Hi ! Welcome back. Once the weekend is done, we are basically in July. And as my friend Laura says, once July comes Christmas is just around the corner. Things speed up. This week I am thinking and writing about tardiness, kindness, friendship, doing difficult things and …monkeys- Eve D.❣️

I’m going to come clean right from the start. It’s 10:30pm on a Friday night, and I am only now starting to write this newsletter. It will be sent out in about 13 hours, and I intend to sleep for at least 8 of those. I had every intention of starting this edition much earlier this evening, but then I clicked “play” on the third episode of Season 2 of Nine Perfect Strangers, and now…well, now I am on episode six. It is what it is. I can’t even tell you that this is a must-watch series because I honestly just don’t know yet. It’s so good, but also so pretentious and so in love with itself, that I am conflicted. Maybe I will have more clarity next week when I finish the season. 

All this to say: it’s late, and I can’t spend a lot of time writing this, even though I wish I could. And it doesn’t even help to say “just make it short, Eve!” because as Mark Twain (or was it Winston Churchill??) said….trying to writing something decent that is also short takes twice as long as writing something long. But we prevail.

Week in review…

🍽️ G and I had dinner with friends at a restaurant that’s an “institution” in town. (It really is! I was going there 25 years ago!). The food was great, as was the company, but the tables were very close together in very tight, enclosed spaces and the whole place was loud. It made the evening difficult because we really had to a) strain to hear each other talk and b)strain to talk loud enough to be heard. That’s enough for me to probably not ever go there again. Maybe in summer they open all the doors and it’s better? Not sure how I will find out. G and I always dissect our restaurant rendezvous the following day, and we both agreed that there are better options out there for us. (But the food was great).

🛍️ G needed some hiking equipment (he’s doing a big hike later in the year, and no I am not going for many reasons but the main one is because I am not totally mad). He went to look at some shops to investigate new gear, and I was happy to tag along and mentally shop for my upcoming Camino. I spoke to the shop assistants about lots of the options, and when G asked me later what I had learnt I said that I had learnt that I don’t make enough money. This sports gear stuff is expensive. But it was super exciting to realise that I am doing this. I will be filling up that new 35 litre backpack (the one with “a light frame, mash for ventilation and lifetime guarantee honoured in every country where it’s sold”) with all new stuff, and lugging it 800km across Spain. Wait a minute, maybe I am mad after all?

🚶‍♀️ Speaking of walking, this week I walked both on a treadmill in a gym, and outside in the clean, fresh air of my suburb. And let me tell you…walking on a treadmill is torture. It is boring, and uninspiring (two different concepts) and I could barely manage 30 minutes. Outside, it’s totally different. I walked for an hour and could have easily done double that. Funny enough, I was listening to a podcast while doing both walks, and the guest talked about exactly that: how walking outside is so much better because our bodies respond well to the small challenges (don’t trip, don’t get lost, what bird is that?) and the constant sideways movement of our eyes (to ensure we stay safe, etc) is scientifically proven to be relaxing. (It’s the theory of EMDR therapy, if you are familiar with it). Point is: get outside. 

🐠 In this section I usually tell you what I did do, but it’s also important to take note of what I didn’t do. And this week, a sure thing that I almost did, but then definitely did not, is buy a fish tank. I was really tempted. A neighbour was selling one and I thought Zac would love it, but then both my kids convinced me that it was really not a great idea. Also, do I need more work in my life? No, I do not. And fishtanks are a lot of work. (Fun fact: I grew up in a house of fishtanks. My father had massive ones along the entire perimeter of his study with quite a collection of fish. If you think fish are dumb creatures…they are not. They knew my dad, and loved him. They got visibly excited when he entered the room. Those fishtanks were a pain in the butt to maintain. But, also, they were fun). Anyway, no fish tank for us. 

🎒 My star grade-8 pupil whom I am tutoring in maths got 70% for his exam, and given that he received 25% for his term mark, I am thrilled with both our efforts. The whole experience has also got me thinking about how our kids are often victims of bad teaching setups, and what the long term and unfair consequences might be. If I didn’t tutor this kid, it’s very possible he would fail the year. The repercussions of that are clearly serious. But, with just a little bit of targeted attention, it turns out this kid is not in fact a kid who is “very bad at maths” but is actually a kid who is “very good at maths”. How many kids slip through the cracks because their assessments are not matched to capabilities of the teachers? Scary shit.

Friendship Spectrum

You’ve probably heard of the Dunbar number concept. It refers to the fact that humans can only maintain about 150 one-on-one connections successfully. Obviously you can’t have 150 close friends, but you probably can know 150 people whom you wouldn’t be loathe to say “hi!” to in a bar, and maybe share an impromptu drink with. (Fun fact: This doesn’t apply to me. I might know 150 people, but if I saw most of them in a bar, I would pray to all the heavens that they did not see me first, and that I could successfully hide. This, btw, is the opposite of what G would do.)

