30th March 2017 Club Penguin - Waddle On Comic

euripides (tr. anne carson) / sade andria zabala / anne carson

US Elevation.

by @cstats1

I'll tell you a secret: I felt like I was better. It couldn't happen to me. I was worldly and supported and had a plan and I spoke well and in 2 languages. The world was waiting to unlock itself to my potential. Back then, I had the secret fear that the world was too small for me.

And it happened anyway. The terrible cliché I felt too good for. I got stuck in the home town. Plans didn't work, and suddenly almost a year had passed and I'd spent it in an internship that was my plan H in a place that was my plan Never. And now, with bloody fingernails, I've held on to the easiest dream I had. Not even the pretty, big ones that I thought I'd conquer for fun and joy. The easy one. And I'm sick. Two years at a minimum, first time I've been sick like this. I can do nothing.

Time is running out and university is drawing closer and I was sixteen in a school I hated and I PROMISED myself I wouldn't let it come to this. I wouldn't cave. I'd take the time I want and I'd see the world and I thought I was so prepared. I thought the world was waiting for me. I thought I was so privileged. I thought that meant everything would be butterflies.

Why can't it be butterflies.

thinking about the people who vanished without a trace. The mutual who reblogged something as usual and never came back online. The friend on discord who just disappeared, and when you go to check on them their account is deleted and theres no other way to contact them

I look out of my window and hope you are okay, I wish you well and Im sorry I didn't get to say goodbye.

I hope we meet again someday but until then. Stay safe. Stay alive. Be well.

i love the idea of ghosts not being dead people but just places where time is kind of thin

like one of my friends & his girlfriend have a ghost in their very old new england house that’s apparently an old timey little boy who does shit like jump on the bed and slam doors but if they tell him very sternly “daniel, stop that” the activity stops immediately

and i love the idea that years ago theres this rowdy little 19th century boy just being alive and playing in his room but if he gets too loud sometimes, the ghostly form of my 21st century friend shows up and is like “Hey! Cut it out.” and then vanishes and no one believes this child

Motivational things to send in the group chat

Gamines by Louise Catherine Breslau (1890), Musée Comtadin-Duplessis.

History will say they were just friends.

one of the things that's the most fucking frustrating for me about arguing with climate change deniers is the sheer fucking scope of how much it matters. sweating in my father's car, thinking about how it's the "hottest summer so far," every summer. and there's this deep, roiling rage that comes over me, every time.

the stakes are wrong, is the thing. that's part of what makes it not an actual debate: the other side isn't coming to the table with anything to fucking lose.

like okay. i am obviously pro gun control. but there is a basic human part of me that can understand and empathize with someone who says, "i'm worried that would lead to the law-abiding citizens being punished while criminals now essentially have a superpower." i don't agree, but i can tell the stakes for them are also very high.

but let's say the science is wrong and i'm wrong and the visible reality is wrong and every climate disaster refugee is wrong. let's say you're right, humans aren't causing it or it's not happening or whatever else. let's just say that, for fun.

so we spend hundreds of millions of dollars making the earth cleaner, and then it turns out we didn't need to do that. oops! we cleaned the earth. our children grow up with skies full of more butterflies and bees. lawns are taken over with rich local biodiversity. we don't cry over our electric bills anymore. and, if you're staunchly capitalist and i need to speak ROI with you - we've created so many jobs in developing sectors and we have exciting new investment opportunities.

i am reminded of kodak, and how they did not make "the switch" to digital photography; how within 20 years kodak was no longer a household brand. do we, as a nation, feel comfortable watching as the world makes "the switch" while we ride the laurels of oil? this boggles me. i have heard so much propaganda about how america cannot "fall behind" other countries, but in this crucial sector - the one that could actually influence our own monopolies - suddenly we turn the other cheek. but maybe you're right! maybe it will collapse like just another silicone valley dream. but isn't that the crux of capitalism? that some economies will peter out eventually?

but let's say you're right, and i'm wrong, and we stopped fracking for no good reason. that they re-seed quarries. that we tear down unused corporate-owned buildings or at least repurpose them for communities. that we make an effort, and that effort doesn't really help. what happens then? what are the stakes. what have we lost, and what have we gained?

sometimes we take our cars through a car wash and then later, it rains. "oh," we laugh to ourselves. we gripe about it over coffee with our coworkers. what a shame! but we are also aware: the car is cleaner. is that what you are worried about? that you'll make the effort but things will resolve naturally? that it will just be "a waste"?

and what i'm right. what if we're already seeing people lose their houses and their lives. what if it is happening everywhere, not just in coastal towns or equatorial countries you don't care about. what if i'm right and you're wrong but you're yelling and rich and powerful. so we ignore all of the bellwethers and all of the indicators and all of the sirens. what if we say - well, if it happens, it's fate.

nevermind. you wouldn't even wear a mask, anyway. i know what happens when you see disaster. you think the disaster will flinch if you just shout louder. that you can toss enough lives into the storm for the storm to recognize your sacrifice and balk. you argue because it feels good to stand up against "the liberals" even when the situation should not be political. you are busy crying for jesus with a bullhorn while i am trying to usher people into a shelter. you've already locked the doors, even on the church.

the stakes are skewed. you think this is some intellectual "debate" to win, some funny banter. you fuel up your huge unmuddied truck and say suck it to every citizen of that shitbird state california. serves them right for voting blue!

and the rest of us are terrified of the entire fucking environment collapsing.

i will love you after you’re gone

here with me by d4vd // lazarus rises (among other things) by @icaruspendragon​ // the adventure zone episode 69: story and song // in case you don’t live forever by ben platt // inkpot gods by the amazing devil // heart to heart by mac demarco