This will be an experiment.
Normally I write these micro-essays on my laptop, maybe in a coffeeshop somewhere, but this weekend I’m camping alone in the woods, not far from the ocean, and if you’re reading this it means I found a data connection and didn’t throw away my phone from all the tap-tap-tapping this whole thing out with my stupid thumbs.
Forgive any typos, please.
Solo camping might be my favorite form of camping. I’m here with a small amount of equipment: a one-person tent, a sleeping bag, a stove to prepare coffee. I fled west this afternoon for the backcountry, in as much as there is backcountry in L.A., and started to leave behind me angst about work, the news, the US, the world. That process became a lot easier once I got to my campsite and got busy: pitched the tent, drank some water, went for a walk in the woods. Doing this alone, I studied the ground under my feet a little closer. I accidentally flushed some quail out of the brush and watched them run away. I feel the gist of urban living, the crowdedness of so many lives and desires, much less present. Slowly, slowly, I find myself again.
The cooler has an ice pack and some beer. Once this newsletter is finished, I’ll cook a bowl of mac and cheese and settle in with a book. The stars should be visible tonight, I’ll make a thermos of mint tea. Tomorrow morning, I don’t know what I’ll do - another walk, a swim in the ocean. That’s the best part. The simple concoction of having a small amount of time to myself but no agenda, it’s pretty heady.
From tomorrow’s “Sunday Supplement,” with ideas on three things I really appreciate (and you might, too), this week focused on camping stuff.
For a backcountry trip in rural Montana several years ago, I shared a motel room with Aspen ski guide Jordan White. White had recently summited and skied down Alaska’s three tallest peaks in the span of thirty days. Wow. But the sleeping bag he pulled out of his duffel bag, somehow in that moment, perhaps for being something I could fathom, seemed even more incredible.
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Book-selling sidebar. A few updates. A podcast interview I did (and actually enjoyed doing) with the guys at “Wake Island,” about city living and movies and hallucinations and “psychogeography,” was released on Friday. The conversation is shaggy and weird and pretty good all at once, I think.
Also – and random that this was released on the same day – here’s me and Randy Newman (!) discussing in Friday’s New York Times, for their “California Today” newsletter, why some people in Los Angeles are reluctant to say they love Los Angeles.
So, I asked Newman, “Do you love L.A.?” He took a long pause. “I think I’ve come to,” he said. “Maybe the song had something to do with it. It’s home.”
Finally, holiday shopping. I’m signing and shipping copies of the new book until the first week of December. If you and/or your hottie so desire, for $30/book (postage included), I’ll inscribe and mail a copy wherever.
Reply and explain where you’d like it sent and how you’d like it inscribed. (If someone shared this newsletter with you, contact me through my website.)
I’ll send you payment info (Venmo, Paypal, whatever ), then I’ll send you tracking info once the book is shipped.
As ever, from this remote little campsite, thanks again to everyone for their support.
What the what? “Meditations in an Emergency” is a weekly email published Saturdays by novelist Rosecrans Baldwin about things he finds beautiful. “The Sunday Supplement” is a recommendation bulletin for paying subscribers.
Rosecrans’s new book, Everything Now: Lessons From the City-State of Los Angeles, is available from Bookshop, Amazon, or your local store. Any other books mentioned in this newsletter are featured on a Bookshop list.