I was delighted to be reminded of Malcolm Guite this morning when I came across his YouTube channel. Here he is reading an essay on pipe smoking.

Around here, Candlemas means crêpes by candlelight (even if it is the middle of the day).

I love this Imbolc essay from Rhyd Wildermuth.

Not only is memorizing Dune’s “Litany Against Fear” during childhood not silly, I commend it as a solid practice for an adult. I did it in my early forties and I’m not even much of an SF reader. And I have a button on my backpack.

Either I’ve gotten trapped in a “woodworking + Maine” algorithm or there seems to be a high per capita ratio of woodworkers in Maine.

Technology is a program of control. Within certain limits, this is good & necessary. Outside those limits, it is a rejection of reality. Living in an increasingly artificial time (AI, AR), we must embrace the contingency of reality by being vulnerable, open, & sincere–a hard, countercultural task.

A company offers free access to the Headspace meditation app, yoga classes, blood pressure monitors, and wellness coaching to help their employees cope. What if–stay with me here, I have a crazy idea–they just didn’t put as much pressure on people?

I like Ted Gioia’s seven heretical questions about progress. But, being the animist, agrarian(?), anarcho-primitivist(?), whatever-the-hell that I am, I would edit his statement:

Progress should be about improving the quality of life and human flourishing. We make a grave error when we assume this is the same as new tech and economic cost-squeezing.

As follows:

Progress should be about improving the quality of our ecosystems and ensuring the mutual flourishing of all life. We make a grave error when we assume this is the same as new tech and economic cost-squeezing.

We must–absolutely must–start thinking beyond the merely human. Gioia may well agree with this, but we need people to start saying it explicitly.

We’re in the “path of totality” for the solar eclipse on April 8. I found out this morning that IU is cancelling classes across the state and holding an event with William Shatner. I find this hilarious and adorable.

Wendell Berry, Hannah Coulter (p158):

Sometimes, a haunted old woman, I wander about in this house that Nathan and I renewed, that is now aged and worn by our life in it. How many steps, wearing the thresholds? I look at it all again. Sometimes it fills to the brim with sorrow, which signifies the joy that has been here, and the love. It is entirely a gift.

I’ve heard it said that grief is the price of love, and that seems true to me. Love is a great risk; only the indifferent are safe. But what good is such safety?