Inspiration It’s Not

Noxious Positivity and Actual Good (Library) News

What is and isn’t Cactus Juice, my friends.

Three weeks into the year, it’s time to check in and possibly revise our goals. We’ve had a chance to try them out. Are they realistic?

I don’t make actual New Year’s resolutions (that fifteen pounds isn’t going anywhere). But I do have yearly goals. The many griefs of 2023 kept me down a long while and I had to let go of much. However, I usually do well meeting my goals because they are about doing the work. They are not about the result because that’s something I can’t control. So—and emerging writers understand this because they live it every day—I can meet my goals and still feel not so great.

Noxious inspiration

This brings me to one of my periodic topics: unhelpful inspiration. Those reminders everywhere to be amazing are not inspirational or in any way helpful. They aren’t exactly toxic either. They’re obnoxious. Noxious in the sense of very unpleasant rather than poisonous.

Here are a few of the sorts of things that drive me nuts.

I have had a persistent cough for many months after being prescribed Prozac for my depression. The medication works pretty well, but a side effect is a dry mouth and throat. I’m taking the lowest dose available, so I can’t reduce it. Although the cough wakes me at night, I’d read that sometimes this side effect goes away, so I have continued with the prescription and make sure I have cough drops everywhere—in my nightstand, in my purse, in the console of the car, in the fancy pack I use while walking the dogs.

Having to use so many of them, I’ve discovered that Ricola sugar-free lemon mint is my favorite. On a particularly bad coughing day, I ran out and found some old Hall’s cherry drops in the cupboard. Maybe they don’t include these ‘Pep Talks’ anymore. They shouldn’t because: people using cough drops don’t feel good. They are not going to conquer the world right now. If Hall’s wants to print out a message, it should be ‘Get well soon.’

Why is chocolate telling me how to live my life? You know why I eat chocolate? To feel warm and positive. Popping a chocolate square in my mouth is not a goal-setting moment. And, yeah, I’m having a hard time with my regrets, so leave me the fuck alone.

All this happy talk printed on food and medicine wrappers is akin to the New Yorker cartoon above. (Actually, it’s from a group of equally spot-on cartoons; this is the one they shared on social media).

Kurt Vonnegut, for all his satire, is much better at a pep talk, don’t you think?

Negatives into positives

I belong to a literary community (the Inlandia Institute, which supports inland So Cal writers and artists in their work) that has started a 100 Rejections Club. The ulterior motive is obvious: if you can get 100 rejections in a year, you are going to get some acceptances. I got my first rejection of the year yesterday from an elite literary journal after 6 months of waiting. Being able to post it on the rejection club actually does ease the pain a bit. Inlandia also has a place to include submissions, which is a good way of reminding ourselves that we are doing the work.

Here’s some actual good news:

Essay Contest : It’s January 1, 2050. How, in 2024, did we pull off saving the world? The only requirement is to start with what you did. Be as concise as you can so as not to lose readers, while giving details that demonstrate the workability of your ideas.

A tough topic, but prize money is big. Have a look: 

An Essay Contest. It’s January 1, 2050.

Good news in the library book banning arena

Yes, there are still big problems. Most of this good news is about fighting back against the censors.

A survey of parents—what they think about school librarians

Here’s a nice summary of book challenges and school district bans from the mid-20th century to the present. The magic pebble and a lazy bull: The book ban movement has a long timeline

‘Book banning is a chaotic and illogical business,’ journalist Laura Pappano writes in her new book on partisan politics and the battle for public education, which includes a section tracing the history of book bans that have ensnared children’s classics

Federal appeals court rules Texas book bans likely violate Constitution

A bill in the New Mexico state legislature proposes preventing public libraries (does not include school libraries) from banning books based on political or religious views from what one of the bill’s sponsors calls “hate groups.”

And lest you think California is immune from banning: Authors Guild Submits Brief to Challenge Critical Race Theory Book Ban in California Court

Good news about libraries themselves

This is directly from from the New York Times daily newsletter on California by Soumya Karlamangla:

A 33-year-old librarian from Solano County has become well-known on social media for making cheerful videos about the power of local libraries.

The man, Mychal Threets, is the supervising librarian at the Fairfield Civic Center Library, and has recently become popular on TikTok and Instagram for sharing stories about his local branch and moments that he calls “library joy.”

Threets, who was home-schooled by his mother, grew up visiting the Fairfield branch where he now works. Those early experiences were formative, he says, and his videos, which have millions of views, are an attempt to share that same sense of magic and to remind viewers of how welcoming and joyful libraries can be.

“They’ve always meant the world to me,” Mr. Threets told my colleague Orlando Mayorquin during a recent interview with The Times. He added: “The library is here to help you. Never be afraid to ask for help.”

What I’m Reading

This Close to Happy: A Reckoning with Depression by Daphne Merkin