Alice Munro and the New Yorker Article

An aspiring author, I realize through regrettable hindsight that the first steps toward writinf are residing in self-care, giving myself time to be, to wait, to feel, hope, and to believe. Tangibly translated, this means reading books. I've a post-it on my lamp shade, "Make time to READ."

I need books. I'm back at the library again, finally. Something happened in the shift of our reading to devices. No matter what new tech touts to protect us from whatever the names of the lights are that ruin the eyea, or all the other distractions, it doesn't work. It never works. I need the cold, hard books- sheets of paper between my fingers, the britler the better as such contain words having stood so long time past, and they stood the test. The need for a careful turn equates value.

I gifted myself a subscription to the New Yorker, where I read the following. Alice Munro and her daughters tell a story with details different from my own, but similar truths apply. The being of a woman has changed so much over time to have remained so much the same. In the end, people close their eyes for one of two reasons. They hope to center themselves, focus on what matters, pay attention to truth and reality, connecting and confessing themselves intricately hemmed into the fabric of creation, of all life, and all pain, or they sink into the converse, closing to shut out and aide the act of ignoring, which leads to ignorance. - The facing of the truth is too difficult an ability, too intimidating a task, and would threaten all that has been so carefully carved to sustain their breath. Even death. For long I was frustrated with those who chose the latter and easier of the two, but of recent I've gained sympathy, found gifted insight because such a choose in actuality proves harder to sustain. And one never is rewarded for all the work it takes him, or them, to be so unmoved, so together, so never broken, never facing, ever erasing the truth that does set free.

Empathy grows. I know how hard it is; I've been there. I remember it. It nearly killed me, and to live became change, identity shift, incongruence shift- cultural shift and countless shifts. I could never convey all of it. Just call me John 21:25. The world could never contain what still I must slow down and step away from the screen to recall and to retain.

Reality will be faced, my friends, my comrades. At some point, all must embrace it, even if it stab us, even as it threaten our life. We must lean in, lest we linger our bodies till they crumble under the weight, and the stress, no matter how much or little we eat, no matter how much money we have, no matter what the world thinks of us, no matter anything. We are not all okay. We just are not. Not any one. The only way to relieve all the pressure is to give in and give up, to release. Be not the passive voice in our own lives, lest we never get free of ourselves and the prisons we create, or the banquets in the grave, the poisoning lies saturating generations, lest we never be free... lest we never escape... It.

Alice Munro, New Yorker article 2025

p.s. let me know if you'd like to support my work by gifting me any other subscriptions. I'm currently accepting offers ;).