There are a few people that I told I'm using this for my day-to-day need/urge to write and not completely draw into myself. Most get it. One doesn't (😹👋). Recently, that person reached out and asked if I'd participate in something on social media. I said, “Thank you, but no.” On the flipside, another person who has no idea this exists asked me if I'd participate in something and I said, “Yes.” and sent along what was needed. What is the difference between the two asks?

I don't do strategic reciprocity to elicit followers and/or likes. I can't stand performative empathy. And if the math don't math, the math don't math. There's nothing wrong when people are transparent about that being what they are doing, but it offends my creative soul because I think it sucks the essence of creativity out of the act. I'm not fond of the whole distribution mechanism of corporate creativity either. It all feeds into an illusion that bleeds the souls of those who crave to be seen and heard.

I find it offensive. I'm sure there's plenty of persons who start out with good intentions. It's hard to know what's happening until you're already doggy paddling in the deep end after all. But once you do know, what you do with the knowledge is on you. There is no right or wrong answer, as people have the right to work the system however they want. It's absolutely not organic, interested engagement though.

For myself, I don't want that. Even if it got me a million followers. I'd take ten interested any day over the million. I do have to acknowledge that with that high a number there'd likely be more interested than ten, but would it be sincere interest or fade like mob-driven interest? That is the question.

Yes, yes. I said the parts out loud we've made a social contract to keep quiet. Oh, well. I've upset people with my opinions before, and I'm sure I will again. That sort of goes along with having an opinion.

It makes me very grateful for having established my love of all things creative before I stepped behind various curtains. When young and competing, I fully believed the stage fair and skill-based. I was absolutely blind to every machination out there. Whether that be a positive or negative, it taught me the complex depths of having a creative soul, and it gave me the discipline and spirit to develop it. I don't know what I might have done had I seen behind the curtain too early.

It is true that each of us are different persons with different needs and wants. I doubt social media lines up with most persons needs and wants when they're honest with themselves about what it actually is. I could certainly be wrong, but in this case I hope I'm not, because that'd be soul-sucking awful.

© 2026 AnOublietteofThought. All rights reserved.

October 2026 Update

“Time passes not, but in it passes the existence of the changeable.”

Immanuel Kant, The Critique of Pure Reason

October is here and I am not sure where September went. It seems as we get older the months and years go faster and faster, and yet the days feel longer. I am consistently exhausted and stretched, and I am not sure whether that is because I am living well and being productive, or because I am hurrying and hurrying and trying to fit everything in. I think the reason it is so hard for any of us to slow down and enjoy life is because we constantly have a vision of what we are missing scrolling in front of us. We never give ourselves the time to meditate on and enjoy our passions and joys without wondering whether we are doing it the right way or getting the most out of it or spending the right amount of money on it. I think this is obvious to us. We all know we are hurrying, which exposes the fallacy that enlightenment is all it takes to help a person change their ways. The alcoholic is usually the one most aware of how they are ruining their own life. How to change? I can only speak for myself, but finding excuses to leave my phone in the car or in the couch and forget about it has been a good step. Just not having it in my pocket or right next to me or even in the same room helps a lot. But really, just discipline, because I still need to use the computer every day and the web browser is right there. Browsing guitar pedals/amps on the internet can be just as harmful because it wastes time and keeps me from my real guitar, to say nothing of emails news and messages and Substack and Medium etc. My mind needs time and space disconnected from it all in order to be able to breathe. It is amazing how hard it can be to do nothing.

Writing

I have a second draft of my novel completed. I just need to read through it from the beginning and see how it flows cover to cover. Once I do that, if I am happy with it, I guess it will be time to move onto querying. I also have a few close friends and family members who I want to send it to. I don’t know if I’ll do any kind of beta reading or not. I am also working on an essay about C.S. Lewis’s Abolition of Man and how it relates to the AI future garbage fire we’re all anxious about. It is proving to be kind of a wild ride. It has been helpful for me and my thinking, but I am not sure how helpful it will be for others.

Music

I really have not been disciplined about recording. I have been playing almost daily, but not exactly good practice, just noodling and jamming and having fun. Nothing wrong with that, but I do want to get going on my long overdue Lit Song demos. My problem is unreasonable expectations for the sound quality, because I am not recording in a treated studio and I really am an amateur. I guess I could pay to go to a real studio, but I would need to really practice my songs so I could keep it affordable. I also enjoy the learning process of recording, and it is really rewarding when I can get something to sound good. I’ve also got a lot of podcast editing to do.

