Fumbling and Juggling
April 12, 2023
Current location: Milwaukee, WI, USA
Reading: Mickey7 by Edward Ashton
Listening: No Rules Sandy by Silvan Esso(if you have a moment, reply with your own 3-item status via email or in the comments)
Fumbling and Juggling
I turn 38 this weekend, and as tends to be the case every year I've been wrangling over whether to instill the day with additional meaning (beyond the accolade of having survived another orbit around the sun).
My inclination is to shape my life so that there are plenty of peaks and valleys, but to also invest in both practical and philosophical salves for most of what life might throw at me (slowly accumulated savings and a AAA membership, but also a “go with the flow” default stance and a reflex for reminding myself of the big picture any time I start to feel down or defeated).
I'm also inclined, though, to look for opportunities for milestone-marking, adopting any holiday I hear about and jumping at the chance to mark time and upend my typical day-to-day expectations and rhythms.
One consistent habit I’ve maintained in the weeks surrounding my birthday (I find the day itself usually isn't the most ideal for this, for whatever reason) is to sit down and take stock, make sure I'm headed someplace I want to be, and ensure I'm finding some flavor of happiness, fulfillment, and challenge-sparked growth where I'm at, right now.
And I'm fortunate to be able to report that according to both metrics, at this moment, I'm feeling pretty good.
There are plenty of frictions and stressors in my life, lots of fresh and persistent variables that threaten to upset aspects of how I do things (and how I'd like to be doing things) that I'm slowly but surely (and with a confident sort of uncertainty) addressing.
I'm experimenting and shuffling my lifestyle deck.
I'm learning a lot every single day, and occupying myself with enjoyable work and tasks laden with adversities that push me just past my current comfort-zone.
I have people in my life who I love and who love me in return, and a staunch ambition to expand my social horizons beyond their pandemic-era shape and scale.
I feel incredibly fortunate on so many levels, and that good fortune has grown from an odd, me-shaped jumble of elements that I find satisfying, but which also motivates me to keep playing, trying, fumbling and juggling, and rearranging the puzzle pieces rather than worriedly gluing them into place.
I'm looking forward to whatever this next year brings; thank you so much for playing a role in shaping this last one.
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My Work, Elsewhere
Aspiring Generalist / Brain Lenses (podcast) / Climate Happenings / Let’s Know Things (podcast) / Never Not Curious / Notes On the News / One Sentence News (podcast) / You Probably Don’t Need
Might I suggest reading:
Interesting & Useful
“So, I decided to take a different approach. Instead of being beholden to reality, and the true size and shape of the Earth’s landmasses, I made a cartogram. By resizing and reshaping different areas, I could both alleviate overcrowding and better distribute the world on either side of the gutter.”
“Taken together, they can convey the feeling of a world convulsing—150 Associated Press images from across 2022, showing the fragments that make up our lives and freezing in time the moments that somehow, these days, seem to pass faster than ever.”
LiveJournal blog (yes, a LiveJournal) filled with retrofuturist science fiction illustrations.
Outro
Despite the past few years of odd and uncomfortable medical issues (most of which are mostly handled or accounted for now, thankfully) I actually feel “younger” in the healthfulness sense than I did in my mid-20s.
Part of that is likely the consequence of differing lifestyle choices, refined prudence, and better habits (my diet has gotten a lot more intentional, my workouts more three-dimensional, my alcohol-intake very low—and having a bit more money saved for a rainy day does wonders for one’s stress levels when worrying about things going sideways).
But I also think leaning into the process of growing older helps: recognizing that one’s superpowers and limitations will shift into a new configuration, and that doesn’t mean a truncation of capacities and capabilities so much as a changing of posture to account for new versions of both.
I don’t feel like my world has to shrink as I get older; I can’t control all the variables that influence my life, but I can decide that I’m going to put in the work required to remain of the world, rather than allowing myself to feel increasingly isolated from it.
Keen to drop me a birthday message (or to just tell me what’s on your mind)? You can respond directly to this newsletter or send an email to colin@exilelifestyle.com. You can also leave a comment to share something with the whole community.
Prefer tangible missives? Send me a letter, postcard, or some other physical communication at:
Colin Wright
PO Box 11442
Milwaukee, WI 53211
Of course, you can also communicate via the usual methods: Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or mechanical turntable GPS.
(Since the social media world is topsy-turvy right now, I’m also trying out Mastodon, Post, T2, and Substack Notes (which I think you can see because you’re subscribed to this newsletter? Not entirely sure how that works quite yet…).)
Location: Boulder, CO
Reading: Godel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter
Listening: True nature of reality with Bernardo Kastrup on the Zdogg MD show