As a kid/teen, I read a lot - and I mean a *lot*; for example I got through nearly 1 book from the Sword of Truth series *per day*. I built a contraption to let me read while showering; I read in the car, by the moonlight, I snuck books under the glass dining table at dinner. 1/
I had at least 2 books on my person at all times just in case I finished one and needed another. I lined my bed with books and slept on top of them.
At this level of excessive, near-constant reading I remember having a different experience of reading than I can achieve now. 2/
I wouldn't read words, I'd read phrases as solid chunks, and often treat full paragraphs similarly to the way I read sentences now; some part of my brain skimmed *in addition* to reading; it sort of told my eyes where to jump to catch the important words so I could come out 3/
of the paragraph with good comprehension. And my comprehension was good - reading tests clocked me at around 800 wpm with decent retention.
What interests me about this is that I think I was doing some sort of data compression? Like, I read fewer total words than were there. 4/
I don't know how my brain managed to figure out which words to read and which ones not to at that significant a scale.
I can't do this anymore; my reading speed has dropped a few hundred wpm. There's still some chunking, but it doesn't feel the same.
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early into my relationship with an ex we sat down and he went thru his darkest, weirdest porn folder and showed me stuff. id be like 'what's the hottest part about this thing' and he'd point out the parts that really did it for him. 1/
id ask clarifying questions, he'd explain. i started tryin to guess the hottest parts of more of his porn to see if i understood what he was into really well.
it was really wholesome and bonding, he was adorably shy about it. but i really loved seeing what he was into. 2/
it gave me an eye for random hot things i'd find in the wild - gifs or photos or whatever - that i'd send him if i thought they seemed to really hit at the center of what turned him on. It also made our sex better, cause i was much more in touch with how our dynamic impacted him
it freaks me out a bit how extremely misguided economic opinions permeate so much of media for young people. I watch youtube and people will casually drop anti-landlord, anti-capitalist, etc. sentiment in completely unrelated videos. I really fear for voting shifts in the future
normally i'd think uneducated economic activist opinions is a niche thing and if i'm seeing it then it's probably some selection bias, but it pops up in places i wouldn't expect to see it. And NO sane economic understanding is casually popping up in the same places.
we're headed in an actually fascist direction, not the flashy memeable fascism but the sort that well-meaning people don't realize is fascism, which is by far the most terrifying type
as i've gotten to know more high-profile people, most are predictably quite great, but some of them have emotional issues, are mean, or live life in ways that are harmful to others.
im not sure how to handle this professionally? how do u figure out boundaries for association?
there's a lot of cases that are sorta grey area, like I catch a glimpse of something going kinda nasty in their personal life, but it doesn't involve me at all, but now i'm seeing them at a profesh event or maybe should work with them on something and idk how to operate here
like is there some general quiet understanding that yeah, some ppl are shitty in private, but we generally keep acting normal in a separate 'everything is professional, keep personal stuff at home' context, unless the personal stuff gets real egregious?
I was homeschooled for the entirety of my k-12 years, as well as were nearly all the other people i knew. Here's some of the pros and cons (of the specific version I got), how it seemed to work out for my other homeschooled friends, and if I'd homeschool my own kids:
Cons: Your parents have a waaay bigger impact on your life. Good parents or bad parents, your variance is huge. I and some of my friends had abusive parents, and that was not great. Your parents get to control basically all cultural information you're exposed to.
Cultural isolation isn't bad when it's happening, but can be pretty rough once you get out into the world. I remember the moment I asked a bunch of kids who this 'britney spears' was they were talking about. Your slang is diff. What are school lockers? social norms are different
As a sex worker online for over a decade, who's been closely watching how the sexy parts of the internet have changed, I have a theory for why this is happening.
Spaces for actual full sex/erotica have absolutely slowly been getting squeezed out. Tumblr banned porn, reddit removed porn from r/all even if you opt into seeing NSFW, fetish subreddits have been getting banned, more rules and restrictions are getting out on sexual behavior.
My theory is that the prudes trying to remove and restrict the expression in full sexual spaces has led to sex "leaking out" everywhere else. There's less full throated sexual expression in specific sex areas now, so people are resorting to non-sexual platforms.
For example:
Ppl shit on poly for being explosive but I've been poly for 12 years and it was rough at first but it's really good now. It's an active, thriving delight in my life.
So here's some hard lessons i learned from mistakes, and some unexpected joys
1. don't date people who are partially open to monogamy. this results in partners dating other people who aren't full-throated yes to ENM, and this ends up with subtle grating pressures that have soooo many ways to go wrong. You want your metamours to be glad you're involved
2. fights with your partner can be lonely, cause you're in this isolated ecosystem of intimacy and it's hard to explain to someone else the things that drive you crazy.
having a metamour can relieve this burden so much. you can share your fights with someone else who gets it