breaks are good, actually

I inadvertently took a late summer break from this newsletter for the past month or so. I wrote one newsletter in early August, and then when the next Sunday approached, I just felt a total lack of energy and motivation to pull together a newsletter. So I thought to myself, I’ll just skip this Sunday and come back next week. That then rolled into the next Sunday and the next Sunday, and soon I was taking the whole month of August off and promising myself I’d bring back the newsletter after Labor Day.

So, here I am! Post-Labor Day, back from my accidental hiatus. Actually, it turns out taking a break was quite nice, and maybe more necessary than I even realized. August 2021 was very weird and for many people, didn’t feel all that great: the delta variant was surging and Covid cases were rising around the country; headlines about breakthrough cases were showing up at a worrying rate; even fully vaccinated people were beginning to feel weary again. Many of my friends said they were starting to pull back on activities like indoor dining and traveling, things they had cautiously resumed after getting their vaccines but now were worried about thanks to the delta variant.

And then there was the non-Covid news: the devastating, rapid Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. The climate disasters: horrible hurricanes and floods and wildfires hitting all over the country. All of that, on top of the Covid surge, just made it feel like everything in the world was terrible all at once.

We’ve been living with the pandemic for so long now that many of us have come to accept this as our normal state; but it’s very easy to forget that we are still in the midst of living through a traumatic, historic, once-in-a-century event. We often expect ourselves to still be functioning at 110% in every part of our lives, but when you think about all that’s going on around us, that’s completely unrealistic. It’s a good time (and has been, for well over a year) to cut ourselves some slack, to do less, to give ourselves a break sometimes — and to not feel the slightest bit of guilt about it.

I hope you all were able to make the most of this weird summer, whatever that looked like to you — and I’ll see you back here on Sundays again.

Good things to read

Why do we work too much? The New Yorker.

Leon Nayfakh always waits too long to eat, Grubstreet. Truly the best Grubstreet Diet in ages. Takes the franchise and elevates it into an art.

The Roys summer in Italy, Vulture. Hunter Harris spent two weeks on location in Tuscany with the cast of Succession as they shot season 3.

Why is it so hard to get rid of books?, Financial Times. Send this to the book hoarders in your life. (Yes, I sent it to Renan.)

The Roe Baby, The Atlantic. A moving piece about the woman whose conception sparked the Roe v Wade case.

We found rage in a hopeless place, Buzzfeed News.

The other Afghan women, The New Yorker.

In the kitchens of the rich, things are not as they seem, New York Times.

The Devil Wears Allbirds, The Cut. On why so many fashion editors are heading to tech.

Sally Rooney’s novel of letters puts a fresh spin on familiar questions, New York Times.

Two particularly good issues of Haley Nahman’s Maybe Baby, one of my favorite newsletter: When I was an influencer and Envy brain.

I was euphoric in June. Look where we are now, New York Times.

The state of the literary Jonathans, Vanity Fair.

Good things to cook

Last week I made this last-gasp-of-summer tomato and corn shrimp scampi, and chicken shawarma bowls.

Recommendations

No affiliate links, just things I genuinely love and want to tell everyone about.

🧴 I’ve recently been on a hunt for better face sunscreens that don’t leave a white cast and am happy to report I found a great one! It’s Etude House Sunprise Mild Airy Finish — Etude House is a K-beauty brand whose other products I’ve used for a while (love their Moistfull Collagen cream moisturizer) so I’m pleased to report that their sunscreen did not disappoint.

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