We also just got back from visiting my wife’s family, and we came back with a pair of speakers and a receiver that I was able to hook up to a CD player. It sounds really good. I played some familiar music and was able to hear a lot more details than I’ve heard on headphones (even good ones) or on any Bluetooth speaker. The crazy thing is that people treat vintage audio equipment like junk nowadays (unless it’s been scooped up or YouTubed about by the audiophiles), but it sounds so much better than the new crap being sold today. If you wanted to listen to music in the 70s-90s, you had to get a receiver and bookshelf speakers for your home audio setup. They last longer, each piece does one thing but does it well, and the speakers are bigger and louder and more detailed. No matter how good the little four inch doodads sound, they just can’t compare. It is really strange to me how most of us are listening to music on really cruddy speakers (laptop, airpods, mini Bluetooth) compared to forty years ago. Perhaps I am romanticizing a bit, because nowadays sound is much more accessible than it was, but once you’ve heard good vintage style speakers that you could get for less than the cost of a couple crappy smart speakers which are unrepairable and designed for obsolescence (even though you can absolutely spend a fortune on old speakers, if you want to), it is hard to go back. Yes, it is less convenient, and it takes up more space, and there is a little bit of a learning curve to setting it up; but it is worth it in my opinion, and it will outlast you.

This brings me to something else I want to do in October, which is listen to music mindfully. Back in the day, people used to have listening parties when new albums came out. They wouldn’t be playing games or watching TV (or driving in the car), they would just be listening to the music. And I want to take this opportunity I have with this speaker setup to just sit and listen. Even if you don’t have nice speakers or even nice headphones, I think we can all benefit from just being able to close our eyes and listen to a track. I recommend this pair of $25 IEMs if you don’t have an audio setup, since they reproduce sound really accurately and they’re cheap and they work with anything (you can choose the USB-C version if you don’t have a headphone jack). But there is also grace with audio, because some of the most important listening experiences I’ve ever had have come almost free. And even if you don’t get the chance to do it as often because you have to make space to just sit and listen and not worry about who might call or text you, that makes it more important and more special. We can absolutely go the other way, where we are always listening to something, which can be just as harmful.

Reading

Well that was a long rant, but these updates are more for me than anybody else anyway. Thanks for reading if you still are! Last month I finished In Dubious Battle and I liked it a lot. I might have to read Grapes of Wrath again. I am also starting The Fellowship of the Ring because Eric and I are doing our LOTR reread for the podcast. I also have the books I have always been reading for a while (City of God, 死神永生, Critique of Pure Reason). I am actually almost done with 死神永生 and should finish it this month if I keep up with my page a day. I don’t know what Chinese book I will read after that, but I should line something up so I don’t lapse. Languages are another area where I feel like I’ve been falling behind. I keep in touch with Chinese, but I don’t do enough real study and practice to progress at a meaningful pace. I could be underrating myself, but there are other languages too, like Spanish and Latin that I really want to learn and I haven’t been successful at making the time. All the carrot and stick methods aren’t going to help. Heck, I haven’t even had much time to play video games, much less the time for other projects. Hurry, hurry, hurry. When was the last time you did something, not for its cognitive or social benefits, but just for the pure joy? I’m trying to write a sonnet about all this hurry. I wish I had an answer.

Let’s randomly connect this back to the Kant quote at the beginning. “Time passes not.” Though we perceive it as a rushing river, time is in fact a constant. This idea is not so unfamiliar because of pop physics, but I think it is no less mind warping. “In it passes the existence of the changeable.” If there is one thing tech has done for us it has made us more changeable. We don’t have to wait to learn new skills or hobbies or information because we can look things up instantly, and so our sense of self seems to be constantly in flux. Perhaps this is why the language we use for disconnecting often has to do with time. “I need to get off my phone and slow down.” It feels fast to us because the rate of development in the digital world moves so much faster than the physical realm. Changeability equals speed.

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Thank you for reading! I greatly regret that I will most likely never be able to meet you in person and shake your hand, but perhaps we can virtually shake hands via my newsletter, social media, or a cup of coffee sent over the wire. They are poor substitutes, but they can be a real grace in this intractable world.

---

Send me a kind word or a cup of coffee:

Buy Me a Coffee | Listen to My Music | Listen to My Podcast | Follow Me on Mastodon | Read With Me on Bookwyrm | Connect With Me on Substack

I only almost fell once. I might be getting the hang of it.

