Han Kang’s Human Acts

(This was written in 2017, for a publication that no longer exists) At the beginning of Han Kang’s The Vegetarian (2016), a woman stops eating meat. Her dull and conventional family is confused: to prefer not to, in this way, is literally unthinkable, and so it breaks everyone’s predictable brains. But what begins as a … Continue reading Han Kang’s Human Acts →

it’s weird that artwork + money = art

I bought a painting from a local artist, recently, and when I met her in the coffee shop where it had been hanging—the coffee shop where we had seen it and said, you know what? We really like that painting, what if we bought it, let’s buy it—the artist told me how happy she was … Continue reading it’s weird that artwork + money = art →

Fossil

There’s a good show buried inside The Acolyte, that they didn’t quite make—or that they made and then unmade—but to dig it out, you have to spoil the show they actually made. This is fine. It’s not a very good show. It has some good parts and scenes, and there are some interesting ideas embedded … Continue reading Fossil →

You can’t see the person taking the picture when you take pictures of your kids (but they can)

I’ve been thinking about why a passage I read in The Media bugs me, and I’ve been trying to turn my irritation with it—the way I respond, instantly, reflexively, with what might be a very predictable and overdetermined disavowal—into the narcissistic question of what my annoyance says about me. This is a blog, I can … Continue reading You can’t see the person taking the picture when you take pictures of your kids (but they can) →

Ten Reasons Why “Get Back” is Bad, You Cowards

1. You think you’re getting the “real” thing, but you are not. People criticized Peter Jackson’s WWI documentary for treating the archive like a canvas to correct, and this hyper-mediated “real” is just as manipulated, partial, and subtly shaped and scripted. It’s just that this one is so long that we’ve decided it’s TRUTH, that … Continue reading Ten Reasons Why “Get Back” is Bad, You Cowards →

Babies are dumb

Nicanor has learned that some foods are hot, which hurts his mouth when he eats them. He has learned that if I blow on a food, it is hot. When I offer him soup, he says “hot” because soup is a food that is hot. A few days ago, I gave him some water that … Continue reading Babies are dumb →

What Remains

Yesterday, a pair of men came with a truck and chains and a check for a few hundred dollars, and they hauled away the car that I inherited from my mother, when she died, and I couldn't let it go, couldn't let it go, and it's been sitting in front of our house for long … Continue reading What Remains →

Every day can be Sunday

Already in the nineties, some 80% of Palestinian kids showed signs of PTSD and nearly half had witnessed the death of a friend. This episode of Ordinary Unhappiness with Jess Ghannam has me still reeling in my dad-feelings: Things got so profoundly worse in Gaza after the 2005 blockade ... The children stopped playing. The … Continue reading Every day can be Sunday →

1.5-2.5, 3-5

Sundays are when all the dads come out, and when I was chatting with another dad at the playground, he told me that the age our kids are at now was the hardest, the span between about 1.5 to 2.5 years. "That's how old they are, right?" His were now 3 and 5. Many reasons, but … Continue reading 1.5-2.5, 3-5 →

A Completely True and Novel Entry in my Weblog

I’m sitting in the back garden, at about 5:30 in the morning. It’s dark, but pleasantly cool, and I can hear the rustling in the vines along the fence-line; I’ve been keeping the back light on all night, so that when I wake up at 4, which I inevitably do, I can look out the … Continue reading A Completely True and Novel Entry in my Weblog →