I’m solo parenting and keeping it light this week. Enjoy a poem and some links!
How to Do Absolutely Nothing
Rent a house near the beach, or a cabin
but: Do not take your walking shoes.
Don’t take any clothes you’d wear
anyplace anyone would see you.
Don’t take your rechargeables.
Take Scrabble if you have to,
but not a dictionary and no
pencils for keeping score.
Don’t take a cookbook
or anything to cook.
A fishing pole, ok
but not the line,
hook, sinker,
leave it all.
Find out
what’s
left.
— Barbara Kingsolver
The Men Who Lie About Their Height
By Bradley Brickner-Wood for The New Yorker
My take: As a certified Short King ™, I finally vanquished any youthful Napoleon complex I may have had by developing a winsome personality and marrying a Tall Girl (against all odds). Those days are long enough ago that it’s genuinely hard to imagine lying about my height, but I did stumble upon a Reddit thread recently that revealed the charmed lives of tall men, which was previously unknown to me. Perhaps the du jour leg-lengthening surgery makes sense in that light, but lying? Such an easily disproven blunder.
Best line: Height discrimination, of course, is not a new phenomenon. Researchers in cognitive science have long theorized that conceptual thinking is informed by how the human body looks and moves. Figurative language for power and success tends to evoke verticality and size: to go above and beyond, to be bigger and better, to reach for new heights. Conversely, the language of diminutiveness—to be down bad, to feel small, to live below your means—suggests submission, subordination, weakness.
Ricky’s Nails the Neighborhood Bar by Amy Cavanaugh for American Weekender
My take: “The only good martinis these days are in one of our homes,” I wrote to my friend Blake last week. (Excluding, of course, a handful of legendary ones around the world at places like Dukes, Harry’s, or Bemelmans.) As someone who daydreams about spending my third act mindlessly wiping a glass with a rag, I have long been intrigued by the qualities of a good bar. Amy gets it just right here.
Best line: Ricky’s is similarly transportive, but to a place of non-specific nostalgia. The interior is layered with details: eclectic light fixtures, vintage beer signs, an inviting pool table, and plenty of let’s say hunting lodge decor — wood paneling, paintings of birds, duck-print wallpaper, and a menagerie of ceramic animals.
The World’s Rarest Pasta Is Hidden in the Mountains of Sardinia by Matt Goulding for The New York Times
Best line: Paola Abraini is one of only a handful of people who still know how to make su filindeu. “To lose this tradition would be like losing a piece of our identity,” she said. Twenty years ago, Mrs. Abraini was among the last custodians of the vanishing foodway. But her tireless work as a teacher has helped bring it back from the brink of extinction.
It’s not a recipe that can be read and recreated by enterprising cooks in kitchens abroad; the technique must be felt in the flesh, learned through repetition and error until the fingertips know the difference between just right and just wrong. To master it requires mastering many variables, including the effect of hard water versus soft water, when to add the salt solution, how to adjust to the weather. This level of dedication has made younger generations of local women reluctant to take up the practice.
Lakeside Charm and Farm-Fresh Ambition: A Guide to the Rising Food and Wine Scene in Michigan’s Harbor Country by Caitlin White for Observer
Best line: With a pair of excellent, locally owned boutique hotels, an agriculturally driven brewery, and a day-to-night deli that morphs into a speakeasy at sundown, this little enclave has all the makings of America’s next great food and wine scene. And since it’s only about 90 minutes by car from Chicago, and less than an hour from South Bend and Kalamazoo, it’s easily accessible from quite a few directions. Here’s a rundown on the best of what Harbor Country, and a couple of neighborhoods just beyond it, have to offer.
garden tour
Peek Inside Chicago Chef Rick Bayless’ Amazing Backyard Garden
By Teresa Woodard for Midwest Living
Best line: In 1996, the couple found a rare Bucktown property: a former tavern with 1,000 square feet of land. “I took two steps in and said to my wife, ‘This is where I want to live,’” Bayless says. They transformed the home and its surroundings, eventually buying the neighboring property, which is now home to their daughter and her family. Today, the shared outdoor space features a grape-covered dining arbor and an outdoor kitchen shaded by maples—plus a beehive, koi pond, and chicken coop. In addition to the raised beds, a greenhouse shelters tropical herbs and microgreens through the winter, as well as an avocado tree Bayless and his daughter started from a pit 30 years ago.
Seth Putnam is an editor and writer in Chicago. He lives with his wife, son, and daughter in a 1920s home that is the epitome of a work in progress.
“Instructions for living a life: Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.” —Mary Oliver