Everything you write is beautiful Antonia ☺️ and you take excellent pictures 👌 Please don't be someone's else lunch , maybe bring some peanut butter for the mountain lions (not sure big cats like 🥜) You are very brave!
Mmm, every time I read your newsletter (or Chris La Tray’s, too) I become more intrigued with Montana as a geography. I’m glad you got another time at a cabin before the tourists/crowds arrive, even if it was not particularly comfortable on multiple fronts. It sounded somewhat healing, and I hope it was, at least a little bit.
And re: links - I like the idea of citing without linking, unless the link (which could also be a PDF of a document that wasn’t originally digital) is super difficult to find. I also don’t mind affiliate links to sites like Bookshop, so that the link sharer can make a little extra money (though I don’t actually know how that all sorts out, and if it’s an ethical system or not). I don’t write for money currently, but I feel you about trying to mitigate screen time, and like someone else said, not having the link available means I need to do an extra step to find the said piece of media. Sometimes that’s worth it; other times, maybe it helps me remember that I’m not a bad person for being up to date on everything all the time, and I’m allowed to not go down every citation rabbit hole.
Nia, thank you yet again. This quote! : “The entire world spills out from every footfall like it’s being remade as you walk. I still think that’s magical.” ❤️
May 6, 2023·edited May 7, 2023Liked by Antonia Malchik
Once again, Nia, you've struck many wonderful chords, not the least resonant of which would include: "The entire world spills out from every footfall like it's being remade as you walk." So true, especially in nature, and even on my routine route with the pup each morning.
And here's my modest remedy for the tyranny of the glowing screen and its hyperlinks: I push long reads, particularly from Substack, from the web or my phone to my Kindle. (Yeah, guilty guilty — a Kindle.) I have to admit that I've grown attached to it — a Kindle Paperwhite. When I send an article from the web, it arrives to the Kindle with no links, nothing fancy — just black-and-white text and images. Clean. Good for reading. No ads, not even from newspaper articles I push to the Kindle. None. So, basically, I don't read on my laptop or my phone (barely anything on the phone). And I can read that Kindle in full sunlight outside. I even sometimes shop on the Kindle, but buy the book locally or get an e-version from the Libby library app. I've even read that Kindle by the light of a kerosene lamp in cabin with no electricity.
I'm with you on radio news (except for my truly wonderful local radio station, WDEV, which is not an NPR station) and increasingly daily print journalism. A former journalist who's read The New York Times religiously for decades, I'm spending far less time with breaking/daily news for reasons that would overload this comment of mine. (I suspect Substack readers know the reasons, anyway.) I'm going with music in the morning -- or birdsong.
Finally, well, aw shucks -- thanks for mentioning my essay The Nature of War.
Oh, one more thing — your three butterflies (left to right): Green Comma (Polygonia faunus), Compton Tortoiseshell (Nymphalis l-album) and Milbert's Tortoiseshell (Aglais milberti). As for being tough in the cold, they overwinter as adults! (Those commas can be tricky IDs, but I'm fairly certain yours was Green Comma.)
There is something to be said about the possibility of dying (at the paws of a hungry lil lion or a burly old bear) that reminds you that you are very much a living hobbit. It helps you forget that your bones ache and that bills are due and also that the human language is failing you in your attempt to wrestle it on to paper with ink.
I love your writing. It is good for my soul. Thank you.
No preference regarding hyperlinks. Although if they're not there then maybe I have to be more discriminating about which citations I really want to take the time to delve into. This is probably a good thing.
I don’t think I could’ve stayed in a chilly cabin, though I do admire you. And I got literal chills just reading about that bear print! My psychology urges me to click on every single link 😂 so my personal practice is reading thru a list of recommendations first and then going back and only clicking on the ones I’m genuinely interested in. I definitely added a few of your books to my list!
I absolutely love how you include audio clips. Thank you for sharing your loon!! ❤️
When I opened this I immediately noted the length and sighed. You covered a lot of ground today and it was worth the read. I enjoy an old-fashioned magazine also. They can be fun and a simpler world.
As always, a balm for my overheated brain, all of this.
>>"I don’t really want to get eaten by a mountain lion, but I especially don’t want one to get in trouble for eating me."
You are completely and utterly mad. But the *right* kind of mad. (The wrong kind of mad is, say, deciding that stealing Ukraine from the Ukrainians is the best thing in the long run for absolutely everyone.)
You've got me thinking, as you always do: what are the right temperatures for humans to be at their most human? Because obviously those temperatures must vary from population to population (case in point: my time in Costa Rica, complete with "I'm an Englishman so now I must go drink 40 gallons of iced water and then lie down" syndrome). But also, the human ability to adjust. So what's the window for humanning, including things like fearless creative work, and the ability to display empathy instead of fight-or-flight, and all the other stuff? And is it possible that to truly persuade someone, to really win them over and get them to open up and cooperate and share ideas (and by "someone" I could also mean "kids in classrooms"), you need to get the right temperature? And maybe humidity? And other stuff? How much is communication and learning about environmental calibration? And why isn't this an Aeon essay?
Hooray for finally getting access to that finicky electronically-locked cabin! And boo that it turned out to be horrendously cold when you finally did get in.
Also, re. Substack Notes - it has been taking up too much of my bandwidth in recent weeks since it launched, and - that is not a good thing. It's felt addictive, and I don't want to get addicted to that. I have my chosen addictions, and they are books, my newsletter, and coffee. But Notes started working its easy dopamine hit Twittery magic and I got pulled in to the point I saw some work deadlines skid away like tires on black ice. Most definitely nope to that. Being devoured by bears and mountain lions is...less than ideal at the best of times, but being eaten alive by another social media platform is a fate I am happy to spend the rest of my life working hard to avoid.
It also occurred to me that I'd love to sign up to something that sent me one outdoors/nature/walking-related thing to read every day. Just one thing. A thousand or so words. One link, one story, one thing. I could do that with my first coffee of the day, outdoors, and that would feel lovely. Someone needs to make that thing. Maybe deliverable to a Kindle or something.
Everything you write is beautiful Antonia ☺️ and you take excellent pictures 👌 Please don't be someone's else lunch , maybe bring some peanut butter for the mountain lions (not sure big cats like 🥜) You are very brave!
Mmm, every time I read your newsletter (or Chris La Tray’s, too) I become more intrigued with Montana as a geography. I’m glad you got another time at a cabin before the tourists/crowds arrive, even if it was not particularly comfortable on multiple fronts. It sounded somewhat healing, and I hope it was, at least a little bit.
And re: links - I like the idea of citing without linking, unless the link (which could also be a PDF of a document that wasn’t originally digital) is super difficult to find. I also don’t mind affiliate links to sites like Bookshop, so that the link sharer can make a little extra money (though I don’t actually know how that all sorts out, and if it’s an ethical system or not). I don’t write for money currently, but I feel you about trying to mitigate screen time, and like someone else said, not having the link available means I need to do an extra step to find the said piece of media. Sometimes that’s worth it; other times, maybe it helps me remember that I’m not a bad person for being up to date on everything all the time, and I’m allowed to not go down every citation rabbit hole.
Nia, thank you yet again. This quote! : “The entire world spills out from every footfall like it’s being remade as you walk. I still think that’s magical.” ❤️
Once again, Nia, you've struck many wonderful chords, not the least resonant of which would include: "The entire world spills out from every footfall like it's being remade as you walk." So true, especially in nature, and even on my routine route with the pup each morning.
And here's my modest remedy for the tyranny of the glowing screen and its hyperlinks: I push long reads, particularly from Substack, from the web or my phone to my Kindle. (Yeah, guilty guilty — a Kindle.) I have to admit that I've grown attached to it — a Kindle Paperwhite. When I send an article from the web, it arrives to the Kindle with no links, nothing fancy — just black-and-white text and images. Clean. Good for reading. No ads, not even from newspaper articles I push to the Kindle. None. So, basically, I don't read on my laptop or my phone (barely anything on the phone). And I can read that Kindle in full sunlight outside. I even sometimes shop on the Kindle, but buy the book locally or get an e-version from the Libby library app. I've even read that Kindle by the light of a kerosene lamp in cabin with no electricity.
