this week’s Thought (singular)
i’ve used a kettle more in the last six months than i have my entire life
a very warm welcome to all new readers. i love new readers so much that whenever i get an email about a new reader, i manifest that they have all the extra sweaters and socks they need for winter. thank you for joining us. may you not layer yourself in three jackets and two sweatpants and socks under two blankets and still feel cold.
a very warm welcome to old readers as well. may good sense continue to prevail.
hi
first! apologies for not being here last saturday. it’s been intense. a cat for your troubles -
i come bearing miscellany today. i’ve been trying to return to myself using a path i’m sure i’ve never been on before, all while deadlines seem to be out to get me. this is what i’ve been watching, reading, listening to, eating, doing on the way.
watching - i continued to watch gossip girl from where i had stopped on season 3 many months ago. i’m enjoying it tremendously, and absolutely loving all the new music i’m discovering from the show.
flowers spotted on campus during a tranquility walk with my friends listening - two albums i’ve been completely obsessed with recently are RUSH! by Måneskin and My 21st Century Blues by RAYE. they’ve been on repeat. i had forgotten how lovely it is to really got to know an album from start to finish, to let it seep into your bones, and it’s so fun to revisit that feeling.
(favourites include GASOLINE and THE LONELIEST from RUSH!, and Oscar Winning Tears. and Black Mascara. from My 21st Century Blues.)
eating - ever since the weather turned, i crave warm drinks. i’ve been having a lot of pea flower and chamomile tea, and i find calmness in the process of preparing them.
tiny plant on the sill next to the water cooler on my floor reading - my goodreads reading challenge progress bar tells me i’m three books behind schedule to complete my goal for 2024. i’m not particularly gunning to rush through five books before the end of the year, but i have been enjoying what i’ve read recently - Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro and Days at the Morisaki Bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa.
please share your wrapped-s with me, it’d make me so very happy doing - packing to visit home in a week after my exams!! i’m giddy at the thought of being back in bangalore, and making a list of all the things i’d like to cover in the 10 days i’m there.
feeling - tired but grateful, looking forward to rest and activity in equal measure, learning more about myself even as i keep changing, trying to be normal about it all, and constantly moving.
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English Recitation Competition
To Do List, Brian Bilston
1. Delay with an urgent hesitation. 2. Be unwavering in vacillation. 3. Embrace the art of equivocation. 4. Read a book on procrastination. 5. Dilly-dally; dither; be dilatory. 6. Drink tea through the day continually. 7. Look up ‘avoidance’ in the dictionary. 8. Ignore all forms of worthwhile industry. 9. Break for lunch 10. Ponder the intrinsic nature of work. 11. Re-prioritise which tasks to shirk. 12. Allow three hours to hem and haw. 13. Lollygag; chew my jaw. 14. Stroke the cat; lose my pen. 15. Re-do tasks from one to ten 16. Lurch and flounder; loll and wallow. 17. Write To Do list for tomorrow.
These Have I Loved, Barbara Farnstein
These have I loved: warm rain dripping over tile roofs, green frogs bellowing from lily pads; pink peonies damp with cool dew drops; wet grass between my toes; crinkly paper; red ink; chubby, blond-haired children building sand castles; mud puddles moving as the wind makes tiny ripples across them; large footprints on wet sand; the sweet potato cart on bitter-city streets: cold nights and warm woolly blanket; light wind upon my face, wet paint brushes on rough rice paper; old men on park benches feeding the flocking pigeons, silence
Sometimes, When the Light, Lisel Mueller
Sometimes, when the light strikes at odd angles and pulls you back into childhood and you are passing a crumbling mansion completely hidden behind old willows or an empty convent guarded by hemlocks and giant firs standing hip to hip, you know again that behind that wall, under the uncut hair of the willows something secret is going on, so marvelous and dangerous that if you crawled through and saw, you would die, or be happy forever.
The Good Side of the Internet
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this week’s Song
find all shared songs here.
thank you for reading, and see you next week <3