Spring Cleaning

I am something of a content junkie. It borders on hoarding. It may be out-and-out hoarding, who knows. It is some sort of condition, for sure, because I am faced with clearing out the piles of subscriptions, online and print, that are stacked up around me—mostly in my email inbox—unread, out-of-date, extraneous stuff by now, and I am having a hard time parting with any of it. 

I blame winter for how bad it has become. Shorter days and longer nights, with fewer chores to do, winter is the time for reading in front of the fire. Easy enough to do with just a book, but if it happens to be reading on my iPad, then I am vulnerable to every link I come across leading me down another dark tunnel to a free weekly subscription on writing, publishing, the media, gardening, cooking, finance, world affairs, national affairs, or dog behavior.

Here’s a sample from this morning:

The Wakeup, which is a daily digest from The Ankler, a pithy, Hollywood business-insider report. The lead in this morning’s email: “Where I was starting to get a little concerned that Hollywood had run out of reboots [sic] reimaginings from the vaults, given our great progress so far this year. But don’t worry America! PEACOCK has ya covered, announcing a new reality show with Paris & Nicole (if you have to ask for last names, you’re just too young).”

 Do I need to know about a new reality show with Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie? Heck no, except as grist for a book (fiction) I am writing about the media industry. I keep thinking I should hold on to my Ankler subscription for that reason. At best, I skim it.

Investopedia Pre-Market. Self-explanatory. Arrives around eight a.m. every day. I read maybe one out of ten of them. Today the headlines include President Biden’s new tariffs on the Chinese, stock rallies at AMC and GameStop, Home Depot Q1 results. (I deleted it.)

Poem-a-Day. A feature of the Academy of American Poets. I do not write much poetry, but I thought I ought to confront myself with the art. Most of it goes right over my head. This morning’s offering: “When The World Falls in Around You or, Vows to My Palestinian Wife on Our Wedding Day,” by Lehua M. Taitano. It is one of those that I will have to read several times for the meaning to wash over me. It has a remarkable structure. Honestly, though, I can’t invest the time. Have to get this column done and spread more pine chips. Which is how it is every day. But still, I think should make room for poetry each morning. Shouldn’t we all? 

Write or Die. Support community for writers. Sometimes funny. Frankly, the email has turned into a promotional vehicle for writing and publishing seminars. This one can probably go.

Politico Playbook: This is a keeper. Everyone should subscribe to Politico’s Playbook, which arrives every morning, high-topping it across the national political agenda. Irreverent, remarkably impartial, I learn more from this about what is going on in Washington than any other source. From today: “Let the Show Votes Begin.” It is campaign season, and as one senior Democratic aide reportedly tells Politico, “We’ve done all the bi-partisan things we have to [for the year].” 

Great.

There are many more: a newsletter by someone I knew in the old internet advertising days called The Future Does Not Fit Into Containers of the Past (obvious, I would think), Astral Codex Ten (I know, right? What’s an Astral Codex Ten? It was someone’s recommendation.), and The Wrong Side of History (flooding in and I have yet to read one. Another recommendation.), plus assorted columnists from the New York Times, the Atlantic, The New Yorker, and all the publications I stopped subscribing to that keep gnawing at me to resubscribe.  

There is not time to digest all of this stuff. As it piles up I feel worse about what I am missing. I need an ignorance-is-bliss-pause in the action. And, by the way (or, btw), I do not really use social media, which I could not imagine fitting into my content day.

I am watching the black flies swarm outside the window. They are waiting for me. They know I can’t stay inside all day reading and writing. There is a pile of wood chips that says so. 

There is just no escaping the swarming and gnawing.

Published, June 4, 2024 in the Monadnock Ledger-Transcript