TKTC

Pie-bringer, pet-talker, garden-tender, and big hair enthusiast

[henryclervals]

we’re almost in the ‘20s and dadaism is thriving, europe’s in a shambles, everyone is broke and the right wing is on the rise so i guess we really don’t learn a goddamn thing huh

[brainstatic]

Kylo Ren really is a great example for how sci fi/fantasy writers should tailor their worlds to fit the times, so it could resonate with the actual audience reading them. There would be no point in making a Hitler villain anymore, because we’re not afraid of Hitler, we’re afraid of the 25-year-old malcontented white boy who fondles Hitler memorabilia while sulking in his room.

[plain-flavoured-english]

Somebody pointed out to me that the First Order aren’t coded as Nazis, they’re coded as neo-Nazis, which is worse, because these are people who looked at horrific historical atrocities with the benefit of hindsight and went, ‘Yes, that’s exactly what we should do again, but this time more’

People complaining that Starkiller Base is a rip-off of the Death Star and that Kylo Ren is a whiny emo fanboy don’t realize that this is exactly the point

[tktc]

Pop Pop is in the last stages of hospice at 98. Honeycat is ancient and too tiny at 18. But then there’s Lucy. And Lucy cures a lot.

[tktc]

We’re contemporaries. I’m 42. I have two children, whom I birthed in close succession in my mid-thirties. If a magic baby fairy had come to me when I was childless and 34 and promised to grant me another ten years of fertility and good knees so I could live a while longer in the serene, feline-focused, fabulously unfettered life I had, I’d have taken it in a flash. I, too, had spent my adult years assuming that someday, when it came to becoming a mother, I’d “just know.” I, too, placed myself on the leave-me-the-fuck-alone end on the “grand gradient of the human condition.” I decided to become pregnant when I did because I was nearing the final years of my fertility and because my desire to do this thing that everyone said was so profound was just barely stronger than my doubts about it were.

Cheryl Strayed with profound love and thanks to Liz who pulled out the perfect words at the perfect time, as is her custom. 

[hyggehaven-deactivated20200904]

I think the weirdest thing about having teenaged boys yell: “suck my dick bitch.” at me is that there’s nothing I can say to them that will make them feel the way that makes me feel.

I have lived my entire life with this threat of sexual violence hanging over my head: I’ve experienced it too. They’re hitting me where I live.

Women can’t threaten men with sexual violence and make men feel small and want to crawl out of their own skin; it’s taken a lifetime of violent socialisation just like this (men leering out of cars since I was 12, peers reaching between my legs in junior high, uncles getting too close, sports coaches grabbing my hips, being groped on transit, being sexually assaulted) to provoke this visceral reaction in me. Men haven’t experienced this constant background radiation of violation that contextualises moment like this.

I get well-intended messages from men: “I’m sorry you had to experience that.” “Those kids are jerks.” I do appreciate people reaching out. The thing is: in the context of my life experiences, this wasn’t even a particularly traumatic incident, so much as an illustrative one. It’s one of thousands of these moments.

I made me sad and a little contemplative, sure, but I’ll get by; feminism really helps with that, because it gives me this (almost) unshakable belief that I am human.

But I don’t want to hear: “those [particular] kids are jerks.”

I want to hear: “I’m not going to tolerate misogyny in my own life, and among my social circle. This stops now; it stops with me.”

There is no threat I can make to a man that will make him hate the fact he was born in the body he was born in. The second I start thinking I’m a person, someone reminds me that to them, I’m just a hole. I’m a bitch. I actually can’t make them see I’m a person. That has to come from other men.

As I get older, I get more and more angry when men I know are hostile to feminism. Because it means they aren’t really listening, or even caring, when I describe the reality of my life. Feminism is my refuge, and the sole source of my belief that I’m not deserving of the way I’m treated. It is the only movement that has dared to put forth the radical belief that women are people.

I don’t even want to hurt the men who do things like this. I just want them to be kind. Yeah, I can carry my knife, or get a big dog in self defense, but I actually don’t have a lust for vengeance or causing people pain. That’s really the worst part of it: being better – being more human, more forgiving, more kind – than them, and still losing.

[smitethestate]

This is one of those pieces of writing that just makes me want to scream and bang my head on the wall and cry and give the author a gigantic hug all at once thank you for articulating this so well.

[tktc]

Courtesy of Holst: Gun policy I can get behind.

[tktc]

Bump.

[tktc]

We had the nicest time with my parents in Galway.

[tktc]

Liz made spinach fettuccine for the first time tonight and is already better at it than I am. Which is both endearing and consistent.

[tktc]

When you miss lil sis. Was this a million years ago? Yes. Yes, it was.

