I read somewhere this week that sometimes it can be hard to maintain “true north,” an inner sense of direction, amid the world’s magnetic forces. Things like our consumer culture, the doomy headlines. The hot crush who doesn’t know you’re alive.
I love true north as an idea. It’s north according to an axis, not magnetism; something fixed, not magical. As though there’s a pole planted somewhere, striped red. For me, the phrase is sensually metaphoric. It suggests something both inside and external, something near and also far away, impossibly far away, celestial, perhaps never to be reached, though still possible to picture.
(And yeah I know magnetism isn’t magic. But I don’t know really know it.)
True north is ambition, it’s ethics. It may be one of my daily needs: to have a kind of star, a Polaris, hovering faintly in my morning and evening imaginations. True north as waking dream.
I learned this week about “escape compasses,” tiny compasses issued to soldiers in World War II. They were meant to be concealed on the body, and hopefully useful for escape if stranded behind enemy lines. Often the compass wouldn’t look like a compass, in order to confuse a captor – resembling a coin, maybe, or a trouser fly button. Do I have an escape compass hidden somewhere, figuratively? Sometimes when I’m feeling anxious, I’ll identify how I’m feeling (anxious), why I’m feeling it (money) and where (in my guts), then try to turn said feeling into an impulse to go do something immediately: no hesitation, just write, or plan something, email or text a friend. Turn fretting inward to outward acts.
Of course, it doesn’t happen every time, sometimes I just stew and rot. A compass can become too well concealed.
I’ve heard people talk about time as a fourth dimension, and perhaps in that dimension the future is time’s true north. I know that sounds abstract, I feel it, too. But god it’s easy to feel lost in life. And perhaps true north can be an ever-present courage, a bit of optimism.
True north is a decision? Maybe.
In tomorrow’s Sunday supplement for supporters:
Highlights from (supposedly) James Baldwin's record collection
A different kind of Oppenheimer to stream
The socialist argument against affordable clothing, a tomato sandwich upgrade, some highlights from recent reading, and more!
What the what
Meditations in an Emergency is a weekly dispatch from writer Rosecrans Baldwin about something beautiful. Paying subscribers receive a Sunday supplement with 3+ things to love, along with a monthly longer piece sent from the road, for some inbox wanderlust. ⛰️
Rosecrans is the bestselling author of Everything Now. His latest novel is The Last Kid Left. Books mentioned in Meditations in an Emergency are stored in a Bookshop list.