An Elephant in A Room.

I'm going to try to real blog. Maybe only like one or two or three or four pictures or something (oh man, slippery slope right there), and lots of words. Maybe I'll even only do one picture and even more words! You guys excited? I don't know if you should be, but whatevs, do it anyways. Get stoked. Be like DRAMAAAA! We love it!

Time to talk about the elephant in the room. Or, as Lena Dunham - I mean Hannah Horvath - says, "at least an elephant in a room."
So here we Gogh.

(On a totally unrelated note, how annoyed are you with my bad puns on a scale of "It's whatevs" to "STFU"?)

 

The nature of the beast is that it's temporary.     ^^^That's a beast. Like in case you weren't, like, sure.
The beast is that stage of flirtationship - vaguely friends, vaguely crushes. It's kind of undefinable. But you know what I'm talking about. Amrite or amirite? So you meet someone that has good legs and a sweet sense of humor. Really good legs. You're a little Leslie-Knope-awkward, but you also rock it with Leslie-Knope-level-class.

 

You work through the stages: Introduction, small talk with enough solid jokes thrown in that you move to the next step; Accquaintanceship (it's a word, guys); and after that, an easy flirtationship/friendship: lunch before class sometimes, study dates, etc.
But just as surely as you've worked your way through the steps, getting more encouraged with each one, something happens. And I don't think it's just me, because when I mention this, everyone knows what I'm talking about. It's nothing especially, you just find a nasty sort of ennui slipping in. It takes more to make him laugh, and you yourself are finding him less funny as you remain in perpetual vague friendship. The stagnation is so uneasy. It's like subconsciously you both understand that this stage is pre- something, anything, even if you can't quite vocalize it. At this point of frustration, you'd give up a potential romance if you guys could just be real friends. Because this stage has to go somewhere or it'll go backwards. And like, yeah, of course you still want to date him! He's still sweet, still has those rockin stems on him, still absurdly attractive. Did I mention he has great legs? Once or twice? But the ennui's hitting him too, and what was easy becomes strained, awkward, and you have no bloody idea how to get out of it and make any progress at all.

(Look, if Jennifer Lawrence doesn't know what to do, then screw it. We mortals don't stand a chance.)

 

You no longer have any freaking idea what's happening. It's all very He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not. (Not the Audrey Tatou movie, though. That stuff's mental.)
It's unstable stuff. If you're in it a second longer than you should be, it becomes radioactive. Did the Imagine Dragons song just pop into your head? Yeah, me too. Sorry about that. The word might not even be radioactive. Retroactive, maybe? Googling "retroactive definition" is not helping. GOOGLE. Y U NO HELP? Look. The point is that the nature of the beast is that it's temporary, and so if you're in it too long, you began to slip back into Accquaintanceship. You just peter off, and in college, awkwardly crawl back into your little "not-quite not-quite friends" thing as the semester drags to an excruciating close. You still sit by each other, but only because it would be awkward and say too much to not any longer. It would be admitting that there was something, some spark, and now there's not. And we're just not invested or mature enough to admit that, amirite? And you still politely ask each other how your weekend was, etc., but that's just it. It's out of politeness. It's not out of any real interest, or out of any hope that you'll be part of the next weekend's plans, you know? And as soon as the class is done, FIN. The curtain closes and there's maybe a smattering of polite applause. You might like each other's statuses every once in a while, but that's it, besides being mocked by the ghost of what-could-have-been.
And you hang out in this kind-of-occasionally-mildly-depressed-about-it-thing (Guys, using really clinical and correct terms esta noche) for a while.

 

But then you convince yourself he was far too conservative/liberal/serious/goofy/uncultured/cultured for it to have really worked out anyways. Like you'd have been like "THAT NEW STROKES ALBUM." And he'd be like, "What about it?" And you'd be like, "Um, it's amazing?" and then it would just be like,

 

Or, you know, think of a situation that actually relates and isn't just some weird extension of my #firstworldhipsterproblems. You know? He wouldn't want to go to the museum or he WOULD but he'd want to analyze Rothko and you'd just be like IT'S COOL BUT DO WE REALLY HAVE TO TALK ABOUT IT? Or you'd be talking about equal marriage rights and he'd joke, "Adam and Eve, babe, not Adam and Steve." And you'd be like REALLY? THAT'S WHAT YOU HAVE TO SAY?

So you convince yourself that it was, like, sooo not gonna work out anyways. And after you have accordingly comforted yourself, and are feeling solid, you're going to remind yourself that, you know, they probably just weren't that into you (and yeah, this time I am referencing the movie, because it's a vaguely accurate rom-com with Ginnifer Goodwin, and you know what, I like her hair lots, so consider the reference made.)  You know how I said you were feeling comforted, solid in your position of "yeah, it would never have worked out anyways, so nbd."? Whatever. Considering that they were probably not that into you anyways: gonna make you feel REALLY AWESOME. I mean, like insanely awesome. Like you're gonna feel THIS good.

