Things I Like
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In the maw of the posting machine, nothing sticks. Code travels but no power shifts. It was terrifying to be suddenly aware of how much time and attention I’ve given over to this strange place where everything happens, but nothing happens, where empathy circles around but ultimately drains out. To see how these new behaviors and habits have co-opted my sense of what it means to be moved to action, convincing me I’m doing something when I’m doing nothing, risking nothing — or, worse, that there is nothing else I can actually do or risk, when of course there is. Of course there is.
Yes, this is an older piece, and yes, today's links have a bit of a theme going on, but I found this reminder really helpful in these times.
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There’s a lot of beauty in the world still within our grasp. We’re better when we’re poets, when we’re learners and listeners, when we’re builders and not breakers. When I read, I learn that there’s no new problems in the world we’re living in.
Such a great short meditation on how putting away the phone can make such a difference in our mental health and our lives. You don't have to be a reader, maybe you sketch, journal, garden, or do whatever fills you up.
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It’s important to remember this: businesses that rely on constant online or televisual engagement — social media platforms, TV news channels, news websites — make bank from our rage. They have every incentive, whether they are aware of it or not, to inflame our passions.
I may not want to subscribe to the same news as Jacobs, but I do agree with him that too much of the "breaking" news is a bad thing. I've been slowly weaning myself away from it, but I'll admit that it's hard to do once you're used to checking in a lot.
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Anyone can make a statement. The world needs us to make loving commitments and maybe even to live them out without broadcasting it.
I've really enjoyed this blog lately and I've been trying hard to live my life in doing things that are good in my local community rather than talking about them and this was a great reminder.
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I think that all labor is skilled labor. I think about the factories and the fields and the ways that demands for speed instead of cadence can hurt people. I think we should seek to understand and value our skills and see effort. But I don’t think we are going to fix anything about how software work is valued by refusing to let it belong to the rest of the world.
Via Mandy a really great piece pointing out that those who make software aren't special and that we all deserve to be treated with dignity and respect and have jobs that do that no matter what field they're in.
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Learning to sew will not only help you avoid the environmental horrors of modern retail; it will show you the thrill of wearing clothes that actually fit. This is not an argument for a cottage-core lifestyle in which you hand-make every raw-linen garment that touches your body. I’m more for an incremental approach: Acquiring a few basic sewing skills, little by little, will change how you get dressed. Even if you never make a whole garment from scratch, knowing how to adjust a seam will make secondhand shopping easier and more accessible. And when you’re looking for new clothes, knowing your measurements will help you order only items that are likely to fit. The goal is not to become a master tailor. It’s to become fluent in how clothes fit your body.
This, this, this! If I could emphasize one of the things Ann Friedmans says it's knowing your measurements, really knowing them. And, guess what? You have to measure yourself again every so often because bodies change all the time. I find making clothes to be so satisying, but especially because I've often changed things after a few wears to get things just right. I realize not everyone will do this, but everyone can get to know their body better and make better choices when buying clothes—at the rate we throw things out, that's a start.
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The recent stumbles of Twitter, which is in the process of being rebranded as X, and the likely ill-fated attempts of Threads to do better, present an opportunity to pause and reconsider this particular trajectory of our digital world. If aggregating connections mainly serves the investors who fund big conversation platforms, there’s no reason why the rest of us should have to play along.
I'm using social media less and less. I didn't join Threads, I didn't get a Mastodon account, and I'm checking Instagram less (or at least actively trying to stay off of it more). But I do use a site that has smaller forum sections allowing me to connect with folks doing what I'm doing, Ravelry. The smaller connections, the niche sites, I think there time may have come, but people have to be willing to seek them out and let go of the larger sites that are cosplaying at connection, at least that's how it often feels.
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I felt most out of place on the bus. Imagine these Greyhound-style buses. Carpet seating with cigarette holes and old gum stuck on them. Broken armrests, missing headrests, and non-existent A/C. Massive windows that were dangerously unsealed. They would open and flap like an uncaged bird as we flew down the freeway. And the smells. Smells that come to mind: smoke, urine, feces, ammonia… How, why?
