the only dependable things are humility and looking

Feb 09, 2024

Greetings, earthlings.

Some weeks I can’t think of a single thing to share here, and some weeks are overwhelmingly rich with things I want to draw your attention to.

This week was filled with links and recommendations from friends and subscribers coming through texts, emails, DMs, and conversations on sidewalks.

I don’t know what the reason is for this sudden uptick, but I’ve loved every bit of it. I’ve been feeling lit up and lucky to be alive alongside so many humans I adore and so much good art.

The sun also shone for multiple days in a row for the first time in over a month, so it could just be that! Sunny joy spills over the edges of our empty winter cups, and we’re all trying to share the excess.

I hope you also see glimmers of hope and beauty all around you. If not, I hope this week’s Field Guide helps.

Here are three things I consumed this week worth sharing:

1. A unified theory of fucks, by Mandy Brown

I came for the f-bombs–I curse a lot, and when people who are smarter than me curse a lot I feel like there’s one less thing about myself I need to fix– and I stayed for the much-needed invitation to orient myself toward what matters most.

“Good work is the art of giving a fuck about the living.”

Thank you to my buddy Jamie for sending this to me.

2. A poem that a friend texted me that made me cry while I ate my lunch: eschatology by Eve L. Ewing

eschatology

i’m confident that the absolute dregs of possibility for this society,
the sugary coffee mound at the bottom of this cup,
our last best hope that when our little bit of assigned plasma implodes
it won’t go down as a green mark in the cosmic ledger,
lies in the moment when you say hello to a bus driver
and they say it back—

when someone holds the door open for you
and you do a little jog to meet them where they are—

walking my dog, i used to see this older man
and whenever I said good morning,
he replied ‘GREAT morning’—

in fact, all the creative ways our people greet each other
may be the icing on this flaming trash cake hurtling through the ether.

when the clerk says how are you
and i say ‘i’m blessed and highly favored’

i mean my toes have met sand, and wiggled in it, a lot.
i mean i have laughed until i choked and a friend slapped my back.
i mean my niece wrote me a note: ‘you are so smart + intellajet’

i mean when we do go careening into the sun,

i’ll miss crossing guards ushering the grown folks too, like ducklings
and the lifeguards at the community pool and
men who yelled out the window that they’d fix the dent in my car,
right now! it’d just take a second—

and actually everyone who tried to keep me alive, keep me afloat,
and if not unblemished, suitably repaired.

but I won’t feel too sad about it,
becoming a star

- Eve L. Ewing

Thank you to my buddy Jane for sharing this with me.

3. An excerpt from a book I’m reading:

I made a goal to read 50 books this year. It’s February and I’m about a third of the way through The Overstory by Richard Powers, which I started reading in October. So, you know, it’s going well.

I loved this bit from The Overstory so much that I wrote it down in my sketchbook:

“Patty learns that real joy consists of knowing that human wisdom counts less than the shimmering of beeches in a breeze. As certain as weather coming from the west, the things people know for sure will change. There is no knowing for a fact. The only dependable things are humility and looking.”

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