There's an unexpected upside to my bad habit of buying too many books: when they all sit unread together, they create a kind of natural selection environment where the truly compelling ones emerge over time. What seems like overconsumption actually enables better choices - as the books compete for attention, one will suddenly jump out as obviously superior to all the others I thought worth buying.
This process of a book demanding to be read reminds me of what psychologists call salience—that quality that makes something stand out. But I prefer Noah Webster’s 1828 definition: “leaping; moving by frogs; as frogs; beating; throbbing; as the heart; shooting out or up; springing; daring; as a salient sprout.” Some books, then, are quite literally (a fun word since we’re talking about books) leap from the shelf, begging to be read.
It’s quite possible that every time I think of buying a book I could instead put it on a list and then, when I’m ready for a new book, look at the list and order the one that feels the most interesting. But I’ve tried that, and it doesn’t work the same way. Maybe it’s the choice of font on the spines of the books, maybe it’s the books’ width side-by-side, or maybe it’s something about being able to pick one or two up and read a page or two (in practice, though, I never do that).
What’s really happening, I suspect, is a kind of attentional compound interest. Each time I pass by a book—plopped on a counter, flaunting its cover on my desk, shoved in a corner, or neatly stacked on my shelf—it catches my eye. Some books slowly fade into the background, but others get more interesting with each glance. A recent book I loved, “Why Greatness Cannot Be Planned,” sat in various places in my office for weeks. “Why can’t greatness be planned?” I found myself thinking as I passed it, turning the lights out for the day.
The real challenge has been learning to trust the process—to quiet the utilitarian voice asking, “Why this book? What will it teach me? How will this make me better at my job?” I learned to let those questions go. A book’s persistent ability to catch my interest is reason enough to read it, as I’ve been rewarded time and time again with discoveries even the books’ titles hadn’t clued me into being in the cards. Interestingness, it turns out, is both destination and journey: it’s pleasure enough in itself to find something out, and it also plants seeds that might flower into something else entirely months or years later. Or not. And that’s okay too.
My wife and I just made a move that might seem counterintuitive: after twelve years in San Francisco, we chose Columbus, Ohio as the place to start our family. No, we don't have family here. No, we didn't move for work—we both run remote businesses. We moved because we found something rare: a chance to design the life we actually want, not the one we're supposed to want.
What drew us to Columbus? A group of close friends from my Ohio State days who've created something special here. They all live within a ten-minute walk of each other in a historic neighborhood, where brick houses and streets mix with coffee shops, restaurants, and a Jeni's ice cream parlor that feels built into the community, not dropped into a strip mall. Oh, and they're all starting families too.
We considered staying in San Francisco or moving to New York—they both have obvious attractions. But they also come with a financial treadmill we realized we could simply choose not to step on. When I catch myself worrying what people might think about us moving to "flyover country," I remember: anyone who'd judge us for prioritizing friendship, financial freedom, and creating ideal conditions for parenthood can shove it.
In Hilarious Mistakes, I wrote about looking back with fondness on the silly things we’ve done in the past not with shame, but amusement and appreciation for letting them teach us what we’ve needed to learn.
That’s it for this issue. I’m looking forward to what’s next!
Andy.