#Sari Botton

[katherynefromphilly]

Today I accidentally discovered a Substack called “Oldster”, which contains numerous positive, realistic, and helpful interviews, essays and reflections on getting older than you are currently, whatever your age. There’s no set age to be an “Oldster”, and you definitely don’t need to be older now to gain wisdom here.

I have been greatly helped through my own life by the insights of older friends and younger friends both. The first group gives you insights into Your Future Challenges and Discoveries and Identity and the second group gives you a connection to Those Who Follow And Other Points Of View. Nice to see so much awesome advice in one place.

Happy reading!

[jkottke]

“I woke up one morning and realized that all I wanted to do was drink.” That’s from the “Ask a Sober Oldster” Q&A series, which is a collaboration between the newsletters Oldster Magazine, by Sari Botton, and The Small Bow, by A.J. Daulerio. (I’m biased because I do the illustrations, but I truly enjoy the interviews.) There have been six installments so far, and I think my favorite is No. 4. Or maybe No. 5. Also No. 2. Really all of them.

[dulcetash]

I’ve been liking and reblogging Little Women posts for a few days, ranging from Introspective to Shitpost, because the new Gerwig adaptation is so good and so thought-provoking. I snuck off to re-watch it in the theater the other day, just so I could study and think on it some more.

There is a lot of discourse on Jo’s rejection of Laurie’s proposal (there has been for 150 years), and most of it centers on the nature of platonic vs. romantic love and, under today’s more progressive lens, Jo’s (and Alcott’s) sexuality and/or gender identity.

A REALLY INTERESTING thing this adaptation did, though, was highlight Jo’s wish to never marry, period. Dialogue is lifted straight from the book: “I like my freedom too well... you’d hate my scribbling...” Jo knows, as many little women know deep down but can’t articulate (because society hasn’t given them the words), that to marry is to give up any ambition or personal fulfillment that doesn’t fall neatly in line with patriarchal domestic expectations.

In the 1860s, societal mores effected this oppression in a general, institutional, largely unexamined way (I once had a professor assert that Alcott saw Meg as the womanly ideal. If that is true, then the way she infantalized her once she was married is a wrenching, ugly example of internalized misogyny). In the 2010s, after a few waves of feminism have put forth the (often fictional) idea that Women Can Have It All, this oppression comes more directly, more personally, from inside the house.

This piece on Longreads is goddamn powerful. I wonder what Alcott would say about it. She never married.

What Gerwig did with Bhaer was so brilliant. The tacked-on, forced necessity of him was made clear (yet more palatable by choosing someone young and hot). The ambiguity of did-they-or-didn’t-they is masterful. In addition to the color and lighting of the shifting scenes, which has been well-analyzed elsewhere, compare the acting, expressions, and body-language with the actual dialogue. The characters are all longing looks, delighted excitement, impassioned tone, yet the actual words are, “oh, it’s you.” “Who is this guy?” “Come see me if you want to.” “I doubt I will.” “You love him.” “What? No, I don’t.” “He makes you happy.” “What?”

There are multiple, layered interpretations, and it’s delicious. There’s plenty of space to find the angle that makes you happy and let it be truth, even as another interpretation is equally true. Great art allows dynamism between the artist and the reader/viewer.

In light of the Longreads essay, I find comfort in Gerwig’s portrayal of Bhaer. Even though he doesn’t like some of Jo’s work, he likes her passion for it very much (her ink-stained fingers, oooh yeah). When she rages at his criticism, he accepts it calmly, affirming her identity as a writer and making no such claim for himself. She condemns him to obscurity, and he accepts that as a matter of course, content to enjoy the glow of her own rising star, supporting her in the ways he knows how, realizing that he is insufficient to all her needs.

Our modern writer married a Mr. Dashwood, the editor. If Jo is to marry, I’m glad she married Professor Bhaer instead.

Little Women with non-domestic ambitions, find you a Bhaer. They aren’t all fictional, but you have to look carefully. Leave the Lauries unless, like Amy, you’re willing and clever enough to play by the patriarchy’s rules while min-maxing for the win. Steer clear of the Dashwoods. It’s hard, because they’re everywhere, and they’re often disguised as John Brooke.

[theglasschild]

Leaving home does something to your sense of identity. Either you become more of that place than you ever were while you lived there, or your identity calcifies around the rejection of this place. It is challenging to inhabit the space between these two positions.

