When the Well Runs Dry, Go Outside

Weekend Reads v. 7.6.2025

Credit: Marina Tikhonova

As I promised last week, I’ve been working on a new gift guide for you. That should land in your inboxes very soon! But other than that, I’ve been coming up quite short in the inspiration department when it comes to curating a list of things for you to ponder or enjoy this week. Between so much uninspiring content out there and the constant barrage of paywalls, it’s been hard to find significant points of conversation on the screen. (Off the screen, however, and I’m delighting in retail catalogs and printed magazines. Feels like 1998 again!)

Once upon a time, it was a chore to get your artistic work in front of someone. You relied on a massive machine to get your song on the radio or in a record shop. Now you hit publish, and your music can be heard by anyone anywhere. Writers slogged for ages behind typewriters before they delighted in seeing their name in the byline. Novels were laborious endeavors that landed on bookstore shelves by sheer tenacity or the benefit of having a childhood friend with a massive social network in the publishing world.

Now anyone with a laptop and a desire to hawk their opinion/affiliate links/AI-generated newsletters can earn $7 a month with the help of a subscription platform like the one that brings you this weekly email. It is a blessing and a curse to remove the barrier between artist and audience. Sure, once that barrier is lowered more people can enjoy the art of someone who lacks the connections or a trust fund needed to propel a career forward. But some sort of barrier ensures the art you encounter has gone through a vetting process.

I suspect this season of paywalls and lackluster content will fade as all seasons do. Hopefully it will be replaced by a season full of remarkably good writing and music and art. The digital screen will be replaced more often by tactile things. Looks like this shifting tide may be starting with photography as more people reach for cameras with real ribbons of film tucked inside.

Lots of time behind screens always seems to leave me with the inevitable desire to close the laptop, put down the phone, and get outside. Which is what I plan to do right now!

Not sure anyone will care besides me, but I am switching the header and sub-header for this weekly email. Starting today, you’ll be seeing a clever subject in your inbox versus the “Weekly Reads v.” formatted for that week.

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If you’re still looking for a unique gift for the dads in your life, I will share a little secret for you. Little King is stocked with unique items for the home, including a fantastic array of hard-to-find pantry items. This is the only place I’ve found Aleppo spice!

The most beautiful hardware for furniture and walls I’ve seen in a long, long time.

It looks like beaded necklaces and bracelets are a trend that’s sticking around for yet another summer. Lulas Jewels is a Miami-based shop that makes beautiful jewelry to order. These colorful stone beads make for a fun set of bracelets, and these freshwater pearls would be lovely for work.

The recipe for this simple bean dish is making the rounds on social media, and it looks really good.

Bookmarked Paul Kingsnorth’s new website so I can stay on top of when the dates for his U.S. book tour are announced. It’s been a while since I’ve eagerly awaited a new book. Very much looking forward to reading “Against the Machine” when it is released in the States!

This collection of essays about working in Hollywood and the messiness that comes with starting over looks really great. Maybe because that has been my life – ha!

Speaking of books, I’m hearing good things about the novel “Broken Country.”

Bethel McGrew published an excellent essay on the problem with religious elites and the need for humility and a steadfast focus on Truth above the shifting tides of culture. Of course she turned to the great C.S. Lewis to drive her point home, and the words she chose reminded me of how strong the temptation to belong is. Regardless of your station in life, there always seems to be an “inner ring” of individuals who are elevated and insulated away from the crowd. She says, “But if you seek respect, let it be for your work’s sake, and not for the sake of joining The Inner Ring. This is C. S. Lewis’s warning in his essay by that name:”

‘Over a drink, or a cup of coffee, disguised as triviality and sandwiched between two jokes, from the lips of a man, or woman, whom you have recently been getting to know rather better and whom you hope to know better still—just at the moment when you are most anxious not to appear crude, or naïf or a prig—the hint will come. It will be the hint of something which the public, the ignorant, romantic public, would never understand: something which even the outsiders in your own profession are apt to make a fuss about: but something, says your new friend, which “we”—and at the word “we” you try not to blush for mere pleasure—something “we always do.”

And you will be drawn in, if you are drawn in, not by desire for gain or ease, but simply because at that moment, when the cup was so near your lips, you cannot bear to be thrust back again into the cold outer world. It would be so terrible to see the other man’s face—that genial, confidential, delightfully sophisticated face—turn suddenly cold and contemptuous, to know that you had been tried for the Inner Ring and rejected.’ (Source)

Is this the perfect T-shirt? Lifestyle writer Joanna Goddard thinks so. “After searching for the perfect white tee for years (decades?), I finally came across this one. The heavier-weight 100% cotton falls nicely and holds a good shape (without bunching around the waist), and the sleeves are loose. I have a little stack in my closet that I reach for year-round.”

Considering this sunscreen for the summer after reading a few solid reviews.

The worst way to reply to a party invite.

David Ogilvy’s advice for a recent graduate is just so David Ogilvy. That is, clever and spot on. Side note: my mom loaned me her copy of Ogilvy’s book Ogilvy on Advertising when I was studying journalism, and it turned out to be a great book – not just about working advertising but also about work in general.

“Always hold your sales meetings in rooms too small for the audience, even if it means holding them in the WC. ‘Standing room only’ creates an atmosphere of success, as in theatres and restaurants, while a half-empty auditorium smells of failure.”

Never forgetting the incredible sacrifice so many made for me.

Hope you engage in many fun things far, far away from a screen this weekend!

And a note that a few Amazon Affiliate links are lurking in this post. If you choose to make a purchase – thank you! I may earn a small commission.