Taylor Abate
You Are Here
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For everyone who has ever been 20 something.
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You Are Here My dearest reader, Welcome to You Are Here, a twenty somethings guide to everything you wish someone told you about your twenties. I hope through your readings you are reminded that there is sure to be disappointment, uncertainty, and loneliness as you progress through one of the most important times of your life. You will dwell on the past, have anxiety about the future, and ignore the now. But more importantly, I hope you also remember that there is sure to be joy, excitement, and fulfillment. My friend, you are a childhood lullaby only half remembered. But who you want to be is never out of reach. So learn from the past, don’t over-think the future, and may there always be a present in the way that you present yourself. For you are here, and here can sometimes be one of the most beautiful places you’ll ever be. With love,
Taylor Abate
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Then
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Khaled Hosseini And the Mountains Echoed I tell myself I am searching for something. But more and more, it feels like I am wandering. waiting for something to happen to me, something that will change everything, something that my whole life has been leading up to.
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Robert and Joe at the crassly named “Pimp and Prostitute” party at Sigma Phi Epsilon 1883-84
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Interstellar 12
Landy’s face… He is a spoiled rich kid that lasted a pair of semesters, 1983-84
We’ve always defined ourselves by the ability to overcome the impossible. And we count these moments. These moments when we dare to aim higher, to break barriers, to reach for the stars, to make the unknown known. We count these moments as our proudest achievements. But we lost all that. Or perhaps we’ve just forgotten that we are still pioneers. And we’ve barely begun. And that our greatest accomplishments cannot be behind us, because our destiny lies above us.
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Unknown
“Binky” reveling at a toga party, 1983-84
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Big Al showing that he was really a model, 1983-84
Vincent Van Gogh used to eat yellow paint because he thought it would get the happiness inside him. Many people thought he was mad and stupid for doing so because the paint was toxic, never mind that it was obvious that eating paint couldn’t possible have any direct correlation to one’s happiness, but I never saw that. If you were so unhappy that even the
maddest ideas could possible work, like painting the walls of your internal organs yellow, than you are going to do it. It’s really no different than falling in love or taking drugs. There is a greater risk of getting your heart broken or overdosing, but people still do it everyday because there was always that chance it could make things better. Everyone has their yellow paint.
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Big Al again… just chillin’. 1983-84
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I was like: ‘Fuck, I could die. We could all die, at any time. Why the hell am I wasting my time? I’m just going to do what I want to do for the rest of my life. I don’t need money.
Grimes (Claire Boucher)
Playing poker at a fraternity retreat. 1983-84
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Soon
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In the end, only three things matter: how much you loved, how gently you lived, and how gracefully you let go of things not meant for you.
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Buddah
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( via megan-hansenn)
— Just a friendly reminder to keep going.
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One day you’ll wake up at 11:30 AM on a Sunday with the love of your life and you’ll make some coffee and pancakes and it’ll all be alright.
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Louis C. K.
Untitled
You’ll be fine. You’re 25. Feeling [unsure] and lost is part of your path. Don’t avoid it. See what those feelings are showing you and use it. Take a breath. You’ll be okay. Even if you don’t feel okay all the time.
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C. JoyBell C.
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Growing up means learning what life is. When you’re little, you have a set of ideals, standards, criteria, plans, outlooks, and you think that you have to sit around and wait for them to happen to you and then life will work. But life isn’t like that, for anybody; you can’t fall in love with a standard, you have to fall in love with a person. You can’t live in a criteria, you have to live your life. You can’t wait for your plans to materialize, because they may never materialize the way you think they will. You can’t wait to watch your ideals and standards walk up to you, because you can’t know what’s yours until you have it. I always say, always take the first chance in case you never get a second one, but growing up takes that even one step further, growing up means that you have to hold on to what you have, when you have it, because what you have- that’s yours- and all the ideals and criteria you have set in your head, those aren’t yours, because those haven’t happened to you.
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Now
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Kahlil Gibran 30
Yesterday we obeyed kings and bent our necks before emperors. But today we kneel only to truth, follow only beauty, and obey only love.
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Time isn’t precious at all, because it is an illusion. What you perceive as precious is not time but the one point that is out of time: the Now. That is precious indeed. The more you are focused on time—past and future— the more you miss the Now, the most precious thing there is.
Eckhart Tolle
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I saw this moth in my room and it was going towards the light bulb and it was buzzing around it and I wanted to know why they did that, so I looked it up. It’s because moths are looking for the moon. They’re looking for moonlight because they’re trying to fly North. So this moth, everything in it’s telling it to do exactly what it’s doing. It’s doing the right thing, but it’s just the wrong light. It’s doing exactly what it’s supposed to do but it’s the wrong light. So it just kinda bummed me out, it just seemed so futile Donald Glover
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And kid, you’ve got to love yourself. You’ve got wake up at four in the morning, brew black coffee, and stare at the birds drowning in the darkness of the dawn. You’ve got to sit next to the man at the train station who’s reading your favorite book and start a conversation. You’ve got to come home after a bad day and burn your skin from a shower. Then you’ve got to wash all your sheets until they smell of lemon detergent you bought for four dollars at the local grocery store. You’ve got to stop taking everything so goddamn personally. You are not the moon kissing the black sky.
Unknown
You’ve got to compliment someones crooked brows at an art fair and tell them that their eyes remind you of green swimming pools in mid July. You’ve got to stop letting yourself get upset about things that won’t matter in two years. Sleep in on Saturday mornings and wake yourself up early on Sunday. You’ve got to stop worrying about what you’re going to tell her when she finds out. You’ve got to stop over thinking why he stopped caring about you over six months ago. You’ve got to stop asking everyone for their opinions. Fuck it. Love yourself, kiddo. You’ve got to love yourself.
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Then
Quotes Hosseini, Khaled (10) Interstellar (12) Unknown (15) Boucher, Claire aka Grimes (17)
Photos All photos shot by Robert Hernandez at the University of Miami. 1983-1984 (11-17)
Quotes
Soon
Buddah (20) via megan-hansenn (23) C. K., Louis. (24) C. JoyBell C. (27)
Photos Shot by Robert Hernandez at the University of Miami. 1983-1984 (20-26) Polaroids shot by Taylor Abate 2014-2015 (20-26)
Now
Quotes Gibran, Kahlil (31) Tolle, Eckhart (32) Glover, Donald (34) Unknown (36)
Photos Polaroids shot by Taylor Abate 2014-2015 (30-37)
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Index
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