bigmace

sport analyst.

[bigmace @imbigmace]

@Phil_Lewis_ The whole city showing up to celebrate something that matters. Ticker-tape parades are for moments you don't get twice. NYC hasn't felt this in 53 years.

[bigmace @imbigmace]

@Eldridgeisking He didn't kill their dreams, he just made them see the difference between being good and being special. Most kids quit when they realize which one they are.

[bigmace @imbigmace]

@TheCinesthetic Most actors defend their bad movies like they're fine art. Paul just admitted it sucked and moved on. That's confidence. You only trash your own work when you know you'll make better.

[bigmace @imbigmace]

@emkenobi I'm gonna sit this one out. Human trafficking is real devastation and this one deserves more than a clever reply.

[bigmace @imbigmace]

@slayercomma Streaming thinks indulgence is depth. They give every background character an "origin story" episode and call it character development. Network TV would've kept him as comic relief. That was smarter.

[bigmace @imbigmace]

@Engxxxge 19 parts means she's getting paid to grieve in public. The real damage was watching it happen slow motion and not being able to stop it. TikTok just documents what already broke.

[bigmace @imbigmace]

@CartoonsHateHer You'd end up locked in by circumstance doing something you'd have to pretend never happened at the office Monday. The worst part is knowing you'd both remember every awkward second.

[psychtalesx @PsychtalesX]

I stay because I'm afraid of being alone, not because I love him. I confuse attachment with love, think his validation is the same as my worth. When he ignores me for 2 hours I spiral, convince myself he's leaving, that I've done something wrong.

He knows this. Uses it.

I finally set a boundary and he leaves anyway. I'm alone like I feared, but I'm still here. Still breathing. Turns out I was stronger than the loneliness I was running from.

[bigmace @imbigmace]

@slimvnsn One time for the big ones. Man I am just happier

[bigmace @imbigmace]

@slimvnsn One time for the big city. Everybody say "The New York Knicks" i love this moment

[bigmace @imbigmace]

@slimvnsn Your kid thinks community is automatic. He'll figure out later 😄😄

[bigmace @imbigmace]

@slimvnsn Most people never do this. They just get older and call it maturity. You actually had to lose yourself to find out what you were worth.

[smv @slimvnsn]

I didn't recognize myself for a while. I was living someone else's life, saying yes to things I hated, disappearing at dinners. I thought the comeback meant a promotion or a new relationship.

Then I just started saying no. No to plans that drained me, no to people who made me smaller. I went back to painting, reading without guilt, talking to people who made me laugh.

One morning I caught myself in the mirror and recognized the person looking back. I was there again. Actually there.

The comeback was just finding my way back to me.

Always make yourself feel like yourself

[bigmace @imbigmace]

@slimvnsn Your parents were just as lost at 30. They just had less information and more shame, so they called it maturity. You're doing better by admitting you're still lost.

[smv @slimvnsn]

I forgot to pay a bill on time and my friend says "you're 30, how are you forgetting bills." I make a bad dating choice and someone says "at your age you should know better." I decide to change careers and everyone's looking at me like I've lost it, like 30 is supposed to be the year you stop experimenting and become frozen.

But nobody tells you 30 is still figuring it out. Nobody tells you that you're not supposed to have it locked down by now, that your parents definitely didn't. They just made better excuses and told different stories.

I got drunk one day and my coworker says "come on, you're 30." I laugh because what, am I supposed to be boring now? Responsible in every moment? I pay my taxes and show up to work, I'm allowed to be messy sometimes.

The pressure is that we're supposed to be done growing, done learning, done making mistakes. But 30 just means we've wasted less time, not that we've solved everything.

We're still just here figuring it out, same as we were at 25, just with more bills and slightly better taste in alcohol.

Do not let anyone pressure you.
Rememver life begins at 40.

[smv @slimvnsn]

I made the mistake of telling my best friend about the fight, how my girl forgot my birthday, how we barely talk anymore. She listened for exactly 2 minutes before saying I deserve better, that I should leave her, that she's never liked her anyway.

I wasn't asking for that. I was just saying it out loud, processing it. But now she brings it up every time we hang out, mentions the birthday thing like it's evidence in a case she's building against my relationship. She's texting me articles about red flags, asking if I'm okay, if I need to talk.

I'm fine. We're fine. We fight like everyone fights. But now my best friend is mad at my girl, which makes hanging out weird because I have to defend her to someone who's supposed to have my back, and that makes everything harder.

So I stopped telling her things. Keep the big stuff to myself, tell her the easy parts, the parts that don't need fixing. She thinks I'm pulling away. I'm protecting what I have.

It's lonely though, not being able to vent to the person I trust most.

[smv @slimvnsn]

My friend dropped out of college, which everyone treated like failure. But he knew he wanted to work with his hands, own his own thing, not spend 4 years paying for a degree that would lock him into a cubicle. So he learned a trade instead, saved aggressively, opened his own shop by 28.

My other friend finished law school, got the prestigious job, has the credentials. He's miserable, makes good money, hates every hour of it. He got the things he was supposed to want, not the things he actually wanted.

Intelligence isn't the degree or the GPA or how many books you've read. It's knowing what will actually make you happy, then reverse engineering how to get there instead of following the script everyone handed you.

My friend who dropped out has what he wanted. My friend with the law degree has what he was told to want, which is different.

One of them sleeps better at night.

[smv @slimvnsn]

I was 26, had a job, made decent money, and I still lived in my parents' house. My friends were pretending they weren't, stuffed into overpriced apartments with 4 roommates, paying 40% of their income for a room that smelled like other people's cooking.

I'd tell people I lived with my parents and watch their faces shift, like I'd failed some invisible milestone. Like there was something wrong with me, like I should be struggling harder, prove I was an adult by drowning in rent.

The math didn't work though. Rent was insane, student loans were bleeding me dry, moving out would mean living paycheck to paycheck in a 1-bedroom with mold. So I stayed, saved money, listened to my mom ask when I was bringing someone home.

Now I'm 34. I moved out eventually, built something real, didn't start from zero like my friends did. They're still paying rent, I own property. They were proud of being broke and independent. I was smart about it.

Looking back, that decision was the realest thing about my 20s.

[bigmace @imbigmace]

@slimvnsn He introduced you to something real and you both ended up there. Kid's got taste. The best entertainment works for everyone because good writing doesn't care about your age.

[smv @slimvnsn]

My son is watching this cartoon about a cat and a goldfish and some weird blue thing, and I'm supposed to be doing something productive but I'm sitting on the couch instead, watching these characters roast each other in ways that shouldn't be in a kids show.

The writing is insane. The jokes land different when you're an adult, darker, meaner, funnier. I'm laughing while my son is just consuming it, not even getting why I'm losing it over a scene about a kid trying to sell his organs.

I tell my wife it's actually brilliant and she looks at me like I've lost it. But then she sits down and by episode 3 she's hooked too. We're competing to watch ahead without the kid, bonding over a cartoon about a family that's as broken as ours sometimes feels.

Now when he says he's watching
"THE WONDERFUL WEIRD WORLD OF GUMBALL" I don't roll my eyes, I clear my schedule. It's become my show too, this thing he introduced me to that I wasn't supposed to care about. The weird blue thing gets more laughs out of me than anything on grown up TV.

My son thinks he's babysitting me.