xuebing Du
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will byers stan first human second
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PUT YOUR BEARD IN MY MOUTH
Aqua Utopia｜海の底で記憶を紡ぐ
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2025 on Tumblr: Trends That Defined the Year
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he wasn't even looking at me and he found me
Today's Document
izzy's playlists!
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@perfectlycuratedprincess
don’t abandon joy because it is brief. don’t commit to solitude because happiness is fleeting. it’s okay that good things do not last forever. it’s okay to simply enjoy a thing for as long as you have it.
^ relevant art by @catcrumb that legitimately rewired my brain
You do not have nine lives. You have one body, one timeline, one set of years that will not be returned to you for revision. The elderly people who say they thought they would live forever are not being poetic. They are describing a very specific and very common failure of the human imagination to make the future feel as real and as urgent as the present. Your future self is a real person who will live in the body and the circumstances and the consequences of the decisions you are making right now. She deserves better than to inherit the results of your present comfort and present avoidance.
"A marriage ending isn't a failure at all. I spent eleven years with her. We were so in love that we couldn't image life apart from each other. We got our own place, adopted a dog, and supported each other through school. I thought if tow people loved each other enough the rest would fall into place, except... love isn't everything.
And I didn't want to believe that, but we were sitting in counseling one day, talking about our future and I realized we were describing two completely different lives. Where we'd live, what kind of life we wanted, what made us happy. And it hit me that- I love this woman and this woman loved me. And after eleven years of loss, grief, career changes, we were so deeply in love... but we weren't aligned. And I kept thinking 'We just need to try harder. We can find some compromise to make this work,' because that's what you're supposed to do when you love someone, right?
But the reality was, we had just become different people. Her trade school took her in one direction, my graduate degree in another and trying to force us back into who we were five years ago wasn't coming from a place of love. It was coming from a place of fear. Fear that, if this ended, it meant we wasted eleven years. But sitting there across from her, I realized: That's not how love works.
Those eleven years happened. They were real. The dog, our home, showing up for each other through grad school and trade school. I wouldn't change a single thing because loving someone doesn't mean you're meant to stay with them forever. And letting go doesn't erase what you had. We measure marriage by whether it lasts forever or not, but what if we measured it by whether it mattered?
What if we measured it by the love we gave, the life we built, and the people we became? Because love's job isn't to last forever, it's to help you become fully completely yourself, and sometimes the most loving thing you can do is give each other permission to be yourselves, separately. But the dog doesn't know were' divorced. He just gets two Christmases now."
Pulled this from this guy Preston Rakovsky's Instagram (@prestonrack) because it is a beautiful perspective on love, marriage, and relationships in general.
Elena Wuest (German, b. 1977) ‘Beyond’, 2025 Oil on canvas, 80 x 60cm
Honoring the promises you made for yourself feels like such a high
I hope you okay
if you're sad just remember in how many different ways you can eat potatoes. you're welcome
I feel like in the rush of “throw out etiquette who cares what fork you use or who gets introduced first” we actually lost a lot of social scripts that the younger generations are floundering without.
A lot of tough situations where we now feel like we “don’t know what to do or say” had social scripts just a couple of generations ago and they might have been canned phrases or robotic actions but they could still be meant sincerely and unfortunately we haven’t replaced them with any more sincere or easier new script.
a lot of people are giving examples in the notes of things they just find annoying like not using headphones in public, but OP is talking about actual literal scripts of things to say in awkward situations
if you have a date or two with someone and you don't see a relationship developing? most millennials / gen Zers just end up ghosting. but a social script that might have been taught and rehearsed in the past could be:
"I really appreciated getting dinner with you the other night and I enjoyed your company, but I'm afraid I didn't feel a spark. I wish you the best, and hope you find that special someone!"
like it sounds kind of trite but it was at least something to say and it can still be meant with kind sincerity. it also communicates in 2 sentences that you don't want to see them romantically again, but there aren't any hard feelings about that. that's it!!! that's all it takes!!!