 

That's right, it sucks a latte. (Somehow I'm obsessed with that pun even when it makes zero sense. Maybe if I inserted a picture of an actual latte? But I've gotta resist the urge to fall back on pictures as usual. Fight it.



 

Ugh, I didn't fight it. Moving on.

And then you remember that like, what kind of logic is that? YOU liked HIM a lot(te) and still let it get weird. So couldn't he have liked you that much? What was true for you could totally be true for him, right? OMG, IT TOTALLY WAS. HE TOTALLY LIKED YOU.

And then reality is like, sugar. Even if he did, it's kind of pointless now? Once you fall from flirtationshipfriendshipish to Accquaintanceship, you can't get back to and beyond flirtationshipfriendshipish. Impossible. And don't listen to that Audrey Hepburn stuff. As gorgeous and excellent as the lady was, "I'm possible!" is not what the word means in this case. Accept it. Embrace it. Move on.

Maybe shouldn't border on sacrilegious by abusing an Audrey quote like that, huh?

 

 

You slowly level out to mild nostalgia for what never was. The ghost of what could have been no longer mocks you on the reg, it just kind of floats by pityingly when you're having a bad hair day and bombed a test. Hang out in this saddish little level until you meet someone with great hair and a dorky laugh. Did I mention he has great hair?

 

Rinse & Repeat.

 

xxx

 

 

 

 

A couple of notes, and I'm wondering if you guys have answers:

When you do things this way (aka always), do you ever really let all the way go?

And does "sad spiral" of Almost-to-Impossible build on "sad spiral" until you just eventually become actually sad? Because I think I'm a little bit afraid of that being the case. Do you think it is? Are ghosts of what-could-have-been just as detrimental as ghosts-of-christmas-past, or not?

I don't have answers. Thoughts?

Also thoughts on the whole actual-blogging-things-about-real-life thing? Working, not working...throw all the ghastly insults and gorgeous compliments you can think of at me, you beauts.

xxx

 

 

 

And one last triumphant note:

ONLY TEN PICTURES! WHASSUUUUUP!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A few things.

A few things.

First, if you happen to be in London, go see Nick Payne's play, Constellations. It's really beautiful. A fair warning, though - if you don't like awesome things, you won't be into this.

Second, go see Silver Linings Playbook. The above warning must be applied.

Third, read this. It's from a list of 15 things that will happen to you in your twenties, but I just like it a lot. Credit Thought Catalog (clicky clicky. you'll like it.)

"You’ll read a book that will change your life. People say that all the time, especially your grandma and your mom and your professors in college, and it always made you roll your eyes but now you get it. Life is changed. You are this book’s bitch. You fell in love with it in the same way you fell in love with someone in high school: blindly and all-consuming. I’m talking about the book that became the lens from which you chose to see the world. You were just waiting for something to come along and explain to you how the world works, to make it all easier for you. and it came. You will remember this book more vividly than some of the people you dated for three months in college."

Fourth, read this too. It's pretty groovy.

"Captive Greece took her savage victor captive, and brought the arts into rustic Latium." Horace, Epistles II. 1. 156. #waywithwords much?

And that's all, folks.
xxx
Tabby

Inspiration Nation

Because it's another day where I've found cool stuff but can't really be bothered to write stuff about it? It's too bloody hot.
All pictures either The Civil Wars' Tour Diary, Bullett, Pintrest, AnOther Mag. Look at me, crediting pictures. I need to get on that, eh?

Love. Them.

Love. This.

Best Tinkerbell ever, much?

Jennnnifer Lawrence. Love this.

                                                             Lea Seydoux is so lovely.

Charlotte Gainsbourg.

Princess Di. Obviously.

And in other news, I just saw The Dark Knight Rises. Yes yes yes YES.

Also I love Joseph Gordon Levitt.  I forget sometimes. Forgive me.

xxx and all that jazz,

Tabby

Get in, loser. We're going to the Capitol.

Been listening to the band Dinosaur Feathers and The Neighbourhood tonight, vair groovy stuff right there.  The Neighbourhood can be found (for frees!) on Nylon, Dinosaur Feathers (tambien!) on RCRDLBL.
Also was on the hilarious Mean Girls of Panem Tumblr - only thing better than this is Harry Potter plus Mean Girls, obvs.
Which of course led me to the gal who plays FoxFace - Jacqueline Emerson - which of course led me to her Tumblr.  Of course.  And she is just freaking adorable.  That's my story.  http://spread-the-light.tumblr.com/.
I think I may be catching a strain of the Hunger Games bug.  I kind of want to go watch it again now.  I'm really starting to dig it...re-read the books/see the movie again? Consider it done.  I guess I'm forfeiting my hipster card, kids.
Also...

