Improvised Life

Wendell Berry’s Reminder

When I heard Wendell Berry reading his poem “How to Be a Poet”, I thought: that’s exactly what I’ve been doing to heal myself of the strange illness I’ve been dealing with.

Ziwe’s Meditation on Feet and Shame

Writing about the public rating of her feet on the celebrity foot database wikiFeet— who knew?!— She describes the strange reality of social scrutiny and all the shit it puts in our heads and that we have to find ways to antidote. Which she does, in the last beautiful paragraph…

Practical Matters: Black Dishcloths + How to Hang Sweaters + a Robert Montgomery Print

Recently I came across two things that have upped my homekeeping game hugely. Robert Montgomery’s brilliant artwork “All Palaces” put it all in perspective.

The Question We Ponder from Annie Ernaux’s “The Years”

The Years by Annie Ernaux was published in 2008 and won the Nobel Prize in 2022, 14 years later. THAT’s how complex and original its vision and ideas were; it took a long time to be seen. One passage haunts us, or perhaps better put, has become a question we ask ask ourselves daily.

Short Meditations to Get You Through (Vivek Murthy, Wild Man Yogi Bryan)

Dr. Vivek Murthy, 21st Surgeon General of the United States and a Yogi Bryan, a wild man meditator we recently discovered, share their quick meditations for regaining connection and calm. Similar practices, VERY different approaches.

Offering: A Platter of Fresh Herbs to Enjoy with Abandon

The story behind Olia Hercules’ A Case for Eating Herbs as if They Were Vegetables in the New Yorker is well worth reading. But the title conveys the vital message. A platter of herbs offered alongside other dishes in a meal is an invitation for guests to enjoy herbs primal and fragrant with abandon.

Jacques D’Amboise: “Friendship is Not a Straight Line”

We’ve watched this beautiful clip many times, delighting in the late, legendary dancer Jacques d’Amboise’s insights into the rituals that define friendships and social interaction. We hadn’t known we were dancing…

Apologies from H.C Westermann, Holton Rower, Buson…

The very best letter of apology we can imagine is a strangely wonderful love letter artist H.C. Westermann’s wrote to his wife Joanna Beall Westermann. “Dear Sweety”, it starts. Then he goes at it. It got us thinking about apologies…

To Make the Unwanted Wanted (Jane Hirschfield)

The New York Times’ Ezra Klein’s conversation with poet Jane Hirshfield yielded many remarkable insights. But what dazzled us most was her reading of her poem A Cedary Fragrance, and the story behind her writing it, and its big lesson and challenge.

Annals of Guerilla Action: Outrage and Chalk Fuel a Powerful Statement

Improvised Life’s vast archive is liberally peppered with posts about guerilla actions: small-scale actions that deploy subversive messages in unexpected ways. A recent one in the middle of a busy New York City crosswalk gets our admiration for its daring, power and simplicity.

Breathtaking Early Morning Tree Report from Sicily

My friend Anthony Giglio, in Italy decompressing from a packed year of teaching people about wine, food, joy, living (read about him here), sent an astonishing series of texts from Sicily where he was visiting family. He managed to bring the feeling of its ancient trees right into my Harlem space.

The Headline We Need To See…(And Other Reminders)

It’s by Alessandra Olanow, whose instagram @alanow has some great, not-treacley reminders…

Advice for An Anxiety Situation (Maira Kalman)

Maria Kalman recently arrived in our Inbox with an invitation to buy a signed and numbered edition she created. It’s called “Don’t Think too Much” and it has much to say on the subject and how not to… (think too much)

Walking and Falling at the Same Time (Laurie Anderson + Francis Alys)

Walking around the park, letting Spotify feed us what it thinks we might like, we found ourselves listening to two minutes of Laurie Anderson that threw a big SHIFT into our perception of walking. Which got us thinking about Francis Alys’ work and view of the subject.

Transforming Ordinary Materials Just for the Hell of It

We love when some visionary soul shifts ordinary objects into the visually beautiful and surprising. And reveals the ordinary for what it really it: material full of possibilities…

A Letter from Sally about Improvised Life

Much has changed since I launched Improvised Life 14 or so years ago in a wonderful big LEAP that would engender 4700 posts on a wild range of subjects. Lately, postings have become less frequent and I wanted to tell you why and how I’ll be moving forward from here…

Nature’s Operating Manual

In her seminal 1997 book Biomimicry, Janine Benyus introduced the notion that we could be better off by simply mimicking the ways problems are solved in nature. Although usually formatted as a numbered list, we saw them for the first time as a single sentence, set up like a poem. And like a good poem, it makes for a radical shift of view…

Ode to Eggs (Let Me Count the Ways…)

Although a lot of people complain about the price of eggs, we think they are a bargain. One or two can still make a mighty meal for under two bucks. And there are ENDLESS ways to cook treat them. To spark egg possibility-thinking, we reprise our edit of Renee Schettler Rossi’s “All Hail the Mighty Egg” that appeared in in Leite’s Culinaria some years ago: inspired ideas fueled by memory, passion and hunger.

‘ a return to the strange idea of continuous living despite the mess of us’ (Ada Limon)

We were listening to music we’d “liked” long ago on SoundCloud and forgotten, when suddenly we heard the great Ada Limón‘ reading her poem, Instructions for Not Giving Up. It arrived with perfect timing.

Lesson in Perception from the Largest Living Being on Earth*

We recently learned about Pando, a clonal aspen tree that is one of the largest and oldest beings on earth. Over 100 acres wide, it has been hiding in plain sight for thousands of years. It is a lesson in how we see, and don’t.

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