constellations #83: ringing endorsements
Hi again.
For this month’s installment of the newsletter: a group effort, by way of a set of ringing endorsements. While my inbox fills up with emails stuffed with affiliate links and my TikTok algorithm feeds me influencers hawking life advice and product placements, I decided that really, I’d prefer to know what my friends are excited about lately. So I reached out to a handful of creative pals I admire — artists, writers, audio makers, etc. — and asked each person to endorse one thing. The results are surprisingly varied and totally charming. (And it should go without saying that I endorse the work of each of these people — I’ve linked to some of the cool stuff they do, too, so you can check it out.) Without further ado:
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Madeline Zappala is an artist and poet with a newsletter called light writing. (They also wrote constellations #5 back in 2020.) Here’s what they endorse:
prioritizing spending time with people who make you feel good
Seems simple but can actually feel hard in practice. This year I’ve encountered several moments of reconsidering how and who I’m spending my time with and trying to step back from obligatory or attachment-based desires when it comes to making plans to spend time with someone. How will it actually make me feel to see them, to spend time together? Who makes me feel understood, accepted, and is interested in who I’m becoming and what I have to say? Who do I have fun with, and laugh with? I recommend leaning into that.
Ben Naddaff-Hafrey makes a podcast about the history of truth called The Last Archive and makes music in a band called Rookin. Here’s what he endorses:
For the past few months, an angry swan has prevented us from kayaking the stretch of the Charles River by my parents' house. You could get maybe half a mile, and then, entering the pond where he'd made his nest, he'd chase you away. Two days ago, I tried again. When I reached the pond, I saw about 10 kids in boats paddling about. I asked the camp counselor if he'd seen the swan. "You see that guy in the hat?" he pointed to the counselor at the front of the flotilla. "A few days ago that swan attacked the kids, and that guy punched him in the face. We haven't seen him since."
So my recommendation is to let things take their course.
Chris Mongeau is a photographer and writer with a monthly newsletter called asynchronous. Here’s what he endorses:
Lately, I've been having so much fun playing with flash brew pour-overs, which is just a fancier name for a way to make iced coffee at home in a flash without having to wait for it to steep as you would with a cold brew method. I tend to prefer delicate coffees with higher acidity and fruitier notes and this is the best way I've found to make my own that preserves all of those notes you'd find in a hot cup. Any pour-over brewer can be used, but my personal favorite is the Origami (partially because it's so beautiful) with a separate carafe I bought from Ikea for $4. A good starting point recipe is to use the same amount of water you would in a hot pour-over (a 16:1 coffee-to-water ratio is what I recommend) with about 1/3 of the water content as ice. If you're really into coffee and like iced coffee in the summer, it's an inexpensive way to start making your own with your favorite shop's beans. This week, I've been using a Colombian Pink Bourbon from Bolt Coffee here in Providence, RI that I taste lots of cranberry and hibiscus from. The variables you can consider playing with if the first attempt doesn't come out exactly to your liking are grind setting (coarser will result in a faster extraction time, finer = longer amount of time) and the amount of ice to hot water. The most enjoyable part of this for me has been experimenting!
Lars Gotrich is a writer and producer at NPR Music who also writes a newsletter called Viking’s Choice, full of wide-ranging music recommendations. Here’s what he endorses:
Sorghum syrup is made from the green juice of the sorghum plant, grown mostly in the South and, therefore, a staple of its cuisine. I was raised in Georgia, but only became obsessed with sorghum syrup in recent months. I use the sweetener in marinades and BBQ sauces, on pancakes and in my daily tea — the syrup’s earthy sweetness and subtle sensuality enhances the same characteristics in the “Black Gold Bi Luo Chun” from Yunnan Sourcing. It’s thinner than molasses, but with deeper caramel notes; it’s darker than clover honey, but slightly sour.
Hazel Cills is a writer and editor for NPR Music. Here’s what she endorses:
Watching music videos like movies with friends
Did anything mark the death of the music video as artistic statement more than Beyoncé not releasing "visuals" for RENAISSANCE? The art form is slipping so tragically, you might have forgotten that they were once fucking incredible. I can't count how many times I've been at someone's house, projector or smart TV hooked up to Youtube, and we've just rolled through communal favorites: Mariah Carey's “Fantasy,” Destiny's Child's “Girl” (during which you have to have a spirited debate about which member of the group you are, but specifically which member in light SATC drag), Madonna's “Nothing Really Matters,” Sky Ferreira's “Everything Is Embarrassing.” I could go on. Music television might be long dead, but it's not when me and my friends have the remote.
Mel Taing is a photographer whose work focuses on creative portraiture, exhibition documentation, and events. Here’s what she endorses:
“My Girl” by Alice Phoebe Lou
Lately, I’ve been struggling to make a new boundary with some friends. It’s been hard, trying to find the distance at which I can love myself and them simultaneously. Where I felt secure, now I’m all shaky. And this discomfort, I realized, is not a sign that I’m doing all of this wrong but rather an inevitable part of the process of becoming a truer version of myself. In Alice’s song “My Girl,” she sings with all the love in her heart, “Let’s shake together / let’s shake as one / And when we stop shaking / a new world’s begun.” If you need a steadying hand in the shakiness of a new boundary, this song is it.
