Three Things: Change is constant
I am a big Fall person. This unsurprisingly does not translate into crafting 6-foot-tall witches for my front porch or adding canned pumpkin to anything. It is never motherfucking gourd season in my home.
What I do love, purely and wholeheartedly, is the theme of transition. From hellscape summer to chilly mornings. 8pm sunshine to coming home from work in the dark. Hovering on the edge of holiday madness (which I also love, but for different reasons). This year holds its own major transition, as I move out of the house that has been our haven for 12 years. My children grew up in it, from toddlerhood to high school graduation, navigating the new form our family took after divorce. We spent far too much time in it during the pandemic, and fought with it during the Snowpocalypse. It’s going to be very hard to leave it.
But as I’ve said before, I love change and cannot wait for the new adventures ahead. I know not everyone does. My kids are grappling with it. The cats are going to hate it. I would happily pay you to come over and pack my things up. As the fury of the world burns brighter every day, though, my little transitions mean even more. I can’t effect change on anything that truly matters, but dammit I can create a comfortable nest for me and mine.
🎥 The Lovers (Criterion)
The next time you’re feeling arty and French and cosmopolitan, fire up this 1958 jewel from Louis Malle (husband of Candice Bergen!). If you’re paying attention during the very-hot sex scene (in 1958!), you’ll be reminded of another sex scene from a famous later movie. I’ll give a prize to the first person to guess it.
📖 Demon Copperhead
I’m still in the middle of this but damn it’s good. Barbara Kingsolver (you should also read her Poisonwood Bible) really shows off her writing skill by assuming the voice of an orphaned boy from the Ozarks. It very much works.
🖥️ Is Hamas Winning the War? (Washington Post)
Another thing I’m in the middle of is this article by Yuval Noah Hariri, author of Sapiens, one of the best books I read last year. I’ll leave my comments at that because I’m not a fool.
Have a great week, friends!