28.

[the-28th-year]

This portrait I took of my sister got singled out in a recent Booooooom submission, and it reminded me that when I am thoughtful about my work, I can make recognizably good work. I don’t want to forget that.

[the-28th-year]

The Ballad of the Sad Cafe and Other Extremely Sad and Lonely and Beautifully Heartwrenching Stories by Carson McCullers

Ok, so it’s not the real title, but it totally should be, because The Ballad of the Sad Cafe is full of twists and turns and excitement and intrigue and then every other story in this collection just casually slips in around your heart and squeezes until all of a sudden you’re holding your heart in your hand, wondering how it got there, that poor little blob of flesh, it feels so much, and you tear up on the subway thinking about how lonely people can be. 

[birdasaurus]

Sally Breer

[the-28th-year]

What are the things I want to accomplish in, and on, the 28th year?

I want to use this space better. I want to hold myself accountable to publishing a small book of my work. I want to document the process of Ordinary Magic (if that continues to be its title). 

I want to continue reading books and listening to music and posting quotes because I like that I am multi-faceted and enjoy all of these things. I like giving and getting recommendations for books. I like listening to new music and allowing myself to be moved. I like keeping quotations for a rainy day. I want to stop segmenting my life as if that will make it organized. I want to embrace the full mess. 

Maybe it’s not as messy as I thought.

[the-28th-year]

I am 28 years, 4 days, and 8-ish hours old.

It’s Christmas today, the first one I haven’t spent with my family. M and I are going to my parents’ house tomorrow, and we’re doing a “Christmas Eve” and “Christmas morning” there, so it’ll mostly feel like a normal Christmas. Just like how 28 feels mostly like a normal age to be.

It’s when I think about the future—getting married, having kids, owning a house—that 28 starts to feel less normal. 28 feels much closer to those things, but I don’t. I love M so much, and I’m so excited to be married to him (at some point) and have kids together (again, at some point), but I wonder when I will feel excited to have those things right now, in this moment. 

Maybe 29?

[the-28th-year]

If our love were externalized, it would be a river of puppies flowing into an ocean of fluff, ruled over by whales of kisses, and surrounded by onlookers vomiting.

nailed it.

[the-28th-year]

[the-28th-year]

Most women fight wars on two fronts, one for whatever the putative topic is and one simply for the right to speak, to have ideas, to be acknowledged to be in the possession of facts and truths, to have value, to be a human being.

Rebecca Solnit, Men Explain Things to Me

[the-28th-year]

When words become unclear, I shall focus with photographs. When images become inadequate, I shall be content with silence.

Ansel Adams

[the-28th-year]

[the-28th-year]

[the-28th-year]

Do I make waves in your body, love? Do you get high, is it just too much? When you get down and you feel my touch Everything stops, but do you go up?

[the-28th-year]

[min-ogi]

[the-28th-year]

[the-28th-year]

this is starting to feel like a goddamn anthem.

[the-28th-year]