Sorry, for the delete and redraft, @ceorl! I had written "talking photos" instead of "taking photos", and I'm pretty sure a talking photo is a movie!

And, of course, I have photos.

Easier just to share the album link - but there's lots of #Graffiti here, as well some nature shots, snaps of the hustle and bustle of life in Centro, cemetery shots and Boteros.

Closer to the north, I stopped taking photos, because that enters far less touristy "barrios populares" & I have a standing rule about not taking photos of people living in poverty, or treating their homes as such.

But feel free to ask if you have any questions!
https://photos.app.goo.gl/NxYSbGdR3C95w5ah7

Pro tip:

When one of the Venezuelan street vendors near your home asks why you look so tired, don't tell them you just walked over 28 km across town - unless you're ready for them to casually remind you that they walked 20 days from Venezuela to Medellín, day and night with children, while finishing shoe repair for someone in a nearby building.

🙃 Just say you're fine.
Because we're here and that's enough.

Here's some #Music from when I passed through Parque de Berrío:
https://youtu.be/X8lY4BuGCUI

All right. Already late out the door, but hopefully tonight I'll sleep well & wake early again like I used to.

About an hour on the metro to get to the far end of the city, then around 6 hours walking back. I have ~8 CAD on me, sunscreen, water, and a book and pen just in case (#writer). I don't expect trouble but one can't be too careful. The key is never walking like a wide-eyed tourist; always move like you belong.

Will check in tonight.
Have a beautiful day, lovelies.
Keep up your hearts.

🕊️ This week's Humanist Book Club for OnlySky asks questions that KSR's Ministry for the Future couldn't fully anticipate.

The work of near-future SF imagines a world centrally focused on a "War for the Earth", by tackling climate change.

Meanwhile, *our* world is in the throes of another war, via Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Environmentally, we do not have time for this atrocity.

But we need to reckon with climate change amid Putin's war crimes all the same.

https://onlysky.media/mclark/can-we-ever-truly-combat-climate-change-in-a-world-at-war/

(I will just add that, as a teen, I used to do this in Toronto. Just bus down to Union Station or Kennedy, and walk back to my west-side residence over 4-5 hours. One encounters SO many different neighbourhoods, rich with their traditions and histories, along the way. Highly recommend it, as a way of reconnecting with the world we share, and learning more about your own home.)

Shout-out today to everyone trying to get by without completely giving up.

Lots still to do today re: teaching, editing, writing.

Then tomorrow I'm going on "walkabout" - taking the bus to the far side of the city, & walking back. Around 6 hours.

The fire in my heart is low.

I haven't been firing on all cylinders all summer (save for three weeks when I didn't eat, but that's... not something I can replicate long term!).

But where there's life, there's hope. Time to touch grass again. 👌#Soon

Psychopomp is a lovely new publisher that focuses on stories informed by death. (They'll have a novella call out Jan-April for any interested writers.)

I wrote about the grief work in HBO's Somebody Somewhere for their blog. If you haven't seen this show, & you're moving through loss in many forms... it might be just the gentle reminder you need, that grief can be carried as part of a community - and alongside joy.

Life is hard.
Harder, when we go at it alone.

#CoSoTV
https://psychopomp.com/somebody-somewhere/

#News

Currently trying to finish a piece on how we tackle climate change amid war. Articles like this are... a grinding reminder that we're not mature enough for the problems we have to face together.

We keep escalating unnecessary strife instead.

What a difficult turn of events (and grief for the family of the deceased). Hugs to my fellow Canadians today. Keep an eye out for upticks in racism and xenophobia in the next while.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trudeau-indian-government-nijjar-1.6970498

I just had the sort of writing session that writers do not like having. Walk away if you start to resemble this character while reading your work! Avoid mass-deleting the whole MS!

#WritingCommunity

(History nerd aside:

In the early 19th Century, Malthusian ideas about exponential population growth & natural overshoot took hold, haunting people with the reality that nature was not "designed" for all to thrive.

Darwin was a sentimentalist about this, too - he hated what evolutionary theory suggested about natural cruelty, saw zero sign of a benevolent creator in nature's torturous ways, and suggested that readers try to imagine that death usually came quickly and the "happiest" survived.)

Every now and then I think about David Attenborough's brilliant narrative strategy, and how to apply it to my own writing.

I remember a nephew, when young, happily watching baby seals, then happily watching baby polar bears, & then... having his love for both brought into conflict.

Or following a chick's struggle to fly off a cliff face - cheering when he didn't crash! - just to get snapped up as prey.

To hold it all in tension & not despair is one of the greatest challenges of being human.

This week I'm going on "walkabout" in the city for a day. Just hoofing it around town with water, a lil' moneda, & *lots* of sunscreen for a reset.

It's far too easy to get caught up in the head-space of my fields, their skewed sense of value.

Touching grass, visiting sectors I haven't been to for a while, & just disconnecting to be present as a body in the cosmos sounds good right about now.

Fingers crossed.
Work first, then one day... tearing out screaming (clothed?) to the streets it is. 🙃

Morning, lovelies.

New day, who dis? ☕️

(Wrong answers only.)

I was nodding along to this fluffy #science news (still in an overhyped computational model phase), when I hit this record-scratch of an AW HELL NO:

"The study’s findings not only confirm existing theories about the brain’s use of Bayesian-like inference but open doors to new research and innovation, where the brain’s natural ability for Bayesian inference can be harnessed for practical applications that benefit society."

NOPE. NOPE NOPE NOPE.

STEAM, not STEM, folks!
https://scitechdaily.com/biological-masterpiece-evolution-wired-human-brains-to-act-like-supercomputers/

My second miniseries launched earlier this week.

@BosmangBeratna, @thewebrecluse: thank you so much for your kind words, & for listening to some of the work on YouTube. I cannot tell you how heartening those messages were to read today. ❤️

Today I have a newsletter follow-up to facets of the final episode. Paid subscribers will get a deep-dive into corporate arbitration's messy rise

I meant to have this out sooner, but so it goes. Many thanks for your patience. 🤗
https://open.substack.com/pub/mlclark/p/what-we-take-for-granted-about-global

Okay, more giddiness over grammatical goofiness and the like later. 😘 #AmWriting!