> 182: Do you trust me? Do I trust you?
I meant to send an edition of this newsletter in February but my day job had a period of being extremely wild and I did not get around to sending it after all. Things are better now. We're here together. I hope you're doing well. If you don't want to get these emails anymore, hit unsubscribe in the footer. If you want to forward this to a friend, do that after you're done reading; maybe they'll join us. That would be nice.
Here's some art, internet, and ideas for you:
Fun, possibly spurious concepts: the trust thermocline, the purpose of a system is what it does, the pizza meter.
A link to the full screenplay of Celine Song's Past Lives, maybe my favorite movie from last year.
I knew this, but did I know this?
A fascinating article about a miraculous new treatment for cystic fibrosis that means many people with CF can expect to live as long as people without it. How do you go about living when you've only ever experienced knowing you were dying?
It’s March 13, 1989, and you are attending a meeting of ACT UP New York, the passionate group taking direct confrontational action to fight the AIDS crisis.
Good recent reads on divorcing, or not divorcing: Emily Gould's "Should I leave my husband" and Lyz Lenz's "This American Ex-Wife" (great title, too).
I've recently really enjoyed the series Mr and Mrs Smith on Prime, with Donald Glover and Maya Erskine (who should both be in everything) as strangers who are paired up as husband and wife when they take on assignments for a shady international spy agency. As a friend put it: each of the eight episodes is a perfect standalone movie. I'm also struck by how good the real estate in this show is, and the clothes: everything looks incredibly tasteful and gorgeous. I think that is part of the point of the show: These people are probably incredibly morally compromised, but look how beautiful they are and everything around them is; isn't it worth it? Probably not. But look at this villa on Lake Como that was a location on the show (and is available for rent if you have 900 euros a night).
Become a Library Defender.
Something I try to keep in mind as a manager: You're always carrying a cannon.
Ann Friedman's moving, funny, thought-provoking essay series on unexpectedly becoming a parent.
Looking forward to: new Vampire Weekend; new Sally Rooney; Rusty Foster's new newsletter project Today on Trail; a new movie with Ryan Gosling in silly action mode (see also: The Nice Guys); the film adaptation of beloved, spicy, well-written wine mom novel The Idea of You (you can be a wine mom without being a mom); Dev Patel's directorial debut, which just looks baller.
Here we are at last, meeting face-to-face like two
heroes of opposing armies, looking each other in
the eye, poised to shake hands. Do you trust me?
Do I trust you? No, trust died last century, along
with truth, so we'll have to think of something else
to shake on. Not to our health. Our health is bad
and only getting worse. Not to our wealth, because
no amount of riches could heal our poverty. Not to
you and yours. Not to me and mine, because yours
and mine, every last one, perished in the wars, and
without yours there is no you, and without mine
there is no me. Just two bodies standing face-to-
face, two envelopes of flesh with nothing folded
inside. How did we survive? And better yet, how
did we emerge heroic after all that carnage, all that
betrayal and heartbreak? Loss for every meal, loss
before bedtime and on rising. That's why we're
empty, because emptiness made us, made these
bodies in which we stand, high on the hilltop,
under a pallid moon, with the fields of bones
surrounding us like a fresh snowfall, except that
the heat here is insufferable. Last winter was years
ago, before the battles broke out, remember? Here,
let's shake on that. To winter. To cold. To snow,
real snow.—Here We Are, Lauren K. Watel
Laura