Friends believe in peace, kindness, simplicity, listening, non-violence, emotional understanding, activism, continuous learning and revelation, silence, togetherness, the inner light within all people, silent togetherness, friendship, love, respect for life. You may know Friends as Quakers. Some of your children may attend Friends schools. Friends gather at Meeting for Worship. Meeting (unprogrammed) is quiet and contemplative; individual; punctuated by the voice of spirit (you and I); an opportunity to be heard, and not be judged, and to hear, and to not judge; to connect. It is thoughtful, and beautiful, and somber, and joyous. And unlike anything else in my life.

I attend meeting in a very old house. It is beautiful and smells of ancient wood, with benches far beyond the years of the bricks around them. History runs deep in such spaces. Death, too: it is a burial ground many generations over, but these days we find it to be a garden both literally and otherwise. For a time, this place had dwindled (so I am told), but now it seems fresh and full of life. We come and we sit and we stand and we speak and we sing. The little ones do their best to keep still, but we know they're moved to run about, for that is the way of things. I don't mind. They are our future.

I was grateful to have been invited by Friends to a retreat out in the country. The residence was rustic and the setting was scenic, calm, and I had been there once for another purpose. I could tell that it was full of meaning. There was space to adventure. I did so. My cohort, which you might broadly call young adult, does not often have space to reveal ourselves. After so many years of repression, we instinctively put up barriers and we forget what it means to really laugh and feel. The goal of the retreat was to provide an open forum for emotional communion, especially getting in touch with who we were (have been), are, and will be. It was not prescriptive. As time passed, our leaders invited two elders to share in and expand our thought with teachings, music, video, movement, objects. Some examples of tone:

• "Welcome."
• "Friend speaks my mind."
• "That of the spirit is within you and I."
• "You were once very small; smaller than this seed."
• "Spirit moves me to vocal ministry."
• "You are among Friends."
• "What do you think?"
• "We love you."

A few specific words stand out to me from the retreat: "BREATHE" "DELIGHT" "LISTEN" "MUSIC" "VISION" "SMALL" "GROW" "THANK YOU" "HELPING" "FRIEND" "FRIENDS" "WORSHIP" "MUSTARD" "LAUGHTER" "JOY" "COMMUNITY" "REVEALING" "HEART" "SING" "SPACE" "CLEAN" "LIGHT" "STARS" "PEACEFUL" "PASTORAL" "WOODPECKER" "SUPPORT" "GREEN" "IDYLLIC" "DOG" "SOCIAL" "WHOLE" "MELANCHOLY" "INTIMATE" "CRY" "HOLD" "BELIEVE" "SEE" "RENEW" "SHARE" "APPRECIATE."

It is not very often that you meet a group of strangers and in just a few days leave each other with such bright smiles and quite a few hugs. And it is quite a bit rarer for those hugs to be deep, meaningful embraces. To be realistic, you can only get to know fifteen people so well in a weekend, but the grace in which these Friends held each other eased my reservations more than I expected. I am learning to see the light within other people (and within myself) more clearly. I find this highly instructive as well as reassuring.

There's talk in our society about the absence of community, especially for young people. Economy, government, technology, culture itself seem to disconnect us. Children are pushed too hard and yet they are left behind. I had opportunity in retreat to think about what it means to be a child and what it means to be an adult. I think everyone in our group had a different and personal takeaway on that matter. I also had opportunity to spend time with people who I would verily call role models. They were (are) kind and considerate and it was a gift to be with them, and to be called Friend (and friend).

I take great comfort in knowing that I have a path of forward support here. I can see myself continue to nurture my emotional maturity among this community, something I think I've neglected until relatively recently. I am grateful that this is not the final time I will see my new friends. We have our entire lives to live. It can be together. Suddenly, I start to see a fullness in the world that I was missing before.

That's what I wanted to share. Forgive my esoteric sentences: it's challenging to express the feeling of emotional/internal dialogue in conventional language. I'm more than happy to expand on anything I wrote here. I also welcome your reactions and your own experiences with faith of any kind.

