Aerogel, also know as frozen smoke, is the world’s lowest density solid, clocking in at 96% air. If you hold a small piece in your hand, it’s practically impossible to either see or feel, but if you poke it, it’s like styrofoam. It supports up to 4,000 times its own weight and can withstand a direct blast from two pounds of dynamite. It’s also the best insulator in existence.
Bon Iver is listing things it pains him to see by themselves. A single work glove peppered with sawdust. A tattered snowshoe abandoned at the trailhead. A lone badminton racquet with a broken handle no one’s bothered to fix. And me.
“Mom, listen, I haven’t been together with Topanga for 22 years, but we have been together for 16. That’s a lot longer than most couples have been together. I mean, when we were born, you told me that we used to take walks in our strollers together around the block. When we were two, we were best friends. I mean, I knew everything about this girl. I knew her favorite color, her favorite food. Then we became six, Eric made fun of me because it wasn’t cool to have a best friend that was a girl or even know a girl. So for the next seven years I threw dirt at her. I like to call those “the lost years”. Then when I was thirteen, mom, she put me up against my locker and she kissed me. I mean, she gave me my first kiss. She taught me how to dance. She always was talking about these crazy things and I never understood a word she said. All I understood was that she was the girl I sat up every night thinking about, and when I’m with her, I feel happy to be alive. Like I can do anything. Even talk to you like this. So that’s, that’s what I think is love, mom. When I’m better because she’s here.” -
Cory Matthews, Boy Meets World