Another example is that at parties a lot of people talk about how awkward it is to mingle or talk to people they dont know. But at old timey parties that was traditionally the HOST'S job, and there was a specific scripted way of doing it that eased the process! The host would bring you in, introduce you and maybe even a little bit about you like what you did for a living, and then guide you to a group you could talk to. They didn't just let you in the door and then ditch you to fend for yourself in a sea of strangers. That would be unthinkable and no one would be surprised if a get-together like that wound up being awkward.
I still do the party-host thing and yall can, too! (Thanks Mad Men for teaching me a lot of outmoded social scripts... no really tho)
Remember things about your friends! Ask people about their weekends, hobbies, holidays, studies, and jobs! Listen for the concerns people have and what they are working on! Draw connections between one person and another to get the ball rolling. "Oh, Maura, you just got your first cat! You should talk to Felix, he used to work at a rescue. Felix, please tell Maura all the new-cat-guardian pointers."
"Bill, Sheila, Xan, this is my friend Kale. Kale is really into Star Trek, Bill you and them should talk about it!"
Orrr whatever! After you make the introduction and draw the connection you just float on into the next interaction with someone else at the function. Just listen, care about your friends, get our of your own head, and think of how you can bring other people together and you will feel 100% less awkward.
hi i am so excited about this post because i have posted this exact thing MANY times on here, often in the specific context of how formal etiquette is so useful for autistic people especially, but also for everyone. even if you come off a little bit formal, which you will sometimes, having Old School Manners (or just knowing what they are) for various common scenarios is like having a magic ticket that will just sail you through all kinds of social iinteractions, gatekeeping, social weirdness, and as is pointed out in the above posts about introducing people to each other, can make you into a really valuable and helpful person for an entire gathering or group of people.
i also want to point out that knowing what the polite thing to do in all situations makes you a lot more effective at being rude and obnoxious when the situation calls for it, which is also a valuable and necessary adult skill
#things to write#but also#things to do#I could certainly benefit from a manual...
If you're looking for a manual on these sorts of things; social etiquette, social scripts, how to handle difficult and/or awkward social situations, etc. then I highly recommend picking up any book by Miss Manners. Her books really are the gold standard for learning the types of skills this post is talking about. I should also mention that Miss Manners is witty and hilarious so her books are also fun to read.
The best book by Miss Manners to get started with would be Miss Manner's Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behavior. This one is probably the best starting point because it gives the best overview of all the basics.
If you're the type who likes to listen to podcasts, I recommend checking out "Were You Raised By Wolves?" and/or "Awesome Etiquette". Both are also great tools for learning the type of social skills this post is talking about. I'm personally a fan of "Were You Raised By Wolves?" because not only are they pretty funny and informative, they also bother to try to teach the underlying social intelligence behind various manners and social etiquette so that you can have the skills to solve social dilemmas on your own. However, "Awesome Etiquette" is also pretty fun and informative.
#long post#I feel like 'i dont do small talk nobody cares about the weather' had a negative impact on social interaction#I mean yeah sometimes small talk about nothing gets awkward. but often it leads to the most interesting conversations#just asking 'what kind of music do you listen to at the gym' or 'have you read any books lately' could be such a lovely subject#I'm sometimes socially awkward despite being a huge extrovert. that's why etiquette is such a great thing#if you don't know how to act around people just stick to the etiquette rules. if they have a problem with it they're not for me anyways
Sorry @darlingdear but I couldn't let this stay in the tags.
I say this as someone who is neurodivergent had grew up very socially awkward, but recently I find the "screw small talk, I wanna get to know the REAL you" attitude to be pretentious as well as a demonstration of a lack of boundaries.