Sari Botton, Goodbye to All That: Writers on Loving and Leaving New York

[millionsmillions]

For me, ghostwriting is a job — one I wouldn’t do if I didn’t need the money. Like any job, it has its pros and cons, its ups and downs — lots of freedom, the satisfaction of helping someone tell their story; but also, frequently, having to handle intense personalities with kid gloves.

Ghost Stories

[oceanstone]

Nonfiction Books About Psychology

On Looking: Eleven Walks with Expert Eyes by Alexandra Horowitz

The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion by Jonathan Haidt

The Edison Gene: ADHD and the Gift of the Hunter Child by Thom Hartmann

How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence by Michael Pollan

How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff

The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat by Oliver Sacks

The Brain that Changes Itself by Norman Doidge

NeuroTribes: The Legacy of Autism and the Future of Neurodiversity by Steve Silberman

Toward Psychologies of Liberation by Helene Shulman and Mary Watkins

Books by Sari Solden

Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer

The Hot Hand by Ben Cohen

Unlocking the Emotional Brain by Ecker and Ticic

Messy by Tim Hartford

Happiness

Happiness: Lessons from a New Science by Richard Layard

The Architecture of Happiness by Alain de Botton

Biography

Savage Appetites: True Stories of Women, Crime, and Obsession by Rachael Monroe

What Made Maddy Run by Kate Fagan

[saribotton]

Check, check. 🎙 This thing still on? Hi, Tumblr. I have a newsletter. Thought you might like to know.

[jamil06f]

Download PDF Never Can Say Goodbye: Writers on Their Unshakable Love for New York -- Sari Botton

Download Or Read PDF Never Can Say Goodbye: Writers on Their Unshakable Love for New York - Sari Botton Free Full Pages Online With Audiobook.

  [*] Download PDF Here => Never Can Say Goodbye: Writers on Their Unshakable Love for New York

[*] Read PDF Here => Never Can Say Goodbye: Writers on Their Unshakable Love for New York

[moodboardinthecloud]

This is 48-and-10-Months: Author and Podcaster Jennifer Romolini Responds to The Oldster Magazine Questionnaire

"Age has humbled and softened me. I’m a more reliable, consistent person than I ever was, which makes me a better friend, better partner, better parent."

Sari Botton

Jan 10 2022

From the time I was 10, I’ve been obsessed with

what it means to grow older

. I’m curious about

what it means to others, of all ages

, and so I invite them to take “The Oldster Magazine Questionnaire.”Here,

Jennifer Romolini

—author, and co-host with

Kim France

of the excellent

Everything is Fine

podcast—responds. - Sari Botton

Subscribe now

How old are you?

I’ll be 49 in March.

Is there another age you associate with yourself in your mind? If so, what is it? And why, do you think?

It’s funny because in the past I would’ve said 25, the year I mustered the courage to leave a terrible and ill-thought-out marriage, went back to school, and started the life I live now. Or 37, the year I stopped self-medicating with alcohol, gave birth to my child, and had my first true taste of professional success. Or maybe 44, the year I published my first book. But these days I identify most with my 9-year-old self, the earnest, gentle weirdo I was before I started performing femininity, before I started performing an identity, period, and before I started competing with other women for prizes that were never worthy of us in the first place.

Do you feel old for your age? Young for your age? Just right? Are you in step with your peers?

Our ideas about aging in this country are mostly so small and fixed and utterly banal so I’d rather turn this question on its head and ask: what is “old” or “young” for an age?

I’ll tell you that some things that feel vital to personhood when you’re young—differentiating yourself by your tastes and your associations, and the exclusionary snobbery often attendant to both—start to feel boring and limiting as you get older.

These days I identify most with my 9-year-old self, the earnest, gentle weirdo I was before I started performing femininity, before I started performing an identity, period, and before I started competing with other women for prizes that were never worthy of us in the first place.

I feel the youngest and most alive when I’m open and curious, when I don’t have an agenda, when I’m not trying to control the narrative but instead am present enough to tune into the discovery of the moment. I feel the oldest when I’m cynical and ego-driven, when I’m seeking relevance or recognition, when I feel the world owes me something just because I’ve been living (and working) here for as long as I have.

