TPO#15: Winter Looms
This is Issue 15 of The Purposeful Object, a newsletter about modernity and the good life by Navneet Alang. This issue: some thoughts about mindset; some links to handwriting AI and mAgNEts; and finally... some dinner plates?
The Purposeful Object started out as a way for me to reflect on and share what I call "the good life." It's a vague, floaty term, but by it I tend to mean a life that is filled with more pleasure but also feels more grounded and connected.
TPO is thus in part about trying to present something like self-help or self-improvement but in a way that wouldn't put off people who might usually shy away from such things. In other ways, the newsletter was meant to focus on the pleasure part itself — for me, very often focused on food and drink, but also good art, good writing, good stuff. And in yet other ways, I was hoping to talk about dealing with our (or at least my) flaws: the way we might face our own challenges with procrastination, fear, loneliness, or the more plain feeling that life keeps slipping out of one's hands.
The era of COVID-19 has upended all this. It's both hard and borderline absurd now to think about how to maximize either pleasure or "productivity" when so many people feel like they're just barely holding on.
The whole, wild situation is made all the worse by the looming threat of American decline. I must admit that even a cynic like myself didn't envision things getting as bad as they are in the States. While the polls tentatively suggest Trump will at least no longer be president, what he and his enablers have set in motion is profoundly worrying. Couple this with all the "usual" twenty-first century worries -- the teetering of liberal capitalism, the omnipresent threat of climate change, and the broad historical shift away from American supremacy -- and... I dunno y'all. Things are bad.
I suppose the reason I'm writing this all out is that I'm trying to think through what a newsletter about "the techno-modern and the good life" should be in 2020 and beyond. Pleasure for pleasure's sake seems oblivious, while the hard work of self-improvement almost feels like a luxury.
Still. I've been thinking lately about the looming winter, and how even a fan of winter like me is not looking forward to even more reason to be indoors. But I came across a Jason Kottke post from last year that tackled how to deal with winter when you live in a place where it is both long and hard (phrasing!). In it, he pointed to the idea that mindset is important - that how we approach winter, or stress, or even a pandemic, can be affected by how we think about it.
That is a tricky idea, not least because it slips easily into libertarian, laissez-faire "just be happy, you idiot!" But it seems there is some solid research that how we approach things can have some effect on how we deal with adverse circumstances. It's much less the annoying, dismissive "your problems are only in your head" than, instead, that a kind of conscious fake-it-until-you-make-it mindset can effect a real change upon our wellbeing.
I don't think merely trying to approach winter or this pandemic with a sunny disposition is the cure-all. But I am going to try and find the positive - to push myself a little to get outdoors, appreciate the warmth of the indoors, and be grateful for both the big and small. For an oft-depressed cynic like me, it will be quite a change. But, I dunno. Things are already bad. It's worth a shot? Join me, maybe?
Ephemera
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An AI researcher gets into how handwriting recognition works on the new Scribble feature in iPadOS14, and it's super fascinating. Also, after 7 years on this MacBook Air, I'm going to switch to an iPad Air after it arrives, and I will undoubtedly have thoughts about ~#computing paradigms#~. Stay tuned.
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Speaking of "self-improvement that's not cheesy," here's smart pal Kelli Korducki with a list of 21 books for a better you.
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Here's a longer piece in Quanta Magazine about how scientists are only now beginning to understand magnetic fields in the universe which, as it turns out, are absolutely everywhere.
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How should you write about instrumental music? This Ismail Muhammad piece on a Coltrane track in The Paris Review gives us one answer, and it is lovely.
The first thing you hear is McCoy Tyner’s fingers sounding a tremulous minor chord, hovering at the lower end of the piano’s register. It’s an ominous chord, horror movie shit; hearing it you can’t help but see still water suddenly disturbed by something moving beneath it, threatening to surface. Then the sound of John Coltrane’s saxophone writhes on top: mournful, melismatic, menacing. Serpentine.
TPO Reviews Instagram Fluff
TPO Recommends was a feature in which I would just recommend things that I thought were, um, good. But since I am such a complete sucker for Instagram advertising, I am p-i-v-o-t-i-n-g to review the stuff I can't seem to stop myself from buying after idly scrolling through my phone.
My latest idiotic purchase? Plates. Specifically, the dinner plates from Fable, yet another "direct to consumer" company that promises to cut out the middleman between you and artisans in Portugal yadda yadda yadda, if you buy the bowls, you can have the lobster bisque.
Anyway, the plates? They're good. They're deliberately uneven (get it, they're authentic and handmade) and they have a soft speckled white finish that is ideal for, well, Instagram. The downsides are that the bottom is unglazed and it feels like it could easily get stained if say, like me, you cook with turmeric pretty often. I also can't speak for durability long term, but a quick scratch test with the tip of a sharp knife (just for you, Keeler) did in fact produce a faint mark, so I wouldn't go to town with a steak knife on these.
At C$68 for 4 plates they aren't super cheap, but they are also far from expensive when it comes to dinnerware. Signing up for their email newsletter will get you free shipping. A solid, if qualified TPO recommends from me due to them not being super tough.
That's it for this issue, friends! As ever, I so appreciate you reading my words, and those of you who support this letter financially are the absolute best. Until next time...