> 181: It has taken all our strength
Every year I put together a list of the things that stuck with me most from those 12 months. I think of it as the ideas, art, and snippets of conversation that were most resonant.
Here's what I gathered from 2023:
Once Upon a Time in Northern Ireland. This is a PBS documentary series in which people on both sides of The Troubles are interviewed about what life was like back then, in a time of seemingly-intractable conflict, and how things eventually changed. I've been thinking about it even more since October 7.
How to define a genocide. "The only word that means anything to me at such a moment is the word: No." "When we can’t make people feel better, we can still make a difference by making them feel seen."
As the world continues to be a lot, I've continued to take comfort in rom-com novels. A few I particularly liked in 2023 were Emily Henry's Happy Place, Annabel Monaghan's Nora Goes Off Script, and Curtis Sittenfeld's Romantic Comedy.
The best movie I saw, which I think about a lot, is Past Lives. The most fun I had at the movie theater was Fast X; Jason Momoa should get some sort of award for gleefulness in movie villainry. I also got properly into the Mission Impossible movies this year and can only say: Tom Cruise, you magnificent bastard. Oppenheimer was fine.
Nothing will ever replace what Twitter once was, but for me BlueSky has checked a lot of similar boxes in terms of shooting the shit, progressive organizing, media criticism, and dumb jokes. I'm on there as my name, so basic. I have a few extra invites; reply if you want one and I'll distribute, first come first served.
If Books Could Kill became my new favorite podcast. I realized recently that it, and the rest of the Michael Hobbes extended universe (You're Wrong About, Maintenance Phase), are basically the only podcasts I listen to anymore. Putting in the work to root out facts and heeding lived experiences, as a journalist? Actually, sadly groundbreaking.
This is the year I discovered the game-changer that is shelf-stable gnocchi. Made this recently and it was easy, fast, and great. Modernity has its plus sides.
This year I went from AI-questioning to an unapologetic hater. My strong belief is that people who work in AI have never tried to produce creative work themselves, and also have no idea what makes humans tick. Oops! Margaret Atwood: "The clockwork bird can sing, but only the song with which it has been programmed. It can't improvise. It can't riff. It can't surprise. And it is in surprise that much of the delight of art resides: Otherwise, boredom sets in quickly. Only the living bird can sing a song that is ever renewed, and therefore always delightful."
"How do I make room for myself to be more creative? How do you be creative at all? What does creativity even look like when your whole job is already to tell stories and make jokes and be silly? How do you do anything with a goal entirely separate from the life you’ve chosen to live?" Kelsey McKinney on learning to play piano when there is no recital.
Nearly every morning, a certain woman in our community comes running out of her house with her face white and her overcoat flapping wildly. She cries out, "Emergency, emergency," and one of us runs to her and holds her until her fears are calmed. We know she is making it up; nothing has really happened to her. But we understand, because there is hardly one of us who has not been moved at some time to do just what she has done, and every time, it has taken all our strength, and even the strength of our friends and families, too, to quiet us.
—"Fear," Lydia Davis
Laura