Justine Paradis is an audio producer and environmental journalist — I especially love her work on a podcast called Outside/In1 — who also writes a newsletter called sheets to the wind. Here’s what she endorses:
This stunning passage from Mrs. Dalloway. Read it aloud.
“So on a summer's day waves collect, overbalance, and fall; collect and fall; and the whole world seems to be saying 'that is all' more and more ponderously, until even the heart in the body which lies in the sun on the beach says too 'that is all'. Fear no more, says the heart. Fear no more, says the heart, committing its burden to some sea, which sighs collectively for all sorrows, and renews, begins, collects, lets fall.”
Marianela D’Aprile is a writer who makes a newsletter called the immense wave. She is also the deputy editor of the New York Review of Architecture. Here’s what she endorses:
rOtring 600 0.5 mm mechanical pencil
About a year ago I thought I lost mine. I’d had it for twelve years. I was desperate. I immediately bought a replacement, but in the couple dozen hours I didn’t have one, I didn’t know what to do. I have a light hand and need the weight of the metal pencil to help the lead make its mark against the paper. I use medium-soft lead, the HB kind. I guess this recommendation is less for the specific item and more for finding the thing that makes your own work a pleasure to encounter.
Here’s one from me:
I was told I was losing my job at the end of March and coincidentally I had a haircut booked for the beginning of April. At this point I had been waffling on getting bangs (again) for a minute, but the job situation left me definitively in a position to commit. I think the style suits my face, which is nice, but the real benefit revealed itself over the course of a few weeks: The haircut was subtle enough not to be shocking but noticeable enough that people sometimes (honestly, more frequently than I ever anticipated) redirected our conversation to ask me, Did you change your hair?! This was great, because it meant that these conversations were not about my feelings, my job loss, my feelings about my job loss, etc. For this reason I really recommend getting bangs if you are going through a difficult time in your life. (If your hair texture and/or gender expression and/or general self-presentation doesn’t account for bangs — or if you already have them — I think you could easily substitute with a different but essentially similar practice.)
And finally: an endorsement from Matt Lewicki, who is a designer (and, incidentally, the great love of my life). Here’s what he endorses:
“Defeat” by Animal Collective
Okay, okay, I hear it. Maybe you sorted out the habits of your mind and stopped worrying about acquiring adobe slats for your girls years ago. Maybe you got a job, did your daily chores, and started avoiding the croaking frog and bleating goat harmonies of four geriatric stoners. But if you ever once loved Animal Collective, you deserve this and, more importantly, your former self is owed this: a 22-minute celebration of perseverance; a culmination of the band’s various projects, experiments, success, and failures in the years since its so-called peak.
We were coming of age
And we were the good news
Now I'm all out but how about you?Maybe you’ve also been cycling between “It’s so over” and “It’s never been more over” for a few years now. It’s not just the collapse and desecration of so many things external, but something else, something inside that’s also ending: the great protracted adolescence we reveled in is now over-burdened with working hours and long distances. The juvenile tenor of The DM can’t mask the reality: you’ve grown up.
Crawling from the serpent in the water
The mirror, the what-have-we-become“Defeat” memorializes and mourns this fact. Find those dusty nugs you’ve been keeping for a dire moment and roll them up. Grab an ice cold apple juice or an orange soda or anything that will close the distance between who you are and who you were. Go outside with some headphones, lay down in the sun and close your eyes maybe, and give this one a go. Then, text all your old friends to let them know how much you love them.
Just grab something, take hold
The only thing you know
Stay grounded like the spruce
Oh, a little change
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Here are some other things I have been consuming lately: Eye On The Bat by Palehound (which I reviewed for NPR); “Padam Padam” by Kylie Minogue; & The Charm by Avalon Emerson; h. pruz & Katy Kirby & Bellows at Purgatory; Swirlies at LPR; a re-read of Bluets by Maggie Nelson; The Years by Annie Ernaux; the Georgia O’Keeffe exhibition at MoMA; “A Labor Party,” a show at Trestle Art Space in Gowanus (which featured work from recommender Madeline!); Asteroid City in theaters; homemade biscotti (I used this recipe); ice cream from Lady Moo Moo in Bed-Stuy; chocolate-covered gummy bears (I used to hate them but I’ve changed my mind); a newfound interest in Sudoku; a really nice Riis Beach day
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This time last year I was: considering limits; and before that: thinking about emo, submitting to art & looking through strangers’ windows
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Thanks for reading. I feel genuinely humbled and amazed to have gathered all that joy and wisdom from the folks above — truth be told I felt a little nervous and corny reaching out about this, so here’s another endorsement for you: asking some friends to help you make something nice! It feels good! I hope you get to do that this month. Until next time.
xo,
M
Justine recently made a great two-part series for Outside/In (part 1; part 2) about the increasing criminalization of protest, especially environmental protest, in the US. I listened to it and learned so much, and then was kicking myself for forgetting to include it in last month’s newsletter. I really endorse listening.