In celebration of my sleeping sanctuary back in place, I thought I'd write a poem to whatever music was playing at the time. Kiltro it is.

———

A Scoured Sailing

Roll headwind over nailing crumbs. Drown spigot's grief to float. Scratch two sticks stern in chastised dump. Wreak havoc with aplomb.

Ring suds to soap last Tuesday. Muse wreckage into Morse. All abound the dangling We, Death sleets to scale off coarse.

© 2026 AnOublietteofThought. All rights reserved.

https://youtu.be/wTf05GKwTIg?is=rsB4l2xWaG9Cg2RD2Stzc8pKwle53

Taro Reading and any spiritual practices—are exercises in humility too. I shuffled the deck a few times because I had the impression that this new deck of mine had a predominantly “air” vibe, and guess what? In spite of my ego’s interruption, the same cards revealed themselves anyway. I kid you not. And I did shuffle those cards. It was always Wands. All three times—and The World. There might have been the Judgment card in the one re-shuffle, but it was always meant to have The World and lots of wands. This deck has a lot of fire energy. I love that the spread was bookended by 2 Major Arcana cards. Beginning with Justice, the subconscious bubbling up to the surface only to end in The World (associated with earth energies) and The Spirit Realm. Divine connection.

I asked, Any last words? The bonus card that I pulled was the Ace of Cups. The artwork shows an arched window frame. Within it a golden cup (The Holy Grail) floating on it’s own in front of a backdrop of a blue sky, with 5 streams of water flowing out of it. A feather floats right above the cup. Beneath the cup, a hand is reaching from the backdrop, revealing a bit of the galaxy/the night sky behind the curtain. It’s time to feel all five senses. Divine. Peace. Love. Resolution. Awakening.

That’s 1 air card, 4 fire cards, 1 earth card, and 1 bonus water card..

This deck does feel very much like where I am right now. There is always more to know, but I do know myself well enough to carry on and continue my practices. In spite of all the chaos and uncertainty, I feel very grounded in my body, in the unity and oneness in everything. The next moment is connected to what came before it and so on. I see the thread and consequences. The cause and effect.

All is one. As above, so below. As below, so above.

I love that I get to talk all about the woo here, without fear.

#daily #taro #newdeck

In Thornbury the other Saturday I picked out ‘Round Midnight (1961) by Dakota Staton from a charity shop record bin. It’s the sort of album that, a decade ago, one could have bought for less than a pound; the British Heart Foundation got a fiver out of me for this copy. I ought to have taken a closer look at the vinyl before purchasing: in record collecting parlance one could say the disc was in fair to good condition, which is to say it was quite badly scratched and otherwise distressed – so I definitely overpaid. Still, behind all the surface noise was a very good album I enjoyed hearing, and I’ll be on the lookout now for a better copy of it.

The album opens with its title track, Thelonious Monk’s renowned ballad embellished with Bernie Hanighen’s lyrics, and served up here in an arrangement by Benny Carter. Staton does a terrific job with it, moving from subdued phrases evoking the spirit of Billie Holiday to momentarily peak at a clear & powerful full belt before bringing it back down again. The record continues in suitably nocturnal mood, with a couple of uptempo numbers amid the torch songs.

---

An arrival in the post on Thursday: a magnificent & costly book which surely would be of interest to hardly anyone. This was Fine Papers at the Oxford University Press by John Bidwell, published in an edition of 300 copies at John and Rosalind Randle’s Whittington Press in 1999. It tells the story of deluxe publishing and fine letterpress printing at the OUP, which peaked in the ‘20s and ‘30s, and continued in a smaller way after WWII. When the University’s print department closed, its remaining stocks of hand-made and other high quality papers were acquired by John Randle, who used some of it for his own productions. The book discusses a variety of these papers, tracing their origins and how they were used, and, moreover, includes forty sheets of the papers themselves tipped in to its back pages.

[the] less plentiful sheets in this volume are now appearing before the public for the very last time. It is highly unlikely that papermakers will ever produce printing grades of this quality again.

I had been aware of this title for a decade or more but with second-hand asking prices typically in the £200-£400 range I’d balked at acquiring it. On ebay recently I caught sight of a copy going for significantly less than £200, and, having some funds to spare, finally got my hands on one. As well as being a highly informative reference for the paper nerd it’s a visual and tactile delight. The text is in an elegant Centaur face printed letterpress on mould-made Zerkall paper, while the tipped-in samples come in a panoply of shapes, sizes, shades and textures. It’s also quite the hefty tome – an elephant folio in a slipcase that’s too tall to fit in my bookshelves upstairs, and too deep to sit neatly among the outsize volumes in the downstairs bookcase. For the time being it will have to lie on its side.