Howdy Tildes,

I have been a raw denim "wearer" for close to a decade or so now. I have been a big denim fan ever since my then girlfriend now wife bought be my first pair of selvedge raw denim from American Eagle. Since than I have admired from afar some of the fun collabs of Naked and Famous and some of the beautifully designed and made Iron Hearts. However I have never branched out from Unbranded. Specifically the 401s and the 421s because of cost, fit and not having any raw denim shops within driving distance of my city. Well my UB401s have gotten a little long in the tooth, and to be frank, short in the rinse and I am looking to branch out!

So normally I'd ask over on /r/rawdenim but I'm trying to kick the shite Reddit habit so I figured I would try asking here and see if there are any raw denim folks lurking! What are you all wearing? What would you recommend? I'm 6'5" and about 205lbs. So fairly tall and lanky and I'm struggling to find jeans that I think would fit. I have a budget of about $200-285 (not a ton I know) - So I was looking at some of the Naked and Famous, Nudie, Rogue Territory but open to others. I dig slim fits but nothing super skinny.

So, let me know what you think (and any recommendations), lets some some sick fade shots and lets have a cool discussion about jeans.

My wooden privacy fence was blown over in a storm (Houston, TX), any recommendations for the best way to rebuild?

Currently thinking of Shadowbox, fence hanger brackets, three rails, with a rot/kick board.

Hi Tildeans,

Today I accepted an offer in New Jersey situated in New Brunswick. My partner and I will be moving out there likely late July/early August. We will be bringing two dogs, one cat, and one snake with us. For those that live around the area, is there anything I should know about finding places to rent (e.g. places to avoid)? We are willing to be a little bit away from New Brunswick, but I would like to have easy access to the rail line that goes through the city so I can commute in without the use of a car.

Also, what are some recommendations for places to check out when we get there? We have pretty broad tastes when it comes to art, food, outdoor activities, and all of that. Lastly, if there is anything else you think I should know about the broader East coast area please feel free to share!

The debate is coming back up because of new talks around student loan forgiveness in the US. I was on the fence about it until I did some extra research for a comment I posted last week.

I am including the comment I posted last week that was from a discussion about whether general education classes should be required for a college degree, but the part about the societal value of a college graduate to the US is relevant.

Higher education is an interesting thing to put a price on because while some classes can provide economic benefits to people who get a higher education, many classes provide more of a societal benefit.

A history class doesn't help an engineer make a jet turbine, but it can help them be an informed voter. College campuses mix people of different races, genders, origins, and socioeconomic classes with each other. The general education courses expose students to different concepts that can help them in their civic lives.

College graduates also have many economic benefits to society. On average, college graduates pay much more in taxes than they take in government benefits over their lifetimes. High school graduates also contribute, but only a modest gain where college graduates contribute 4-5x what they take. Governments invest $28,000 per college student on average but gain $335,000 in net monetary benefit over their lifetime.

I get that many people are opposed to courses that don't directly apply to a career because they have to pay a lot of money out of pocket when the course may only provide a benefit to society. Why can't the government provide loan forgiveness to anyone who graduates? It would take pressure off students and still provide a net benefit to society over having them not graduate.

Does anyone have any experience with online degree programs? I was looking into the Arizona State University online Electrical Engineering BSE. The program is accredited and your degree is not marked any differently than an in person ASU degree.

I already have a BA in Economics, but I don’t really use my degree for my work. I feel like my career is progressing just fine, but I’ve always been interested in science and math. I tried Electrical Engineering at the beginning of my undergrad, but I was too undisciplined and unfocused to handle it.

I am interested in ASU because it will allow me to take classes while still having a full time job, but I am interested if anyone else has gotten a degree while working full time. What was your experience like?

So I'm looking to get out of apartment living in the next couple of years, so I browse housing listings semi-frequently just to get an idea of what's out there and what I can expect cost wise.

My boss made an offhand comment about buying a lot and getting a prefab installed on it, so I started looking into it, but I came back with a lot of questions.

1. Home builders seem to have preset floor plans. Every time I try and find a prefab house, all I can find are blueprints for purchase. Do you find a plan you like and then find someone to build it?

2. Home builders I find all build giant houses. I always see comments online about how "Builders can't build affordable homes because of red tape," but I don't understand how that means they can only build 5B/3Ba houses. I cannot find anyone that has preset plans for a 2B house.

3. How much about getting a lot "ready" would be up to me vs a builder? Is that gonna depend on the builder and what they offer? Is that all done out of pocket, or would that be included in the construction loan?

For reference, I'm in Atlanta, though I imagine a lot of these answers will be "It depends on the builder."

I posted previously about looking for a house for my disabled partner and myself and after several stressful months we're closing on April 30th!

So, now what? I'm working on home insurance quotes, I have the money arranged for closing. We're in the "these issues need addressed" phase of the contract process (there are no smoke detectors in this house wtf) and the home inspection raised no dealbreakers. No radon or termites.

So what don't I know about? What new homeowner things do I need to be thinking about now? We plan to move in the latter half of May. Accessibility suggestions are also useful, we're going to have to add a small ramp inside (one step), move a cabinet in the kitchen and replace carpet in the master bedroom.

Thanks for all the advice last time, please give me more of it?

Every now and then, I need, or at least am drawn to, something to turn my brain off for a bit. For some reason, this is often political content for me, which probably isn't healthy. Was wondering if you guys had any recommendations for content creators that upload fairly regularly about non-political, not-super-deep stuff.

Hello, I hope this is the right place for this kind of question. I've thought about posting it for a few weeks now but didn't know whether I should or not.

My wife has recently opened a small home daycare. We tailored everything to what we would look for if we needed daycare for our child, which was a small class size (5 children max), fully licensed and compliant with all local and state laws (which a lot of other places aren't), plenty of safe indoor and outdoor space (including a whole damn playground), and a learning-based curriculum rather than just babysitting. We have gotten a couple of people to sign up, but are having a rough time attracting more. Some people message us to ask questions, but then never reply when we provide answers. We've tried lowering our prices a bit to get started, and we're very flexible when it comes to time and needs.

So I'm just wondering, for any parents out there who have or have had small children and needed daycare, how did you decide on a place? Where/how did you find this place? And what about it stood out to you? Was it the price? Location? Recommendation of a close friend?

Any insight would be appreciated, thanks.

I'm currently a software developer consultant working as a lead developer in the fintech industry. My team consist of me and 6 other developers of various levels of expertice. I started apx a year ago in this position and the project was to take over an system built by an external company and develop and maintain it going forward. We grew the team over time, so initially there was only me, but after 3 months we'd added a couple of other developers. The most junior developer with only a few years of experience took on the scrum master role at 50%, which allowed the other of us to focus moren on dev stuff. I wouldn't have said the scrum master was a junior level developer based on them having worked for several years. That was my expectation...

After a few months we've continued to grow the team. All in all we are now 7 developers. The person that initially had the scrum master role has since opted to focus more on the dev side. We've accomodated them and since mid january they've focused soley on dev. However, the outcome of this hasn't met my expectations. Working 50% as a dev I understand (and expected) that they wouldn't pick up the domain/system as easily as simeone soley focused on the dev role. Given that they've now had a couple of months I don't really see any improvement however! And, to be clear, it isn't really about their level of output. I'd be content if they were able to show some increased understanding of the domain and/or had increased the quality of their work somewhat. I see none of this and a tendency to "hide" their work (postponing creating PRs so it's hard to judge their progress/need of help, not asking for support, dismissing offers for help when given, non participation in discussions/problem solving etc etc).

Speculating, but to me it seems they are not comfortable in their dev role and I seem to have failed in this instance to establish enough trust (either in me or in the team as a whole). I don't see this issue in the other team members though (even with the more junior people). Complicating things is that I am not their manager. So, it is ultimately not my responsibillity.

Any advice in addressing the issues? Ideally the outcome would be a situation where they have started to contribute to the team in some meaningful way. Should I be more patient? Should I impose help on them, e.g. comitt to pair with them on all work? What is a good and construcrive way to approach this (preferably without being a complete ass)?

