My Analog Summer

Ditching my Kindle for popsicles, paper pages, and a summer that is strictly “all vibes.”

Hi, it’s me.

I quit my Kindle cold turkey last month.

Or rather, it quit me.

I’ve had the same Kindle Paperwhite since 2012, which is kind of insane in this world of forced tech upgrades. Feels like I’ve been forced to upgrade my iPhone forty-two times since then! I think maybe I still had an iPod Shuffle in 2012!

(Remember those?)

One of my favorite things about the Kindle was being able to read library books on it that I reserved using the Libby App for library lending.

Shout out to libraries!

Sadly, Amazon finally figured out they could have been doing more capitalism that whole time and promptly stopped supporting its connection to Libby.

So for now, while I assess potential non-Amazon eReaders that work with Libby, I’m going analog. With actual books. And I’m kind of excited. I mean, look at this beautiful stack! 👇

My analog reading list for the summer!

I want this summer to be all vibes.

(That’s a thing, right? All vibes?)

I want to read a book at the beach and see blockbuster movies in a full theater and drink rosé at an outdoor table in the middle of the day.

And I want to read the hell out of books that have pages I turn by poking at a corner with one finger while a second finger slides down the back side as I gently fold it across —

You know what? I don’t need to make it weird.

My Summer Reading List

Awake, by Jen Hatmaker

I just finished reading this one. It was an easy read with short chapters and surprisingly lightweight for a divorce book. I haven’t read any of Jen’s other books, so I don’t have any context regarding how the subject and tone of this memoir fits into the rest of her work. But I do know we’re roughly the same age and both grew up in and spent a chunk of our adult lives inside Evangelicalism, so many of her stories felt familiar along those lines.

However, I was a little distracted by wondering how she could afford her life. And how her friends were able to drop everything and whisk her off to Mexico. And how it was possible for a single mom of five kids to disappear for a “Me Camp” every year for an entire month. Nevertheless, it was a positive and inspiring story, and I can see why she’s popular. Her experience is a bit fantastical for the rest of us normies, though. In fact, I texted my divorced friend, “Why have I never whisked you off to Mexico?? I’m sorry for being the worst friend ever.” 😂

Big Baby, by Kevin James Thornton

I started this one over the weekend, and was immediately dumped into the premarital sex clown story before leaving the prologue (this will only make sense if you’ve seen his Reels or stand-up). I first learned about Kevin during COVID when he blew up on TikTok/Instagram. He posted about when 🎵it was the 90s🎵 and teld stories from his time in a 🎵super fundamentalist church.🎵 He’s creatively adventurous and dabbles in social media content, a couple of different podcasts, stand-up comedy tours (which I’ve attended live), a weekly Secret Sunday newsletter (I’m on the list!), an artist gathering space where he lives in Ohio, and now this memoir. I’m now several chapters into it, and it’s truly lovely how he’s filling out the familiar and absurd comedic parts of his story with earnest and heartbreaking stories of navigating a gay awakening inside a small-town midwest evangelical church in the late 80s and early 90s.

Lost and Found In the Cathedral of Cinema, by Jeffrey Overstreet

Probably my most anticipated read this summer, and I can’t wait to get into it (up next, after Big Baby)! Like me, Jeffrey grew up evangelical and was embedded in the world of secular vs Christian expressions of art. And like me, he was confused about the distinction, because stories that come to us through music, movies, poetry, and other art forms actually fed our curiosity for God and spiritual connection. At his book release party, Jeffrey called this memoir a love letter to cinema, and that’s all I needed to know.

I’ve known Jeffrey for at least 20 years (based on photographic evidence of how old my daughter was at his first book signing) and spent early internet days hanging out with him and others in movie discussion forums online, arguing about really granular stuff I don’t have time to care about anymore, but GAWD, those were the days. Amiright?

Writing Down the Bones, by Natalie Goldberg

I’ve been such a fan of Anne Lamott’s Bird By Bird for decades that I can’t believe I’d never heard of Writing Down the Bones until I entered the Substack universe. I’m a few chapters into it, and I can already tell why it’s everyone’s favorite book about writing. I’m looking forward to pacing my way through this one over the summer as I continue working on my book.

Crisis Engineering, by Marina Nitze and some other dudes.

I’m sure Marina’s co-authors are cool, but Marina’s my friend in real life, so they’re just “Marina’s friends” to me. This book choice may seem out of left field for my usual Pretend You’re Good At It vibes (checking in again…am I using this right?), but in my work life I get super jazzed about figuring out how to solve complex problems.

(I apologize for writing the words super jazzed. I’m currently binge listening to the Lonely Island and Seth Meyers podcast, so I have a lot of Andy Samberg referencing early 90s pop culture swimming around in my head.)

I’ve only read three chapters so far and already want to send it to every person I know who thrives when making sense out of complicated, systemic messes.

So that’s a taste of what I hope my analog summer will look like this year. How about you? What are you looking forward to this summer? What are you watching and reading to keep your spirits lifted?

Until next time,

Jen

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In the garden this week

I never thought my chaotic ADHD brain would embrace this, but I love the rhythm of gardening season. I love how every year, I know June is raspberry season, July is blueberry season, and early summer is when I harvest chamomile, oregano, and garlic scapes. When everything else in the world is chaos, I can always count on nature — the sun, rain, bird, and my plants — to keep me grounded in the precious present.

Raspberries, chamomile, garlic scapes, and dill.

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