---

Wine of the week was the Terre des Poètes Vaucluse from Aldi, a very tasty Rhône red from last year’s vintage in which Grenache and Syrah grapes apparently predominate. Says the label on the back: “…appealing red fruit aromas on the nose with suave cherry and spice notes on the palate” – I'll drink to that.

I asked three different AI models a simple question, “What is the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?”

Clearly, this is a reference to Monty Python and the Holy Grail. No AI model should miss the reference, at least not any AI model developed by anyone with a Y chromosome. It's a softball.

Claude Haiku 4.5 and Gemma 4 actually tried to give me an answer by assuming a type of swallow, atmospheric conditions, etc. and then calculating an answer in miles per hour or meters per second, respectively. Eyeroll.

Only one, Gab AI, got it right:

African or European?

Brilliant.

#life

I just pulled my canopy from the dryer. I'm struggling to make heads or tails of it. I really don't enjoy putting it back on my bed, but I do enjoy the total darkness it encapsulates me in once I get it sorted. I've put off doing it since rearranging my bedroom, but with nights getting chillier and my dislike of warm air or blankets, the cocooned space helps. Heh, typing this up helps me procrastinate a little longer.

I realize I haven't shared music as I intended. The lyrics absolutely don't fit the situation. The title and rhythm do. Plus, one can never go wrong with Radiohead. Enough procrastination. Time to see if I can once more resist breaking my neck.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=CvjRlYpXS5U&si=8bZmGIojk3xdJ-7K

© 2026 AnOublietteofThought. All rights reserved.

Not edited nor proofread.

Happy Spooky Season to all who celebrate!

As I always do at this time of year, I’m thinking a lot about horror movies, and so I’ve decided to assemble a non-comprehensive list of horror movies I consider canonical.

What I mean by this is that these are the movies that everyone making horror has seen and that all other horror movies are therefore inspired by or reacting to in some way. Please note this is not a “best of” list. Nor do I intend it to be the end of anyone’s horror movie viewing. I see it more as a gateway drug. Once you’re acquainted with Argento, for example, you’ll probably want to check out Fulci and Bava. Or once you’ve seen Nosferatu, you might want to check out Vampyr and Haxan. Though Haxan sucks and is way too long. But you get the point. Ready? Here we go!

Three notable exclusions:

1. I haven’t included any Hammer movies, on the theory that the style and aesthetic have been incredibly influential, but not really any individual movie. Dracula A.D. 1972 is my favorite, but really any of the Christopher Lee/Peter Cushing Dracula movies will do.

2. Same with Vincent Price’s oeuvre. I’d recommend Masque of the Red Death as a representative of the Poe “adaptations,” (i.e., movies with the same title as Poe stories) and The Abominable Dr. Phibes as representative of the 70’s, and Comedy of Terrors for comedy, but while Price is a horror icon, I don’t think any of his individual movies qualify as canonical.

3. Jason’s not in the first Friday the 13th, so it’s obviously not that one. So, like, one of the other ones, I guess. They’re mostly the same until he goes to space or fights Freddy.

Content warning: yeah, it’s horror, but in addition to violence and death, you may encounter misogyny, racism, and homophobia in a lot of these movies. I’m not excusing them or making a judgment about whether those elements ruin the movie, as your mileage will vary on that stuff.

Nosferatu (1922)

Dracula (1931)

Frankenstein (1931)

Freaks (1932)

Bride of Frankenstein (1935)

Cat People (1942)

Abbot and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948)—Horror comedy starts here. Watch and marvel at how many movies and Scooby-Doo episodes were influenced by this movie.

Creature From the Black Lagoon (1954)

Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)

Plan 9 From Outer Space (1957)—an objectively terrible movie, and therefore the spiritual ancestor of all the bad DIY horror movies we know and love.

Psycho (1960)

Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)

The Birds (1963)

Rosemary’s Baby (1968)—Please pirate this or buy it used on physical media if you want to watch. It was directed by a child rapist who is unfortunately still alive and will financially benefit from any legitimate purchase of his work. Great movie, tho.

Night of the Living Dead (1968)

The Night Stalker (1972)

The Exorcist (1973)—I don’t believe in Satan and therefore never found this movie as scary as everybody else did, and I find the head spinning and the puking comical. Nevertheless—can’t deny that it’s hugely influential.

