tmi…
I am a sweaty man. I once read somewhere that you lose a greater-than-you-might imagine volume of sweat when you sleep at night. This is doubly true for myself. So, I often sleep with the window open just a crack to get some airflow. When I wake up in the morning, I open the window wider, I pull back the bed cover/sheets to air them and the mattress out, and I keep it that way until I’m ready to leave for work. I do this everyday.
the point I’m trying to make is
I started this Substack a year or two ago with the intent of making this a space for me to share my thoughts on teaching. I very much view teaching as a craft — it is something you continuously work at and hone.
However, I found that to be too stifling. Much like a duvet that gets kicked off in the middle of the night, I found myself sweaty and uncomfortable (am I pushing this metaphor too much? Drive it till the wheels fall off…)
So, I’ve decided to peel it all back, open the windows, and let the fresh air in. There will still be posts about teaching, but now it will include other things: thoughts on what I’ve been consuming lately, where I’ve been, where I’m going, where I don’t want to be…
I no longer have any intentions with this space other than to treat it as the blank canvas that it is. I’m reminded of Jenny Odell being reminded of John Steinbeck who said:
When you collect marine animals there are certain flat worms so delicate that they are almost impossible to capture whole, for they break and tatter under the touch. You must let them ooze and crawl of their own will onto a knife blade and then lift them gently into your bottle of sea water. And perhaps that might be the way to write this book — to open the page and let the stories crawl in by themselves.
And perhaps that’s how I should treat this space: as an empty jar for my thoughts to crawl into. I’ve been re-engaging with this platform over the last week as I’ve, yet again, been considering my media consumption and screentime. In the past, I forced my thoughts onto the Canvas, and the results were…fine? If I treat this space (and myself, for that matter, but more on that later) with no preconceived notions and without force, perhaps there will be a more enjoyable outcome1.
Of course, I still have my journals2 and will keep my more private thoughts and commonplace activities there. But let’s see what specimens we collect here, shall we?
postscript: when re-reading this before posting, I noticed myself using “found” as the main verb of several sentences. Writing is indicative of inner states. If I had to venture a guess, unsurprisingly, then perhaps I am in pursuit of myself. I hope I find him
I feel this also likely has something to do with attempting to curate an “aesthetic” rather than maybe treating this as a commonplace. Again, maybe thoughts for another post
Plural, of course, because who has just one journal?