13 Comments
User's avatar
Sally Showalter's avatar

This is one of the best, if not the best, written pieces on the overall mental climate of this world.

Expand full comment
Lisa Renee's avatar

Thank you! 😊

Expand full comment
Sue Sutherland-Wood's avatar

Well, yet again - I echo everything that you say here, exactly. I have also read and re-read that May Sarton book when I was much younger but found it relatable and somehow reassuring even then: her everyday habit of rising as usual, feeding the parrot, etc. Like you, I am always fascinated with how women coped with the onset of WW2 especially. I think a big factor was, (not unlike the Pandemic for us), they had no idea how long it was going to go on.

Had we been told at the onset, there's going to be *years* of this ahead, it would have been (even more) unbearable. Like those who lived during a war, we were all *forced* to live one hour at a time whilst plodding through with the every day bits of life that need tending to, waiting for updates.

And it's happening again, unfortunately - and, also, ridiculously, unnecessarily.

I loved this line: "I need to clear a path through the shrill panic and write it all down."

Absolutely brilliant.

(Excuse me while I get my own brush ... and a pen!)

Expand full comment
Susan OBrien's avatar

Timely, thoughtful and beautifully written.

Expand full comment
Elizabeth Marro's avatar

A terrific post. My mother gave me a biography of Origo years ago. I will find it and read it then seek out the journal. Interestingly, my best friend of many years and a writer herself, has been re-reading Sarton's journals. She is doing something very interesting. She reads an entry and then, in her own journal, responds to it. This "conversation" has become especially important to her as time grinds forward.

Expand full comment
Lisa Renee's avatar

Thanks, Betsy! Origo wrote a second diary, "War in Val d'orcia, 1943-1944" that I'd like to read (though I'm sure it's depressing). I love that conversational approach to Sarton, what a wonderful way to engage with a text.

Expand full comment
Leslie Hoge's avatar

Wooowwwww. This is so perfect. You’ve put into words what I and many others have been unable to articulate. Thank you.

Expand full comment
Natalie Serber's avatar

Thank you. RN I just feel so tired. I’m tucking this away to read again. xN

Expand full comment
Chitra Eder's avatar

Thank you. It brings depth to our times in a way that isn't divisive or loud.

Expand full comment
Kathryn Vercillo's avatar

I read Sarton's Solitude when I was in my early twenties and loved it but also always thought I'd go back to it when I was old enough to understand it a little better. You're not the first person I've noticed mention it recently and I think it means it's time I return!

Expand full comment
Emily Kaminsky's avatar

Picking up the dropped stitches, so stabbingly true. I've been struggling with this as well, finding myself all of a sudden turning inward and writing about things other than current events. Somehow dancing around the obvious. To write about what's happening in the world is almost too painful. Too, thank you for putting words to this strange phenomenon of needing to rise, cook and love while the world burns.

Expand full comment
Margaret B.'s avatar

Yes. And thank you for your words.

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Mar 27
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Lisa Renee's avatar

Thanks for this, Anna! I just put a letter in the mail this morning, let's see how long it takes. 📬

Expand full comment