a list of some things i thought and did in 2022
as 2023 approaches
At some point I realized that I had watched more than half of Pedro Almodóvar’s films and decided I would watch the rest of them, and rewatch some of the ones I had already seen. I have two left to go, Matador and Law of Desire, from 1986 and 1987, but I can’t imagine they’ll change my overall impression: the wish for more art that depicted women with the veracity and complexity of Pedro’s films.
I think around a dozen people asked me for book recommendations this year, and I think I told five of them to read J.M. Coetzee’s Disgrace.
At The Smile show at Kings Theatre, people kept shouting “thank you, Thom!” at Thom Yorke. At first just a few, between songs, and then for while they came in bursts, as songs were beginning and before they quite ended. I considered being annoyed—this isn’t about you, he heard you the first time—but I thought about it for a second and just got it. Like, yeah, go ahead, shout your gratitudes. I am thankful for all this—Thom’s voice, Jonny’s guitar, so many people in one room, decades of beauty—too.
A lot of people in this country die at work. According to new forecasts, fatal workplace accidents in Italy won’t be reduced to zero for another 100 years. That’s better than Spain and France, though, where statistically they will never end.
I read several books and essays and watched several movies about marriage and infidelity only to conclude that we are all obsessed with these things because none of us can figure out what they’re about. Probably they are about several things, like money and love, that have nothing to do with each other.