vibing to songs about god
plus: some pre-thanksgiving musings
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💌 dear diary reader: a love note from nins
like arns, i went to private catholic schools for my entire life. like a weirdo 🤡
organized religion was deeply embedded in our upbringing and our families’ dynamics—v much filipino catholic vibes. but now that i’m older, i feel pretty detached from a lot of the traditions and structures and beliefs around catholicism.
and this is by no means a unique experience. i think a majority of our peers feel the same way. but i do still prescribe to this wonderful idea that there is a bigger meaning to all of this.
i don’t know what it is—i’m not going to call it god, and i’m not going to advocate one belief over the other, nor am i trying to convince you of any one way of thinking.
but i will just say: for me, i still believe and feel that there is some higher power out there. and whatever it is, my personal relationship to this cosmic force is just between me and it. period.
and this is what Tems is saying in her song, “Me & U”…
👉🏼 LISTEN TO THE REST OF THIS STORY: ep 020: omg / lost & found
🍯 short n sweet
📺 ARNS WATCHED: saying “i love you” for the first time
neuroscientist and third generation Japanese-American Wendy Suzuki tells Mel Robbins about the first time she and her aging parents exchanged an “i love you”.
a reminder that if we permit ourselves tenderness and vulnerability—and ask for that tenderness from others in return—we just might get it. healing generational trauma, one “i love you” at a time.
🔥 slow burn
📖 NINS READ: Half a Soul by Olivia Atwater
oh my GOD i loved this book. this is Pride and Prejudice meets Eleanor Oliphant with just a dash of evil faeries. i was fully anticipating (and excited for!) a simple, whimsical, and comforting read about about a grumpy dude falling in love with a not-like-most-girls girlie. but babes i got that and so much more.
this story tackles head on the paralyzing problem of looking at the dreadful state of the world and all its despair and thinking that nothing i do will change anything; that i only have the capacity to effect tiny changes; that any impact i have is small and therefore insignificant. but what if that’s actually far from the truth? what if just maybeeeee “if you take the time to rescue even one [fish], then perhaps you may even convince a bystander to join you and rescue another.”
🦃 merch for your dreaded thanksgiving
if you 1) are dreading thanksgiving with your dickish, incredibly insensitive aunts and uncles, and 2) want to passive-aggressively inform them that you, unlike them, embrace your feelings and encourage everyone to do the same: we have the perfect hat and long sleeve shirt for you. (get them both here.)
🎧 pod drop
other highlights from this week’s episode, ep 020: omg / lost & found…
✨ARNS DIGS INTO MODERN NATIVE AMERICAN HISTORY & BELONGING
speaking of thanksgiving: in this week’s ep, arns talks about a crucial piece of native american history through documentary daughter of a lost bird.
in the film, native adoptee Kendra rebuilds a relationship with her birth mom, April. as an adoptee herself (more specifically, as one of the ~30% of native children who were adopted out of their tribes following the Indian Adoption Project of 1958), April’s story unfolds alongside her daughter’s. in uncovering their lummi roots, Kendra grapples with how to hold the pain and suffering that was once a distant people’s but is now very much her own.
told over the course of 7 years, this is a story that’s uniquely native—but at the same time, deeply familiar for any of us searching for belonging.
that’s it. that’s all we got. we can’t wait to hear from you. ok bye love you!!!
in shambles,
nins & arns