Um.  Because she's adorable and also crazy talented?

Um.  Because it's her birthday?  Happy birthday Emma Fantastic Watson!

I will be forever trying to figure out how to be as excellent as you.

And haters gonna hate, but I love winter.  I just saw this picture randomly in my files and it made me happy.  So here you go!

xxx and all that jazz...love you kids!

Tabby

I Wandered Lonely as a Clud...

Oh brag on, I know.
But seriously, I'm in love with Wordsworth's Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey.  Which so redeems him from the crap I thought the "I wandered lonely as a clud" poem was.  Yeah, clud.  You can thank Georgia Nicolson and/or Louise Rennison for that excellent change to the English language. Anyways. Such a brill poem.  So I thought I would share my luuurvely essay on it with you chumettes.
And don't let said luuurveliness throw you off, go read his poem cause it's gorgey. 
Okay thanks. And go to Lazy Oaf cause I've been on it for ages and it's fab and also vair amusing and I'm SO DIYing like a million things on there. Also seriously thinking about buying the blue anorak there to throw my grams off her frenzy. (It's seriously an obsession she has. Like I'll die in London without one. (Possibly true.)  And I can't let her dig out her 90s Gap anorak, that would be just wrong and also demented.) Anyways!
I luuurve you children and I hope this weekend is a groovy one.
Going to see Hunger Games, anyone? Delicious.  So in love with Jennifer Lawrence (because of X-Men, children.  Obvs.) No Harry Potter, obvs, but fun stuff eh?
Bon week-end! (How I love cognates.)
xxx and all that jazz
Tabby

In one line of Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey, William Wordsworth captures the essence of not only what it is to commune with nature, but, perhaps redundantly, to be really, truly alive.  “And so I dare to hope” (NA 697).  “Hearing oftentimes the still, sad music of humanity” (697), Wordsworth “felt a presence that disturb[ed] (him)… with the joy of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime of something far more deeply interfused” (697, 698).

“…Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, and the round ocean and the living air…” (698). Like the phrase, “the good earth”, “the round ocean” is whole, lovely, warm, even alive.  The spirit of which Wordsworth speaks, the “presence”, which “impels all thinking things” (698), “rolls through all things.”  Wordsworth, as a master wordsmith, is expected to come up with beautiful phrases, to pick the right words and the truest images.  Yet that does not overshadow the perfection of this line. The spirit of Nature, which Wordsworth so loves, rolls through like a silent swell.  Wordsworth adopts an image of absolute beauty – roundness and wholeness in nature, found in snow and fauna and the sea and the flowers – and uses it to express the nature of Nature.  What better way?

How Nature does what it does to us, he has told us.  In lines 132 and 133, Wordsworth attempts to put in words what exactly it is that Nature does to us – a sentiment many have tried and failed to express, falling to clichés and overwrought phrases that try far too hard.  It is not enough to tell us – we must feel it before we can agree and admire.  Wordsworth tells his sister, “(Nothing) shall e’er prevail against us, or disturb our cheerful faith, that all which we behold is full of blessings” (698).

My grandma once told me about when she fell in love with my grandpa, and, pointing to a spider on the wall, she said, “When you’re in love, the whole world is in love.  You see a spider, and you think, “I wonder if he’s going to visit his girlfriend!””  While my grams is tremendously cheerful by nature, and probably attributed charming characteristics to everything even before she was ever in love, I’m more than inclined to believe her.  And in the way that Grams described love’s potent influence, Wordsworth described nature’s power.  Just like when one is in love, the whole earth is filled with love; just like when one feel the Spirit of God, the whole world is full of good things; when one is filled with the spirit of Nature, “all…is full of blessings.” 
And I’ll hazard this:  the spirit of Nature and the Spirit of God?  Probably one and the same.  To hear this spirit as Wordsworth described it: “The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse, the guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul of all my moral being” (698).   If in that phrase you don’t hear a definition of the Spirit of God, go sing a hymn and take a walk in the mountains – you’ll hear it, and feel it, and smell it and taste it and see it then.

It’s “a sober pleasure” (698), this thing we speak of. “In….the heavy and weary weight of all this unintelligible world” (696), we find in nature, as Wordsworth did, “that in this moment there is life and food for future years” (697).  With all the weighty power of an artist who truly sees his subject, Wordsworth gathers the shadows and impressions of thoughts that “roll through” at quiet moments, hardly noticed, and invites them to make letters and words and fall in place as they will. 

The beauty of being alive is thought to be impossible to describe – it’s a fleeting sensation felt during beautiful music, in nature, sitting at a fireplace, witnessing a newborn testing out his powerful lungs.  Yet because Wordsworth  both understands it as imperfectly as any human, and lets it filter through his mind and medium like the artist he is, he is able to harness a feeling so matchless and pure as this.  And this is a gift in which “there is life and food for future years.”