The Wicker Man (1973)

Black Christmas (1974)—Fun fact: Elvis loved this movie and watched it at Christmastime every year from the time it came out till his death! So three times. But still!

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)

Deep Red, aka Profondo Rosso (1975)

Trilogy of Terror (1975)—really just the doll segment with Karen Black, but that’s iconic enough to merit inclusion.

Carrie (1976)

The Hills Have Eyes (1977)

Suspiria (1977)

Dawn of the Dead (1978)

Halloween (1978)—I’ve said this before, but in my opinion this is a perfect movie. Not one wasted frame.

Alien (1979)

Phantasm (1979)—kinda weird, but people love it for some reason. I’m not one of them, but I have to admit it’s not like everything else.

Cannibal Holocaust (1980)—filmmakers were literally arrested and held until they could prove that the gore gags weren’t real. There is significant animal cruelty in this movie, but it’s one of the sharpest, nastiest indictments of colonialism I’ve ever seen.

The Shining (1980)—I don’t think Jack Nicolson can actually act. He does the same thing in every movie. Including this one. Still there’s some good suspense and iconic visuals.

An American Werewolf in London (1981)—Okay, I actually hate this movie, and I believe The Howling, released the same year, is a much better werewolf movie. But this is the one people remember.

The Evil Dead (1981)

Poltergeist (1982)

The Thing (1982)

Children of the Corn (1984)

Gremlins (1984)

A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)—Only two of the sequels are worth watching, imo: 3: the Dream Warriors and Wes Craven’s New Nightmare.

Fright Night (1985)

Re-Animator (1985)

The Fly (1986)

Evil Dead 2: Dead By Dawn (1987)—Probably my favorite movie. Like a 3 Stooges movie but with only one stooge and some demons that swallow people’s souls.

Hellraiser (1987)—The whole movie looks murky and sounds like shit and I can’t say I fully understand it even after 2 viewings, but, again, iconic visuals.

The Lost Boys (1987)

Near Dark (1987)

Child’s Play (1988)

Tremors (1990)

Troll 2 (1990)—see Plan 9 From Outer Space, above. Just a wonderfully terrible movie.

Candyman (1992)

Scream (1996)

The Blair Witch Project (1999)—not the first found footage movie, but certainly the most influential.

Scooby-Doo and the Witch’s Ghost (1999)—the best Scooby-Doo movie. Plays with the formula in delightful fashion, has numerous quotable lines, and introduces fan favorites The Hex Girls.

Surely the world isn’t crazy..

15% of the whole planet is what Google says the average is of folks living with a mental disorder. What they don’t say is things like thinking the South seceded for States’ Rights is crazy. Not to mention, imagine the world view for a second of someone who thinks slaves were a minor issue, aren’t they crazy? I don’t think Google is including them.

What about the boycott folks?

I tend not to use a company when I learn what evil shits they are, I don’t have any hopes of putting them out of business in a fascist regime, but it makes me feel bad to see their name in my house and know what they do. So I try not to feel bad. The best I can hope for, but if I was a boycotter…

These poor saps get on social media putting other folks on their side down for trying to get the cheapest brand. They may not even realize they themselves have other brands in the office, kitchen, garage that do worse than what they’re preaching about. But their war isn’t for environment, equality, or justice. These folks fight for narrative. They have to. Because if you realize how ludicrous it is to hope a company goes under from a boycott, you realize we have been misled on that. Some companies even bounce back better! The gap in income means they have a lot more money now. We have less. We don’t have leverage in that situation anymore. Make them unpopular, sure, but bitching out other folks online for eating at the wrong chicken shack? Are you nuts? What if you need those folks? Why did you lose them? A sandwich? What billionaire did that hurt?

The US Mail micro targets, as well as all the campaigns online too.

“Google, tell me about micro targeting and the US Mail.”

Paxton Talarico mail

I looked this up after getting Talarico and Paxton for senator flyers, 4 in one day. Seemed too dumb to be an accident. It wasn’t. It was supremely individualized targeting from both parties. I do not have a phone. I use email on an iPad, talk on a forum site sometimes. This blog. Some music. No social media. So they turned to mail! lol.

Mail has a lot to offer. They will even deliver it to houses with no internet. They can make the thing look official on fancy paper, convincing. Authenticity is easier to feel when you can hold it. Plus, unless you throw it away, it is always lying around, occupying some space in your brain. Could be what it’s after. How in the hell do we know? It’s not like we can trust anyone who sends us anything.

