1. Poetry from Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer: For When I’m Rushing, and What the Gardener Knows, and Once grief was a bonfire. I will never understand how someone can be both so prolific and consistently offer so much beauty — I mean for as much as she writes and publishes, HOW does she never bomb?!

2. On Self-Trust, a pep talk from Maggie Smith.

3. If a Steel Magnolia Falls in a Forest: R.I.P. Madeline Mabry Lippman, 1931-2024.

4. How to make new friends as a grown-up from Sas Petherick.

5. Dream Maintenance Crew, a poem from Out With Lanterns, “a daily poetry practice.”

6. There Is Still Beauty: Being Here and Resilient in a World on the Brink from Frederick Joseph.

7. Chelsea Bieker Tells Us About the Work of Loving Yourself from Cheryl Strayed’s Dear Sugar. P.S. I recommend Chelsea’s books.

8. Practical approaches for more effective teamwork from Seth Godin. I’d say this list applies to families and other communities as well as “the work place.”

9. Recipes I want to try: Lazy lasagna, and Chicken Pot Pie Pasta, and Lemon Chicken Orzo (Instagram reel), and Loaded Burger Sweet Potato Rounds (Instagram reel), and Mediterranean Creamy Vegetable Soup (Instagram reel), Sticky Ginger Sesame Tofu (Instagram reel), Zucchini Cornbread Loaf (Instagram reel), and and One Pot Brown Butter Orzo with Butternut Squash, and Big Soft Ginger Cookies.

10. ‘Love and service make us rich’: Anne Lamott on aging. “NPR’s Mary Louise Kelly talks with Washington Post aging columnist Anne Lamott about what it means to get older in the United States.”

11. The 44 Best High-Protein, Low-Carb Foods, According To Nutritionists.

12. Exclusive: Two more women accuse Neil Gaiman of sexual assault and abuse. This is why we can’t have nice things, and why I don’t like to say out loud that I like anyone these days — because it seems like everyone is hiding something awful.

13. ‘No Ordinary Love’: Roxane Gay on allowing yourself to accept love. “The author talks about ongoing love stories, overcoming differences, and other lessons from working with a real Hinge couple for the ‘No Ordinary Love’ anthology.”

14. Who were the 6 hostages killed in Gaza? Make it stop…

15. Easy Crowdfunding Principles, or “how to convince people to give you money.”

16. My Top 10 Favorite Fat Coaches, Trainers, etc.

17. After a Splashy Book Deal, I Got Dropped By My Publisher, But I Kept On Writing. “Why stubbornness is the most fundamental skill an author can have.” 

18. Unreasonable Love, “Elizabeth Gilbert & Nancy Reddy on love that changes you” on The Isolation Journals with Suleika Jaouad.

19. On Still Grieving The Dog, from Out With Lanterns, “a daily poetry practice.”

20. These Famous Brands Used To Have Different Names.

21. Five ways to avoid burnout.

22. A photographer captures life in America’s last remaining old-growth forests.

23. The 100 Best TV Episodes of All Time on Rolling Stone.

24. 17th Annual iPhone Photography Awards 2024 Winners.

25. 10 Simple Tips To Help You Get Off Your Phone And Into Your Life from Tammy Strobel on Be More With Less.

26. How To Calm Down And Reduce Your Anxious Thoughts Fast, According To Psychologists.

27. 100 tiny tricks to help with everything from digital overwhelm to lumpy sugar and unpaid bills. “Ever feel like you’re lurching from crisis to crisis, or chore to chore? Here’s how to knock at least some of them on the head – and lay the foundations for a less stressful, more organised existence.”

28. I Had to Leave My State of Tennessee to Get An Abortion Post-Roe v. Wade Even Though My Health Was At Risk.

29. 5 Signs You’re Dealing With Unresolved Grief.

30. How Embracing My Introversion Changed My Life for the Better.

31. The Prince We Never Knew on The New York Times Magazine. (gift link) “A revealing new documentary could redefine our understanding of the pop icon. But you will probably never get to see it.”

32. And finally, this poem from Jessica Jocelyn.

1. My Aim Is To Be True, Not Great. “Rather than becoming great, I prefer to be true. Ordinary. Happy with staying close to home with an adventure here and there if it arises. Happy to run into friends and neighbors when I venture beyond the house. Happy to walk the same trail every day. Happy to be an ordinary human doing ordinary things. This is my freedom. This is my truth.” So much this.

