Here are the books I want to read this year: Braiding Sweetgrass — Robin Wall Kimmerer Homeland Elegies — Ayad Ahktar Locking Up Our Own — James Forman Jr. Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 — Cho Nam-joo Boom Town — Sam Anderson The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life — Erving Goffman The Plague — Albert Camus Exodus — Leon UrisContinue reading “2021 Book List”
Category Archives: Uncategorized
The Council of Pecans
All flourishing is mutual. Potowatomi proverb
Willow
Willow is an SMS-bot that sends you gentle, daily reminders to breathe.
Noise Altering
I’ve been thinking about noise: how much of it exists, its characteristics, and the lengths to which we go to remove it from our lives. Not too long ago it was assumed that clean water’s not important, that seeing the stars is not that important. But now it is. And now I think we’re realizingContinue reading “Noise Altering”
Cracks and Crumbles
To accept one’s past – one’s history – is not the same thing as drowning in it; it is learning how to use it. An invented past can never be used; it cracks and crumbles under the pressures of life like clay in a season of drought. James Baldwin
Leave Tracks
Whatever you choose to do, leave tracks. And that means, don’t do just for yourself, because in the end it’s not going to be fully satisfying. I think you will want to leave the world a little better for your having lived. And there’s no satisfaction that a person can gain from what people callContinue reading “Leave Tracks”
The language for creativity
It’s a frequently cited trope that art derives from experiences of suffering and pain. The discussion of the conditions for the creation of great art is usually a tired one, painted in broad strokes with its participants citing heartbreak, conflict, suicide, poverty. But the following passage from Ocean Vuong’s novel, On Earth We’re Briefly GorgeousContinue reading “The language for creativity”
Minor Feelings
Minor feelings are also the emotions we are accused of having when we decide to be difficult — in other words, when we decide to be honest. When minor feelings are finally externalized, they are interpreted as hostile, ungrateful, jealous, depressing, and belligerent, affects ascribed to racialized behavior that whites consider out of line. OurContinue reading “Minor Feelings”
Mom’s response to my participation in #BLM protests
Say Their Names
Like so many others, I’ve spent much of the last week sitting with sadness, anger, anxiety, and great discomfort, catalyzed by the killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor at the hands of police. This moment in my country’s history feels both unprecedented yet so familiar. Set against the backdrop of a pandemic that isContinue reading “Say Their Names”