As I age, my ambivalence towards social interactions becomes clearer. I can't really sustain the doom and gloom facade, as it is entirely obvious that, if I ever achieve "solitary utopia", the first thing I would do would be to find someone to talk about how great it is to be alone.

I used to have an awesome way to do things where I saw my friends 5 or 6 times a year. It was enough for me. Unfortunately, that group is imploding since mid-pandemic, and I don't think there's a way back.

This is made worse by the fact that most men I know are either completely ignorant, downright hostile, or intentionally removed from anything relating kids or fatherhood. Sometimes it feels like I am carrying some kind of virus, and spending time with me will make them become fathers by association.

It's hard to not feel jealous of the kind of support my wife gets from her female friends.

Given the current situation, I feel inclined to ask. Has anyone managed to make meaningful friendships in their 40s or early 30s? And by that I don't mean just someone to play videogames with, but someone with whom you can share stuff?

I am not really opposed to friendships with women, but that is kinda covered already.

This is one of those bizarre examples where I think a simple Google would solve the mystery, but I've tried dozens of searches like "halogen track lights with LEDs in center" and NO product comes up with it. Does anyone know what these are?? My guess is that it has to do with one of the lights being out, but why so many LEDs then?

The latest iteration of a study regarding the cost of student housing in Germany found, that rent prices for students have risen to a germany-wide average of 479€. Three years ago the average was just 391€. In Munich the average cost for student housing has risen to no less than 760€. This is more than double than the housing-cost covered by BAföG, a public program providing financial support to students from low-income families. [1]

Statistically, more than a third of students in Germany are at risk of poverty at the moment, meaning they have less than 60% of the country's mean income available. [2] [3]

Also with regards to Munich specifically, the number of designated student housing facilities has not grown significantly or even dropped over the past few years, while the number of students has been steadily increasing. This means that more and more students have to look for rooms in shared apartments on the city's highly competitive housing market. Statistically, these students are those that live close to the poverty line particularly often.

I realize that the cost of high-quality higher education in Germany is not as majorly fucked as for example in the USA, but still the financial burden on students is steadily increasing due to housing cost. How does this compare to where you're from? How is student housing organized in your city, how much does it cost relative to the mean income, and do you experience similar trends in your region?

Sources (german), besides in-person conversations and experiences:
[1] https://cms.moses-mendelssohn-institut.de/uploads/24_03_19_Wohnkosten_Studierende_804a7b53ef.pdf
[2] https://www.spiegel.de/start/statistisches-bundesamt-mehr-als-ein-drittel-der-studierenden-lebt-unter-der-armutsgrenze-a-460cb19f-8a62-43ab-8b52-652814234250
[3] https://youtu.be/UVaY8SCtjwg

I work as a prek teacher. I go to work, clock in, and spend 8 hours actively engaged with kids teaching reading, writing, math, social skills, science, games, and more. I don't have "down time" at work; I'm always on, because I have to be. There are demands of me every moment I'm there.

But what about you corporate folks? I can't seem to figure what you actually... Do?

My dad worked such a job (VP in pharma) and I could never get a real answer from him. He would always just say "I'm busy", he traveled a lot, and as far as I could tell his "work" was just meetings.

Other business folks I interact with, it's the same. They're always playing on their phone, or (my favorite) constantly talking on the phone when picking up or dropping off their kids at school, and ignoring them. A buddy of mine is a senior exec and was able to complete baldur's gate 3 during work hours because he's just sitting around in meetings all day.

How is that work? How does that justify earning 4x+ what I make?

I'm genuinely curious because I've never gotten a straight answer and my impression is that in these jobs you don't actually do anything, but that can't be right.

Sorry if this is a dumb question.

Hey folks - I've been wanting to go whole hog on automating my home, I read through this smart home automation - tips and tricks thread started by @Merry and had a lot of useful information.

Some of the things I took away from it:

• Home assistant is pretty great (if you don't mind tinkering)
• Getting something that will boot back up after a power failure is great
• Use smart plugs / switches vs bulbs
• Maintain it's usefulness if there is an internet outage

Like I mentioned I'd really like for this to be privacy focused and mostly self contained. Sure I'd love to be able to control stuff from my phone while I'm home and also recognize that I'm home or away.

