THE SUMMER DAY

Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean —
the one who has flung herself out of the grass, the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down — 
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass, how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields, which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

Mary Oliver 'The Summer Day' from House of Light (1990).

I was originally introduced to Mary Oliver’s poetry after listening to her 2015 interview with one of my favourite voices, Krista Tippett, on the On Being podcast. You can listen to the unedited interview on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.

If you would like to read more poetry by Mary Oliver I recommend Devotions: The Selected Poems of Mary Oliver. It is a book that I return to over and over.

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-Ꙩ-Ꙩ-Ꙩ-Ꙩ-Ꙩ-Ꙩ-Ꙩ-Ꙩ

In the illustration, each circle or “pearl” represents an action — and, since each pearl is a similar size, each action has the same value. This means that every large or small action in your life (brushing your teeth, deciding to end a relationship) is just that: a thing to do.

You are the only person who can put the next pearl on the string. But, within each pearl is a dark spot (Stutz calls it a “turd”), which is a reminder that no effort you make will be perfect. The key is to acknowledge that and keep adding to the string anyway.

This is a matter of identity, looking at yourself in terms of the habits with which you take action. If there is a failure or a big success it doesn’t matter. Either way, you are going to keep going.

That’s it.

A tool from psychiatrist Phil Stutz, learn more of his therapeutic tools.

Stutz is a 2022 documentary film directed by Jonah Hill and is available on Netflix.

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Welcome to the third edition of my newsletter, a glimpse into my current interests and a curated short-list of the things I’ve found most noteworthy and valuable. Please feel free to forward this along to friends.

Science Can Answer Moral Questions

In this talk, Sam Harris delivers a compelling argument for the role of science in navigating and defining answers to moral questions. He challenges the notion that science can help us get what we value, but not tell us what we ought to value. If you want to dive deeper, his book The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values is a must-read.

If Fish Could Scream

A question that I encounter surprisingly often upon disclosing that I am vegetarian is "Do you eat fish?"

I recently stumbled upon a visceral thought experiment from Australian moral philosopher Peter Singer that illustrates the reasoning behind my emphatic “no.”

"If Fish Could Scream" proposes a scenario where fish, have the ability to scream when caught or killed. The question is, would this change our moral obligations towards them?

Singer argues that our moral obligations towards other sentient beings should be based on their capacity to experience pain and suffering. If fish could scream, it would be impossible to ignore their suffering and would oblige us to consider their moral status as sentient beings.

It would be reassuring to believe that killing one trillion fish per year does not matter, because fish do not feel pain. But the nervous systems of fish are sufficiently similar to those of birds and mammals to suggest that they do. 

— Peter Singer (Sep 13, 2010) If Fish Could Scream. Project Syndicate.

It may be that I’m encountering people who are confused about what it means to be a vegetarian: a person who does not consume meat. Short of that, I’m perplexed by the intuition that fish are somehow lesser beings than other commonly consumed animals.

The assumption that certain animals, in this case fish, are not sentient and do not experience pain or suffering is morally unjustifiable. I don’t need to hear their screams to know that.

Recommended reading — Ethics in the Real World: 82 Brief Essays on Things That Matter by Peter Singer

The Harvard Study of Adult Development

The Harvard Study of Adult Development is the longest in-depth examination of adult life ever conducted. Starting just after the Great Depression and continuing to this day, the study began by following 724 men from diverse socio-economic backgrounds, then expanded to include their spouses and children with data spanning over four generations and eight decades.

The study provides valuable insight into human flourishing across the lifespan focusing on participants’ physical and mental health including their close relationships, lifestyle habits, and sense of purpose in life. It addresses questions around what makes for a happy and meaningful life, how lifestyle choices are linked with how long we live, what experiences in childhood are more predictive of midlife health, if parents’ thriving marriages predict thriving marriages among their children, the impact of major societal events such as WWII and the upheaval of the 1960s on adult development and more.

An exploration of the data has recently been published in a wise and beautifully written book, The Good Life: Lessons from the World's Longest Study on Happiness by Robert Waldinger and Marc Shulz. I would highly recommend adding it to your reading list. It is excellent.

Thanks for reading. Replies are welcome. If you do, make it thoughtful.

I learned of your existence 6 years ago at a Moth Story SLAM where a girl told a story about meeting you at a book signing.

Since then, I have started a tradition of reading your books over the holidays during summer. I mark out tabs for the stories I find most amusing and read them aloud to friends.

In 2018 I got to see you speak live on your book tour in Melbourne. I was excited to have the experience of meeting you for myself, but I got too nervous and hid behind a pole at the last minute as the line closed.

Next year, I have tickets to see you again and promise to make it there on time, with one of your books to sign. I’m still deciding which one.

See you then,

Melissa

Tickets to An Evening with David Sedaris, February 2023, Australia tour

Christmas Gift Idea — Let's Explore Diabetes With Owls

David Sedaris in the New Yorker

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Black midi refers to the Japanese music genre in which black notes render sheet music near unreadable.

Their sound embodies complex and overlapping progressions. A continuous ebb and flow of structured chaos. Changing tempos. The element of surprise. Theatrical expression. Engaged, deliberate, undefinable. Eargasmic bliss.

Black midi's new album Hellfire, released July 2022, is a good place to begin. Their catalogue has become the soundtrack to my life since walking into Innerwest Vinyl in Yarraville in early September. The song Welcome to Hell captured me instantaneously. I love it.

Check out black midi.

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