Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), Poem 85 From “The Gardener”, 1914 Translated By The Author From

this will be the year I finally convince everyone to abandon New Year's resolutions in favour of Yule Boasting, the clearly superior tradition

Of course I'll be fine

I'm good on my own

An appartement that's all mine

Decorating however I want, as whimsical as I please

No screaming at 3 am

And I'm safe. The mess is mine. But so is the tidiness. I don't have to leave. This is mine. I'll protect it, and anyone that needs a small haven is welcome. Hot chocolate and cookies will always be here waiting. Such as a couch and a blanket. I can let people stay. No one to ask for permission to be kind and soft and to host a dinner.

A work that I am so excited about. In a region I already love. Discovering myself again. Reinventing myself and getting a third shot at life.

I couldn't be more excited.

But leaving... leaving everything is fine.

But him.

Yet I can't hold on. He isn't mine. And I am not settling. If I can have his friendship. And that's all. I'll always be grateful for that. For it shows me what I want. Even if I am forever looking for him. At least I know what I search for. If my heart is breaking, watching him live his life. That's alright. For I get to witness it. And perhaps, help the happiness along a little.

I know I am fine on my own. Yet I can't imagine being without him. Even now, without having actually had him entertwined in my life.

How do I leave a love so strong. Without giving it a chance. This gift the universe gave me, and I have no choice but to throw it away. How will I stand alone, when I know his quiet strength as it is behind me.

I know how to leave everything and everyone

But him

Well damn

Ottessa Moshfegh, from My Year of Rest and Relaxation

I was talking to a coworker recently and offhandedly said I wasn’t exactly competent at a lot of things. He reared back in obvious visceral disagreement that made me stop midsentence.

“What do you mean you’re not competent?”

“I guess I mean compared to the people I’m surrounded by? I’m not very handy, I guess.”

He looked baffled.

I tried to illuminate with a story. So at the sex shop we needed to vacuum every night, right? But one time after my days off I could tell the carpets hadn’t been vacuumed since I last saw them. I asked the other girls why not. It turned out that the screw that held the handle on the vacuum had been stripped and it wouldn’t stay in. Why was that down to a single screw? Bad design.

So any attempt to vacuum meant the handle just popped off when the screw jumped ship. I looked over the vacuum. I found a junk drawer. I found the biggest screw I could that still fit in the hole wrapped it in tape to bulk it out. Then I shoved/screwed it in place. Then I duct taped the opening so that fucker couldn’t pop out. Voila, a working handle.

The other girls were utterly delighted that I’d fixed the vacuum but I was painfully aware that my solution was neither elegant nor long term.

My coworker listened. Finally he said, “I think being competent just means you have the ability to learn a skill you lack, and you can do that. Your solution worked, and you were the one that tried to fix the problem.”

I digested that and agreed, but admitted any new skill learned would prompt me to be a huge baby about it.

Mr Darcy is so fucking unsubtle all of the time I truly don't understand how Elizabeth doesn't get it. Someone mentions Elizabeth likes books? Darcy immediately goes into a rant about how he wants a wife that reads. Elizabeth says she wants to live close to her family? Darcy is bending over backwards to figure out how far is too far, would she mind it if she could easily travel back at forth, would she miss the people or the places. My girl he's so down bad, he's just autistic.

Sometimes love isn't grand gestures or daily phone calls

Sometimes love is when my mother comes home from visiting family 7 hours away. Where I couldn't go. Because, because car ride are too much and I'm sick.

She comes home and tells me of my whole family crying about me when they were leaving. Wishing they could do something

Maybe love is when my cousin gifts me fabric and patterns because she knows I love sewing. Even if I can't right now.

Perhaps love is my aunt gifting me rolls of leather and upholstery fabric and 3 kilos of cherries for the same reason.

Love might be another cousin crying, wishing my mother to tell me she thinks about me every day but doesn't have the words.

These people, my blood, that never felt like family or close. That are so far away in the world and in life.

Perhaps life is in those small moments. And way more people care for you than you think. Even if you have no clue. And thought they'd abandoned you long ago.

Another good thing to come from this bummshit journey :)

People care, we are all just as awkward and lost for words. Give others the grace to be as awkward as you think yourself to be. They might surprise you

Imagine if you met someone who can't eat watermelon. Not that they're allergic or unable somehow, but they just haven't figured out how to do that. So you're like "what the hell do you mean? it works just like eating anything else, you open your mouth, sink your teeth in, take a bite and chew. If you can bite, chew and swallow, you should be able to eat a watermelon."

And they agree that yes, they do know how to eat, in theory. The problem is the watermelon. Surely, if they figured out where to start, they'd figure out how to do it, but they have no clue how to get started with it.

This goes back and forth. No, it's not an emotional issue, they're not afraid of the watermelon. They can eat any other fruit, other sweet things, and other watery things ("it's watery?" they ask you). Is it the colour? Do they have a problem eating things that are green on the outside and red on the inside?

"It's red on the inside?"

Wait, they've never seen the inside? At this point you have to ask them how, exactly, they eat the watermelon. So to demonstrate, they take a whole, round, uncut watermelon, and try to bite straight into it. Even if they could bite through the crust, there's no way to get human jaws around it.

"Oh, you're supposed to cut it first. You cut the crust open and only chew through the insides."

And they had no idea. All their life this person has had no idea how to eat a watermelon, despite of being told again and again and again that it's easy, it's ridiculous to struggle with something so simple, there's no way that someone just can't eat a watermelon, how can you even mange to be bad at something as fucking simple as eating watermelon.

If someone can't do something after being repeatedly told to "just do it", there might be some key component missing that one side has no idea about, and the other side assumed was so obvious it goes without mention.

The word garbage sounds like it should mean clothing

Hidden cabins, roaring waterfalls, and endless peace…Norway’s wilderness

giuliogroebert