Coffee Break #026: Fish earrings, deep conversations, and a heatwave.
Your weekly roundup of inspiration and ideas to build your dream life.
Dear Friend,
Hello from the literal fires of Hades! Chicago has a heat index of 105 today, and I’m sweating my makeup off as we speak. This weekend my husband and I cleared out two overstuffed closets and our entire basement storage unit and dropped off an entire carload of stuff to a charity shop. It was so much work, but I feel so accomplished. And now I’ve got the purging bug and I’m ready to attack my closet and underneath our bed next. There’s no stopping me!
Love always,
In Brief
📚 Reading
I finished Spellstruck and absolutely adored it. If you like Sangu Mandanna’s books, you will love this. Out in September!
📺 Watching
We watched the Why Didn’t They Ask Evans? mini-series last week (based on the Agatha Christie book) and I absolutely loved it. Christie adaptations seem very hit or miss (big pet peeve of mine is when they completely change the ending, which happens surprisingly often). But this one was delightful!
🎶 Listening
New Phoebe Bridgers!!!!!
🧣 Wearing
I snagged this red boatneck shirred tank from Uniqlo a few weeks ago, and I’ve been waiting for the weather to heat back up so I can wear it. Finally getting the chance today, and I love it!
✅ To Do List
Tasks to help you reset and re-energize for the week.
Creativity & Curiosity: Pick up a new book that’s outside your typical genre comfort zones, but that sounds interesting. You might be surprised!
Personal Style: Spend some time documenting your favorite outfits for easy access. Could be a photo album, notes app, or just a good old-fashioned notebook.
Home & Environment: Clean out one single closet, storage unit, or other spot where you’ve just stuck things for ages and not thought about.
Connection: Put together a care package for a friend or loved one who is going through a hard time or could just use a little extra support. It doesn’t have to be super expensive—cozy socks, a paperback, some artisanal coffee or hot cocoa, and a cute mug goes a long way.
Joy & Whimsy: Play hooky—call in sick to work or school and do something fun for yourself.
📚 Release Radar
This week’s book releases that are on my radar (and my TBR).
Rules for Aging and Larceny by Julia London | Ocean’s Eleven meets the Golden Girls when an all-female group of chaotic, elderly thieves come out of retirement for one last heist.
Main Characters by Bobby Palmer | Told from the eyes of their audience—friends and flatmates, rivals and lovers, strangers and confidants—Main Characters is a sweeping portrait of all sides of Clara and Seb. Everyone has their version of events, but only the main characters can decide how it ends.
Picky by Julie T. Kinn | Zillah’s twenty-three and stuck—stuck living with her quirky mother, stuck with a diet of ten toddler-approved foods, and stuck in a relationship with a man who thinks sharks are immortal. Things change when she eavesdrops on her neighbor’s exposure therapy and decides to DIY her own mental health.
One Day, Hard and Clear by Anne Baldo | It’s 2004 and childhood friends Sami and Lucy are on the edge of adulthood. Lucy knows what she is going to do—she’s going to school and getting out. But Sami, caught in an endless loop with a boy from a troubled family, can’t seem to get unstuck.
The Summer of the Serpent by Cecilia Eudave | This surreal, horror-tinged work is a kaleidoscopic descent into the small violences and hidden horrors of one sweltering summer, forming a coil of vignettes that slither under the skin for a strange, deeply human portrait of memory, myth, and family.
The Shampoo Effect by Jenny Jackson | An ambitious young woman insinuates herself into a tight-knit social set, shaking up friendships and marriages in a small seaside town. A frothy novel of love, money, sex, and friendship, from the bestselling author of Pineapple Street.
Six of Crows: A Darker Shore by Leigh Bardugo | From bestselling author Leigh Bardugo comes a new Grishaverse short story: a mystery told through found documents and set after the events of Crooked Kingdom.
💌 Reading List
Links, essays, Instagram captions, carrier pigeons… anything and everything I’ve enjoyed reading this week.
How to Have Deeper Conversations With Anyone | Time
“People badly underestimate how interested others are in connecting—and how good a deeper conversation will actually feel, says University of Chicago behavioral scientist Nicholas Epley […] His research suggests that we brace for awkwardness and come away happier, more connected, and more understood than we predicted.”
How Creative Rituals Can Help You Break Free From the Idea Echo Chamber | It’s Nice That
“And in a moment where so much of the technical side of creativity can be outsourced or automated, having a deeper understanding of who you are, what your tastes are and how you come up with ideas away from the usual sources really matters. AI tools generate, refine and perhaps polish, but they can’t decide what is worth making in the first place, they can’t tell you what feels meaningful, or urgent, or true to you, that still sits with us. Which is why creative rituals feel less like a luxury and more like a kind of defence against the slow erosion of taste, attention, and intention.”
Librarians on Horseback | Oxford American
In the 1930s, the Pack Horse Library project emerged as a program that could satisfy New Deal goals of literacy expansion and job creation by paying local women (and a few men) to deliver books on horseback through the mountains of eastern Kentucky. Due to meager funding for new reading material, the Pack Horse Librarians often circulated scrapbooks they assembled by hand, makeshift volumes filled with content from magazines, damaged books, or old pamphlets.
🧥 In My Cart
Things I’m eyeing and buying this week.
1. Mini Lamp, Target 2. Blouse, Banana Republic 3. Tarot Plate, Anthropologie 4. Velvet Vanity, Urban Outfitters 5. Resin Purse Strap, Quince 6. Staub Bowl Set, Crate and Barrel 7. Heeled Sandals, Aerosoles 8. Pearly Fish Earrings, Loft 9. Dream Lip Oil in Bare Sand, Summer Fridays
✨ Joy Scrolling
Fun links & recs for your reading pleasure.
This post on “how to stay married” made me giggle (and also seems like pretty solid advice).
Summer mocktail recipes for my low- and no-proof pals.
A roundup of summer camp aesthetic decor inspiration.
New trailer for Sense and Sensibility with Daisy Edgar-Jones!!!
⏰ ICYMI
What I’ve posted recently.
Parenthetical is a publication for women who dog-ear pages, overthink their seasonal wardrobe, and want to make their ordinary days more magical. Paid subscribers get access to the full resource library, plus The Well-Designed Life curriculum.
I added The Shampoo Effect to my reading list after loving Pineapple Street. Also, that mini tortoise lamp from Target is adorable! Thanks so much for sharing these recommendations.
purging feels so good!