Step away from your Instagram feed
I don’t know about you, but all this Sad Pandemic Holiday content is really doing a number on my mental health. I haven’t regularly celebrated Thanksgiving...
A quarantine recommendation
In Piranesi by Susanna Clarke, a man lives in a house he believes is the world. To be fair, the house is massive, perhaps infinite, and it contains the sea,...
The spell
Once upon a time, a boy was born, and his father didn’t love him. The boy had all the toys in the world, and he always got everything he wanted, just the way...
Remember fun?
This week I’d like to share an article that made me feel seen: “What Was Fun?” by Rachel Sugar in Vox. “Are you fun?” I wonder, staring at focaccia recipes...
My favorite election movie
No, directed by Pablo Larraín and released in the U.S. in 2013, is a movie about the 1988 plebiscite in Chile, in which people could vote “yes” or “no” to...
Big news
Friends, I’m so excited to tell you that I sold my book proposal, and I’m officially writing my first book! It’s tentatively titled Apocalypse: Rediscovering...
The joy of being a snob
As part of my current turn toward being Extremely Offline, I recently went back and read the best piece of writing about the high priest of internet...
What a time to be off social media
One of the greatest tricks the platforms have pulled is making it seem like saying something is the same thing as feeling something, or doing something, or...
A pandemic profile
This week Science published my profile of Abigail Echo-Hawk, a citizen of the Pawnee Nation of Oklahoma and a public health researcher committed to making...
Too many words about Twitter
Once upon a time, I really loved Twitter. I joined in 2009, just after I’d moved to Mexico City with a Fulbright. Facebook, which I had joined in 2004, early...
Writing during a pandemic
This week I’d like to share a series of interviews from Man Repeller about writing during These Times, with Mary H.K. Choi, Shenequa A. Golding, and Vivek...
Why tweet?
I’ve been using my vacation to pull back from and reevaluate my relationship to various digital tools and online platforms. That’s a project that will take...
Out of the office
I’m still on vacation, struggling to figure out what relaxing means when everything I used to do to relax (get cozy at home, cook a new recipe, watch TV, get...
How to thrive during a global pandemic
Throughout these five-going-on-six months of quarantine, my sister Carrie and I have been having long phone conversations about how we’re doing, how we’re...
The return
Hello! I’ve missed writing to you. I’ve finished my Very Big Project, which was—*drum roll*—my first book proposal. I’m not ready to say more about it...
New stories
Hi friends! I’m still working away on my Very Big Project, which I hope to have more to say about soon. (Both what it is and how I’m getting so much of it...
A quick hello
Hello! I’m back, just for a minute. My Forever Quarantine™ life is going well, and I’ve reached a point in my Very Big Project where I need to keep going...
The long haul
Up until now, my strategy for staying sane in quarantine has been to work all the time. I’m a journalist writing for one of the most important scientific...
My new story on pandemics and inequality
This week Science published my feature about how various kinds of inequality affected the course of past pandemics, and how (sometimes) those pandemics...
Nothing better to do
I’ve been thinking about the monks in the desert again. I wrote about this article, about work and life at a Benedictine monastery, in an early issue of this...
