Tomorrow is a Rest Day... and Other Lies.

I've been overextending myself again (big surprise there). I haven't had an opportunity to properly share all of the things that are currently going on for me, and, while most of them are exceedingly good, they're all also incredibly demanding.

So, today has become a rest day, sparked by a new (hopefully minor) flare of back pain. Sometimes, your body just lets you know what it needs.

How often do you rest? I mean really rest? I think about the frenetic pace of modern life, and it seems obvious that this can only continue for so long before humanity breaks down.

We aren't meant to work monotonous routine jobs like so much biological machinery.

Thank you for reading Halvorson Times. This post is public so feel free to share it.

We aren't meant to be making vital social political decisions in-between the hectic enterprises of our fraught and exhausting lives. Who has time to stand in a voting line between jobs, kids, school, and the dozen other common chores of existence?

Human psychology and human society are not naturally capable of sustaining the mechanistic reality we've imposed the last two-hundred or so years. You know it, deep down, just like I do: the way the world works isn't right.

But this is a rest day.

So, instead of regaling you with politics... I'm going to suggest a book series.

My wife and I have been absolutely immersed by Elly Griffiths' The Magic Men Mysteries. Right now, I'm reading the third in the series: The Blood Card, and it has to be some of the most enjoyable and engrossing mystery writing that I've encountered since Agatha Christie. You’ll want to start with The Zig Zag Girl.

Griffiths manages to capture the internal state of her characters with profound simplicity: each one is as alive and real as it's possible for text on a page to be, feeling like true, distinct people. You know what sort of things each character cares about, and how they'll respond to situations.

Thanks for reading Halvorson Times! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.

There's a strong sense of close-knit cast that you get from the best ensemble series, there's romance and humor, and the early 1950s U.K. setting is delightful in its vivid clarity (Griffiths has done a remarkable job researching the era).

So, if you, like me, need an enforced period of rest... turn off the damn screens for a day and dive into this series. You won't be disappointed.

Either way, dear readers... go easy. And, if you can't go easy, just go as easy as you can.

~Odin