What It Is I Think I’m Up to Here, Roughly

Welcome to The Pocket

Yes, welcome to The Pocket.

I’m here because I finally said yes to the invitation that’s been thwacking about my inner landscape. The invitation to write, to share what I’m learning, exploring, and researching. To trust that there’s some gold in these hills.

You’re here because I’ve passed the invitation along to you. And now we’re in a daisy chain together.

We are in strange times, unprecedented times, time outside of time. And in such a phase, “Talking to yourself can be useful,” Zadie Smith wrote in Intimations, her recent collection of essays. “And writing means being overheard.”

So this is The Pocket, where I will be talking to myself, yes, because it’s what I think feels useful in my brain and body. And I am sharing it here, in whatever form that emerges, because frankly that’s the invitation that emerged. 

But also it’s an offering to you. Maybe it will nourish, educate, or entertain in some way meaningful for you. And I hope you’ll connect back and share widely what lights you up.

As Robin Wall Kimmerer wrote:

For me, writing is an act of reciprocity with the world; it is what I can give back in return for everything that has been given to me.

I’m in the seat of abundance. Even amidst all of life’s shifts and struggles, losses and anxieties, complexities and corny cooking shows, I have been nourished by so many beautiful souls and transcendent words. A cross-disciplinary cornucopia. A fellowship of plenties. A lineage of light-bearers. 

And one thing I’ve learned. When the invitation comes clear and close, when it comes to you in the slipstream of a sweet beat or a resonant melody, ... you always RSVP “yes.” 

And tonight, my almost-two-year-old woke up crying in the two o’clock hour, and I found myself unable to fall back asleep. This post thwacking about in my head and heart. So I got out of bed to make this post happen in the dark of night. Yesterday, I’d have likely slept on this draft, knifed it a dozen times come morning, let my monkey mind go to hell-town on it, and left it on the shelf to molder. But today I’m hitting send right now.

But before I go, here’s the emerging charter of The Pocket:

- posts may be off-the-cuff, stream-of-thought
- or they may be annotated and precise
- they may convey tools, tricks, and listicle delights
- Or answers to big questions
- but more likely than not, more questions than answers
- and always, priority will be given to surprising connections

Thanks for being here. Until soon.