i can't read good

books i've read this summer:
the namesake by jhumpa lahiri
hurt others by sam pink
the blind eye by james b stewart
the stranger by albert camus
skippy dies by paul murray (again)
the myth of sisyphus and other essays by albert camus
possible side effects by augusten burroughs
brief interviews with hideous men by david foster wallace (still working on it)
how to lose friends and alienate people
various works from the american anthology of short fiction, edited by joyce carol oates
taipei by tao lin

hey so yeah

i'm doing this thing where i only watch hugely popular cable television series 6 years after the episodes air. case in point: weeds, arrested development, gossip girl, and most recently, desperate housewives. interesting because i don't really care for any of the characters and yet the show is actually super well-written. i think im working at a bank. im not sure if this news is bleak or exciting. more 2 cum

the depressed person's guide to staying awake

-the long awaited sequel to the hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy and harry potter 8 (the ride)
-today i felt like crying four different times
-i still think i can love bb, but the child-like state i've entered at the hand's of my childhood house and my parents is crippling my ability to imagine myself hanging out with people my own age or in an even vaguely sexual situation. the summer will end and things will return to normal. 'normal' being how things were 2 years ago: more innocent, more fun (strangely), but less visceral and i dont know, let's say 'thought catalog'. my parents are of course passionately albeit indirectly, campaigning for themselves to be my 'role models'. truthfully, i don't think i have any role models. the closest things are more like entities: thought catalog, certain twitter accounts related to alt lit ppl, das racist, bb even. i don't know' is my mantra. karma. dharma. when can i unashamedly identify as indian? i think im less embarrassed of this cultural baggage, and more protective. seeing a white person in a sari truly irks me in a way that i know is unfair, as my parents love seeing shit like that, and they can lay claim to that culture way more than i will ever deserve. i'm ashamed to be discovering parts of this culture through things like jhumpa lahiri books and song lyrics, as opposed to just absorbing it while growing up via cultural osmosis.

i wore a bindi with normie clothes and loved it
yet i have to wonder, am i only noticing the stylish quality bc it's currently trendy for white girls to do on tumblr? i am struggling w this whole 'bi-cultural identity' business. i have to at least know more about india and hinduism than shitty white culture hoarders, no?