55. What are we doing today?
What I’m up to
You know you’re truly enjoying vacation when you lose track of which day of the week it is (thus the late newsletter). You also know you’re on vacation when what would normally be just one of the day’s many tasks (like writing this newsletter!) feels impossible. :)
We spent the last week+ in Catbalogan, my dad’s hometown. We planned to be there for just a few days, but we had to push back our return flight to Manila because we ALL got Covid within days of arrival. The first few days were miserable — worse than I expected! — but we all recovered pretty quickly.
It would’ve been a terrible way to spend ten days of vacation except my uncle’s family kept us well-fed with fresh seafood, and we spent each day enjoying sea views from my grandma’s deck.
What I’m reading
I finished Hanya Yanagihara’s To Paradise. It is not quite as devastating as A Little Life, but it’s perhaps haunted me more because of the scope of its hopelessness. The book takes place in three time periods, a hundred years apart, and in each storyline the protagonist longs for happiness, identity, or freedom. The final storyline is particularly poignant because it is set in a future where pandemics are the norm; it reminded me of a bleaker, more drawn-out Sea of Tranquility (by Emily St. John Mandel).
I also read Ali Hazelwood’s rom-com novella Stuck With You (which is about as different from To Paradise as you can get).
Still working on Harlem Shuffle by Colson Whitehead.
What’s crazy is we’ve been to bookstores four times this week and I haven’t purchased a single book! After my quarantine reading streak, I’m feeling a little listless in my reading life (and that’s ok.)
What I’m thinking about
I never finished The Netanyahus by Joshua Cohen, but it still left me thinking. It’s set in the 1950s, and the protagonist is a Jewish academic struggling through his transition from the Bronx into a Cornell-esque university, where he is the only Jewish faculty member. My understanding of antisemitism is limited to what I learned about WWII and various books and articles I’ve read over the years; it is absolutely incomplete. It’s taken seeing the limitations of my non-Asian loved ones’ understanding of Asian hate that made me comprehend the depths of my own ignorance about others’ suffering. My friend M articulated this when she wrote about a stalled relationship with a guy she met online: “…[it] begs me to question how the differences in our identities contribute to the ease of our conversation. If everyone has their own unique experiences of oppression because of the different identities they hold on to, then will any of our conversations be sustainable?”
I hope the answer is yes, and I am pondering the questions and posture that would help me bridge these gaps, even incrementally.
Of course the reversal of Roe v. Wade is foremost on my mind. I think it’s one reason I have been procrastinating writing this newsletter — I am too emotionally drained and angry to put anything into words. I’ll leave you with some recommended reading:
Gabrielle Blair’s Twitter thread on irresponsible ejaculation.
Much-needed hope from AOC.
My friend/former student C wrote this for 12 Point Font (which was, incidentally, created by a current student M). (Now is a good time to mention working with young adults gives me HOPE.)
What I’m learning
One of the best parts of vacationing at my parents’ house is not having to be the adult. I love not having to make decisions. I like not being in charge of travel arrangements. It feels so good to just wake up and ask, “What are we doing today?”
It’s like being a child again, except I’m still a grown up so no one can make me do anything. :)
What I’m doing
Some highlights of our vacation in the Philippines so far:
ALL the good food
getting to ride on my uncle’s boat and wave runner
the view from my grandma’s house
shopping - Filipino malls are something else!
SO MUCH SLEEP
time to truly do nothing (except watch Stranger Things and Only Murders in the Building)
of course, family time.
What I’ve saved
Pre-order Gabrielle Blair’s book Ejaculate Responsibly (based on the above thread).
Pre-order Hua Hsu’s Stay True.
This interview with Emma Thompson reminded me of another way women are not treated as equal humans: women’s pleasure is not valued the way men’s pleasure is. I liked what Thompson said about how sex ed should include emotional education. Also, I want to address this another day, but this is so spot-on: “I think one of the great tragedies in our lives—in women’s lives—is the time, the effort, the energy, the passion that we’ve wasted on not being able to accept our own bodies.”
“My money don’t jiggle jiggle…” I hear this at least a half dozen times a day. Who knew Louis Theroux was behind this earworm?? (NYT)
Super interesting takedown of Top Gun: Maverick as pro-US military propaganda.
Until… later this week,
Kate