Click here to read this on the web, or to have a link to share on social media I'm in. Hey y'all! The world is at least/ fifty percent terrible, and that’s a conservative/ estimate, though I keep this from my children. That’s a line from one of my favorite poems, Good Bones, by Maggie Smith. And while I do not believe that the world is actually fifty percent terrible, it sure feels like it is at times. It’s the election season here in the US, and the chaos that is ensuing seems pervasive....
3 months ago • 4 min read
Click here to read this on the web, or to have a link to share on social media When things suck, plant flowers. Things will still suck, but this way, you will also have flowers. - HH “I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo. "So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” ― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring Hey y’all, Things right now just feel...
3 months ago • 3 min read
Click here to read this on the web, or to have a link to share on social media “I know things change and we’ll all be gone before it’s changed too much but when we are gone it still will rain in summer in the north and hawks will still nest in the Cathedral at Santiago. The great thing is to last and get your work done and see and hear and learn and understand.” Ernest Hemingway - Death in the Afternoon This is Puss, using her judgemental face. Hey y’all, It’s difficult to write a letter you...
4 months ago • 4 min read
Click here to read this on the web, or to have a link to share on social media Hey y'all! I live in Jackson, MS, a city historically defunded and under-invested in, which has resulted in collapsing infrastructure, poor educational outcomes, and extremely poor health outcomes. We also have a lot of feral cats. Those are not unrelated sentences. If a city doesn’t have the money to pave their streets or make sure the water is safe to drink, having a robust animal control department is seldom at...
4 months ago • 4 min read
Click here to read this on the web, or to have a link to share on social media “Why fit in when you were born to stand out!” -Dr Seuss Hey y'all, We are, by and large, a species made up of conformists. Don’t stand out, try to blend in. One of the largest indicators for whether you have a lawn service is if your neighbors have a lawn service. We tend to dress like the people we spend time with, shop at the places they shop, do the things they do. According to the Kelly Blue Book people, in...
4 months ago • 3 min read
Click here to read this on the web, or to have a link to share on social media Coneflowers in my pollinator garden. Hey y’all! Thanks for all of the birthday wishes last week - y’all are the best. And yes, I know that 52 is not old - my line that 52 was the age of old men was more an attempt to say that is how it felt in my head - that I was much too young to be that old. But if you have to explain it… In any event, I felt tremendously loved and affirmed by you all. We buried our 16-year-old...
4 months ago • 3 min read
Click here to read this on the web, or to have a link to share on social media I’m Hugh Hollowell, and this is Life Is So Beautiful, a lovingly curated, hand written, AI-free artisanal short essay and collection of links to things I thought were beautiful. I hope you like it - I made it just for you. - HH A magnolia bloom I saw this morning on my walk. It smells divine. Hey y’all, I’m not sure what the problem is, exactly. You can blame it on shame, or my ADHD, or the consequences of late...
5 months ago • 4 min read
Click here to read this on the web, or to have a link to share on social media Dorothy's daylily Hey y'all! Its scientific name is Hemerocallis fulva, but most of the old people I grew up around called them outhouse lilies or ditch lilies. But my grandmother Dorothy thought that was common and just called them daylilies, and they were her favorite flower. There was a long swath of them that grew behind her house, on the border that separated the backyard from the wild thicket behind it. And...
5 months ago • 3 min read
Click here to read this on the web, or to have a link to share on social media I’m Hugh Hollowell, and this is Life Is So Beautiful, a lovingly curated, hand written, AI free collection of links to things I thought were beautiful. I hope you like it - I made it just for you. - HH Not red, but I love these Caldwell Pink roses in my yard anyway. Hey y’all, Her name was Monteree, and she and her husband Doc lived just down the road from us when I was a boy. They were retired farmers, and lived...
5 months ago • 3 min read
