I needed a break from work on Monday, and pulled the pile of “stuff to process” that has been sitting on the corner of my desk just a bit too long. There are no time-sensitive documents or essential tasks in this pile; rather, it’s the accumulation of things I’ve read or seen that I want to record in some way, whether it’s the name of a book to add to my library, an interesting item to keep handy for book ideas, or something to add to my clippings box. (Yes, I still keep a box of clippings from the newspaper and other print media.)

In August 2020, the San Francisco Chronicle did a set of special supplements on the pandemic, and in the August 30 edition was a short fiction piece, “The Spectrum Generation” by Carolina De Robertis. She frames it as a letter from a college student to his professor, written in the year 2030, about the assigned topic of “How the COVID Era Shaped Your Life”.

She imagines the letter writer as a science major who is having trouble fitting the assignment into the standard five-paragraph essay. The student claims not to be a writer, but “I was raised by an English teacher”, and the writing is wonderfully descriptive of the student’s experiences as a child during the pandemic.

What spoke to me most was this quote:

“Maybe that’s what I learned from TCE: we don’t have to fear change. This isn’t some dystopian future where all is lost. Those old narratives are so lazy. If all is lost, you can just throw up your hands in despair, and then what? Look at the climate crisis. We can’t afford those old despair stories anymore.
The more complicated truth takes all of where we are, and tries to see it clearly. The more complicated truth is that I may be part of a different generation, but I’m also my grandma’s grandson, and we all have to pick up where past generations left off and carry the work forward.”

I encourage you to read it in full; it’s a one page story, and well worth the time.

Overlooking the Cortile
—David St. John

for T

Late winter yet we stood at the open window
Its green wood shutters pushed back like wings
Against the walls of the ancient building
We stood at the aperture of the narrow room
Looking down onto the fountain in the cortile
Her old room now mine & she said nothing
Of the year she’d slept here
Knowing the Russian painter she loved
Was out somewhere on the streets of Rome
Walking with his Contessa every evening at dusk
As the grief of a rossignol ran down the stones of
The faded wall just outside her window & along the ivy
Seeping slowly as water from the lips of Orpheus
& those liquid sobs of a Roman nightingale

For years, we’ve had the amazing Death Wish coffees, both at home and the office. Because some days, you need 708 milligrams of caffeine per 12 ounce cup (the average coffee has between 105 – 405 milligrams per 12 ounce cup), and making an offering to the gods with Valhalla Java Odinforce Blend feels right.

However, I’ve had a metabolism shift, and can’t do caffeine like that any more. But I love my coffee, and found Birds & Beans—Smithsonian Bird Friendly® shade-grown organic coffee. Their website states, “[the] certification is independently considered the best guarantee of environmentally sound, sustainably grown coffee farming. Now by simply drinking the right coffee, coffee lovers can help preserve over 100,000 acres of prime tropical habitat and biodiversity, save birds, family farms and the Earth we all share.”

[Image description: A drawing of a tree and two birds in silhouette, with the words “Bird Friendly” and “Smithsonian” in white letters.]

They go on to explain:
“For over 100 years full and partial shade farming was the traditional method of coffee production. However the industry’s boom resulted in most forests being cleared. Full-sun farms elicit a higher yield and require less management creating bigger profits for CEO’s. For migratory birds and local wildlife the result of this is habitat loss. Now less than 40% of coffee farms remain in true shade and organic. The human cost is that many coffee workers must move to find work and fair wages as this increased demand for coffee has led to lowered standards.
At Birds & Beans Coffee we pay our farmers the top price for coffee so they can keep growing coffee the old-fashioned way and so they can keep supporting their workers and families.”

They company also donates 5% from every bag sold to their conservation partners, including the American Bird Conservancy, the Urban Wildlands Group, and the national and several local chapters of Audubon, among others.

And the coffee is good! It’s so nice to be able to enjoy a cup of coffee and not bounce off the walls for the next 10 hours. They also have decaf, for people who want to avoid caffeine entirely.

Organic, fair trade, environmentally sensitive coffee that does good and tastes good! What more could you ask for?

[Image description: A photo of six bags of Birds & Bean coffee in different flavors.]

Note: I don’t receive a commission or anything from them for writing about the coffee—I’m doing this solely because I enjoy their coffee, and I appreciate being able to do some good just by doing something as simple as buying coffee.

Punch cards are mostly associated with the early days of computer programming. Because computers could not store files, the programs and data were entered onto punch cards, which were then fed into the computer so it could move through its motions and do its job. (For a longer explanation, you can check out Computer Hope’s article.)

A computer punch card.

Punch cards were used as early as 1725, when Joseph Marie Jacquard supported the development of the Jacquard Loom to weave, well, Jacquard-pattern fabrics.

A Jacquard loom showing information punch cards, National Museum of Scotland. Photo by Stephen C. Dickson.

Like many people I know, I have days when self-care is easy, and days when it’s not so easy. I don’t know who thought giving me a body to take care of was a good idea, but they were somewhat mistaken. Additionally, my life has a lot of moving parts (really, whose life doesn’t?), and it’s easy to forget things.

So, I made myself a set of punch cards to help me do my job of getting me through various parts of my day. Three of them are pictured. Yes, they are on 4″ x 6″ index cards, which makes them easy to carry as I move through my day, and to take them with me when I travel.

[Image description: Three purple index cards with handwritten lists on them.]

Yours don’t have to be this complicated! Mine are quite detailed, because I need all the help I can get to remember to do things—especially in the morning, when I am not at anything like my best, and putting myself into human form and ready to leave for work involves entirely too many steps.

These are not my to-do lists for work or personal projects; these are only the things I need to do in order to get ready for the day, navigate certain points in the day, and then end the day in something like a calm and peaceful manner, so I have a better chance of sleeping well. (My to-do lists are another thing entirely, and will make an appearance at some point.)

Some days, I don’t have to do more than skim them for reminders (set the alarms for my meds doses, for example—it’s a small thing, and easy to forget). Other days, I have to follow them, one item at a time, because otherwise I will end up leaving for the work with wet hair and wearing my house slippers.

A simple version might have this list for the morning:
*Eat breakfast
*Wash breakfast dishes
*Brush teeth
*Take vitamin
*Shower
*Put on clothes and shoes
*Pack work bag (I have a list inside my work bag to remind me of what needs to be in it before I leave the house.)

Then, at the end of the day:
*Eat dinner
*Wash dinner dishes
*Check tomorrow’s calendar and add extra items to work bag if needed
*Brush teeth
*Wash and moisturize face
*30 minutes of calm (screenless time—read soothing poems or a calming book, listen to calming music, etc.)
*Check front and back doors are locked
*Tuck myself in

If that seems too much, you could start with this for the morning:
*Eat breakfast
*Brush teeth
*Shower

and this for the evening:
*Eat dinner
*Wash breakfast and dinner dishes
*Brush teeth
*Wash face and moisturize
*Go to bed

I hope this idea is helpful for you!

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[Image description: A teaser screenshot of this week’s Insight from the Oracles, with just a hint of the cards and runes showing.]