puttingpentopaper:

forgoodnessjakes:

The Loneliest Whale in the World.

In 2004, The New York Times wrote an article about the loneliest whale in the world. Scientists have been tracking her since 1992 and they discovered the problem:

She isn’t like any other baleen whale. Unlike all other whales, she doesn’t have friends. She doesn’t have a family. She doesn’t belong to any tribe, pack or gang. She doesn’t have a lover. She never had one. Her songs come in groups of two to six calls, lasting for five to six seconds each. But her voice is unlike any other baleen whale. It is unique—while the rest of her kind communicate between 12 and 25hz, she sings at 52hz. You see, that’s precisely the problem. No other whales can hear her. Every one of her desperate calls to communicate remains unanswered. Each cry ignored. And, with every lonely song, she becomes sadder and more frustrated, her notes going deeper in despair as the years go by.

Just imagine that massive mammal, floating alone and singing—too big to connect with any of the beings it passes, feeling paradoxically small in the vast stretches of empty, open ocean.

Nooo whale ;n;

Oh god, this is the saddest thing I’ve ever read.

(Source: erickimberlinbowley, via slomotionwalter)

STILL love it when the few things I regularly keep up with on the internet and IRL cross over.  It’s like that moment when you realize Past You left twenty bucks in your pants pocket and Present You can now take your friend out to dinner.  

fishingboatproceeds:

Tumblr, I know we are all tumbly and everything, and cats and Paula Deen Riding Things and Ryan Gosling Reading YA, and that’s all great. It’s perfect, really. I wouldn’t want to change it.

But can we just take a moment right now to be grateful and astonished that we are alive and able to bear witness to the universe? Can we just spend like four seconds letting it sink in that we are here, together, amid something much larger than we can effectively imagine?

How strange it is to be anything at all.

On the list of songs that reminded me that world was bigger than the tiny, dark, and lonely cubicle of my last job.  The little infinity within my ribcage seems to expand when I listen; I smile, close my eyes, and let the vastness of the world rest all the more intimately in my mind for a few minutes.

(Source: cloudpalace)

Born in the Chicagoland area, raised just north of the city, I moved away for college and only got as far as Indiana and Michigan.  Though I didn’t spend significant amounts of time actually in the city of Chicago while I was growing up, the cluster of suburbs around my neighborhood offer more than enough to drain my limited high school budget, I always consider Chicago to be my home town.  While I currently make my home in Grand Rapids, MI, today I will be driving down to Chicago to join the One Book, One Chicago lecture/talk/discussion at the Harold Washington Library.  Saul Bellow’s novel The Adventures of Augie March recounts the life of one Augie March from childhood through adulthood.  Augie’s later (mis)fortunes branch from the inherent struggles of his younger years, trying to make even a little something of himself in Depression Chicago.  This book is not always an easy read, if fact it rarely is, but for those who think fondly of Chicago and know even a little something of its history, it serves as an lyrical step back to the Chicago of our yesterdays. 

I haven’t finished the book quite yet, but I am certain the drive along the Dan Ryan, up Cermack, and down State Street with renew my energy and fill me once again with excitement to hear John Green, Benjamin Alire Saenz, and Donna Seaman speak to their own engagement with the story.  Here’s to leaving work early for the things I love!

Have you ever traveled?  Wanted to travel?  Gone to a restaurant just to try some foreign food?  Imagine being dropped of for your last first day of high school and finding out there are no pop tarts for breakfast, only the most buttery of French croissants!  Join Anna as she tries to make her way in a country full of food, friends, and fun she has only yet to discover!  (not) Only at the Grand Rapids Public Library!