First thing: book club.

On September 1, I’ll begin leading an action book club. An action book club is where you read plus do stuff. This book comes from the vault, specifically the 80s vault: Robert Fritz’s The Path of Least Resistance. It’s a short presentation of one essential move: how to stop circling the drain of broken dreams, and start creating the LIFE YOU WANT instead.

I’ll tell you right now: this is not a perfect book. It’s a self-help book lol! We love the genre but you better know going in: it’s gonna have dated filler in there.

Still a goldmine. So we will be 49ers. Our approach will be to pan for gold, sift out anything goofy, and use the treasure therein to fundamentally change our orientation from stuck in the problem, to creating what we truly want.

Three meetings, two weeks, <300 pages, some skips. $22.

Here are all the details and signup link. This is going to be fun! And we are going to see, I predict to you here and now, ASTOUNDING RESULTS.

Hope to see you there!

“I feel like myself, and I like it”, said Georgia O’Keeffe.

Speaking of astounding results, I have something truly surprising to report. It sure surprised me.

I got back from a month+ in New Mexico a couple weeks ago. I like it there because like Georgia, it makes me feel like myself: like a human among humans.

I have to say that in New England, even tho I was born here (technically) (being born is not a technicality, but being a New Englander is), even tho I was born right here, I often feel like an alien among slightly heartless aliens of some other stripe.

In New Mexico, I have this experience all day: human strangers greeting each other just as a nod to our shared humanity. I had many, many conversations, some lengthy, with complete strangers that I did NOT HAVE TO INITIATE. I went for not one but TWO walks through the neighborhood with random folks that were also out walking. These were not negotiated; we just fell into step and then chatted while having together walk. I went to the post office where a postal patron became embarrassed because he felt he didn’t greet me in a timely enough manner I MEAN COME ON. This is in contrast to Marblehead where people I actually KNEW would sometimes cross the street just to avoid having to speak, and it wasn’t because I’m an asshole because I’m not an asshole.

Some of these chance meetings were beyond pleasant. One of them, I can’t say it any other way, straight HEALED me. None of them were bids for amateur therapy or trauma bonding. Lots of them were with people not just like me: men, young folks, people of ethnicities other than my own, municipal workers.

One day my sister and I were walking near a guy and his girlfriend. The guy was wearing this:

What is la chancla? I asked, not putting it together. (Answer: It’s the flipflop which in your mother’s hands becomes a weapon.) Did you not have la chancla? they asked and my sister and I were like oh no, at our house, we had la mano, we had improv.

Maybe that’s trauma-bonding adjacent? We all laughed and laughed at our shared hilarious experience of physical parenting for a pretty long time tho, like two blocks long.

I don’t expect these encounters with human warmth in New England. Weirdly, the moment I got back exactly this sort of thing started happening. Conversations I did NOT HAVE TO INITIATE! Long ones, even. I got double-hugged in the pub when I found someone’s reading glasses, just like we were west of the Mississippi. Then a guy in a convertible, a younger-but-not-implausibly-young quite nice-looking guy, gave me a huge smile and made a point of waving enthusiastically at me like … he was just enjoying the day and wanted me to have some of that? I don’t even know! Howdy, I said, bemused. But pleased, for sure. WHERE AM I and where did the customary chilly reserve go?

It’s possible that Georgia O’Keeffe didn’t need other people to do anything so she could feel like herself.

I do tho. I need to feel like I belong. It is as they say: home is where they look you in the eye instead of straight past you. So it’s feeling a lot better entirely different here since I got back and I can find no cause for the vibe shift.

Anyway, I would be interested in your thoughts on this. Do you feel at home where you are? What makes you feel like you belong? If you don’t feel that belonging where you are right now, is there a place where you do feel it?

🐦‍⬛ 🐦‍⬛ 🐦‍⬛

RECOMMENDING.

writing.

We’ve rounded the horn of the year. Over at MDK, I have a little piece on checking in about that: Today is a Good Day to Start (Or Start Again).

reading.

Freddie deBoer was probably the first Substacker I followed? He writes on education, disability, mental health, and his Neuromancer book club just started. I have five f.ree subscriptions (one month) to give away; if you want one just hit Reply.

Otherwise, that’s the week! xoxo and see you soon.