A veteran baseball player who just finished his 16th season writes about the beginnings. I love Joey Votto, he's a character in the sport, a talkative first basemen who loves to joke around and now he's revealed he's a good writer as well. Hopefully he writes more.
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There will always be too much to do, no matter what you do. But the ironic upside of this seemingly dispiriting fact is that you needn’t beat yourself up for failing to do it all, nor keep pressuring yourself to find ways to get on top of it all by means of increasingly extreme multitasking.
Yup, another thing about time, routines, how you spend it, etc. But I've been quietly rebelling against a trend I see in the knitting world and that is knitting all the time, everywhere. I get it, I love to knit as well, but I also recognize that breaks are good my; full presence in many instances is better than getting in a few more stiches. And, like Burkeman, I do try and do one thing at a time as I find it less draining.
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Because it’s not really Twitter that I miss: it’s the activists and artists and writers I followed; the voices who weren’t like mine, the people who walked different paths than I did, each of whom taught me so much. I miss the many, many friends I made on that website. That place we all gathered was, bluntly, taken from us. From me.
This is so well said from Ethan, with links to some super great pieces, some of which I'd never seen (and have linked to here myself). It isn't the scrolling of that website that I miss, it's the people and connections I've made. They've all scattered and are no longer all in one place. I've opted not to go to another site like Mastodon or Bluesky, but instead I'm trying to be on this site more, posting more thoughts and links with throughts attached. We'll see how that goes.
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It reminds me that even if social media is crumbling around us, people can endure. The impressions we make on one another outlast the silos and the buyouts and the implosions.
I'm with Bellwood here, as I just got a delightful email from an old friend and now I'm thinking about the ways in which I can come out of my shell a bit and connect more with people without the intermediary of a big company.(link via Ethan)
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Now the whole cornerstone of my life is sleep. There is almost nothing that doesn't seem to me to be fully affected by whether or not I'm sleeping well and enough. It’s really shocking to me how much the way I respond to situations, the kind of attention I can bring to a podcast or to my children, or whether or not I'm able to eat a healthy diet comes down to whether or not I’ve slept enough to have a buffer against my own reactivity the next day.
I'm not saying we should all do what Klein does to have a good day, but what I really liked about this piece is how much he talks about doing the things that he needs to fill him up. Just like another piece I'm linking today, figuring out what fills you up and gives you energy helps you do your work and all kinds of other things so much better. And it takes noticing and getting to know yourself to figure this all out.
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The question to ask with all those things isn’t, “how do I make time for this?” The answer to that question always disappoints, because that view of time has it forever speeding away from you. The better question is, how does doing what I need make time for everything else?
This, this, this. And this ties in to so many of the links I'm posting today. Doing the things you know fill up your cup (as my yoga teacher says so often) are worth it. They are what give you the energy to do all the other things that may not be the most exciting or energizing.
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Many things that were once true – that we didn’t have adequate solutions, that the general public wasn’t aware or engaged – no longer are. Outdated information is misinformation, and the climate situation has changed a lot in recent years. The physical condition of the planet – as this summer’s unprecedented extreme heat and flooding and Canada’s and Greece’s colossal fires demonstrate – has continued to get worse; the solutions have continued to get better; the public is far more engaged; the climate movement has grown, though of course it needs to grow far more; and there have been some significant victories as well as the incremental change of a shifting energy landscape.
Reading Solnit on the climate is always a good thing. I don't always feel optimistic but she always makes me see things are better than I think they are.
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One thing I’ll say, though, about 2023 and beyond, as I head into my 50s: I mostly want to make art, not arguments.
I love this way of thinking about life and I'm with Hendren here as I think we must be around the same age. As I move away from being so involved in tech day-to-day, I've found my interests lie in making in many different forms. (link via Ethan)