But also, I think a lot of people who have this attitude don't actually really know what does qualify as small talk. The definition of small talk is any topic that's of no real consequence and includes topics like food, pets, sports, music, whatever show you're currently streaming, whatever book you're currently reading, and yes, the weather. A lot of people who have this "I hate small talk / I don't do small talk" attitude probably think it's only reciting a bunch of secret scripts about the weather, and don't realize how much they engage in small talk whenever they talk about their pets or their favorite foods or the really cool show they're watching right now.
Small talk is just about boundaries and getting to know someone *before* you move into more serious and personal topics. The older I get the more I learn you really can't just trust anyone with more serious and personal subjects. Small talk first is important to gauge if they're someone safe and trustworthy first before moving into more serious and personal subjects. If you really genuinely refuse to get to know someone before immediately discussing serious and personal subjects you may have an issue with boundaries and should consider working on that.
Oh my god, so much the last point. All of them, but especially the last.
Small talk is a way of sounding out a person’s attitudes. It’s about finding out if they’re a rabid asshole or someone you want to spend more time with.
I had a professor who got angry at a group of (mostly women), from five countries, all of whom met yesterday, for talking about daytime TV. He basically insulted us and called us shallow.
Dude, we were figuring each other out with a safe topic! We were the best of friends three weeks later. We could broach harder topics because we understood each other’s boundaries better. If you immediately demand people bare their souls, you’re not likely to get them to be honest.
Hanging out with retirees will make you so much more comfy in social situations!
Inter-generational friendships are really important for learning social skills, cause the old folks are skilled in the social skills
i like the additions here, but i feel like something from the OP has been glossed over. What fork you used used? That stuff, specifically, also had social scripts attached that helps the host or staff to communicate back and forth with the guest in a way that does not interfere with conversations the guests may be having amongst themselves
Place settings too -- when you sat at a table as a guest, you could look at the setting and know what the dinner was going to be like, whether there would be soup or salad or both, if there would be desert, whether it would be red meat or fish. You could, simply by looking at the setting in front of you, know not to accept a second glass of white wine because a red wine would be served with the entree
these are not pretentious rules meant to exclude people or set them up for judgement, but social standards meant to help both guests and hosts. Indeed, the simple rule for usage of the various silverware is usually, depending on region and period, either from the center outward, or from the outside toward the center, and the host is responsible for making sure the silverware is laid out in the correct order for the courses that are being served.
So you can see in the first place setting pic, you will probably be served tea as you sit -- perhaps you will chat a while with the other guests over a mug with some bread and butter to nibble before receiving your first course.
Whereas in the second place setting, you can infer that you will have appetizers served first, likely soon after sitting, but then have an opportunity to take a break from eating and chat over a cup of tea before the main course is served.
All of this is great, and I'm going to add one (including my modern take on it that's worked very well for me): introduction order.
Traditionally, you introduced the "more important" person first. "Principal Smith, this is Catherine Jones. She's the librarian at Brown Elementary. Mrs. Jones, Principal Smith. He'll be taking over Washington High this year." Smith is technically higher on the command chain than Jones, so he goes first.
Now I still find that useful in work situations, but at least in the US where we often don't have delineated class boundaries, what to do?
I go by personal familiarity.
"Roommate Of Ten Years, this is Friend Of Three Years! She's just gotten into Hobby You Also Have. FOTY, this is ROTY! She Makes Fun Things."
It means I always know who's going first, and each of them now has 1) a conversational topic and 2) a memory hook to make the name easier to remember.
May I draw your attention to the bread knife, and also the butter knife (not shown)? The idea is to convey the butter to the bread without any of the bread getting to the butter. Nobody likes somebody else's bread crumbs in their butter, of course, but you know what else that's really good for? Making sure people who can't eat gluten foods can still use the same butter as everyone else without cross-contamination.
Frank Cadogan Cowper - "The Beautiful Lady Without Mercy" (1926)
daniella jones
Carrie Fisher / on location in Norway during production of Irvin Kershner’s The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
