vingtcinqunvingtcinq's recent activity

  1. What was it like for you and your partner when one of you was losing a parent "slowly"?

    ~life Ask (advice)
    Without going into details, my partner's parent is sick with an unknown prognosis (1-5 years; 1 year has passed). I admire how they've come to support their parent and have tried to both be...

    Without going into details, my partner's parent is sick with an unknown prognosis (1-5 years; 1 year has passed). I admire how they've come to support their parent and have tried to both be supportive and keep myself busy so my partner could focus. Still, it's created a lot of distance for me. Where I see the future as exciting and exploratory for us, for my partner, they imagine their family in shambles and their favorite person gone. With the uncertain prognosis and the aftermath, it's hard to imagine that really changing for the foreseeable future.

    I am looking for insight from people who have been in similar situations. Perhaps it's the sort of ridiculousness of how selfish this is or sounds, but I don't know if I've ever heard much about how this affects romantic relationships.

    20 votes

  2. Comment on The vast majority ~90% of us only consume, never post and never comment. So come on in, leave a tildes-worthy comment, and join the 10% my dear lurker in ~talk

    vingtcinqunvingtcinq
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    My first real foray into online life revolved around forums and the close-knit weirdos on them. At different times I've been the 90%, the 9%, and the 1%. The internet was such a crutch for me....

    My first real foray into online life revolved around forums and the close-knit weirdos on them. At different times I've been the 90%, the 9%, and the 1%. The internet was such a crutch for me. That has been true on Tildes too, though on this account I am in the 90%.

    Between Reddit migration, the state of the world, and the slowness of Tildes, what used to be so regular to me is gone. I can still doom scroll, but I've pared down so much and disengaged so much I tend to run out of content within an hour nowadays. I enjoy simplifying my life, but miss the weird fun things I used to uncover before. I also miss the self-expression outlet, the knowledgeable subcultures, and discussing things like TV shows. However, while I worry about being out of touch with stuff like internet security and whatnot, I am sort of okay being out of the loop on things even at the cost of bonding with others. I had no idea what the CEO cheating scandal was until my partner mentioned it to me. I don't know or care what restaurants have opened. I'm increasingly unfashionable. It's fine.

    On the article:

    In general, I'm not a fan of reviews. I see why they exist, but largely, I prefer something more natural. They mention recommendation algorithms based on purchasing history, but I'd also say that I like how on platforms like say, Amazon Prime, it does automatically thumbs up things I complete watching. I think there's so much work to be done in easily and accurately gathering feedback in a manner that resonates with people.

    3 votes

  3. What are the "white spaces" or "breathing rooms" in your life?

    ~talk Ask
    It's easy to be wired all the time. Checking messages, performing tasks, planning for the future, making the most of every second with obvious output. But do you have any intentional inefficiency...

    It's easy to be wired all the time. Checking messages, performing tasks, planning for the future, making the most of every second with obvious output. But do you have any intentional inefficiency in your life? Breaks? Breaths between tasks? If so, what are they?

    39 votes

  4. Comment on The “loneliness epidemic” myth in ~life

    vingtcinqunvingtcinq
    (edited )
    Link
    This was an ironic link to see: I was at home stress-eating because I didn't want to go to a social outing. And I didn't want to go because, although I knew everyone, there was only one person I...

    This was an ironic link to see: I was at home stress-eating because I didn't want to go to a social outing. And I didn't want to go because, although I knew everyone, there was only one person I felt I could talk freely with and had interest in catching up with. Everyone else, however nice, I just didn't want to talk to right now today. I didn't want to go through the song and dance of "hi how are you hows your partner hows work hows life wow you look great" for an hour. To his point, I felt like I was walking into a situation where I didn't really belong.

    • I also agree with the dude's "would you ever bother if a third place were there?" because I've spent a lot of time realizing no, I'm full up usually. Sometimes you like to meet to talk, sometimes you need an activity; I generally need an activity for my third place because it's a lot of pressure to have to put on my affable face. My third place– and maybe this is selfish– needs to be something where I'm there for myself first, and for others second.
    • The "high-maintenance" friendship has high resonance with me. I'm not extroverted, and admittedly stingy with time and energy. I'm the type that wants to be there for a lot of people– some, more than others– in the bad times. The good times, you'll probably not see me so much, I'd rather be spending time alone. The bad times– your bad times– I want to try and be there for you, because I dislike the idea that you might be feeling alone and hopeless when you don't need to be. I'd love to be part of a community where it was normal for people to want to give to each other in some way without having to make sure you were "hanging out enough" and "talking enough" in between. If I like someone, I like them. As long as I know you don't have beef with me, I'll like you just as much 3, 6, 12 months from now. I have a lot of room for the small talk as I live my life (grabbing my coffee, jogging, the gym, whatever) and for favors of explicit scope. I have minimal room for high-intention relationships– I'd say max 2, 3 if the relationships are efficient (e.g. a live in partner, a nearby best friend). I've been reflecting a lot recently on how it can be hard to have multiple female friendships for this reason too (much higher expectations than with men).
    • I also generally agree with his statement that loneliness is a sort of intrinsic condition. Recently, I was quite upset. It was the sort of upset that was in the body. The brain– my brain– could only scramble to try and decipher meaning. Why was I slouchy, terse, short, teary? I had to clarify: I'm not consciously upset, but I'm feeling upset, and it's just how I'm feeling. It wasn't for lack of friends or health or anything, or even a mourning of an outcome. I probably could have hopped on a plane somewhere, prompted a few people for drinks, something. But nothing would have helped. It didn't need a label or cause; it's just a feeling, like taking an emotional dump. The best I could come up with was that it was some kind of perennial loneliness. I wondered how cavemen were able to decipher mutual emotion; what in the world did it take for sad cavemen to realize they were feeling the same kind of sad? Did they define sad and then define lonely? Or was one lonely and the other was something else and they agreed to call it some collective feeling of 'sad'?
    3 votes

  5. Comment on High and dry: Sobriety and transcendence at Bonnaroo in ~life

    vingtcinqunvingtcinq
    Link
    I recommend just setting aside time to read this; I think it opens up really well as you read it. But, here's a submission statement with slight spoilers. Submission Statement I couldn't find a...

    I recommend just setting aside time to read this; I think it opens up really well as you read it. But, here's a submission statement with slight spoilers.

    Submission Statement

    I couldn't find a better category than "life." The author, who has been maintaining sobriety for years, goes to a music festival. He touches on many different topics, from the festival itself, to consumerism, to escapism, to sobriety. It follows him throughout Bonarroo, so it's all told pretty linearly.

    Ultimately, I would say it's really an essay about "transcendence" vs. escapism. (Sobriety is a vehicle for this, but I think it's really about the aspect of transcendence where we see something we couldn't originally.)

    2 votes