Leisure pursuits
Welcome to this week’s Jumpstack! No politics this week, as people of all ages are completely over the churning chaos of this election: even the children are getting restless. Instead, we’re making time for the good things in life. Let’s jump in!
Do you know where your friends are?
We’re at the cusp of the best part of the year: we’ve settled into routines, the weather is good, and we’re in that pre-holiday season before schedules fill up with obligations. Which makes it the perfect time to catch up with a good friend.
According to studies, however, we are collectively lonely.
We may interact with many over the day, but the depth and quality of those interactions leaves us wanting. Sarah Raphael consults with various experts to find out why we feel isolated despite being technically connected:
Due to the prevalence of social media in our lives, we might actually be spending more time nurturing these superficial relationships—the 35 in the third layer, or the 100+ in the final layer—than the highly valuable individuals in our immediate circle. Despite engaging with a wide network, if that first layer is missing, we’re likely to feel lonely.
As with most things, maintaining friendships requires patience, and effort, and putting your pants on. Hearing a friend laugh is worth a thousand likes, and we can use our connectedness to re-establish old ones:
Time is on our side
October is the best month, for Thanksgiving and Halloween and, throughout, baseball.
I luxuriate in these final few weeks, despite the Blue Jays having no part of it: it’s easier to enjoy the game when you’re not holding your chest through the duration. In a letter to a friend, John Rawls reflects on what makes the sport such a great escape:
Baseball shares with tennis the idea that time never runs out, as it does in basketball and football and soccer. This means that there is always time for the losing side to make a comeback.
Read right hand
Ever since I was a child, I’ve loved advice and manners columns, to the point where I consider myself a connoisseur.
A good advice column is rare: often the writer will miss the actual question being answered, or spend more time on themselves than the problem at hand. The writing is often not inspired.
Nick Cave makes none of these mistakes:
Almost a sermon, Cave provides advice as applicable to middle-aged cynics as it is to the insecure teenager it is addressed. We also get a peek into the perspective gleaned from a musician’s life:
I live mostly in hotels these days, and as I cautiously enter a different bathroom each night, with its angled mirrors and merciless lighting, I stand before the mirror at my most defenceless and exposed, and watch it do its worst. I often wonder how much accumulated misery a hotel mirror contains as it reflects back at us what appears to be our essential self.
I’ll never look at a hotel mirror the same way again, but I’ll also remember to be kind to who I see in it.
And that’s it for The Jumpstack! Enjoy the long weekend, and we’ll see you next week for another smoke break with your work wife.
— Jump
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