2024 in Input/Output

On What I Made and What Made Me This Year

Taking in mountain air and the makings of a literal postcard. Great Smoky Mountains National Park, November 2024.

In attempt to return to the areas that I said this newsletter would be about (but aren’t always consistent), I’m sending out year-end lists based on those categories. I firmly believe that what we take in (books, movies, news, conversations, etc.) changes who we are and how we are in the world. So these are the things that have shaped me this year, in large and small ways. Before that, though, a few items in process that I made this year that made me happy or that I’m particularly proud of.

I never got finished pictures of either of these projects before they were given as gifts, but hopefully the sentiment is there!

Books

Note: you can find my full 2024 reading list here. I experimented with a different format this year, and ultimately decided that I didn’t like it, so will be trying something inspired by this post next year.

My reading this year felt haphazard; some months I barely read at all, while others I read everything, everywhere, all the time. I surprised myself with some of the things that I loved, like this exquisite ghost story (I hate ghost stories), this exploration of spirituality (which is even more an exploration of how we explore thing, which felt very relatable), and this multi-thread story (throughout which I had to really breathe into not fully understanding the lineage and just let it BE). I did not surprise myself by loving this midwestern academic’s heart-filled exploration (probably my favorite book this year, though The Sentence is a close second), or this half-memoir, half-Bakhtin treatise, or this memoir of a journey to Northern Ireland, but I loved them just the same. Braiding Sweetgrass changed me - again, as I re-read it for the second time and listened to it a third. Of all the full texts I read, the one I want to quote all of is Andrea Gibson’s You Better Be Lightning, which lives up in every moment to its fantastic title. One poem from this book undid me in a yoga class and I have returned to the whole text again and again.

Music

This year was the year of live music. I’ve talked before about how Spotify’s “near you” function got me hard this year, and about several of the concerts that I saw. Overall, I’ve been struck with just how different the experience of listening to an artist live versus their recordings can be. This is an obvious statement, but feeling it several times this year really reinforced it. I love Life Uncommon and Hands by Jewel, and was honestly SHOCKED by how much different (deeper, more complex, more interesting) the live versions were from the recorded versions that I love. So: more live music!

In order: Dashboard Confessional, the Indigo Girls, P!nk

In terms of other things I loved this year, it’s typical of my eclectic taste. I listened to a lot of Celtic or Celtic-adjacent music; this song was one of my favorites. Carrie Newcomer was the soundtrack of much of my spring, particularly this song. Mary Chapin Carpenter is always over-represented in my listening, and this song was my favorite of hers this year. I really loved this band, too, outside of my “normal” repertoire. I’ve talked enough about P!nk, but may never hear this song enough times.

Words

Now that I’m in the rhythm of it, I love the way that keeping a list of beautiful sentences helps me pay attention. I’m a chronic skimmer, and looking for perfect writing forces me not only to slow down a little bit, but also to revisit a book as a whole once I finish it. I’m forever grateful to Ann Friedman’s lists of sentences for inspiring me to do this. Below is a collection of quotes that either brought a lightning bolt of clarity, a shock of recognition, or simply a deep appreciation of the way words are woven together. All bolded words are emphasis added; please be aware that some of the quotes have strong language in them.

“Instead of Depression” (whole poem by Andrea Gibson)

try calling it hibernation.
Imagine the darkness is a cave
in which you will be nurtured
by doing absolutely nothing.
Hibernating animals don’t even dream.
It’s okay if you can’t image
spring. Sleep through the alarm
of the world. Name your hopelessness
a quiet hollow, a place you go
to heal, a den you dug,
Sweetheart, instead
of a grave.

“We are showered every day with gifts, but they are not meant for us to keep. Their life is in their movement, the inhale and the exhale, in our shared breath. Our work and our joy is to pass along the gift and to trust that what we put out into the universe will always come back.” - Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass

“Asking what is our responsibility is perhaps also to ask, What is our gift? And how shall we use it? - Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass

“We should all be in awe of teenagers, of youth, youth artists in particular. Holy hell, the emotion! The love and the anger and the energy, all so huge, enough force to power a city. I think back to myself then, and I look at the young writers I work with now, and am blown away by their courage. It scares people, think. We try to contain it. We teach them to hold back. To be “appropriate.” To be “Respectable.” I wonder: What might happen if we got out of their way? What might happen if we actually listened? -Megan Stielstra, The Wrong Way to Save Your Life

“You don’t get to hate something just because you don’t understand it.” The author is quoting her teacher here. -Megan Stielstra, The Wrong Way to Save Your Life

“When you have love, you can handle any amount of bullshit. Right up until you can’t.” -Megan Stielstra, The Wrong Way to Save Your Life

“Banish overwhelm with curiosity.” - Chani Nicholas

“‘Energy is potentially the greatest word in the English language. It has the depth of ‘mystical,’ the friendliness of ‘vibe,’ and the versatility of ‘fuck.’” - Diana Helmuth, The Witching Year

“As my nurse sister Nicole is found of saying, ‘the placebo effect is still an effect.’” Diana Helmuth, The Witching Year

“Regret is worth nothing because you can’t be walking all the paths or you wouldn’t be walking any path at all.” -Michelle Porter, A Grandmother Begins the Story

Don’t Worry (whole poem by Mary Oliver)

Things take the time they take. Don’t
worry.
How many roads did Saint Augustine follow
before he became Saint Augustine?

It’s a truth of travel that we see so much more when we are away from what we know. -Nina MacLaughlin, The Making of a Carpenter

Any collection of words, however expressed, can invite these kinds of conversations that connect I and we, then and now, here and gone. Because every utterance is already lived in, by occupants real and imagined. Every word is ours and other people’s at the same time. Every voice, a “territory shared.” - Lissa Soep, Other People’s Words (quoting Bakhtin, in the quoted portion)

The only education in grief that any of us ever gets is a crash course. - Gail Caldwell, Let’s Take the Long Way Home

There is no sense in panicking when you’re alone. Particularly when your aloneness is the result of your own decision-making. Panic needs an audience to be useful. - Glynnis MacNicol, I’m Mostly Here to Enjoy Myself

The hard truth is that no one gets to be in community without effort. - Ann Friedman

“What Sucks About the Afterlife” (a whole poem by Andrea Gibson)

On Earth, everyone loved butterflies,
but I trusted the caterpillars more.
I trusted the ones who knew
they were not done growing…
…I’m not about to spend
eternity burning in the lie that holy
and perfect are the same thing.
Do you understand?
A promised land
is not a promised land
if I can’t keep learning.

“No longer lend your strength to that which you wish to be free from.” - Jewel, Life Uncommon

I’d love to hear what you made or what made you this year, in any format!