Better Living Through Literature
Words + Projects + Stuff I Like
1. If you haven’t seen this, you should read it now because it is great: All the Ads in This London Tube Station Have Been Replaced by Pictures of Cats.
2. This is accurate (via):
(True story: A friend’s parent passed away and at the funeral, an extended family member I didn’t know thanked us for coming. My response? “Yes.”)
(This just happened. I am almost 37 years old.)
This is a good one–but a sad one and maybe one not to read if you’re feeling worn out or worn down by the world. On the other hand, it may help. There’s something to that catharsis idea after all.
Good Bones
Maggie Smith
Life is short, though I keep this from my children.
Life is short, and I’ve shortened mine
in a thousand delicious, ill-advised ways,
a thousand deliciously ill-advised ways
I’ll keep from my children. The world is at least
fifty percent terrible, and that’s a conservative
estimate, though I keep this from my children.
For every bird there is a stone thrown at a bird.
For every loved child, a child broken, bagged,
sunk in a lake. Life is short and the world
is at least half terrible, and for every kind
stranger, there is one who would break you,
though I keep this from my children. I am trying
to sell them the world. Any decent realtor,
walking you through a real shithole, chirps on
about good bones: This place could be beautiful,
right? You could make this place beautiful.
Sigh. 55 days to go until Election Day. If you’re not registered to vote, not sure how or where to vote, need info on voting early, or anything else, just google it. (It’s a far better interface than vote.utah.gov, but that works too.)
I’m still plugging away at the “Om Shawl” and have nearly reached the end of the plain middle section. That means it’s getting big enough for the gato to steal when I’m working on it. So of course I have to wrap him up like a kitty burrito when he does.
Doc and I got fitness trackers so I’ve been walking more downtown in the week. I hit my goal of 10,000 steps Friday and Saturday, so we opted out of a hike Sunday and got things done at home/recuperated from the week like Toby here.
Other notes:
1. Happy birthday to Lev Tolstoy and Otis Redding today.
2. It was a hard week, but I discovered this video at the end of yesterday and it made everything all right for the course of three minutes:
You have to make it to 2:40 for the “extreeeeeeeeeme yodeling!” and to see someone holding a chicken and yodeling. All is right in the world.
I just bought a pair of Vans hi-top sneakers. I remember the skater kids in high school wore them and I always liked the style, but I wasn’t a skater and I wasn’t nearly cool enough to dress like one. It literally took me 20 years to feel confident enough to buy a pair of shoes.
So this piece from Stacy London (What Not To Wear) is apropos and an awesome read about aging, style, and being “part of the first generation of women not truly dependent on anyone.”
It was a rough and busy start to a short week yesterday, and HRC here looks like how I feel: Over it.
We’ll press on, though. Because we’re tough.
The rest of the weekend included a farmer’s market, peach picking, visits with family, hiking with friends and little kids, and lots of cleaning, but I only was able to stop and get some pictures yesterday. Toby pretty much followed me around the house and found some sun to sit in while I organized or sewed. He’s a good kitty supervisor.
1. Get outside this weekend. I read an alarming news report that said
According to a recent survey 75% of children spend less time outside than the average prison inmate…On average, Americans spend 87% of the time indoors and 6% in an enclosed vehicle, probably with the windows up.
2. I have two big boxes of papers that are lingering from last year’s Kon Mari magic tidying and this weekend I will tackle them. So this is apropos:
