january 2023
just links + books
Here I am again trying to stick to some kind of posting organization. I’m sure you’re all taking bets on how long this will last! As mentioned here, this is my monthly round-up post of just links. Check out my recent writing here in case you missed anything.
Books
I read some great books this month. I always come in hot to January with grand reading plans and motivation, and this year is no different. This is a longer list than most months, so I thought I would give it its own space. I read and would recommend all of these1 in no particular order:
Carrie Soto Is Back. I really like TJR, and while this one wasn’t my favorite of hers, it was still really good. I raced through it in a few days. It surprisingly gave me some insight into Grant and other friends who played sports through college. Even though Grant didn’t play basketball professionally like Carrie did tennis, Carrie’s identity was completely wrapped up in being an athlete, and it made me see things from a different perspective. 📚2
How To Keep House While Drowning: A Gentle Approach to Cleaning and Organizing. I bought this on Kindle because KC Davis’ Instagram account was one of my favorite follows of 2022. I don’t know that I’ll necessarily use any of her tips for cleaning and organizing, but the (very short) book was worth reading for all of the grace she offers to her readers about how much is stacked against us when it comes to caring for ourselves, our families, and our homes. It helped me to have more compassion for myself and offer it more freely to others - a pretty grand endorsement for anything if you ask me. 💖
Feminism Is For Everybody: Passionate Politics. This was my first bell hooks (I know, I know, embarrassing), and I wish someone would have assigned me this in high school because of how intersectional all justice work is. hooks wants this to be a very accessible and short primer on feminism, and she achieves that well. What I found depressing was how little we’ve progressed - and how similar the arguments she was confronting when it was originally published (in 2000) are to the arguments we hear today when it comes to feminism and anti-racism work. 🔥
God of Surprises. Grant bought me this for Christmas because I had left a note about it in some other book that he was reading (so thoughtful). Hughes, the author, was a British Jesuit priest, and this book is in its third printing (which means it has at least somewhat withstood the test of time). I loved it at parts, and it dragged in others. The bit about prayer was worth reading for me because I have some serious baggage around prayer. 📕
The Way of the Rose and Waking Up To The Dark. I love Sophie Strand and noticed that her parents wrote The Way of the Rose, so I read it on a whim over our holiday break, which then led me to find Waking Up To The Dark. I have a recent fascination with the rosary/Mary (longer story), so if that intrigues you too, I would definitely recommend The Way of the Rose, which delves into how the rosary evolved pre-Christianity as an explicitly feminine way of prayer and how the church tried to erase it before deciding to subsume it instead. It has some captivating history about the rosary specifically and the divine feminine more generally. I really liked the anthropological parts of Waking Up To The Dark, but the format seemed a bit choppy to me. It was still a great read, especially for January, and made me think about the repercussions of the electric light bulb. I read both of these on Scribd, but would probably buy my own copies if I stopped Scribd because both of the books’ bibliographies are so good.💖
To Shake the Sleeping Self. I love following Jedidiah Jenkins (what a name) on Instagram and have for years, but had never read his books. Sleeping Self is his first book and tells the story of his epic cycling trip from Oregon to Patagonia - and all of the stories and lessons that came along with it. Nature, bikes, stories, and theology are basically some of my favorite things, so I loved this. He’s coming out with a book this year about his relationship with his mom, which if you’ve read Sleeping Self, you know you’ll want to get your hands on. 💖
Winter is for reading, plus I had some solo travel this month, so I was able to get more reading in than usual. I’d love to hear your recommendations in the comments.
Rants and raves
👍 Bombas slippers. My sister gave Maeve a pair of these for Christmas, and I kept stealing them because we wear the same size so I finally bought a pair for myself after Maeve kept yelling at me. They very much live up to the hype. We have all hardwoods (well, pretend wood), so I wear through socks quickly. But I don’t like thick slippers because I prefer to be as close to barefoot as possible even when it is cold. Bombas to the rescue.
👍 Bittermilk bitters. I’ve been trying to drink less generally thanks largely to Holly and Laura over the last several years, and I’ve discovered that even though I don’t like hard alcohol, I do like making mocktails. I like the mindfulness of making a drink and how that elevates the drink to make the occasion feel more special, even (especially?) if it’s a random Tuesday night. In my mocktail experimenting, I’ve discovered that I really like bitters. Bittermilk is a charred grapefruit bitters that tastes delicious with some sparkling water and fresh lime juice or, even easier, with a lime or grapefruit Spindrift.
👍 I’m pretty sure Elon has ruined Twitter, but these kinds of threads were what made it so great - click and read through the whole thread for some truly great tidbits of advice:
👎 Virginia Sole-Smith on the terrifying new AAP guidelines on obesity (to be clear, my rant is with the guidelines, not with Sole-Smith’s argument).
👎 I shared this Pantsuit Politics episode about perimenopause last week along with my comment that I’ve been to three separate doctors in the last six months about some weird stuff I’ve been experiencing with my heart - and not one of them said it might have to do with hormones/perimenopause. Within five minutes of this episode, all three women talked about the exact heart thing I’ve been experiencing. After posting about it on Instagram, I received TONS of messages from other women experiencing similar symptoms or worse. I don’t understand how we continue to neglect - or worse, gaslight - half of the population.
Stuff worth sharing around the interwebs
Stop reading the news. A short and sweet - backed by research - call to quit keeping up with the news. I wrote about this a bit in my 2022 recap post on the blog.
On Botox, ageism, and Joe Jonas. I couldn’t pick out any of the Jonas’ brothers in a lineup, but I’ll read everything Jessica Defino writes, but I keep thinking about this specific newsletter where she coalesces a lot of thoughts around the ageism of the beauty industry. I’ve heard so many people, when talking about any kind of aesthetic product or procedure, that “they just want to feel like themselves again.” But everytime I hear that, I wonder what they’re comparing themselves to. I especially loved this quote from Clare Chambers on that point:
The very idea … suggests that there was one moment when you had the body that was really, authentically, naturally yours. On this understanding our real bodies are not the saggy, stretchy, lumpy, wrinkly ones that, somehow, we find ourselves in. When [people] try to get their bodies back they are usually aiming for the post-pubescent … body that exists for perhaps ten or twenty years of the average eighty-three years of life. Somehow, that minority body becomes not just the ideal body but the authentic body: the one that most accurately characterizes who you really are, inside.
In this narrative, the body must be constantly modified to remain true to itself. But why on earth should that particular body, the one that has done so much less than you have, be the ‘real’ you?
Sharing Mama Sycamore. I’ve been doing a ton of thinking and research on friendship and loneliness lately. I even begrudgingly made a Reel about it - go watch and like it to make the algorithm happy:
Other good stuff breadcrumbs. I listened to this to celebrate MLK Day - it was great and would make a great listen for Black History Month. I am obsessed with all of these conversations on composting Christianity - Brie is doing great work with her podcast. Working from home is the best thing to happen to families in decades (ya’ll knew I’d share that one!). It is almost time for Imbolc and one of my favorite things I’ve written. Lyz’ Dingus of the Week is always good, but I would’ve recommended this week’s if only for this paragraph:
If my reporting is correct, the LGBTQ agenda right now is just brunch. So, hardly anything to get worried about unless you hate pancakes and Bloody Marys. In contrast, the heterosexual agenda seems to be putting fake barn wood on your walls that say “Cabin Life” and making jokes about how men can’t find the ketchup in the grocery store. lol weaponized incompetence is so so silly in a man.
What are you ranting/raving/sharing these days that I missed?
Happy almost February,
Sara
I typically try not to post about books that I wouldn’t recommend. It just feels like negativity that I don’t really need to put out into the world, but I do add everything I read to Goodreads so you can check there for the stuff that I didn’t love.
My very scientific rating system for books that I recommend:
📚 = I liked it, but not worth owning/re-reading. Check it out at the library instead.
📕 = I liked it, but had some reservations. Check it out at the library if you’re going to read it.
💖 = I loved it and will want to reread it, so I’ll probably buy a copy if I haven’t already.
🔥 = I loved it and think everyone should read this book.