What A Mother Of A Month! Also We Have So Many Book Recs
 As much as I find my period inconvenient, annoying and uncomfortable, I'm still somewhat fascinated by it. There's something almost primordial about the process, especially since I switched to using a menstrual cup a few years ago, which requires becoming extremely familiar with your insides. Every 28 days, I go through a cycle that suggests that somewhere deep within me, there's the potential for motherhood — a potential that is fraught and scary and occasionally exhilarating.
— Tomi
Poetry  Two Poems For Black Mothers In America by Camille T. Dungy
"But look at me. Still on my hands and knees—still pushing."
Personal Essays  How To Destroy Your Friends Emotionally With Astrology Memes by Scaachi Koul Astrology apps like Co–Star label my anxieties and let me drag my friends.
Why Rachel Held Evans Meant So Much To So Many by Laura Turner The popular Christian writer, who died last Saturday, knew that asking questions wasn't anathema to faith. What will we do without her?
I Hate AirPods by Tomi Obaro They're ugly, overpriced, and harbingers of gentrification.
What I Learned About Love From American Movies by Mira Jacob Is it normal to use someone's shower on the first date? According to Top Gun, yes.
How My Runaway Daughter Unearthed My Mother's Secret Shame by Bernice McFadden "There are things you don't know about your grandmother. One day, one day I'll tell you." An essay from What My Mother and I Don't Talk About.
Reckoning With Personal Responsibility In The Age Of Climate Change by Shannon Keating As someone who loves traveling and going outdoors, I struggle with balancing my hopefulness and my despair — and my culpability — regarding an imperiled earth.
Features  Ilana Panich-Linsman for Buzfeed News Fixer Upper Is Over, But Waco's Transformation Is Just Beginning by Anne Helen Petersen HGTV stars Chip and Joanna Gaines helped convert a sleepy Texas town into a tourist mecca. But not everyone agrees on what Waco's "restoration" should look like.
Inside The World Of Stay-At-Home Moms Who Blog For Profit by Kathryn Jezer-Morton There is a digital shadow-realm of intriguingly bland blogs about motherhood, written by women who aspire to make big money from home. But are their hopes in vain
Is Hiking With Face Masks The New Normal? by Wudan Yan People move to the Pacific Northwest to be near incredible natural beauty. But each year, wildfires and rising temperatures are making it harder to go outside.
These Women Are Only On Facebook For The Groups by Anne Helen Petersen Private Facebook groups have been a respite from online toxicity, even as the social media giant continues to suck at combating misinformation and abuse.
How Startups Like Zola Are Changing The Wedding Industry (Or Not) by Elisabeth Donnelly Companies like the Knot, Zola, and other boutique startups promise to cater to the whims of millennials by moving the mundane parts of wedding planning online. But are they as innovative as they claim to be?
Charlie Kirk And Candace Owens' Campus Tour Is All About The Owns by Anne Helen Petersen
The young conservative stars of Turning Point USA's Campus Clash speaking tour don't actually engage in debate — they just cut to the winning.
Hollywood Is Finally Paying Attention To Christian Movies. What Happens Now? by Alison Willmore Faith-based hits like God's Not Dead and I Can Only Imagine aren't the surprise they used to be. But how will an industry fueled by a sense of neglect handle mainstream acceptance?
Books  19 Amazing Books That Prove Indie Presses Deserve Your Attention by Wendy J. Fox Updated Japanese folklore, an unexpected love triangle, meditations on family and addiction, and more.
19 Books That Will Make Your Life A Little More Magical by Arianna Rebolini As recommended by BuzzFeed Book Club members.
I Know It's Okay That I Chose Not To Breastfeed. But I Still Feel Guilty by Teresa Wong During those first months with my newborn, I was overwhelmed by sadness. The doctor said it was just baby blues. (An excerpt from Teresa Wong's Dear Scarlet.)
17 Books That Will Change The Way You Think About The World by Arianna Rebolini From Naomi Klein to Barbara Kingsolver, these authors explain the consequences of our warming planet — and imagine its future.