2. Wisdom from Patti Digh: “My thoughts on resisting a possible ultra-conservative presidency following the blueprint outlined in Project 2025: Choose one topic you feel strongly about and work on that topic. There is too much for us to split our attention among all the things that are planned. Know your topic inside and out, donate what you can to organizations advocating on that topic, and make a dent in that topic. Others will choose different topics and do the same. Hit that one topic hard, with all you can muster, given your resources. That is going to be my approach.”

3. Wisdom from Søren Kierkegaard, “The most common form of despair is not being who you are.”

4. All in from Josie George. “What am I opening and closing to? Life itself. My existence entirely. Inconvenient, uncomfortable, surprising, often disappointing, wise, perfect. Terrifying. Terrifying. And the greatest gift there is.” [Thanks to Rita for the link.]

5. Psychologist explains why everyone feels exhausted right now and it makes so much sense.

6. Wisdom from Roshi Joan Halifax: “Keep clearing the mind of psychosocial debris, to the extent that we can, through practice, love, art, and the wilds. and keep aligned with the values of integrity and care, letting wisdom and courage be the guide, not the psychological manipulations of ill-meaning players.”

7. I spent 60 years sneering at yoga. It turns out I love it – and it does make you healthier and happier. “It boosts flexibility, strength, balance, breathing and mood … Here are the stupid reasons I avoided it for so long – and 21 things I’ve learned since I embraced it.”

8. Laura Pritchett considered a life of crime — but only in a kind, fictional way. “A thought experiment at a writing conference provided the impetus for her new novel, ‘Three Keys’ — the second book she has published this year.” In related news, A struggling middle-aged woman takes to the highway in “Three Keys.” “After losing her husband and her job, the protagonist of Laura Pritchett’s latest novel finds a rough start to her journey of self-discovery.”

9. ‘I felt I had no right to grieve’: what happens if your sorrow doesn’t seem appropriate? “When the author Daisy Buchanan lost a series of friends, she felt bereft – yet also that her feelings were misplaced. Here, she explores the notion of ‘disenfranchised grief’ – and learns how to let her sorrow in.”

10. 100 Best Books of the 21st Century on The New York Times. (gift link)

11. PBS Short Film Festival. “The PBS Short Film Festival continues to elevate the reach and visibility of independent films and filmmakers from across the country. For thirteen years, the festival has showcased films about love, acceptance, family, strength, equality, friendship, loyalty and much more. The 2024 festival highlights ‘Story Time’ as we celebrate the art of short form storytelling.”

12. Locusts in your noodles? Singapore approves 16 insect species as food. Confession: This doesn’t bother me. 

13. The Key to Longevity Is Boring on The New York Times. (gift link) **Spoiler Alert**: “Research has long shown that health and longevity come down to five fundamental lifestyle behaviors: exercising regularly, eating a nutritious diet, eschewing cigarettes, limiting alcohol consumption and nurturing meaningful relationships.”

14. Wisdom from Michelle Cassandra Johnson: “The world is rather upside down, and I know this feeling of discombobulation will only continue leading up to the U.S. Presidential election in November. The dog days of summer are upon us in North Carolina, and we are inflamed. The climate is inflamed. The entire globe is on fire. I keep coming back to the light and what opportunity exists here for us to find light in this strange place and land that sometimes feels unrecognizable. And even if, at times, it feels difficult for me to find the light, I know it’s there. I know it exists, and all the darkness and shadow that makes itself known cannot and will not extinguish the light.”

15. Giving up vs. quitting from Seth Godin.

16. Wonder is a Practice, “a conversation with the unrivaled Frederick Joseph.”

17. Now That the Stakes Are Low, a poem from Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer.

18. Practicing Friendship: Sy Safransky and Sparrow. “In many ways they are opposites. Sparrow is impish, unkempt, chaotic. Sy arranges the pens on his desk so that they’re parallel and makes his bed every morning.”

19. What Your Grocery Cart Says About You on The New York Times. (gift link) “We combed through a month’s worth of receipts from more than two dozen people across the U.S. to better understand our relationship to the food we buy.”

20. Fine, Let’s Talk About The Election from Chuck Wendig on Terrible Minds.

21. 24 Ways To Simplify Your Life In 2024 from Courtney Carver on Be More With Less.

22. This is Where I Live Sometimes from Jenny Lawson.

23. Wednesday Thread: Quick Revision Tricks from Jami Attenberg on Craft Talk.

24. Later on Short Reads.

25. Smash Burger Tacos. (Instagram reel) We finally made some of these yesterday, and YUM.

26. Trail cam videos are one of my favorite things. For example:

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A post shared by ℕ𝕖𝕚𝕝 ℝ𝕚𝕔𝕖 (@neil.rice85)

27. And finally, this cute video.

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A post shared by Lilly Davis (@dear_and_darling)