This makes me (once again) question the definition of the word “friend”. Like most people, I have all degrees of friends: from best friends, through good friends, acquaintances, colleagues and online-only friends. It’s these online-only friends who pose the biggest conundrum. Some of them I have known for years, and have exchanged multiple social media comments, reactions, Whatsapps, emails and even phone calls (big one for me!) or Zoom sessions (hello, Covid lockdown). I cherish most of these online-people, and definitely refer to them as friends, but for almost most of them I have absolutely zero interest in ever meeting them in real life. On the other hand, some specific online-friends are my best friends, and hugely important to me, and meeting them in real life is a must-do item on my list of things that need to be done.

It seems strange to apply the same word to someone I know through vague but consistent pings on the socials, as to someone to whom I pour out my heart, face-to-face over coffee once or twice a week. Yet “friend” is the only word we have to use to describe a non-romantic, or non-familial connection that extends past our work life. Which is all to say that the word “friend”, much like the word “love” is totally inadequate to describe the many layers of the connection spectrum. We need more words! 

(By the way, this week I learnt that there are over half a million Japanese citizens who have no friends, and who have not left their house in months or years. And I’ll bet this is not just true for Japan.)

(And also, another fact: the 150-connection Dunbar limit does not apply just to friends. It also applies to colleagues. It’s been shown that offices or branches that have fewer than 150 workers are much more functional, and have much happier people than the massive skyscraper headquarters that pepper our CBDs).

Do the tough stuff:

I’m reading The Comfort Crisis by Michael Easter. I am not done, but I want to tell you about it anyway. The book is somewhat of a self help / pop-psychology book about how we should do more things, but it is told (and very well, at that) on the back of the story about the author’s 40 day trip to the Arctic, to go hunting caribou. Basically, the author and two other men get dropped off in the Arctic wilderness with nothing but a backpack and a lot of trepidation, and they have to hike for hundreds of miles to find a herd of caribou, shoot one, and then bring the meat back to camp. 

I’m at the point of the book where they have sighted herds of these majestic animals, and the author has described them with such passion that I am horrified that he will succeed in his mission and actually manage to kill one. I do not want a caribou bull to be shot and eaten. It seems so unfair to the poor animal, who was just minding his own business, on his own land, in his private corner of the world (she says, while having had enjoyed a burger for dinner). To ease the pang of pain and guilt, the author makes it clear that they only shoot bulls who are at the end of their life, and the shot is painless and quick, and …circle of life etc, etc. But still. I do hope the caribou outsmart them all.

Nevertheless, I still strongly recommend this book. The storytelling is masterful and funny, and the message is clear: get out and do shit that’s difficult, because that’s how you grow and become a better and happier person. You don’t have to hike for 40 days in the Arctic (honestly, I do not recommend this at all) but you should attempt to do something at least once a year that fulfils two rules: it should be something so difficult that you only think you have a 50/50 chance of actually completing it, and b) it shouldn’t kill you. There is a word for this types of task: misogi, and I strongly suspect that by the time you finish the book you will be making a list of all the misogis that you should be trying at some point in your life.

I’ve been watching…

We watched Better Man, which is a about the life of Robbie Williams (the singer), whose character throughout the entire movie is played by an (extremely well executed) CGI generated monkey. Yep. Literally. At first, I thought…WTF? But then, the concept kind of grew on me and  can say with absolute confidence that if there was no monkey it would simply have been an okay movie. But with the monkey, it’s brave, and very good! I’d certainly recommend it. As a bonus, I loved the fact that I knew all the words to all the songs, and was thrilled to discover that the Never Ever song by All Saints also made it into the movie, because Robbie dated Nicole, the lead singer from All Saints. I loved that song. 

Also, this is a true story. And another example that everyone’s life has up and downs, goes through cycles, is not easy…and that when you think you’re at your end and have nothing left to give… you still have the power to change that. And the results will be remarkable.

Looking ahead…

I am looking forward to a good week. Laura is back in town, so we will probably resume our mountain-hiking. Zac is doing an online holiday camp and an in-person Robotics camp at the local university, where he gets to design, create, 3D print and program a robot. Micole is on holiday, and is planning to a) get her driver’s licence and b) sleep. G will be out of town for most of the week and weekend, so I will hunker down and focus on work. I will finish reading my book, will focus on writing my own, wil definitely watch a lot of streaming shows (Murderbot is so good!) and will hopefully not wait till last minute to write this newsletter. For the record, it’s now 00:15 on Saturday. The weekend has arrived. Hope you have a great one!

Thanks for reading!

Want more? You can find past editions here.

Want to chat? You can email me privately by hitting reply on this email. I read and reply to all :-)

P.S.