There hasn’t been much Link Partying around here lately. I need to fix that, and I promise to be more consistent in the last few weeks of 2016 and into 2017.
Here’s a party to last you all week. Take your pick:
Hi! Long time no see. It’s really only been about two weeks, but it feels like a really long time to me. In those two weeks, my work/freelance/personal lives consumed me and I got a cold that kicked my ass. I’ve kind of been on the Internet, but not in a particularly mindful way.
But those two weeks off were actually a really good thing, because I realized just how much I miss doing this as a regular thing. Back when I first started, I would write 2-3 posts a week. Now I’m lucky if I can get a Link Party out on time. I want to get back to a regular writing schedule, so that I have time to do what I actually, really love I can have consistent brain workouts. This means reshuffling of priorities, setting harder deadlines with myself and probably less sleep. I have a feeling that this will all be worth it in the long run.
You, dear reader, have been consistently awesome from the beginning. I am always shocked to hear from people, in comment form or IRL, when they say how much they like it. Thank you for being the best.
Here’s what I’ve been reading lately:
1. This 24-year-old woman tried a Coke for the first time. I really loved this essay — I thought it was extremely well-written and weaved in all the right social elements.
7. The last time Luc Sante saw Jean-Michel Basquiat. This type of personal essay is one of the many reasons why I love the Internet as a writing space: a quick but powerful thought.
8. If you don’t know much about Gene Wilder or Gilda Radner, you need to read this post ASAP.
3. This is a masterpiece on the political power of single women, and I’m excited to see Rebecca Traister at a Call Your Girlfriend event in a few weeks. (My favorite part: “Today’s women are, for the most part, not abstaining from or delaying marriage to prove a point about equality. They are doing it because they have internalized assumptions that just a half-century ago would have seemed radical: that it’s okay for them not to be married; that they are whole people able to live full professional, economic, social, sexual, and parental lives on their own if they don’t happen to meet a person to whom they want to legally bind themselves.”)
5. On my way home one night this week, I listened to an incredible episode of This American Life about the power of the mind. One story brings up an important conversation about mental health, hospitals and guns (in collaboration with the New York Times) and the other was about another man’s denial of his Parkinson’s disease. I highly recommend it.
And a bonus: I’m so, so excited for “Loving Vincent” to come out. It’s going to be gorgeous.
1. I first heard excerpts of Gay Talese’s “Frank Sinatra Has A Cold” on This American Life in an episode for Sinatra’s 100th birthday, and the full article is stellar.
4. I didn’t know a lot about SoulCycle besides it being a very expensive spin class, but after reading this first-person account I understand its appeal.
And a bonus: My best friend Paige and I have been waiting to see this short movie called “Ticky Tacky,” which stars our favorite actor, Oscar Isaac. We found out about it a few months ago, but we couldn’t find it on any corner of the Internet. It’s finally up and it’s fantastic.
I saw this on the marquee of a local florist, and I think this is new because I’ve never seen motivational messages on the marquee before. Anyway, I love this and think it is A+++ and relevant.
2. This article about hair as a gender marker and what it does as a gender marker was really fascinating. (The New Republic had a lot of good stuff this week and I don’t traditionally link more than once to the same publication, but these stories about the Broad Museum and Peggy Guggenheim were also favorites.)
Zoë Lance. 