I just am a bit smooth brained when it comes to even seeing "would something like this work with the wiring / circuity that I have in my home already?"

If there are any good guides to follow or really specific advice / steps I could follow to begin this process I'd really appreciate it.

I've always been interested in entrepreneurship, and I think I want to get serious about doing something. I checked out the Millionaire Fastlane forums, and it's just completely saturated with the whole "grindset" BS. I tried reading a couple of threads, and my eyes almost rolled out of my head. 🙄

I've also hung around on the entrepreneur subreddit, and it just seems like a bunch of people without much experience trading unproven advice and people trying to sell courses.

Does anyone know of a better community? I'd like to find some friendly, welcoming adults with actual experience to talk with. Are entrepreneurship and hustle culture always a package deal?

I’m looking for advice about what sort of portable room cooling devices to look at and what pitfalls to avoid. Some context:

Over the past few years I’ve noticed that I do pretty badly in the heat, especially at night. I live in Zürich, the concept of air conditioning has not yet arrived in this place. The prevailing wisdom for how to survive summer is to just make sure your house doesn’t get too warm in the first place, but my apartment is pretty badly insulated and during the worst weeks it doesn’t cool down that much at night either, so it’s been pretty bad the last few years. I’ve mostly just avoided being in my room whenever possible, but I do have to sleep somehow.

The obvious solution to me is to buy some sort of air conditioning device, a topic I know basically nothing about. My flatmate has one for his room, of the “dangle a tube out of the window” kind, which seems to do an okay job, but it is extremely loud and quite bulky - neither of those are dealbreakers per se, but I’d happily pay a bit more money if that gets me something quieter. In addition, our windows are not sliding windows but ones that open like a door, so any device that requires me to poke something out of the window would probably need a solution for this as well. Any sort of permanent modification to the house such as putting a hole through the wall or the window glass are not allowed.

So my questions are: What types of coolers should I look into, what types are best avoided? Any specific brand or model recommendations would also be appreciated. I looked at one electronics vendor’s website and found a huge range in prices from below 100 to over 1000; I don’t have a specific budget in mind per se, but unless it makes a big difference (e.g. in noise levels) I would rather stay below 500 dollars.

I've tried before to get input on this, but online it doesn't go anywhere and IRL people don't seem to understand. Thought about putting it in the /~finance area, but I don't know that it's really a finance issue, plus things there seem to be wider-scale financial in focus. And there's no /~advice page, so here it is:

I feel like I should be making more money lol. Now immediately, that sounds greedy or either capitalistic/anticapitalistic, depending—I know it does, but hear me out. I have a great job that pays ok but not great, and tons of free time; in my mind, and if I'm being honest in my field, chasing a 5% raise is low ROI and low likelihood of even happening. There is little room for vertical movement, but enough security that it seems crazy to make any changes. Post-college, I have had a pretty varied career background, I am very good at editing, research, training, tech, etc. but I am not an "idea person" and I don't have a lot of marketability or self-promotion ability, it seems like (also no coding abilities, which is always a suggestion; I've tried, believe me, but my brain won't do it). I'd rather edit your book than write one of my own, not because I'm afraid of rejection or can't commit to doing something/run out of steam, but because the steam just isn't there.

I don't feel the need to change careers, but I am also feeling super unfulfilled. I've worked on doing things to try and fill that gap, hobbies/other pursuits/etc, but I am haunted by the fact that I am using such a small part of my bandwidth, when it seems like I could be outputting at 2x or 3x and earning similarly. I've applied for contract work, freelance, all that stuff, but it is spotty pay at best—what I want, short of a medieval patron/wealthy benefactor, is a second job I could do on top of this one. Which leads me to side-hustle-type rabbit holes on starting an Etsy shop/a YouTube channel/a Patreon page. But when it comes down to it, I don't actually feel any passion about doing any of those things, and I can't get a narrow enough niche figured out to even come up with a potential audience. I've avoided specializing because I wanted to do all kinds of things, and now I've done that, and I feel like maybe it was a mistake. I just want to have the resources available to do what I want. Bills are paid, life is good, but I feel like I am spinning my wheels: even writing this out is like a roller coaster of feeling shame that I'm not satisfied or that I'm ungrateful, then being frustrated I can't make it happen the way I want, on my own.