In terms of peers, I don’t know that I always understood that we get to choose our peers, get to the choose the people with whom we want to compare ourselves and measure up to. I feel most in step with people who are honest with and about themselves, who are kind and compassionate about their own and others’ foibles, who have a healthy relationship with work. In some ways I’m so much more impatient as I’ve gotten older, I lack tolerance for the bullshit inherent in transactional relationships, no longer wish to interact with humans who seem little more than pre-programmed holograms.

What do you like about being your age?

There’s this idea that the joy of middle age is giving fewer fucks, but that always rings false to me, a kind of “badass”/superwoman posturing that’s handy on Instagram and hollow at its core. Truth is, I give all the fucks now, my fucks are urgent, I care more deeply about how I show up than I ever did before. The real joy of middle age —if you can get there— is trusting yourself enough to be tender and porous when you can and developing the shrewd sense to know when you can’t.

What is difficult about being your age?

It's so embarrassing but right now it’s grappling with vanity. In your 40s your young face begins the slow metamorphosis into an old face, it changes in ways you somehow hadn’t imagined would happen to you, which can send you into a real panic, especially if you relied on the power of youthful beauty in the past.

I can’t wait to turn 50. A few years ago, I was invited on a desert retreat with a group of cool women who were all over 50. It felt like being part of a secret coven. I thought, “That. I want that.”

I’m pretty sure that this panic is temporary, that if you can find acceptance and a bit of grace you’ll be happier than if you’re constantly trying to fight it, than if you’re throwing thousands away on pokes and erasures and fills. Because, let’s be honest, eventually the choice is “fake face” or “old face” and, ultimately, I’d rather look like myself.

What is surprising about being your age, or different from what you expected, based on what you were told?

Perimenopause is indescribably cruel, a physiological cataclysm. I cannot believe no one told me about this. Still, this stage of life doesn’t feel “old” like I’d imagined. I’m basically the same age Rue McClanahan was on the Golden Girls. For better or worse, I don’t yet feel like a Golden Girl.

What has aging given you? Taken away from you?

Age has humbled and softened me. I’m a more reliable, consistent person than I ever was, which makes me a better friend, better partner, better parent. Age and experience have given me the perspective to stop chasing achievement for achievement’s sake. All of which makes being alive more peaceful and rewarding.  

Age took drinking away from me and smoking too—both for the best, though I miss them all the time.  

How has getting older affected your sense of yourself, or your identity?

About four years ago, when I was 45, I had what was, for me, a full emotional breakdown. I felt dark and depressed and hopeless. For the 20 years previous, I’d built my identity around my career, thought I could outrun my pain through constant engagement in work, through checking all the life boxes; thought I could hide my self-loathing behind conventional success and accomplishment. But that shit catches up with you and, honestly, you’re lucky if it does.

I feel the youngest and most alive when I’m open and curious, when I don’t have an agenda, when I’m not trying to control the narrative but instead am present enough to tune into the discovery of the moment.

What are some age-related milestones you are looking forward to? Or ones you “missed,” and might try to reach later, off-schedule, according to our culture and its expectations?

I can’t wait to turn 50. A few years ago, I was invited on a desert retreat with a group of cool women who were all over 50. It felt like being part of a secret coven. I thought, “That. I want that.”

What has been your favorite age so far, and why? Would you go back to this age if you could?

So many! Here’s one: When I was 20 I lived with a bunch of female artists in a ramshackle house on the main street of a small town in Amish-country-adjacent Pennsylvania. We made (mostly bad) art and dyed each other’s hair platinum blonde and listened to every Lilith Fair band before there was a Lilith Fair. You couldn’t pay me to go back to that age, but I sometimes try to conjure the feeling of freedom and possibility I had then, waking up in a house with my friends, listening to the Breeders “Last Splash” on a spontaneous summer road trip, the way the air felt on my face and my skin.    

Is there someone who is older than you, who makes growing older inspiring to you? Who is your aging idol and why?

I’ve been around enough famous and powerful people to know we shouldn’t idolize any of them (no offense! fame is hell!). That said, for different reasons, both John Waters and Deborah Levy seem to be doing everything right. I also interview older women each week for the podcast I co-host with my former boss, now friend Kim France. I learn something from all of them, which is the goal and the point. We have to talk more (and more honestly) about aging instead of treating it like some secret shame.

