Listen, in the early 1920s, women were paid to paint radium onto watch dials so that men wouldn’t have to ask the time in dark alleys. They were told it was safe, told to lick their brushes into sharp points. These women painted their nails, their faces, and judged whose skin shone brightest. They coated their teeth so their boyfriends could see their bites with the lights turned down. The miracle here is not that these women swallowed light. It’s that, when their skin dissolved and their jaws fell off, the Radium Corporation claimed they all died from syphilis. It’s that you’re telling me
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