On tending
An essay, in three parts
There is a kind of work that does not announce itself. It happens in the spaces between the things you put on your calendar — the kitchen at six, the half hour before bed, the slow walk home that takes the long way on purpose. I have come to think of this work as tending.
Tending is not maintenance. Maintenance keeps a thing from getting worse. Tending makes the thing more itself.
part ii · the small daily
A sourdough is not the bread; it is the relationship. The starter is fed at roughly the same hour, in roughly the same way, and over months it stops being a procedure and becomes a small ritual that holds the day in place. Notice how the most reliable thing in your week is something you have to keep alive.
The same is true of writing, of friendship, of a body. Skipping a day does not break it; skipping a season does.
part iii · what the margin is for
A book without a margin is a sealed object. A book with a margin is a conversation. When you read with a pencil, the book reads you back.
The margin is where the reader becomes a maker. It is also, frequently, where the best part of the book is — not in the typography but in the pencil.