I'm with you on radio news (except for my truly wonderful local radio station, WDEV, which is not an NPR station) and increasingly daily print journalism. A former journalist who's read The New York Times religiously for decades, I'm spending far less time with breaking/daily news for reasons that would overload this comment of mine. (I suspect Substack readers know the reasons, anyway.) I'm going with music in the morning -- or birdsong.
Finally, well, aw shucks -- thanks for mentioning my essay The Nature of War.
Oh, one more thing — your three butterflies (left to right): Green Comma (Polygonia faunus), Compton Tortoiseshell (Nymphalis l-album) and Milbert's Tortoiseshell (Aglais milberti). As for being tough in the cold, they overwinter as adults! (Those commas can be tricky IDs, but I'm fairly certain yours was Green Comma.)
There is something to be said about the possibility of dying (at the paws of a hungry lil lion or a burly old bear) that reminds you that you are very much a living hobbit. It helps you forget that your bones ache and that bills are due and also that the human language is failing you in your attempt to wrestle it on to paper with ink.
I love your writing. It is good for my soul. Thank you.
No preference regarding hyperlinks. Although if they're not there then maybe I have to be more discriminating about which citations I really want to take the time to delve into. This is probably a good thing.
I don’t think I could’ve stayed in a chilly cabin, though I do admire you. And I got literal chills just reading about that bear print! My psychology urges me to click on every single link 😂 so my personal practice is reading thru a list of recommendations first and then going back and only clicking on the ones I’m genuinely interested in. I definitely added a few of your books to my list!
I absolutely love how you include audio clips. Thank you for sharing your loon!! ❤️
I love that you're concerned for the lion mountain eating you as you are you.
I just started reading Jim Harrison's memoir "Off to the Side" last night, and here's the epigraph:
"Beware, O wanderer, the road is walking too." Rilke
When I opened this I immediately noted the length and sighed. You covered a lot of ground today and it was worth the read. I enjoy an old-fashioned magazine also. They can be fun and a simpler world.
As always, a balm for my overheated brain, all of this.
>>"I don’t really want to get eaten by a mountain lion, but I especially don’t want one to get in trouble for eating me."
You are completely and utterly mad. But the *right* kind of mad. (The wrong kind of mad is, say, deciding that stealing Ukraine from the Ukrainians is the best thing in the long run for absolutely everyone.)
You've got me thinking, as you always do: what are the right temperatures for humans to be at their most human? Because obviously those temperatures must vary from population to population (case in point: my time in Costa Rica, complete with "I'm an Englishman so now I must go drink 40 gallons of iced water and then lie down" syndrome). But also, the human ability to adjust. So what's the window for humanning, including things like fearless creative work, and the ability to display empathy instead of fight-or-flight, and all the other stuff? And is it possible that to truly persuade someone, to really win them over and get them to open up and cooperate and share ideas (and by "someone" I could also mean "kids in classrooms"), you need to get the right temperature? And maybe humidity? And other stuff? How much is communication and learning about environmental calibration? And why isn't this an Aeon essay?
Hooray for finally getting access to that finicky electronically-locked cabin! And boo that it turned out to be horrendously cold when you finally did get in.
Also, re. Substack Notes - it has been taking up too much of my bandwidth in recent weeks since it launched, and - that is not a good thing. It's felt addictive, and I don't want to get addicted to that. I have my chosen addictions, and they are books, my newsletter, and coffee. But Notes started working its easy dopamine hit Twittery magic and I got pulled in to the point I saw some work deadlines skid away like tires on black ice. Most definitely nope to that. Being devoured by bears and mountain lions is...less than ideal at the best of times, but being eaten alive by another social media platform is a fate I am happy to spend the rest of my life working hard to avoid.
It also occurred to me that I'd love to sign up to something that sent me one outdoors/nature/walking-related thing to read every day. Just one thing. A thousand or so words. One link, one story, one thing. I could do that with my first coffee of the day, outdoors, and that would feel lovely. Someone needs to make that thing. Maybe deliverable to a Kindle or something.