academic networking, or as I like to think of it, hanging around people long enough that they add you to their dropbox of illicit and highly topic-specific pdfs
suicidal, no future aspirations, self and situationally-isolated with no friend/support group, letting medical issues get worse, dropping/failing out of school
Me now:
semi-medicated, double AA-DTA, starting an undergraduate in paleontology with aspirations for a graduate degree, new medical issues but a doctor/therapist that's willing to listen, bffs and fiancé for support, getting married soon, moving away from unhealthy family to start a life with soon-to-be husband and our cats
predicted meme for later in the year: everybody saying “shit now I can do X because I’m vaccinated” when X is something entirely unrelated to the coronavirus
first meme wave: X is a completely outlandish or impossible thing. Like “shit now I can shapeshift again because I am vaccinated”
second meme wave: X is a completely mundane thing. Like “shit now I can put milk in my cereal again because I am vaccinated”
okay this reminded me of the strongest human being (I use that label with some reservation) I have ever met and I still think about him like once a week because about 4 years ago on Thanksgiving night my sister, cousin, and I were going to pick up a friend about a 40 minute drive from home, and I got lost and tried to turn around on a little gravel pull-off on the side of the road, but my front tires got stuck in the snow.
we were in the middle of nowhere with no cell reception, and the only sign of life was a single, completely dark house across the road from us.
We all did our best to push the car out, and we’re strong people, but we couldn’t make it budge. Cold and stuck, we climbed back and wondered what to do. A car full of men pulled over beside us and asked if we needed help, but getting out of our locked car on a backroad at night with strange men felt like a bad idea, so we said a tow was coming and waved them along. We did that twice before finally deciding our only option was to accept the next offer for help and just risk it,
when a man came out of the house across the street.
He’d clearly been watching us and figured out why we’d been lying to people, which really surprised me & he said “it’s okay, you can stay in your car and keep the doors locked. Just start backing up when I say so.”
I had the window cracked and told him “it’s too stuck. There’s no way we’re getting out. Could you call a tow?”
And he said “just back up when I say so.”
So he walked around the front of the car, squatted, and said “okay back up,”
and I did, and
he lifted
the front of the car Into The Air. Off its front wheels, and we backed up while he essentially wheel-barrowed us back onto the road.
And we were honest to god yelling. We couldn’t help it. We just yelled until all four wheels were back on the ground and he was waving us off while we thanked him.
And then I looked at my sister and cousin & said “he REALLY told us we can KEEP our doors locked as if THAT WOULD’VE FUCKING STOPPED HIM!!!! As if he couldn’t have just RIPPED EM OFF THE HINGES.”
I later looked up the weight of my car, and it’s 3200 pounds without anything or anyone in it.
