To be alive is to be missing
Hi,
"to be alive is to be missing." This sentence has haunted me since I first read it in John Green's novel Turtles All The Way Down.
To be alive is to be missing everyone, everything, all the time.
To be alive is to be missing, because not everyone we meet is meant to be a part of our future. To be alive is to be missing, because so often we realize meaningful endings only in retrospect. To be alive is to be missing, because sometimes the concept of home becomes a time. To be alive is to be missing, simply, because we don't know what we've got until it's gone.
Missing, longing, nostalgia – call it what you will, but the pandemic has brought these concepts to the forefront of our minds and lives. Who do you miss? So much it hurts? Where do you long to go? Do you remember what salt on your skin feels like? The smell of your mum's apple pie in the late summer?
Corona was the privilege-check for all of us millennials, who have been roaming the planet like our living rooms, collecting friends, moments and temporary homes along the way. Confined to our city, country, and now in some places continental, limits for nearly half a year, we had to postpone highly anticipated trips to an unknown point in the future, resort to calling our friends instead of squeezing in a quick weekend visit.
Does this increase our longing for far away places? Or does it ultimately make us more content with the things around us? Will it turn us into more appreciative, responsible travelers in the future? Will we be more present with our long distance friends when we meet them again – because we don't know when we'll be back? Will it inspire moves to different cities and countries? To the seaside?
Ocean Vuong writes in On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous that in Vietnamese, the word for missing someone and remembering them is the same. I believe that missing someone, or someplace, is remembering a feeling, rather than a fact. I think you can miss people much longer than you can actually remember them. And I think you can miss places just as much as people – because nothing that ever happens to us, good or bad, happens in a vacuum.
It makes sense that in a time of pandemic, when carefree, happy moments are hard to come by, we turn our gaze backwards and invite nostalgia in. In order to do so healthily though, I trust in practicing gratitude for what has been, and not allowing space for bitterness about what is currently not. Because, and now we circle back to the closing line of Turtles All The Way Down: "No one ever says good-bye unless they want to see you again."
Disclaimer 1: I am writing this in a train, on my way home after 10 days on the road. I finally got to quench my thirst for new places and the great outdoors for a little while. Most importantly, I got to hug some dear friends I had not seen in way too long – so talk is cheap. But there are still places and people I miss dearly, and of which I have no idea when I will see them again.
Disclaimer 2: I realize that I'm writing about a major first-world-problem and do recognize the importance of keeping a pandemic under control. However, feelings are feelings and all of them are valid.
⭐️ You want verve, you get verve:
Dolly reflects on the magic of the seaside in her current newsletter. Why we're so drawn to it, why mere images of it make us feel all the feelings. Oh, how I miss the ocean. 🇩🇪 An dieser Stelle muss ich auch nochmal Lara Fritzsches Ode an die Quartalsfreundin teilen – die Freundin, mit der man mit unter viel tiefere Beziehungen hat, als mit den Menschen, die wir jede Woche sehen.
"Wer sich nur alle drei Monate sieht, fragt ja nicht, ob der Partner inzwischen endlich die Pfannen weggespült hat (...) Man fragt anders, mehr so: Bist du glücklich? Kannst du zumindest hin und wieder im Beruf etwas tun, was dich wirklich erfüllt? Sollte man alles versuchen, um am Meer zu leben?"
Pandora Sykes had Rutger Bregman on her "Doing It Right" podcast and it turned into an amazing conversation. Bregman just published a book in which he makes a case for humans being innately compassionate and kind. They discuss the science behind this claim and I particularly liked his thoughts on the difference between optimism and hope.
This experiment once again proved that unconscious bias is very much still a thing in 2020: When Catherine Nichols pitched her novel to 50 literary agents, she received only two manuscript requests. When she sent out the same pitch as "George Leyer", a whopping 17 requests hit her inbox, most of them within 24 hours of her sending it out. Yeah. Ugh.
I like the idea of keeping a "Cupboard List" of things to do in order to make you feel better when you feel low – but don't really know why. The twist: Everything on the list has to hit the golden trio of "comfort, effort, and non-regrettability". Especially the latter is important, as it excludes screens, booze and other quick-fix distractions.
While I was scaling the Swiss Alps, Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez took to the House floor in order to denounce the abuse faced by women in Congress and across the nation (she had been called "a fucking bitch" by Republican Representative Ted Yoho earlier). The NYT explains why this move was "norm-shattering".
Emma Gray goes further and analyzes why it is generally important to speak up against being called a "bitch", something she calls "the lazy man's insult". And she unpacks the history of this misogynistic insult, so common that no woman can keep up with how many times it's been hurled at her.
By the way, I found these last two articles in the Which I frequently recommend on here and will do so until 👏 everyone 👏 has 👏 signed 👏 up 👏. It's bold, hilarious, smart and slightly evil in the best possible way and you need it in your inbox asap. Thank me later.
I told you that I got hooked on the "Is this working" podcast lately, right? Well, its newest episode is another winner. Therapist Kati Morton talks about the relationship between work and our mental health – and absolutely everybody can take something away from this.
That's all from me for now. Tell me, what do you miss?
Until next time,
Anna
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