Something I thought about:
- Mostly I’ve been trying to work through some narrative issues in my dissertation. I tried to move material around in a few different ways. One idea didn’t work at all, but the rest of the edits helped. I still have way too much in my head that needs to be on paper.
Something I did:
- I had to surprise rebuild my entire website — long story, but it was accidentally deleted, and the backup system that was in place failed. I had in my typically obsessive way kept parts of it in various forms (even though I thought it was being backed up) and was able to put it back together again. And I promptly backed it up and put that backup (and all of the composite pieces) in two places, both of which have local and off-site backups.
- A lot of dissertation work — some structural edits to move material between the first and second chapters and reordering of text in two sections of the first chapter. Logic and transitions make more sense now.
Something I read:
- Such a good interview with Frank Bidart, and the last line made me laugh out loud.
- I love Yanyi’s newsletter for its combination of sensibility and deep care. This one was particularly good.
Talent is the internalized, mythic substitute for what you deserved to have, but didn’t. You deserved safety and belonging. You deserved a stable place from which to roam. You deserved a way to fail without losing your worth, a number-one-fan you didn’t have to impress. You deserved someone who could tell you about the world; someone who could tell you that you already had a place in it.
