Monday, November 16, 2020

HEAVEN IS A PLACE
WHERE NOTHING EVER HAPPENS


Sarah: Did u finish watching the dash and lily show? It started out a lil cringe but i straight bawled at the last ep ugh new york at christmas ❤️💔

Adam: Omg yr already done? We have three episodes left

Sarah: I have anxiety i have to binge my shows. Enjoy!!! I hope yall have some tears too hehehe

Adam: Did you agree the main girl is you

Sarah: Um idk, she was a girl in new york who loved books which is an experience i’ve had but there are a gazillion girls who are probably like that

Adam: Eh I thought it was uncanny
I bet Tina would agree

Sarah: But what about it was uncanny tho? Her first scene was literally her caroling and i can’t sing hahahaha

Adam: Like she’s also a super idealist and romantic sentimental girl

Sarah: Do you, not know... a lot of idealist romantic sentimental girls? I feel like if someone is an idealist then the other two come naturally with

Adam: Lol well I guess not really
Like I could totally see you in the club and slam poetry scenes

Sarah: Omg!!!! That is true

So I spent 3.5 hours on the way to and from work yesterday, just watching Dash and Lily. It's adapted from a book for young adults, I think. The first two episodes are a little bit cringe, but I did get into it by the end. It's basically about these two teenagers who have never met, but dare each other to do things through a notebook, first introduced in The Strand. The Strand is a popular bookstore in NYC, that's in need of saving, through these terrible times we live in. They finally meet properly in the final episode, back in the bookstore, and everything about it is perfect. 

Lily is an idealist who loves Christmas, and Dash is a cynical grinch who has walls up to guard himself. Eventually he has the bookstore set up especially for her, with her favorite pie from Gowanus, etc. It obviously reminded me of my own experience in New York. In that episode, when they meet, they don't know what to say, because they'd been communicating only via the book and telling each other things they hadn't told anyone else. Lily then just says, "sometimes words aren't enough", and kisses him. 

I know what this feels like, when you love books and words and even though there are a million ways to say I can't stop thinking about you, sometimes you just need to touch. I think the pandemic has been affecting everyone in very strange ways, I don't know if there's such a thing as hooking up safely, I don't know when the last time anyone got a hug was. I do know human touch is very important, so remember to hug the people you can meet.

Yesterday, at work, I was telling my friends that we’d finally sent the first black person to the International Space Station, and they didn’t know what the ISS was. When you’re thirty and your colleagues and friends are mostly in their teens or just past their teenage years, sometimes your cumulative knowledge can be more than theirs. I wonder if it will be the same when I’m back in school. Perhaps. It was strange explaining the ISS to them, I thought everyone knew we had astronauts that are based in space, but the idea was completely foreign to them.