Curiouser and curiouser
Been thinking a lot lately about the ways curiosity and creativity overlap, and how art and literature are almost always early casualties in any giant power grab. Curious minds and sensitive hearts are an absolute force when they engage in a sense of play, and of course when pushback comes, by contrast, its arrival is usually breathtakingly stupid (see: manufactured panic over autism, drag queens, books about freckles, etc).
There are gobs of evidence suggesting that our minds are swimming in a sea of creative genius when we're kids, but then we're yanked ashore and put to work, conditioned to run ourselves to death on our hamster wheels while robber barons feast on the dividends. Over time, our inclination toward original thought shrinks, because of course it does. It's too easy to forget how good it was to kick back and live in a state of awe, inquiry, and expanse. I know we're all stretched thin right now, but what if we started wading back out there? What if we made a habit of it?
Anyway, here's (a) wonderwall:
- Did you know bumblebees like to play? They're the first invertebrate species ever to meet the scientific standard of playing just for the heck of it. Here's how I learned this—through someone online who's as smitten with this news as anybody ought to be, which is to say: very very.
- I can't stop thinking about this art by Helena Hafemann, who takes broken china and makes it into something wondrous, a bit like kintsugi but with colored threads instead of gold leaf. Beauty in brokenness, metaphors abounding. (her socials, her website)
- Also of note: these hyperrealistic disco ball oil paintings by Alice Masters. The amount of patience required to focus on one square at a time, culminating in something like this... hot damn. Also, it's likely a good time to revisit the history of disco, remember why its downfall was so swift, and name who and what shut it down (tl;dr: the great philosopher Ilana Wexler was right: in da clurb, we all fam, and joyful solidarity like that freaks out the cowards).
- Please enjoy a taste of Squirrels at the Window, a video channel where someone regularly puts muffins and such on the windowsill for fluffy-tailed local rascals to nibble on. The treats are made with their little squirrel tummies in mind, so it's like a health food bakery with unlimited free samples. Come for the "aww," stay for the unscripted drama and pathos of Greta, Manny, and the rest of this motley arboreal crew.
- Speaking of neighbors, may we all be this kind.
- And speaking of standing up for one another, here's author, humorist, activist, and all-around gorgeous human Alok, as ever, letting the truth tumble from their chest like a song.
- Did you know about this gentleman named Rob Kenney who started a "Dad How Do I" series during lockdown in April 2020? When he was a kid, his dad split and wasn't around to teach him life skills like shaving, car maintenance, and basic finances. He eventually figured all that stuff out, and now as an adult, he offers a free, nearly bottomless well of tutorials online for anyone who needs them, complete with terrible/wonderful dad jokes and pep talks from the heart. (If he gets milkshake ducked, I give up, and if you don't know what that means, I commend you for being that offline when twitter was a thing.)
Be kind to your mind, friends. Let's hear it for your spirit. Get some rest, if you can, and leave room for wonder. You-know-who hates it when we do that.
"Curiosity is insubordination in its purest form."
—Vladimir Nabokov
21 April 2025
[read the previous week's post] [read the following week's post] [see all posts]