The things we'll carry from 2020
We lost much this year, but what we end up keeping will surely surprise us.
I recently found a bottle of Worcestershire sauce in the back of my cupboard that I purchased no later than 2009. (The “best by” date was in 2010. It seemed fine last week.) That means the bottle came with me on eight moves, beginning when I lived in my first apartment in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. I moved it to the building next door, then a few blocks away, then to Western Massachusetts for the year I spent on sabbatical from my job as a theology professor, then back to the same apartment I had left the year before, then back to Massachusetts for a semester of unpaid leave after I became miserable in my job, then to a new apartment in Pennsylvania, then to Dallas after I quit my job, and finally to the house my wife and I bought earlier this year.
Through all of that, I used only a few drops, if any, of the bottle’s contents before I packed it up and took it to the next place. You would think it was one of my most prized possessions, a family heirloom or talisman of my identity. There were good pieces of furniture I got rid of more readily than that bottle. But really, it was just something I didn’t think much about, something that wasn’t hard to keep and that gave me no reason to discard.
What does this mean? I think it means that we can’t know in advance what we will take away from any place or time or relationship. Even in a year as painful as this one — we lost people, and jobs, and so much of our ordinarily lives — things happened that we will find ourselves holding onto. Some may even be good things that we cannot quite recognize yet. Or neutral things, like the Worcestershire bottle, that will grow in significance just by the fact that you’ve carried them for so long. I can’t even say, “I hope you find those things,” because you just will. You will, one day, just realize what they are, and that they matter for no other reason than that you’ve kept them. How much of culture, or of meaning, is nothing more than this?
Spiritual nonfiction class
There are just one or two spots left in my eight-week online Spiritual Nonfiction writing class, which begins next week. Each week, I walk you through how excellent examples of writing about religion and spirituality are put together, and then we discuss them, and you have the opportunity to practice the techniques you just learned. You also get to workshop two longer essays, getting feedback from me and your fellow students. Please reply if you have questions. Register soon!
New podcast
Just out today from America Media is a podcast on free time, for which I was interviewed. The podcast is very well done, composed more like an essay than a typical radio interview. The host Maggi Van Dorn talks not just to me but to Conor Kelly, a theological ethicist who has just come out with a book on free time, and to a guy named Fitz who works for REI, a company that puts a priority on its employees’ free time. (I talk about burnout and monks: you know, my usual shtick.) Here again is the podcast; here it is on Apple Podcasts.
My year in writing
I wrote a lot in 2020. It’s just that you won’t get to see it until late 2021. The big accomplishment was finishing my book on burnout. The publisher has officially accepted it, and it will go into production soon. Don’t worry — you’ll hear plenty about the book as we get closer to its publication date. I plan to post this newsletter more frequently in the second half of the year, and I will be recruiting you to help get the word out. (Even now, you can help by sharing this post with others; click the red “Share” button at the bottom of the email.)
I only published a few pieces in the past year. If you missed them, here they are:
A review of Meghan Daum’s most recent book, The Problem with Everything, for America.
An essay on the value of regret, “Je Regrette Tout,” for The Hedgehog Review.
An essay on how to imagine a better way of working after the pandemic, based on conversations with people who, early on, were glad to have their normal work routines upset, for The New Republic.
A long personal essay on drinking and (not) belonging in Rust Belt Pennsylvania, for Commonweal. (Definitely the one that got the biggest response, and that I’m most proud of having written.)
A short essay on Covid-19, work, and religious ethics for Journal of Religious Ethics. (Scroll way, way down to find my essay, or search for “Irene Oh,” and read what follows her piece. Read Irene’s piece, too, which is on the idea of home and the myth of safety.)
It was also nice to find out that two things I published last year were listed as “notable” in The Best American series: my Commonweal essay on monks and work in The Best American Essays, and my New York Times Magazine Letter of Recommendation for cheap sushi in The Best American Food Writing.
You will get to read much more from me in 2021. I have a backlog of ideas having nothing to do with work or burnout that I want to get into the world, and then later in the year, I will have much to say about burnout around the book’s publication. Regardless, I will keep writing for you here, too.
Thank you for reading throughout the past year. Here’s to a much better year ahead!
Jon