Because see, I didn't say I deserve more money; I want the opportunity to earn more money. There are a ton of things I would be perfectly happy doing for a living, or for a second job. And more money might not even help—if I was a trust fund baby I be in a similar situation. But what the fuck should I be doing then? I guess what I really want is for someone to say "Hey, I need this job done, I'll give you $XXk a year to do it" like it's 1980, and then I know I am serving a purpose? And I wouldn't feel guilty about time left over, because the job is Done. But part of me is afraid that, even if that somehow magically materialized, I would feel the exact same way I do now.

so what do tilderinos?

Greetings Tildeans!

I am wrapping up my Ph.D. and am pursuing a teaching-focused career in higher education. I am currently in talks for a 4-year institution teaching faculty position that would revolve around teaching a subject I am passionate about and could provide a lot of intellectual stimulation. Unless something wild happens the offer is there and we are just negotiating the parameters. I also have a position that is in 2nd-phase interviews for a community college tenure track position that would be teaching general biology, anatomy, and physiology. I feel optimistic that they are going to offer me a position, but nothing is concrete yet.

I'm at this impasse because both have really good reasons for doing them and would provide experiences unique from the other. I am trying to balance the pros and cons between these two positions and consider what might be good for my career in the long run, and so I was hoping I could get some advice. Even if you're not in academia I think it would be helpful to get some outside prospective. I'm gonna list my thoughts on it below.

4-year University

Pros:

-Teach upper level and domain specific courses with opportunity to design courses I am passionate about.
-Integrated into scientific community if I want to to do more research/keep abreast of scientific advancements.
-Great community of teaching faculty with lots of support.
-Could be good curriculum vitae experience if I want to stay teaching at a 4-year institution, and could open up teaching psychology courses.
-Option to develop a community outreach project I am passionate about, not sure if there is support for me but there is infrastructure there.
-Partner's family is in the area, and it is a big metropolitan area with lots to do.
-Can get tuition at 25% cost for my partner and I incase we want to get some other degrees.

Cons:

-Pay is not great (does have option of picking up extra summer online classes to earn more).
-My partner and I don't want to live here long term, primarily because of climate, and cost of living is increasing. We are already ready to move, but this is a good opportunity.
-Is contract based, so not as much job security. Having said that, many of the teaching faculty have been there a long time and it seems like the student body for this department is generally growing.

Community College

Pros:

-Pay is pretty good, and there is a baked in growth of salary as long as you stay there long term. Pay could be as much as $15K more starting out than the 4-year institution.
-Small class sizes, so better teacher:student ratio means more involved education.
-Cost of living in the area is pretty cheap (so far).
-Beautiful area and would put us closer to a part of the country we would like to live in long term.
-I do like biology and physiology, just not as much as neuroscience.
-From my understanding there is lot of support and easy options to get into administration if so desired. All the faculty I briefly met had been there at least 7 years.

Cons:

-Only lower levels courses, with little room to develop new ones.
-Not sure how this would impact my ability to switch to a 4-year institution if I end up craving that intellectual stimulation.
-The area is in a part of California that does have issues with forest fires (not the town proper), and the county swings hard in the opposite direction of my politics.
-Small town so there isn't as much to do.

Overall, the community college looks best on paper. We're not planning on having kids so family support isn't as big of a deal. My main concern is if I could switch back to a 4-year institution if I feel like I'm missing something. So if anyone has any thoughts please let me know, in particular if there are other things I'm not considering that you think are worth examining.

Edit: Just to add some additional information. As part of making myself a good candidate for higher education, I have worked as a teaching assistant for several courses during grad school and I have taught online physiology as an adjunct professor at a community college, so I have some experience in both environments.

Thanks ahead of time!