the review

alright kiddos.
2014.
a tricksy year.

see, on a global scale: it was not good. and i'm feeling that weight. my belief in the goodness of humans, on a grand scale, has been really shaken. and i worry, i fear. but we've talked about that a lot on here. so i'm going to walk away from that for a moment. for this here end-of-year look-back.

because on a personal scale 2014 was kinda kick-ass-inest. my own world: it was real good.

family time and travel was like whoa.
my bestie had a baby.
my sister got a married.
my roommate graduated law school like a total rockstar.
my nephew was old enough to have his first *real* grimas.
THE OLYMPICS HAPPENED!
i turned 30 and can confirm that being 30 is the best.
my birthday cake was beyoncé-themed and there were black balloons everywhere.
i saw robyn again!!
i learned i can run pretty fast when i feel like it.
i got a new job.
i bought an imaginary space that will one day not be imaginary, but will be a home that i will live in.

i met a really amazing new lady-friend. famjam was born.
then i met another super spectacular new lady-friend and famjam went next level.

ladies be drinkin was a constant source of joy and baking.

my bookclub got more and more feminist.
jian ghomeshi got dragged out into the light and seen for the sack-full of disgusting jackass he is.

my dog made so many jokes.

i re-connected with two women who i have known so long, and who feel so much a part of my heart and soul i can barely stand it. we looked at the adult women we have all become, and we said: yes, i like this person so much more for the dark bits and the unsure bits and the pain and change and time.

i saw scotland again.

i said goodbye to the home-est home i will ever know, and that was hard and sad sad sad.
i saw my parents in their new home and new world, which is exciting and full of love and jokes (and soaker bathtubs).

we lost someone. far too soon. and it blew through us and left us ragged. we did our best to hold each other together, to hold each other up. we miss you, mav.

and then there was the culture.

best books:

* the flamethrowers - rachel kushner (on art and independence and revolution)
* swamplandia - karen russell (on siblings and dampness and fear)
* the year of magical thinking - joan didion (re-read, but still a top-fave - on living and grieving and light)
* the elegance of the hedgehog - muriel barbery (on the ache and the void)
* the collected short stories of lydia davis (pure beauty and perfection)

best films:

* lucy (on insignificance and humanity and feeling everything)
* under the skin (on being a woman)
2014 officially goes to scar-jo. oof, wow. thank you.

best music: well that'll get its own post. there's a playlist a'comin.

so that's where we will leave it. 2014. goodbye.

flowers

 

i am rather slowly working my way through this piece where snp & tao lin talk to eachother for a while, semi-curated by sheila heti. it is charming and lovely and also kind of hard to get through cause awkwardness. and flowers. as you know if you follow my instagram, i am all flowers all the time these days. flowers always flowers everywhere or i'd never survive this summer. but. anyway. snp said something about lydia davis (whom i will read soooooon, it's on my stack) that i laughed at a little as it is kinda sorta how i feel about snp.

i like that. quite. i've been underlining a lot in the things i've been reading lately. like maybe they'll help me fix this brain of mine. like maybe they'll help me know what to be doing. or comfort me in the things that i am not doing. (like. how should a person be? page one. haha.)

roommate-sarah recently explained my snp-feelings to someone who was trying to figure out what on earth i was talking about when i was talking about her. she called her my sorta-daemon. like in phillip pullman. dark materials. and i like that a lot. i should re-read that series. (also. me and sarahs, hey? i mean. i know it has to do with my generational-peers and whatever, but whoa. me and sarahs, sarahs and me.)

i wish i was better at reading. if i could be one thing, i think maybe that is what i would be. better at reading. faster. more capable of retention. (or i would be a singer in bjork's choir. alternatively. for my one thing. so maybe i could have two one things i could be?)