[H]ello and happy holiday weekend, friends! Are you still decked out in red, white, and blue? Do you still have a sparkler in you hand? Is that s’mores I see in the corner of your mouth? Understandable. We’re in the middle of summer living it up. Actually… most of you are living it up. I’m spending a weird amount of time alone with my cat and watercolor paints and active dry yeast. You’ll reap the benefits of my solitude. Not to worry.
I hope you find a good breeze and some afternoon summer sun. Here’s what the Internet has to tell us this week:
• In light of the three vicious terror attacks across the globe this past month… In light of the tremendously savage way he humans treat one another sometimes: The Problem of Evil. Let’s not be afraid to call it what it is.
• Take some time to read the story of Clemantine Wamariya. At the age of six, she and her sister escaped the Rwandan genocide, struggled as refugees all over Africa, found refuge and education in the states and… went on Oprah. Actually, it’s much more storied and powerful than my trifling introduction. Everything is Yours / Everything Is Not Yours
• What will you do with your 106 years on earth? Sir Nicholas Winton saved 669 children destined for Nazi concentration camps.
• What I learned from leading tours about slavery at a plantation. Good grief.
• A new class of app promises digital… therapy. We don’t need an app. Let’s just put down our phones. Related: the rise in popularity of coloring books for adults. We want OUT.
• Ex-lovers meet each other for the first time after 30 years and they make really deep eye contact. Not going to lie, I cried. The Artist Is Present. Related: I, too, take all my breakups to The Great Wall of China.
• Frida Kahlo’s letters to Georgia O’Keefe.
• Women, stop saying ‘Just’ so much, you sound like children. Just when we’re trying to work ‘Sorry’ out of our systems. I’m guilty of many ‘just’ bombs.
• I have dishwasher issues. It’s mainly that I’ll load it, begrudgingly and NEVER EVER unload it. Why is unloading the dishwasher the worst chore of all. WHY!? You’re Loading The Dishwasher Wrong: a chore and a power struggle.
• Stop Buying In Bulk. We don’t need that much stuff and we might just be wasting it. Do we all just need smart fridges… or maybe just more time to calmly make ourselves dinner.
• Kanye West. I feel like maybe if we ignore him… he’ll go away. Can that please be true? I know that linking to him is the opposite of ignoring him. At least Freddie Mercury is making fun of him.
• Currently and still listening to Amos Lee: Live at Red Rocks. Click on ‘Jesus’. I mean… just get this dang album.
• I’m trying to put together a Summer Reading List for us but I’m having a hard time. There’s last years Summer Reading List if you need inspiration.
Here’s two books that I’m genuinely reading:
• Dark Places by Gillian Flynn It’s dark… This title is no joke.
• Stir: My Broken Brain and the Meals That Brought Me Home by Jessica Fechtor
Have a lovely day. I’ll see you real soon.
xo Joy
Connie
A brilliant response to the “just” article. https://debuk.wordpress.com/2015/07/05/just-dont-do-it/
I wholeheartedly agree with it and am curious to know what you think about it!
Evangeline (yes, like the song)
If you haven’t been to Laura Plantation in Vacherie you may want to make a little trip of it. One of my cousins owns it. It’s a really nice tour.
Libby
I love your book and album recommendations. Because of you, I got Amos Lee live at Red Rocks and guess what–I haven’t stopped yet, either. Thanks!
Amanda
Love Dark Places — Gillian Flynn’s mind is terrifyingly amazing.
dulcie
I look forward to your “let it be Sunday” and I JUST have to say this Sunday’s killed it. I’ll be thinking about some of these stories for some time. Thank you!
Edlyn
Also, I don’t know if you’ve read this yet. It’s not really a summer-read per se because it broke me. It’s called Men We Reaped and it’s by Jesmyn Ward.
joythebaker
I read that this past winter. BROKEN. Have you read The Girl Who Fell From The Sky? Excellent!
Edlyn
I have not read that yet but I will now! Thank you for that. It sounds like something I’d like. I’m currently reading Ruby (It was part of Oprah’s Book Club). I’ll let you know how that goes.
Edlyn
Joy, I know you have a wonderful history with Seattle so I’d like to gently nudge you to this organization that I volunteer with called Rain City Rock Camp for Girls. One of the things they stress on with the girls and the volunteers is not saying sorry and instead replacing that with “I Rock!” If any one woman says sorry (let’s face it, we’re conditioned), we have to say “you rock” to them. It has helped me so much because I haven’t said sorry for non-sorry reasons for the longest time. I have also passed this on to a co-worker who used to say it a lot! We don’t need to apologize for taking up space, ladies. Let’s do this right. Oh yeah, and btw, you rock.
joythebaker
this is fantastic! you rock! obviously.
Hazel
I, too, keep hoping that Kanye West will disappear. Have you seen his acceptance speech from the Art Institute of Chicago? It’s probably the most awkward thing on youtube. And ‘Amen!’ to that Amos Lee album seriously rocking, I listen to it on my morning commute nearly every day. The Hubs and I saw him at the Orange Peel here in Asheville last year and it was A.MA.ZING. Come visit Asheville sometime….There’s a brewery in town that will serve you doughnuts with your beer (not even kidding).
Foy
I struggle with the idea of refugees or “displaced people” as the news calls them. These are words that don’t adequately capture the terror of your home land being so unsafe you must run for your life and leave everything behind including the people you love.
That was a powerful story of a Rwandan girl and her sister. How their parents keep them safe by cowering under a bed in the room with the smallest windows for months, then belly crawling through the sweet potatoes to escape slaughter, then living in refugee camps all over Africa for years before being granted asylum in The States. Then the bizarre and disparate treatment of the adult older sister and younger school age sister which culminates in an appearance on Opera, where with the wave of her Queen of Talk Show TV wand, finds the parents they have wondered were even alive for the last decade, and they are reunited for a surreal week. Then life goes on.
This is a long, good read that allows one girl’s story to illuminate a part of our world that seems too distant to understand. If you didn’t read that link go back and do it! https://medium.com/matter/everything-is-yours-everything-is-not-yours-d6f66bd9c6f9
Aisha
The Turner House by Angela Flournoy is really good. I’m also starting the Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl.
Chrissy
I HATE unloading the dishwasher…
gabby
I have a connect the dots book for adults. It’s great! It’s called “Dot to Dot Cities” and creates landmarks like the Golden Gate bridge and the Eiffel Tower. It’s amazing.
https://www.amazon.com/1000-Dot-Dot-Thomas-Pavitte/dp/1626860661