[elesheva]

i know - i know - that this is some privileged white girl shit, but as the only little jewish girl in a class full of other privileged white kids, i was promised never again. promised! made to feel silly for my fear! i used to have to leave the room when we watched clips of documentaries. i would rather stand in the hallway by myself, thanks, no, i know everyone is going to watch me walk out and know why. and then i grew up and learned about ICE raids and what the police are really like and i am trying my goddamn hardest to fix those things, i promise, i’m so sorry, i’m trying, but the one fucking thing i thought we could all agree on was nazis! why is it always one step forward ten steps back with this festering shithole of a country i still love! never again means never again for anybody!!

[tktc]

I've been so gone but I will want these here later. I keep talking about taking Martin 'home' for the first time, to the Cape, this week. But I already did take him to the first home I made for myself. Chicago in March, when it did not stop raining and it was cold and awful the whole week through. As if proving the point that no one lives in Chicago for 11 years because of the weather. All my friends, their children, our favorite places, and the home that belongs to someone else now. What a wonderful trip.

Edited to add a dedication to the pitchers of lunchtime mezcal margaritas at Big Star for my insane eyebrows at Hamilton later that evening.

[tktc]

A reminder to myself that while I’m pretty stoked to be laying my 27th year to rest, I could not be happier about the people I get the bring into my 28th.

It was my turn to make dinner for the girls tonight. KP ran to my house and just rinsed off when she got here, proceeding to smell all the different herbs I’d clipped for our pasta. Gina, Bec and Joner arrived and everybody immediately launches into stories between bites and goes just like that for hours.

By the time they’re buttoning up to go, I decide I don’t want to wait and open the superbly taped up box from my parents by myself (I routinely bring boxes over to Molly’s to unwrap, even if I know what it is. No idea why).

I will have to take a picture in the morning of what was in the box. My mom kept saying on the phone “it’s just something little.” It may be one of the best presents I’ve gotten. I can be a tough girl to surprise. I love to be on the planning end, a product of my father’s always “having something up his sleeve.” But I’m nosy and a busybody on top of it and I just love to know exactly what’s going on.

In the box was a beautiful ceramic platter I’d seen over the holidays in one of those thrift/antique stores that feels like walking into a treasure chest- Sarasota Trading Company. It wasn’t a super pricey thing but it was just after the holidays and you know how that goes. I fell for an old wooden bar 5 minutes later and just left it at that.

But she went back for it. Carted it all the way from Florida to Massachusetts when they made their migration. Packed it up in bubble wrap and got it to Chicago before I go out of town again tomorrow. That makes it the absolute best kind of present.

The girls left and of course I raced straight over to Molly’s with my treasure and the leftover strawberry amaretti parfait. The luckiest.

[tktc]

I was looking for an old funfetti cake recipe in the archives and found this instead. Six years ago and this platter is still the centerpiece of every gathering and is with me, still somehow unscathed in England. I haven’t been keeping up over here but I should be. I love finding things like this years later.

[archivesofamericanart]

Hello Women’s History Month.

This letter is from painter and activist Nancy Spero (1926-2009) to critic and activist Lucy R. Lippard (b. 1937), October, 29, 1971. Find it in the Lucy R. Lippard papers, http://s.si.edu/2lTFSll and also browse the Nancy Spero papers, http://s.si.edu/2mdxKgy.

[lauraolin]

always reblog

[tktc]

Yes, Lucy. They sure fucking will be.

[tktc]

We had a housewarming party with a lot of bo ssam, Martin made me chocolate chip banana pancakes, I celebrated pancake day on my own, kimchi fried rice and Korean beef lettuce wraps are excellent ways to use leftover condiments, and Lucy's very existence still runs our lives in a very sweet way.

[tktc]

At two days old, Lucy Langsen is already a woman of her time.

[tktc]

I am getting next to nothing done. Unless identifying Lucy's facial features on a per family basis counts. I'm ACING that one.

[tktc]

Lucy Langsen is here and she is absolutely perfect.

[tktc]

I am waiting for my friend

Erica (my sisterfriend/sister-in-law) is in labor. 

I’ve been anticipating this day since she found out she was pregnant. On my birthday. On their first day in London. When Matt and E found out they were having a girl, I cried in the middle of the office. 

I keep squinting my eyes and thinking I can send them strength and calm in what was always going to be an INSANE day. I’m barely doing anything else. 

My mobile has the sound turned on for probably the first time this year. I think I may be a mom at some point and I’m sure that would be wonderful...but I was born to be an aunt. Today is the day my brother becomes a dad.  She’s coming and I can’t wait.