There’s this idea that the joy of middle age is giving fewer fucks, but that always rings false to me, a kind of “badass”/superwoman posturing that’s handy on Instagram and hollow at its core. Truth is, I give all the fucks now, my fucks are urgent, I care more deeply about how I show up than I ever did before.

What aging-related adjustments have you recently made, style-wise, beauty-wise, health-wise?

I go to bed embarrassingly early. I finally, consistently, use sunblock and use more useless creams on my face. I still love buying and wearing vintage clothes though I’ve stopped, and this is forever, wearing anything that hurts — though that’s probably more pandemic related than about my advanced age.

What’s an aging-related adjustment you refuse to make, and why?

Essentially I try to reject any rules or conventionally-held beliefs about getting older—whether it’s what we’re “allowed” to wear on our bodies or pursue with our (still very good) brains.

What’s your philosophy on celebrating birthdays as an adult? How do you celebrate yours?

My philosophy is: do something. Make sure to blow out a candle. Go out of your way to see a person or people you love and like. Have a moment in the day when you reflect on your life and sit in some gratitude for the fact of still being alive. I used to throw enormous boozy parties but these days I get the same thrill from hanging out with a few friends, getting a little stoned, and playing “Clue.”  

https://oldster.substack.com/p/this-is-48-and-10-months-author-and?s=r

[vanessaquinteropoesie]

Habt ihr auch bestimmte Bücher, die euch wahnsinnig inspirieren ? Ich habe einige Bücher, die mich inspirieren und die ich oft zur Hand nehme und lese. Diese beiden Bücher 📚 gehören definitiv dazu! Goodbye to all that - writers on loving and leaving New York und Never can say goodbye - writers on their unshakable love for New York von Sari Botton. ❤️ Diese Bücher sind gefüllt mit Essays von Autoren, Künstlern und Schauspielern, die über ihre Liebe für New York schreiben. Wie sie dorthin kamen, gingen und nie zurück kehrten oder für immer blieben. Ich liebe New York und habe selbst sechs Jahre auf Mallorca gelebt. Daher kann ich diese Bücher allen empfehlen, die gerne reisen, schon anderen Orten gelebt haben oder einfach nur einer bestimmten Stadt verfallen sind. 📚👍🏻❤️ ____________________________ #saribotton #buchtipp #buchliebe #meerliebe #reisen #gedichteschreiben #writersofinstagram #newyorkcity #goodbyetoallthat #joandidion #gedankenkarussell #meerweh #künstlerin #schreiben #newyorkbücher #liebe #dichterunddenker (hier: New York City , USA) https://www.instagram.com/p/CBV2IhUKydw/?igshid=43lpt4zf3lqr

[workmoneyfun]

‘Let’s Reset’: A Career Social Distancer Mends Some Fences | Coronavirus inspires Sari Botton to reach out to family and friends she’s fallen out with.... https://longreads.com/2020/04/06/lets-reset-a-career-social-distancer-mends-some-fences/

[millionsmillions]

Exactly how much do I make writing other people’s stories? For most books, I receive a flat rate — anywhere from $10,000 to $40,000

Ghost Stories

[eating-reading]

Goodbye to All That by Sari Botton (making me miss New York already) + froyo from Blueboy in Montreal

[faradaysworld]

Taking Cents, Making Sense of a Broken Family — Longreads Sari Botton turns to petty – incredibly petty – theft after her family life hits the fan. via Taking Cents, Making Sense of a Broken Family — Longreads

[lodelss]

In this week’s episode of the Longreads Podcast, The Rumpus Editor-in-Chief Marisa Siegel joins Essays Editor Sari Botton, Head of Audience Catherine Cusick, and Contributing Editor Aaron Gilbreath to share what they’ve all been reading and working on. They discuss poetry, looking beyond humans to understand human behavior, how our bodies other us and bring out our humanity, and the music we write to.

Subscribe and listen now everywhere you get your podcasts.

5:06 “This is small talk purgatory’: what Tinder taught me about love.” (CJ Hauser, December 7, 2019, The Guardian)

12:56 “Spines of the Finwomen.” (Lidia Yuknavitch, October 31, 2019, The Rumpus)

20:50 Aaron’s Music Corner, in which he unironically recommends writing to Chill Out Piano Night Jazz, while Sari does not recommend writing to the Beastie Boys’ “Intergalactic“

* * *

Produced by Longreads and Charts & Leisure.