december love list

via GIPHY

are you keeping warm this winter? are you finding light? in one week it will begin to lighten. one week. we will have made it thru the longest night. we are getting there. so proud of you.
make sure you have a drink beside you (no really, go get water.) settle in. fall in love.

listening

→ Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto in D Major, First Movement
nadine: for this month’s classical recommendation, i was going to go with a december favourite, Pas de deux from Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker (the piece i like best from the nutcracker, which also features the holiday classic the dance of the sugar-plum fairy), but i honestly can’t stop listening to the first movement of the violin concerto. on break at work. in the morning. on public transport. as i make dinner. on walks. all the time. it’s so good.

→ Toute seule pour Noël by Klô Pelgag
nadine: i have been waiting impatiently for new material from this artist for so long!! this is a christmas song; the lyrics (translated from french by myself) at one point go: “i’m looking for the star like the others / we’re the new apostles / again [we’re] all alone for christmas / pulling the sleigh of the father.”

→ ocean eyes cover by Alicia Keys
nadine: this time last year, i was listening on repeat to a playlist i made that i called “urban conch shell” and that featured the original ocean eyes. i haven’t listened to it much since last december. but now this. i’m not sure what makes this cover so special. it’s something words can’t say. please listen to Alicia Keys make magic.

→ E by ecco2k
m: sad boi hours, but in a rainforest.
portrait by frida vega.

→ repairable by never,forever 
m: this song, an unreleased nothing,nowhere track, has been a source of hope this season, with its honesty and calming guitar: “i’m not so broken, repairable / yeah i’ve got my flaws too, exposable.”

→ big business by levi the poet feat. j givens
m: been thinking a lot about church and deconstruction (and impeachment). levi the poet’s album cataracts is my soundtrack to this discussion, especially big business.

watching

→ nadine: Abbie Emmons created this gold mine for anyone planning to write a novel.

→ m: i just finished brooklyn 99, and while it’s a bit like cop propaganda, i absolutely love this show.

reading

→ nadine: travel guides from where i live, especially themed ones, for discovery ideas and new takes on old sights. “the real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.” (Proust)

→doubling down on love by brene brown
m: when anger is not enough to stay sustainable.


→ bunny by mona awad
gray: this book was just so weird and funny and got me out of a super long reading slump.

→ bright dead things by ada limon
m: i’ve never read a book like this. limon’s poetry had me gasping and taking pictures of poetry to send to a friend. one of many surprises included her poems about mourning singleness in a new relationship. i’m a very independent person, and rarely do i feel seen in this feeling. love her work.

→the crying book by heather christle 
m: crying. too both ordinary and disturbing to pay too much attention to. one act that takes whole books and sculptures to make sense of. this tiny, complicated, ambiguous thing. heather wrote a book of- about- crying, in all its flavors and experiments and rooms and all the things. is it poetry? is it prose? is it an experimental essay? yes.

→ becoming rbg by debbie levy and whitney gardner
m: an easy to read comic book biography on our queen ruth bader ginsburg. this is aimed towards middle grade, but works so well for most age groups.

sipping

→ naked berry blast
m: i deeply resent the single use plastic bottle, and will probably never drink this again once i am off an elimination diet, but straight up, this drink is saving my life and happiness right now. good for dessert, good for a snack.

thinking

→ nadine: what are some causes and manifestations of overwhelm for me? how may i accept and manage them more successfully? (reading Was That Really Me? by Naomi Quenk helped a lot with this)

→ m: my perception of my self does not belong to others. In fact, i can not possibly say i know what is thought of me, unless i am told. and what i am told is generally the opposite of the narrative told by my ever so eloquent imposter syndrome. and this is good. how may i learn to believe the voices outside of my head?

via GIPHY

​what about you? what's making life worth living lately?

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