July 2012
John Green's tumblr: On Having Figured Out the... →
fishingboatproceeds:
“Why, for example, do the great writers use anticipation instead of surprise? Because surprise is merely an instrument of the unusual, whereas anticipation of a consequence enlarges our understanding of what is happening. Look at a point of land over which the sun is certain to rise, Coleridge said. If the moon rises there, so what? The senses are startled, that’s all. But...
THE HISTORY OF ENGLISH IN 10 MINUTES →
Everything about this is the best thing ever.
Progress - Momastery » Momastery →
I loved this so much.
Jody: how many hams are in a pig?
George: all of them.
Book Review: 'Yours in Truth' a revealing portrait... →
If Obama loses the election, here’s why - The... →
Shootings aren't 'senseless': Five lessons about... →
If you need me, I’m in the middle of nowhere, sleeping with the door open, listening to the crickets and other chirpy things. So it’s like I’m camping except without all the things that make camping a terrible idea.
Frank Sinatra, Axl Rose, and Matt... →
Nonfiction writer friends, this is good.
First Person / To the parents of James Holmes: Our... →
“The moment I gave up “struggling” and stopped seeing my sexual...”
– Evangelical Writer “Struggles” after Chick-Fil-A Outing | Religion Dispatches
“Craig and I are also committed to knowing everything we can about other...”
– On Faith - Momastery » Momastery
“Money is speech and Chick-fil-A used money to promote hate.
This is why I, and...”
– Chick-fil-A and Hate Speech
rubatosis
dictionaryofobscuresorrows:
n. the unsettling awareness of your own heartbeat, whose tenuous muscular throbbing feels less like a metronome than a nervous ditty your heart is tapping to itself, the way people hum to themselves while walking in complete darkness, as if to casually remind the outside world, I’m here, I’m here, I’m here.
‘Parks and Recreation’ Goes to Washington -... →
The glory of sports: Why do we love them so? -... →
Girl-child walks me to the door, starts to close it behind me, stops, reverses. I look back. “Just,” she says, holding onto the handle, left hip jutting away from the door, “be careful in the rain, okay?”
“Here’s the hard part. We aren’t taught how to go back.
We’re taught to move...”
– Heading Home on the Back Roads
Me: [girl-child] loves boys.
Girl-child: no one likes boys.
“Ben wished the world was organized by the Dewey decimal system. That way you’d...”
– Brian Selznick; Wonderstruck
When I was in grad school round one and Mary was trying to get me to break through my slick technique, she told me to start a brand new page for the truth. In the blank space, I could whisper it, unencumbered by any of the other words.
If you’ve ever seen my handwriting, it’s big and loopy (and many other things that we could divert to, but today we won’t). And so my...
“Over time, the ghosts of things that happened start to turn distant; once...”
– Tana French, Broken Harbor
Wherein I give the girl-child a kiss goodnight
Girl-child: You're spreading germs.
Me: It's worth it.
Girl-child: No it's not.
A Mole of Moles →
Man, I love the Internet.
Sometimes I think about ideological differences and what we can do to listen to and work with both our own and the other side.
I try not to get sucked into “things today…” in most sectors of life because, more often than not, “things today…” are already well represented over history.
Instead, today, I’m thinking about how my definitively not-feminist...
“You know how they say everyone’s got a book in them? I think in...”
– Mary Richards
faultlines: More, More Light - On the 15th... →
Jenn’s sermon from this morning. It is a stunning look at who we were, who we are, and who we become. It’s also a brave call for us not to get into the kind of self-congratulatory liberalism that winds up in the same kind of behavior we supposedly condemn.
“They are all in there and I am here, caught in my house, room by room, unable to...”
– Jeanette Winterson, “Disappearance II”, a short story in The World and Other Places
kenopsia
dictionaryofobscuresorrows:
n. the eerie, forlorn atmosphere of a place that’s usually bustling with people but is now abandoned and quiet—a school hallway in the evening, an unlit office on a weekend, vacant fairgrounds—an emotional afterimage that makes it seem not just empty but hyper-empty, with a total population in the negative, who are so conspicuously absent they glow like neon signs.
“And so, far from being pretentious, semicolons can be positively democratic. To...”
– Semicolons: A Love Story, by Ben Dolnick (via bruiseandgetbetter)
Kara: I wore my Slytherin robe to Harry Potter last summer.
Me: Why wouldn't you?
Kara: I mean, if I wasn't of the Slytherin house.
“There are so many arcs of movement in our lives, and it is impossible for me to...”
– A Holy Habitation for Life’s Story
i, oliver yeh: F. Scott Fitzgerald to Frances... →
oliveryeh:
I was at first going to snip out the most affecting parts of this letter Fitzgerald wrote in response to Turnbull’s request for feedback on her work. However, one must read the whole letter to get the full impact of what he’s saying, because as hard as it might be to hear feedback as stark as this, it’s truth.
November 9, 1938
Dear Frances:
I’ve read the story carefully and,...
'Now And Then' TV Show In Early Stages Of... →
Oh, oh.
Me: Is he a mo?
Kara: I don't think so. He was just home-schooled.
“I’m getting tired of the argument that suspending the football program at...”
– PSU reality check - Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Mary Chapin Carpenter tonight!
This is, I think, the second time I’ve seen her indoors, which is weird. MCC is outdoors in the summertime. Preferably at Wolf Trap. I suppose all things must change. But it’s still MCC! And summer! And with my baby sister! (But minus my best friend. Sad.)
This, my friends, is something worth putting on pants for.