9 Books That Helped Me Through My Infertility by Alexandra Kimball During my five-year struggle to have a baby, these were the stories that made me feel not only less alone, but proud of my story — with all of its complexity, trauma, and triumph.
8 Author-Owned Bookstores Every Book Lover Needs To Visit by Arianna Rebolini Check out these shops owned by authors like Judy Blume, Louise Erdrich, and more, are a great place to celebrate.
What Would You Do If A Rich Woman Promised To Change Your Life — As Long As You Married Her Son? by Helen Hoang When a wealthy woman offers young, single mom Mỹ an extravagant summer in California, she's intrigued. The only issue is what this mysterious woman wants in exchange. (An excerpt from Helen Hoang's new novel, The Bride Test.)
Cultural Criticism  Courtesy of Marvin Price
The Rich, Black, Southern Heritage Of Hip-Hop Majorettes by Frederick McKindra
The choreography of these college dance troupes makes me feel proud knowing that this artistry is so deeply embedded in black American life, there is little danger of it ever being appropriated.
Long Shot Is Refreshingly Honest About The Garbage Women Deal With by Anne Helen Petersen
Sometimes, the funniest and most feminist thing a man — or a movie — can do is stop pretending that everything is fine.
YouTubers Are Obsessed With Reviewing Yelp's Worst-Rated Businesses by Ann-Derrick Gaillot "Worst reviewed" videos inadvertently shine a light on how subjective Yelp reviews really are.
Boyz N The Hood Is A Great Film. So Is Rosewood. by Hanif Abdurraqib
John Singleton spent his career exploring contemporary black life and love. But his historical drama Rosewood is a movie that will stick with me forever.
Detective Pikachu Is A Movie About How Brands Are Our Friend by Alison Willmore Ryan Reynolds voices the world's cutest CGI creature in the new Pokémon movie, but not even Pikachu can fix your relationship with your dad.
What Happened To Thor In Avengers: Endgame? by Jenna Guillaume
The latest entry into the Marvel Cinematic Universe uses a superhero's body as a cheap punchline. (Spoilers for Avengers: Endgame.)
Wendy Williams' Divorce Drama Has Put Her In The Hot Seat by Pier Dominguez The longtime talk show host has become the kind of scandal-plagued celebrity she usually gossips about on her program.
A newsletter exclusive: an interview with a writer we love! This month: Natalie Scenters-Zapico, whose latest poetry collection, Lima :: Limón is out on May 14.
What are you reading... Natalie Scenters-Zapico?
 Courtesy of the author
"I am wrapping up a particularly busy National Poetry Month of visiting classrooms and giving readings and find myself on planes a lot. I love reading on the plane because it can feel like a kind of womb. It might seem morose, but I always think that if I were to die on a plane it wouldn't be so bad to spend my final moments reading, as long as it's something good.
I just finished Sara Borjas' incredible Mouth Like a Window Heart Like a Cliff, which interrogates our current moment in Chicanx Literature so well. What are the keys to writing about a Mexican American identity, and who is excluded from that landscape for being too American, too Mexican, too monolingual, etc. Cecilia Vicuña's New and Selected Poems, translated by Rosa Alcalá, has also been traveling with me as a kind of art object I like carrying with me in hotel rooms. American culture seems to be obsessed by a kind of yelling right now in writing, as though loudness means sincerity, which Vicuña's quiet observations and performances remind me to interrogate. She writes in "Word & Thread":
"Is the word the conducting thread, or does the thread conduct word-making?
Both lead to the center of memory, to a form of uniting and connecting.
A word is pregnant with other words and a thread contains Other threads within it.
Metaphors in tension, word and thread take us beyond Spinning and speaking to what unites us, the immortal fiber."
Finally, coming from the safest city in America — El Paso, Texas, which is also one of the most surveilled cities in America — I am reading a lot on the role of surveillance in our most mundane activities and have been revisiting Harry Gamboa's essays on this topic in Urban Exiles.
We've updated our privacy notice and cookie policy. Learn more about cookies, including how to disable them, and find out how we collect your personal data and what we use it for. Show privacy notice and cookie policy.
BuzzFeed, Inc. |
Post a Comment