I found a website in researching these handouts from these Texas candidates, and I found some interesting things. The website is called paidforby.info. On this tool, you can scan your flyers, leaflets, campaign ads, and it will tell you about the money behind it. This is refreshing to someone like me who was taught the now-forgotten phrase, “follow the money” in school. On a Paxton flyer, I noticed they get 20 million (state politics, mind you) from Elon Musk, and the next “donor” is at 500 bucks or so. I am anxious to learn why these things are so silly. I bet I won’t like it, but I am anxious to learn it.

With mental illness tho..

My point with mental illness is we have to stop calling being tricked or brainwashed mentally ill if we aren’t going to call the predatory profiteers mentally ill too. That’s pretty much the whole world, thanks, Google.

Maybe check yourself.

I am not ill for thinking folks want to watch me and observe me to cater specific messages to me. I am not ill for trying to aggregate news sources with different brands and locations to try to get a clearer picture. I am not ill for wanting to use my own mind and judgement on art projects. I am not wrong to get my feelings hurt when folks no longer wish to speak to me. I am not crazy because I don’t want social media informing my view on what is outside my front door; I’ll just open it. I am not wrong to not want to talk to robots. I am not crazy to be extremely suspicious and cautious in a fascist regime. I got more, but you get the idea.

I get called crazy a lot. But it is not because I am a bipolar patient on meds. Or, it may be. I value my mind and mood these days, more than ever. I get ownership in that by shutting out as many robots as possible. I can call it “mine” for one thing. I can feel actually proud when I make stuff and have memories of making it. I am able to build muscle memory with rehearsal and practicing. All this is therapeutic. It helps my mind and body get along. What I am after with music! AI robs me of that.

So while I may technically be the crazy one, all the crazy shit I do is helping me not be crazy.

Kelly Kintner

The Horses Mouth

The Kintners

Djembe Funk

The hour after thought:

Our protest tune with bkbirge on old school equipment in an analog studio called “Pill Party” is a sad fiesta. I will put it here. A good song for this entry. “Going in circles, we never make it anywhere” :

Video

Bandcamp

The Attention Economy by Tom Chatfield, in Aeon.

Good read, here's a quote from it:

From the loftiest perspective of all, information itself is pulling the strings: free-ranging memes whose ‘purposes’ are pure self-propagation, and whose frantic evolution outstrips all retrospective accounts. This is the mountaintop view of Chesterton’s Satan, whispering in a browser’s ear: consider yourself as interchangeable as the button you’re clicking, as automated as the systems in which you’re implicated. Seen from such a height, you signify nothing beyond your recorded actions.

Vint Cerf is working on a plan to unleash AI agents on the open internet by Tim Fernholz in TechCrunch.

^This headline reads like it's a bad thing but it reads more like it's about tying AI agents to an identity like how humans on the internet are generally tied to an IP address. Also, this article is from July so it's probably old news to people who keep up with this stuff but it was news to me.

---

Masha Gessen in the NYTimes on NAZA

Zeeshan Aleem at MSNow on NAZA

I gotta write dedicated Masha Gessen and Zeeshan Aleem posts one of these days. They're both terrific.

I'm unlikely to see NAZA in theaters just 'cause... I don't go to the movies often to begin with and I certainly don't go to the movies to see depressing documentaries, but I intend on seeing this thing as soon as it's available at The Guardian in November.

Closing Day

I thought closing day would feel different.

I imagined there would be a moment when everything settled into place. A signature. A handshake. A set of keys placed in my hand. Some unmistakable sensation that said:

You made it.

Instead, I walked into closing exhausted.

I had worked the night before. I had barely slept. The sellers' car was loaded up and still parked in the driveway when I did the final walkthrough. It quickly became obvious that what I can only describe as a menagerie of animals had lived in the house, and by the time I walked through it, my eyes were watering from the dander stirred into the air.

The seller was trying to coax their cat out of hiding inside the kitchen cabinetry. It had hidden in a void behind the Lazy Susan through a hole in the cabinet under the sink.

Apparently claiming squatter's rights.

That probably should have told me something.

But I was too tired to make much of it.

Besides, there were papers to sign.

For months, everything had been moving toward this day.

There had been the search itself. The houses I considered. The ones I rejected. The questions about where I wanted to live. The calculations about payments and commuting and what I could reasonably afford.

Then this house appeared.

It wasn't perfect.

But it had things that mattered.

