Moving On Up
Your Sunday read: fellow Substackers on the way forwards.
I am grateful to be here.
We all reacted to the news of the U.S. election in different ways. When many of my (genuine) friends had Facebook meltdowns, engaging in a self-perpetuating sinking into the mire of petty name-calling, finger-pointing and general vindictiveness, I decided to take a break from the platform entirely. It was good for me. Among other things, it reminded me that I had a life before FB, and that I have a better life online among the writers of Substack who, almost overwhelmingly, think before they comment, not only because they are writers, who recognize that their words define them, but because they are thinkers in the first place.
As I suspected, while I engaged in the difficult task of rewriting a piece on an uplifting Bruce Springsteen song about the U.S. immigrant experience that felt all too different on the morning of November 6 than it did on the morning of November 5, many of these fellow writers here took their time to compose their response, and when they did so, ensured that they spoke to their own strengths, in their own fields, and with their own accrued wisdom.
Here are nine such posts that have helped me deal, offered me hope, suggested a path forwards, and even made me laugh. Some are from people I have known personally for a number of years, some are from people who may not know I exist. All of them have something positive to say, and I have inserted a quick excerpt from the post in question before linking to it in full. I rounded it out to ten with my own post about that Springsteen song “American Land.”
I offer these up to my paid subscribers in the form of a “bonus” post… I felt a little guilty using my usual weekend post this Saturday to feature myself being interviewed by
, and so sharing out these following writers and their excellent little articles is a way of giving back, both to those among you who have helped me stay committed to my Substack by ensuring I earn at least something from my writing here, and perhaps, if I am honest, as an incentive for more of you to get on board. My own Wordsmith account offers paid subscribers access to all 158-but-who’s-counting of my previous articles, ongoing exclusive posts and interview transcripts from the archives, and the Crossed Channels post in which myself and my friend Dan Epstein discuss the thing that keeps us going in good times, and bad: music. I would love you to consider patreon-iz/sing my work with a paid subscription, but if not me (and if already me), perhaps you would like to support one of the following writers instead.We are all grateful to be here.