The Thursday! Newsletter 1-1: Let's Don't Quit.
Volume 1, Issue 1
Ooh! That looks impressive, doesn't it? Volumes and Issues? And Arts and Letters and whatnot? I assure you, this newsletter is in no way impressive. Nor fancy. Nor snooty.
That's not to say I don't have a noble aspiration for Thursday! I do. I want this newsletter to be the one thing you are sure to share with someone because there's something in it you think that person really needs this week. I'll do my best every week for you here. You just be ready to share it, because I think it'll be quite shareable!
Okay? Okay.
So, what's happening today worth talking about? There's nothing worse than a boring year in which nothing every happens, don't you think? Give me lots of uncertainty and changing decisions by "experts" and maybe just a little gaslighting from folks who ought to know better, I say! That makes a year really bracing, like walking naked into a blizzard and taking a big, deep breath of freezing air. Ah! Nothing like it!
Or, you know, not any of that at all.
I'll be honest with you. I have not liked very much about this year at all. Personally, I'm wobbling worse than the top at the end of Inception (WHOMP WHOMP) for various reasons. I'm looking to change day jobs and trying to get my writing career moving forward at a good pace. I've had family members get quite sick this year. All the normal places I'd find refuge are either closed to me or have changed so much that they provide no refuge at all.
In short, this year has sucked rocks and I'm not really sure next year is going to be any better. Are you with me here? I feel like most of you are. In fact, I can't think of anyone for whom 2020 has been even good, much less great.
In most other newsletters, this is the place where the writer drops a couple paragraphs of pure wisdom complete with bullet point solutions and an inspirational quote from some spiritual leader somewhere. Unfortunately, friends, that's not going to happen here. I don't have much pure wisdom and I forgot to find a relevant quote. So here's what I'm going to do.
I'm going to tell you to keep going.
That's it. Keep going. Look, here's the deal. You could have quit before today, but you didn't. You could have gone into hiding and not come out of your house all summer but you didn't. You handled your business. You took the best care of yourself and those around you that you could. You woke up and got about the day even if the day stunk to high Heaven.
Those are wins. You really don't need any more wisdom nor inspiration than that. You won today because you're here, reading this. I'm proud of you for that. Plenty of other folks have folded up their tents. Plenty of others have decided to put their burdens off on everyone else and lay down in the middle of the road. You have not.
Just keep going. Get to next week, okay? Come back to our little newsletter here and give a little fist-pump because you won the whole keep and kept going.
Cool? Yeah. Stubborn persistence in the face of a crapulent year is cool. I'm saying it right here and now.
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Here are the Arts and/or Letters I Promised.
From "Six Spooky Stanzas".
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Here are Links either Useful or Fun.
I'm not done with spooky, fun poems and I don't think you should be either. Why not gather a few folks around the fire, give them some tasty apple cider, and read Kim Watt's "Under the All Hallow's Moon" aloud?
We readily notice when we're feeling anxious, right? Do we notice as readily when we're doing well? These folks think that might help mitigate the anxious times.
How's your to-do list? Rambunctious? Unkempt? Way out of control? I like Leo Babauta's advice for getting your out of hand task list back into hand.
One last thing. If you've ever wondered how you're going to get that 40-foot whale skeleton out of your garage and into the storage facility, here's how some other folks did it.
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One Last Thing.
You might wonder why a newsletter that comes out on Wednesday is called "Thursday!" Truth is, I thought "Thursday!" was a better name than "Wednesday!". But Wednesday is a better day to put out a newsletter than Thursday. So here we are.
If you have anything you'd like to share, you can always reply to the newsletter. I get all the replies and promise to read every one of them. I can't promise I'll answer back, because I'm quite forgetful, but I'll read everything you send.