2019.07.15
I felt restless, the way you feel when you've already done the wrong thing and you're anxious about what the outcome is going to be.
I knew Bobbi would know what to say in this situation, because she had a lot of opinions about mental health in public discourse. Out loud I said: Bobbi thinks depression is a humane response to the conditions of late capitalism.
All I could decide was whether or not to have sex with Nick; I couldn’t decide how to feel about it, or what it meant.
At some point the chocolate cake was gone. I looked into the box and saw crumbs and icing smeared around the paper rim that I had neglected to remove. I got up from the table, put the kettle on, and emptied two spoonfuls of coffee into the French press. I took some painkillers, I drank the coffee, I watched a murder mystery on Netflix. A certain peace had come to me and I wondered if it was God’s doing after all. Not that God existed in any material way but as a shared cultural practice so widespread that it came to seem materially real, like language or gender.
I closed my eyes. Things and people moved around me, taking positions in obscure hierarchies, participating in systems I didn’t know about and never would. A complex network of objects and concepts. You live through certain things before you understand them. You can’t always take the analytical position.After enjoying Normal People I went back and read this, Sally Rooney's first novel. I guess I enjoy reading stories of the romances of academic people. (heh... I guess to be honest I ended up treating my undergrad degree in computer science as a high-end trade school... and the English major I kept up to go with was a bit perfunctory...) This one told some of its story in quoted emails and going over old text messages, I really appreciate when stories do that... maybe it gives a smidge of validation to my own archiving with very occasional review.
FWIW The scene of people hanging out at a wealthy european's beach dwellings reminded me a bit of Martin Amis' "The Pregnant Widow"
--Panel from this Oglaf comic riffing on Hamlet - Oglaf is such a raunchy, fun, goofy, R-rated romp (maybe even NC-17) of a fantasy cartoon. I really like how it celebrates the joy of gettin' it on across a wide range of genders and sexualities.
French Inventor Totes Rifle While Flying Turbine-Powered Flyboard at Bastille Day Celebrations - word is previous Bastille Day stuff inspired Trumps' Campaign-Rally-With-Thanks July 4th ambitions. How long 'til he says we need one of these?
School of Honk on parade with "Rock Anthem" - at 4:06 you can hear me leading the call in the call/response: