Books of 2020 and 2021

Oof. It has been a while, hasn't it? As with many things in the past few years, both this blog and my pleasure reading have fallen by the wayside. But as I poke my head out from the rock I've been living under since August of 2019 (Smeagol is FREEEE!), I'm trying to catch up on a few of those things I've been missing. As the following list, compiled from the past two years, indicates, I have not been reading much. But I've already finished 3 books in 2022, and we're only 5 days in, so I think that bodes well. I am looking forward to visiting with old friends, making new ones, and hopefully diversifying my topics of conversation a little bit, for everyone who has been bored with hearing me refer to the same few things every time we talk (but also, that's unlikely to change: the impression made by certain books can be measured in decades, not months or years).

So without further rambling...

2020

The Bloody Chamber - Angela Carter
The Evolution of Cooperation - Robert Axelrod
Endurance - Alfred Lansing
Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead - Olga Tokarczuk
City of Brass - S.A. Chakraborty
Underland - Robert MacFarlane
Weather - Jenny Offill
Gathering Mosses - Robin Wall Kimmerer
In the Dream House - Carmen Maria Machado
How to Be Anti-Racist - Ibram X. Kendi
So You Want to Talk About Race - Ijeoma Oluo
The Master and Margarita - Mikhail Bulgakov
Re-Enchanted: The Rise of Children’s Fantasy Literature in the Twentieth Century - Maria Sachiko Cecire
The Parable of the Sower - Octavia Butler
The Fellowship of the Ring - J.R.R. Tolkien
The Two Towers - J.R.R. Tolkien
The Return of the King - J.R.R. Tolkien
Prairie Fires - Caroline Fraser
The Oracle Code - Marieke Nijkamp
Walter Benjamin’s Archive - eds. Marx, Schwarz, Schwarz, & Wizisla
Year of Wonders - Geraldine Brooks
Nightwood - Djuna Barnes
Jitterbug Perfume - Tom Robbins
On Trails - Robert Moor

2021

The Voyage of St. Brendan
The House of the Spirits - Isabel Allende
Caste - Isabel Wilkerson
Howard’s End - E.M. Forster
The Vanishing Half - Brit Bennett
The Home Place - J. Drew Lanham
Preserving Archives & Manuscripts - Mary Lynn Ritzenthaler
Death and the King’s Horseman - Wole Soyinka
The Painted Veil - W. Somerset Maugham
Push - Sapphire
Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
Amazons, Abolitionists, and Activists - Nikki Kendall
The Golden Thread - Kassia St. Clair
The Fabric of Civilization - Virginia Postrel
Christy - Catherine Marshall

Nevertheless, we persist

 The joke has been worn so many times it's see-through. It has been 500 years since March, or some variation thereof. Every month, sometimes every week, bringing a new challenge to respond to. Sometimes that challenge is just completing all the little tasks that need to get done, even in these strange times. Sometimes it's bigger with more uncertainty.

I don't know how we get through. I could not have coped with knowing that this would go on for so long when it all started in March. When I think about it, I'm reassured to see how well I've been able to weather it and I'm heartened by the goodness that has been revealed in the ways that people have reached out to help one another, even as, of course, the querulousness and bickering grow louder.

And I am So. Tired.

I'm reminded of something Nicholas Wolterstorff said in Lament for a Son: "Death is the great leveller, so our writers have always told us. Of course they are right. But they have neglected to mention the uniqueness of each death--and the solitude of suffering which accompanies that uniqueness. We say, 'I know how you are feeling.' But we don't."

There's both a unity and an isolation in how each of us is dealing with this situation. Each of us faces a similar global story: a novel virus sweeping the globe in ways that we have predicted but not so far seen in quite this way in recent history. Out of concern for ourselves and our loved ones, we've shut down so much of our social lives, restricted our movements, retreated into our homes and separate spaces. As individuals and governments struggle to chart a response, though, the original contours of the story begin to diverge for each person.

Someone else has lost a loved one, or even several depending on the circumstances. Someone else has lost their job. Yet another person was deemed an essential worker and had to work under very high stress conditions, sometimes for measly pay and little recognition in spite of the public plaudits offered more visible workers. We demanded that transit workers, trash collectors, delivery drivers, and hospital janitorial staff sacrifice their lives for us. Some people can't make rent and face eviction as housing courts reopen and emergency stays lift. And in the midst of all of this, the bruises of trauma and ignorance in national conversations about race.

Every single person has a different set of circumstances. The uniqueness of our lives, and the uniqueness of "the solitude of suffering," can be difficult to navigate. I have it so good, in terms of being cushioned from financial, health, and housing impacts, but I'm also isolated and depressed as the days grind on with no sign of improvement. I struggle to concentrate, to plan for the future, to go outside and take a walk.

I wonder in all this story of loss whether there's anything we've gained. I'm trying to think about these things, because I want there to be some kind of balance here. It is so hard. And also, in hard times, there are opportunities for good things to arise. If you think of any, let me know.

Discontent

It’s an aesthetically pleasing photograph that definitely fits into a particular design ethos and palette. The walls are white, the wide window sill is lined with small plants, and a gorgeous mustard-colored quilt with a white geometric design is stretched out over one workspace while the other, a table set on wooden sawhorses with large wicker baskets underneath, has been neatly laid out with measuring tools and cutting supplies. The quilter who took the photograph of her studio was delighting in the way the sunlight hit a disco ball-like, mirrored planter that cast a constellation of light across the ceiling.

The rest of her Instagram falls into the same vein of photography. Earth tones, minimalism, geometric shapes, and photographs of women dancing through creeks or a perfectly laid out photograph of a tent set against a rugged vista, the tent flap wide open to reveal a beautiful quilt spread across the air mattress. Who wouldn’t want to camp in that place and that moment?

Her life is beautiful, and she works in serene, sunlit places making beautiful things. Your life could be like this...

There are many beautiful things about sewing Instagram, not least that it’s a community that draws in people of every size, age, and skin tone. You don’t have to be young, pretty, and white to draw followers - although I can’t deny that that helps. But if you have a flair for the distinctive and some skill with a needle, a phone camera, and a few good hashtags, other sewing folk and would-be sewing folk will eventually stumble on your work and probably be inspired by it too. I’ve been inspired by it: in between coursework, I’ve been finishing a small sewing project and I’m planning to finish another. I’m dreaming about touching bolts of linen and anxiously comparing fabric colors and scrutinizing florals.

But there are so people in this community who are selling things. Classes, fabric, patterns, the items they make. And to sell those things, they’ve rigorously, carefully built a custom-tailored Instagram presence that’s also selling a dream. Like the dream of the quilter’s studio and her camping trip: “I don’t just sew - I live a beautiful life! Look at my rustic minimalist space. It’s so peaceful!”

I look up from my phone to see a mess of computer cables, my homely tower of craft bins labeled with my dope but industrial labelmaker instead of the fairly steady, romantic Copperplate hand that I’m capable of producing, my kitchen island that I’ve been dreaming of clearing off since I moved in, the mishmash of furniture that’s functional and comfortable and adaptable and even sometimes downright nice to look at but rarely cohering into a peaceful design scheme. 

It’s not peaceful, in spite of my best attempts to present a de-cluttered space. It’s sort of sunlit, sort of white, but I don’t mess with plants, and I’ve gifted my cat a giant piece of crunchy packing material that’s strewn across half the kitchen floor. My studio apartment will never be a wonder of artistic arrangement.

Or rather, it’s an artistic arrangement of a totally different sort: the current detritus on the aforementioned kitchen island includes a cutting mat, a half-sewn laptop sleeve, my metadata textbook, a bin of dried fruit and nuts that doesn’t fit in any of my cabinets, and my Mr. Beer 2-gallon keg of fermenting saison. I sew, I cook, I brew beer, I bind books, and this space is not pristine because I’m often in the middle of any number of projects that won’t tidily be packed away out of sight in the space that I have to work with.

And it reminds me, as I’m looking at all of it, that it takes a lot of work to present a space or a face in a particular way, which Instagram influencers will usually not show you. They’ll tell you, as a caption to a photo of an un-made-up face (foundation doesn’t count!) that was probably chosen out of 700 photos taken in different lights and from different angles and is somehow never unflattering, that their process is messy, that they get frustrated, that they had to rip out all their seams and start over or dump three batches of sourdough before a loaf actually turned out, but somehow, even the mess is curated and controlled.

As someone who couldn’t maintain a single aesthetic on my Instagram page if I tried, I respect that. They have to apply a lot of skills and effort to maintaining their followings and selling their brand. It’s a full-time job. 

Is it a good work? (Like: a truly good thing to do) I don’t know. It seems like it’s predicated on generating and monetizing envy and dissatisfaction. But they’re also often fairly skilled and genuinely inspiring, and they show what I could do, if I put in the time and effort to learn certain skills. That inspiration may be empowering for me. When it comes to sewing, it’s undeniable that well-fitted clothing makes me feel great about myself and my body, and seeing so many people making beautiful, well-fitting clothing suggests to me that it’s something I could do too.

For me, it’s mostly just helpful to be clear-sighted about what these people are doing. I understand why heavy Instagram use correlates more highly with depression than use of any other social media platform. When you scroll uncritically, you’ll be fed a steady diet of images that depict how great life could be - if only.  There’s plenty of ink spilled in critical theory about the illusion of the photograph as objective, real, evidentiary. At the end of the day, even an exact replica of a moment is framed, both physically and temporally, and the viewer cannot see what’s outside the frame. 

I think that being aware of the motivations and efforts of the people behind the photographs, and adding that filter to everything you view, can ultimately be critical to healthily enjoying, engaging, and being inspired by these communities. That picture of that studio was beautiful. But it’s also staged, and it’s okay if my process or my space doesn’t look like that: my job is not to convince people on Instagram to buy my life, and as far as I’m concerned, the reason I live the way that I do, with some caveats, is because this is how I like it to be. I’m grateful for what these people show me, and I’m grateful for what they create. I’m also grateful for the life that I have, and I hope that amid that gratitude, I can be content and let the beautiful things simply be beautiful without needing them to be mine.

Motion

If you’ve ever been at the viewing platform at John Heinz Wildlife Refuge early in the morning, you’ve probably observed the tree swallows engaged in a flurry of acrobatic activity, zooming above the water as they catch insects in mid-air and then rush home to feed their young. They never seem to sit still long enough to actually see them, unless they’re at the nest itself, in a frazzled rush to fill the many urgent little beaks that demand food.

Their energy is admirable and they’re wonderful to watch in motion, but I was struck when I finally saw one alight on a reed at just how rarely I see them pause. For a tree swallow, that probably works - their goals are simple but urgent, all about collecting the energy needed to be a top-notch aerial insectivore.

My thoughts sometimes feel like they’re locked in a whoosh of activity, flitting here, flitting there, probably less gracefully than the tree swallows in the arcs they trace as they fly high and low. I don’t know how to slow them down, and the things I ruminate on aren’t always healthy or good when they’re points of fixation. Seeing the swallow take a moment to rest was an invitation to stillness - though it was a little easier to stop the thoughts when I had an unobstructed view of a beautiful bird to concentrate on.

Recent events have slowed all of us down, but the circumstances provoke anxiety. It’s hard to focus, as I hover over one task, then another, but never come in to land. There’s a need to plan and to fix, but too much uncertainty to make any plans or fix most problems. If you’re feeling like I am, take a moment to accept that this is how things are for reasons beyond your ability to control. Let the world be as it is. And in that freedom of giving up, let your mind slow, still, and rest. Whatever happens will be, but for now, this is the time that is given to you.

Wait

What does it take to be intentional right now? Surely we’re already being asked to do so much: hold down a job while working from home in the midst of so many distractions, figure out what to do when there is no job to hold down because working from home is impossible, try not to panic or become depressed as all the benign routines of daily life become fraught with dangers to ourselves or to others and the endless scroll of a social media homepage becomes one pandemic article after another, figure out how to obtain perishable food items without going to the store (but what about the delivery drivers and low-paid grocery store workers?). Must we also add, on top of that, a demand to be intentional?

In my archival theory readings, there’s this buzz phrase, “reading against the grain,” and I feel like what we need right now is to be very deliberate about living against the grain. The urgency and intensity of the waves of bad news are such that it can be easy to follow them wherever they lead. I’ve tried to push back by emphasizing the good amid the bad, and that’s one way to do it. But I think there’s a deeper, non-reactionary action that needs to be taken, of pausing to breathe deeply, to focus intently and deeply on one thing whether that’s a book or a meditation or a complicated bit of needlework or two birds engaged in a mating display, thereby strengthening and providing respite for your spirit, so that you can take stock of your life as it currently is, take stock of the options open to your, and respond to the moment with clarity and vision (as far out as an hour or a day or a week, if nothing longer is possible).

For some people, this is a moment of furious activity, and certainly we should do what we can to support them. But for those of us who are not so engaged, whose role is to sit and wait, this is a tremendous opportunity. What have you been ignoring in your life, because you’re (deliberately?) too busy to take care of it? What is something you have not taken the time to celebrate, for which you’re grateful and can savor delight? Have you learned anything in this experience that might shape how you live your life as, some day, restrictions are lifted and everyday life resumes a less horrifying character?

I don’t have that much time between working from home and doing schoolwork, but I’ve been trying to take my own advice to heart. My emotions in the midst of this have been informative as I attempt to communicate my aspirations to scholarship committees and see doors close and lean into difficult situations. And, unusually for me at a time when I journal less than ever before, I’ve taken the time to write those things down.

There’s only so much time one can spend in introspection, and that’s good: the world is a good place and others are worth consideration, so we can and should be involved in the external world. But we can also find ways to make this an emotionally formative and informative experience.

May your spirits be strengthened and your hearts refreshed.