shadowfromthestarlight

[shadowfromthestarlight]

man the public defender discourse pisses me off so bad. yeah. yeah I do think that every single person deserves representation. yeah that includes people who *have* committed rape and murder and abuse. when I say every single person I mean every single person. if your idea of justice excludes one person it excludes everyone. next question

[shadowfromthestarlight]

gonna give a word of encouragement to y'all, as much as i hear you all say time moves too fast, or you can't keep up with all your hobbies, or you've been too depressed to engage with certain things you'd like to engage with, in MY perspective just the fact that you all can talk about 50 different TV shows or movies or albums on tumblr every day means you're doing great. i don't read fanfic, haven't watched a season of a TV series in about four years, and maybe watch one movie a month on average and on most days i'm still like la la la where did the time go lulz. i don't know how you all do it.

[shadowfromthestarlight]

Last week, I did a road trip to Pennsylvania and Ohio. My dad met me for one day of the trip so we could go to Cuyahoga Valley together. He said he had been watching something about travel recently and they said "Your life is a book, but if you don't travel you only write one chapter," attributing it to Mark Twain.

I actually think the quote is "The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page," but okay.

I then saw a post the other day that prasied peope who travel, saying "You're the one who refuses to live the same day 75 days in a row."

Honestly? I think however you phrase it, those are all horrible things to say. It's awfully close-minded, despite people who say such things thinking they're more open-minded than others. You don't know somebody else's life. A person could live in the same geographic area for 80 years and not travel extensively and still write many "chapters" of the book of their life. One chapter could be raising their family, one chapter could be starting their own business, and one chapter could be sitting on the board of trustees for their library. Or starting the community garden. Or building their own house. Or opening their home to foster dogs. Or whatever.

Though I was in the middle of my own road trip when I read the "75 days in a row" post, I got angry. If I remained within my own county for 75 days, I could still find something different to do every day if I wanted to. There are dozens of villages I could wander and shop in, trails I could hike, points from which I could view the sunset, restaurants I could dine in, etc.

Besides, isn't noticing the nature that's in your own backyard the new thing? There's value to just observing the different bird species, watching the time the sun strikes your yard subtly change, getting to know the trees, listening to the footsteps of animals in the dark, learning which plants flourish in spring and which in fall, and overall becoming attuned to your environment. "It is the mark of wisdom to see the miraculous in the common," and you can do that by appreciating a hawk perching in your neighbor's yard at sunrise, a black swallowtail gracing your garden with its presence, a frog leaping out of your way in the dim twilight, the roar of the nearby creek after it rains, the flowers gradually opening themselves to the sun in the morning, the spongy feel of moss beneath your feet.

There's value to standing in a museum in Paris, too, don't get me wrong, but that's not the only way to have valuable experiences in your life.

I'm not anti-travel. I travel. I've been to over 30 countries, I've been to some hard-to-reach corners of the globe and some of the most iconic places out there, I've been to more than half of the US national parks with the lifetime goal of visiting every single one at least twice, and yet travel culture annoys me to no end. It can be a positive force in your life, indeed, but it doesn't automatically make you a better person than someone who doesn't travel. And you have no place whatsoever making judgmental comments about what someone else's life is like if they haven't been as many places as you have.

[shadowfromthestarlight]

~ Croissants ~

[shadowfromthestarlight]

Poet's Corner

Guerneville, CA, July 2025

Shot on Nikon N75 with Kodak Ultramax 400

[shadowfromthestarlight]

we are entering slop era, where movies and tv shows even music dont need to be good as long as they sell and gain traction by being cringey/stupid/ragebaity and yall fall for it every single time

[shadowfromthestarlight]

[shadowfromthestarlight]

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@ Baronka Bed & Breakfast Bistro

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I see the good in people but having discernment is important

[shadowfromthestarlight]

Hollidaysburg, PA

[shadowfromthestarlight]

new lefty term i just learned: "structural loneliness," or the feeling of having been abandoned by "society" or by the government

[shadowfromthestarlight]

Heads up! @knowledgetosorrow (OP of the nuance and depth post) is a proud anti abortion transphobe.

Deleted, thank you