A fenced yard.

An attached garage.

An extra bedroom.

No homeowners association.

Room enough to begin again without pretending I was beginning from nothing.

The asking price had already been reduced by $10,000.

My realtor thought my offer was too low.

I understood her reasoning.

I made the offer anyway.

Not because I needed to win a negotiation, but because I had been taught a long time ago when buying my first car: Never fall in love, and don't let the seller see how bad you want it.

That logic applies to houses as well.

You negotiate differently when you are willing to walk away.

Eventually, we settled at a price.

It unfolded almost exactly where I thought it might.

Then came the financing.

There was down-payment assistance. There was supposed to be another $2,500 incentive from the bank.

That $2,500 mattered.

Not because the entire purchase depended on it, but because money already had assignments. Houses have a way of spending money before you ever move into them.

Then, on closing day, the incentive disappeared.

The lender had apparently tried repeatedly to get the loan through Freddie Mac.

Eleven times, I was told.

Eleven denials.

Eventually, the loan received final approval through Fannie Mae, but the $2,500 incentive was gone.

Which meant $2,500 less in my pocket.

The explanation for why remained frustratingly vague.

For a moment, I could feel the disappointment trying to take over the day.

I had expected something.

I had counted on something.

And at the last possible moment, it changed.

There was a time when that might have been enough to make me start to questioning.

Maybe this wasn't supposed to happen.

Maybe I made a mistake.

Maybe the resistance meant something.

But I have become increasingly suspicious of the idea that every difficult thing is a sign to turn around.

Sometimes something goes wrong because something went wrong.

Sometimes your calculations turn out to be off, and you have to figure out how to make the equation still work.

So I proceeded.

Not cheerfully.

Not pretending I wasn't frustrated.

I described it to myself another way:

I was forcing it, but not faking it.

There is a difference.

I didn't need to manufacture gratitude to prove I had faith.

I didn't need to call disappointment a blessing.

I could be frustrated about what happened and still recognize what was happening.

I was buying a home.

So I signed.

And signed.

And signed some more.

Eventually, the papers ran out.

The transaction was complete.

The house was mine.

There should probably be swelling music here.

There wasn't.

There was cleaning.

A lot of cleaning.

Once the sellers and their animals were gone, I began seeing the house differently.

Not the way you see a house during a showing.

Not the way you see it during an inspection.

The way you see something once responsibility for it belongs entirely to you.

There was pet hair everywhere.

Grease.

Dirt.

Cobwebs.

Cabinets that needed scrubbing.

Blinds coated with dust and cat hair.

Standing in that dirty kitchen, exhausted, surrounded by evidence of other people's years in the house, closing day stopped resembling anything I had imagined.

And somehow, that made it more honest.

Because beginnings rarely arrive clean.

We like stories with thresholds.

Before.

After.

Old life.

New life.

One door closes and another opens.

But real life is messier than that.

Sometimes you walk through the new door and discover that somebody left cat hair on the stove.

Sometimes the promised money doesn't come.

Sometimes the previous occupants haven't finished leaving when you arrive.

Sometimes you receive the keys before the place feels remotely like yours.

The threshold is real.

But so is the cleanup afterward.

Maybe that is what I will remember most about closing day.

Not possession.

Responsibility.

The moment something becomes yours is also the moment you can no longer wait for somebody else to take care of it.

The dirt is mine to clean.

The walls are mine to wash.

The broken things are mine to replace.

The useful things are mine to preserve.

The decisions are mine now.

And there is something strangely freeing about that.

Because responsibility and agency arrive together.

I get to decide what stays.

I get to decide what goes.

I get to decide what this place becomes.

A few mornings later, I stepped outside.

The street was quiet.

Above the houses was an enormous October sky, layered with clouds and morning light.

Later, I took my dog Mo for her walk.

Nothing extraordinary happened.

A man walked his dog through his new neighborhood.

That was all.

And perhaps that was enough.

Because there have been seasons of my life when home was not something I could take for granted.

There were years when survival demanded more attention than permanence.

Years when the future was measured differently.

And now I found myself looking down an ordinary suburban street knowing that, when the walk was over, I had somewhere to return to.

My house.

Not a monument.

Not proof that I had finally become successful.

Not evidence that every wound had healed or every question had been answered.

Just a house.

A place with dirty walls but good bones.

A fenced yard where Mo can run and be safe.

A bedroom where I can sleep after working through the night.

A kitchen that needs work.

