The very thing that drove you away

10 things worth sharing this week

A collage in my diary

Hey y’all,

Here are 10 things I thought were worth sharing this week:

1. Everyone, it seems, is on vacation. My bike gang is on vacation! My bandmates are on vacation! My barber is on vacation! My therapist is on vacation! Heck, you might be even on vacation. One day soon, I, too, will be on vacation, and when I am, I will think of Seneca quoting Socrates in Letters from a Stoic: “How can you wonder your travels do you no good, when you carry yourself with you? You are saddled with the very thing that drove you away.”
   
   

2. “It’s very difficult to be lazy.” (To quote James Brown, “Watch me!”)
   
   

3. I like to read big books for summer, but I can also get down with “slim volume summer.” Some favorite short books of mine: I Remember by Joe Brainard, The Summer Book by Tove Jansson, Train Dreams by Denis Johnson, Slow Days, Fast Company by Eve Babitz, and True Grit by Charles Portis. (And what sort of self-promoter would I be if I didn’t mention that you can read most of my books on a single plane ride?)

   

4. It turns out America is having a shortage of fun. (To quote Captain Renault in Casablanca, “I’m shocked!”)
   
   

5. “You do not have to be good…” Next month PBS American Masters is premiering a new documentary about the poet Mary Oliver. (Did you know that filmmaker John Waters used to work in her bookstore?) I quoted her in the beginning of The Steal Like an Artist Journal:

   

   A page from The Steal Like an Artist Journal

6. Truth: “If you follow the data you will eventually just make mass appeal nothingness.”
   
   

7. Pixel Skylines is a site that collects urban backgrounds from old video games.
   
   

8. What happens in our house when a character says the title of the movie.
   
   

9. “If you think of yourself as an actor, or a dancer, or a singer, and you’re not singing and you’re not acting, or you’re not dancing, what are you? Most people are between jobs. What are you between jobs? If you think of yourself as an actor and you’re not actually acting, you’re kind of no one. This is how it’s possible to see yourself. The way out of that is to actually separate yourself from your profession. That’s what I do, that's not what I am.” RIP actor Sam Neill, who starred in our #1 pizza night blockbuster, Jurassic Park. (Time to put Hunt for the Wilderpeople in the queue.)
   
   

10. “Artists are people who suffer when they’re not making art.” I had another great conversation with art coach Beth Pickens:

Thanks for reading. If you’d like to support this hand-rolled publication, buy my books and become a paid subscriber:

xoxo,

Austin

PS. I loved this photo of two sisters reading Don’t Call It Art — one in Korean and one in English!

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