“park that car, drop that phone, sleep on the floor, dream about me”
I have been thinking a lot about how the present self can be in conflict with younger and older selves.
In discussing this with friends, I imagine my early 30s self sitting down at a cafe table with myself 10ish years ago. Younger-me, dressed in Forever 21 black leggings and an oversized thrift store men’s sweater, screams at what she considers a passive corporate sellout, asking me where my ambition went and how I can live with myself while so many others suffer. Older-me wears all black, takes a long drag of a cigarette1 and lets her vent until she is done, before saying you’re not wrong, I’m sorry, you’ll understand someday. Younger me hates that answer. An even older self sits at a nearby table, kindly shaking her head at both of us.
Last month, two of my all-time favorite artists (Sylvan Esso & Maggie Rogers) released this week’s jam, their cover of “Anthems For A Seventeen Year-Old Girl”. The track drips nostalgia, as the singer reflects on the girl she was & who she is now.
The comments on the original Broken Social Scene video are genuinely beautiful. I especially love : “Every time I hear this song I imagine myself at 17 dreaming of where I’d be now. She really was dreaming about me, and now I am the dream. Such a beautiful way of remembering who she was and who she hoped we’d be. And who we are”
Here is me at that age, splitting a $5 pizza with friends at sunset, in an empty lot between grad parties the summer before college, teaming with dreams and possibilities.2 She could never have imagined my (our) life now, and I love her for that.
good things on the internet
cannot believe the official scooby doo account posted this 🐶
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currently reading
The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah: This WWII fictional epic follows 2 French sisters who, in their own ways, resist the Nazis and survive through the armistice. A bit saccharine in places for my taste, but overall a compelling story with visceral depictions that kept me reading late at night. A timely reminder that war is bad!
Educated by Tara Westover: RUN DO NOT WALK and get this memoir from your library!
Ann Friedman interviews Jessica Slice, author of Unfit Parent: A Disabled Mother Challenges an Inaccessible World:
“Taking care of another person is tiring, painful, and monotonous. What's worse, you have very little control over any person's future, including your own. If you try to problem-solve or purchase your way out of that reality, you will never succeed. Instead, you will feel ashamed. The first step is this: tell the truth to yourself about what you're experiencing and your limits. It will feel like coming home.”
“Fake images of real people, real images of fake people; fake stories about real things, real stories about fake things. Fake words creeping like kudzu into scientific papers and dating profiles and e-mails and text messages and news outlets and social feeds and job listings and job applications. Fake entities standing guard over chat boxes when we try to dispute a medical bill, waiting sphinxlike for us to crack the code that allows us to talk to a human. The words blur and the images blur and a permission structure is erected for us to detach from reality—first for a moment, then a day, a week, an election season, maybe a lifetime.”
this week’s jam
Maggie & Amelia’s harmonies AHHHHHHH
photo of my cats
I have never smoked a cigarette, but apparently my imaginary self indulges.
I am SO mad I did not keep that green Delia’s sweater.