Rooms waiting to accumulate memories that haven't happened yet.

And maybe that is why closing day did not feel like the ending I expected.

Because it wasn't an ending.

It wasn't even the triumphant arrival I once might have needed it to be.

It was quieter than that.

I have spent much of my life learning how to survive what was handed to me.

Somewhere along the way, survival became rebuilding.

And somewhere during the rebuilding, I began making choices not simply about what I wanted to escape, but about what I wanted to create.

That is different.

The keys in my hand were not a trophy for everything I had endured.

They were permission to begin tending something.

There will be paint.

Repairs.

Furniture.

Bills.

Probably discoveries I would rather not make.

There will be mornings when the novelty has worn off and this place is simply where I live.

Good.

I think I am finally beginning to understand the holiness of simply inhabiting my life.

A dog asleep in her corner.

A refrigerator with food in it.

A door that locks behind me.

A familiar street.

A sky I will eventually recognize from season to season.

People I love coming through the door.

Quiet evenings when nothing important happens.

Ordinary life.

And one day soon, when the cat hair exorcism is complete, when the walls have been washed and the paint has dried, and the work of removing the previous owners' footprint begins giving way to leaving my own, I will move in.

Not into the house I bought.

Into the home I have begun to make.

For years, I thought transformation would announce itself.

I thought there would be a moment when I could look backward and clearly see where the old life ended and the new one began.

Maybe sometimes there is.

But sometimes transformation looks like a tired man standing in a dirty kitchen with a set of keys in his pocket, deciding what he will do with what has been placed in his hands.

No music.

No audience.

No revelation necessary.

Just the quiet recognition:

This belongs to me now.

Not only the house.

The life.

The choices.

The responsibility.

The next chapter.

All of it.

Closing day.

Funny name for it.

Because nothing closed.

Something opened.

ArchitectureOfGrief

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Explore more writing from Silent Sentinel →

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• Fun Andy Weir interview, whose books I never read. I've only watched the movie adaptations, which weren't quite my jam, but judging a film-adaptation is no way to judge an author's work. Either way, the interview is fun and inspiring and does provide some food for thought.

• The entire part 1 of COLLIDER by Warren Ellis and Jerome Eyequem, which is being serialized at Warren's Orbital Operations newsletter. Strong STALKER vibes, but clearly far more demented.

• Steven Heller on his time as art-director for EVERGREEN, a magazine that “devolved” into a paperback periodical. Didn't even know this was a thing. Somewhere in the back of my mind I've been toying with the idea of a regular paperback zine of sorts for quite a long time now.

• Kickstarter for Catherine Tedford's PAPER BULLETS: 120 Years of Political Stickers From Around the World forthcoming from PM Press, which I'm fortunate to have some work in.

• Fonts-in-Use looks at fashion designer Tania Marcial's DELIVERY collection. Hard thrift-wear aesthetic.

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More podcast note-taking today and a new plumbing issue I gotta look into, when all I'd really like to do is read and write right now. Should also start thinking about the next edition of the RESTRICTED FREQUENCY newsletter, which is supposed to go out in 4 days. Do what you love and never have to work a day in your life, they said.

#radar

So, starting a blog, or a journal as you like. How do you even do it? I am currently staring at this blank page trying to put whatever the hell is going on in my brain into words. Let me tell you, it is not easy.

Maybe I can first start with the why? Why would I do this, and why do I think anyone else will care. Well, I don't think they do. It is mostly an exercise for myself to express the “whatever the hell is going on in my brain”. I am not going to stick to a single topic, I will probably be all over the place, but I do think it's helpful for myself to write some things down. If someone else happens to like to read it, so be it. It is also not topics and things I feel like I need to hide from the public.

How many times do I need to write though? Once a day? Once a week? 500 words every post? I think it's easy to try to make some ground rules, but I also think it will hinder whatever creativity I have in myself. So, it is probably going to be quite irregular, and I am fine with that.

One thing I do believe strongly about is that I will not use any AI tools to do any of my writing, proofreading, summarizing, spell-checking or whatever it could potentially do. Sure, this will make my posts flawed when it comes to spelling and grammar, but I am also fine with that.

For today I think a simple introduction is sufficient: Hi, I am Pieter, 39 years old (shit, almost 40), and living in Berlin with my wife and son. Pretty nerdy about technology, loving music + books, and currently recovering from a not so nice burnout at work.

To whoever will read this at some point: Hi to you! Hope you enjoy all the mess I am writing down and hurling into the world. See you soon!