My favorite ... in July
Travel
This month started with a dreamy roadtrip in a convertible to Monterey. Monterey Bay Aquarium never ceases to amaze me, and after studying the architecture in an aquarium for months, I feel I can say with accreditation that this is the best aquarium in the world (so far). I was impressed by their visible and invisible commitments to ocean conservation, and it did make me really heartened to see that it’s possible for aquariums (and to more difficulty, zoos) that make a positive impact instead of solely as exhibitions. Locally, we also explored Dolores Park and Mussel Rock Beach, the latter of which was shockingly cold but a lovely nature preserve.
Media
I read prolifically this month. My partner and I have been trying to have a book club, with one of the problems being that our reading pace and schedules are out of sync. We had a recent success in sharing Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield, a magnetic and haunting story about the powerful bond of two people in love, and the grief of that love. The setting was unique and mesmorizing, and a very fitting platform for an engaging story that is really about something else. I saw a lot of myself and us in the book, which made it more special to feel like we can share this together.Other books, with brief ratings, I read this month: Book Lovers by Emily Henry (4/5), Death Valley by Melissa Broder (4/5), The Seven Year Slip by Ashley Poston (3/5), Last Night in Montreal by Emily St. John Mandel (4/5), These Summer Storms by Sarah MacLean (4/5), Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan (4/5), and The Do-Over by Lynn Painter (2/5). That’s an average of 2 books / week -- I updated my reading goal to 45 books this year!
I watched Shrinking from Apple TV on the plane ride back -- it was fantasticly funny, poignant, and gripping, and almost makes me want to get a subscription just to finish the season.
Restaurants
My... such good food this time around in Scandanavia! I had an amazing scone + goat curd + homemade jam at Lille Bakery in Refshaleøen. The scone was so perfectly warm and fluffy, and the goat curd was slightly salty which made for a great combination. Juno was a delight, as always, and their cardamom bun is unrivalled. I headed over to Malmö during the last day of my Nordic trip, and returned to Ruths (almost one year exactly!) where I had a delightful grilled stuffed sardine with cherry tomatoes. I rarely have fresh -- not canned, that is -- sardine anymore, and I was fully expecting a tinned fish meal, but this was a lovely surprise. Do you recall that scene from Ratatouille, where the mean critic takes a bite of the ratatouille and is suddenly transported back to his childhood? My first bite felt like that -- deliciously briney, sweet, savory, with a spice I couldn’t place, made me nostalgic for something so deep in my childhood it almost brought tears to my eyes. I did struggle with the tiny bones of the sardine, but I tried to focus on how they made me so much slower and more appreciative of the food.
Hobbies
I have been writing extensively. At first, it started as a fiction project to be able to put down in third-person, everything that was bothering me. 7000 words later, I feel like this might actually go somewhere. It reminded me of the days in my teenage years where I wrote obsessively on Wattpad and participated in yearly Nanowrimo challenges.
VIEWS MY OWN
subscribe to new fieldnotes
I’m a 20-something year old living in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA. I’m a lover of life - in particular, sunsets over the ocean, thunderstorms, niche playlists, long meandering novels, and all cats. Fieldnotes are detailed observations collected by anthropologists, sociologists, and ethnographers while situated in an environment of interest; the obsessive intensity to learn and grasp and make sense of phenomena during the collection of fieldnotes is the way that feels most reflective of the way I live life. My fieldnotes serve as reminders for me of how beautiful, short, and stunning life is.