Follow the Invisible Thread

Mind maps, movies, and the essence of tomato

Weekly Digest, June 21st 2025

Favorites:

• Following threads. How do we ever discover anything? There are paths we walk, threads we pick up and follow. Sometimes they work almost like a loop and this is what we call serendipity or coincidence. This is when I get the sense that something was meant to be. While trying to decide what my favorites for this week would be I scribbled out a map of the things that have been interesting me. It was such fun trying to trace things back to their origin, creating a strange little map that only I can really understand. There are so many small decisions we make which lead us to pay attention to things we would otherwise never have noticed. Even as I think of this now I can trace these things further back, discerning how a buried thread from many years ago found its way above ground to form a connection. At times I feel I am holding a fragile thread loosely in my hand, praying it doesn’t snap or disintegrate. Other times I feel pulled, effortlessly, by the strength of a great number of interwoven threads. I once had the idea, not quite the same as this one but similar, that we are all connected to our memories by silver threads. I search the words in my notes app and find it in September of 2022: Silver silky threads connecting everyone to everything that ever marked them and remains, only snapping silently once that thing has been wholly forgotten. I think I had wanted to use it as a concept for a short story but I never did because something about the idea of the threads snapping didn’t feel right.

• Going to the movies. And painting film stills. I mean, they work so hard to make each scene visually captivating, suspenseful, tense, harmonious etc. — the perfect opportunity to study good composition.

• Painting paintings. I said I wanted to make a modern interpretation of the Veronese piece I shared last week and I did and I really love it.

Painting: Still-life with Chessboard (The Five Senses), Lubin Baugin, 1630

I saw this painting in a book all about flowers in paintings through art history. As I flipped through the pages it caught my eye so I left the book open to it all week and continued to look. The narrative told through the symbolism of each object was completely lost on me until I read up on it. What drew me in was how it made me feel. My modern eyes perceived the piece so much differently than any pair of eyes in 1630 would have. I thought instantly of surrealism, especially Magritte, although the similarities are few. Is it the eerie calm? The lute looks to me like a deflated balloon, and every object seems like a character playing a part.

Quote: From Robert Henri’s The Art Spirit

“There are moments in our lives, there are moments in a day, when we seem to see beyond the usual. Such are the moments of our greatest happiness. Such are the moments of our greatest wisdom. If one could but recall his vision by some sort of sign. It was in this hope that the arts were invented. Sign-posts on the way to what may be. Sign-posts toward greater knowledge.”

Food: Daniel X Claire’s Tomato Sorbet with Tomato Tartar, Tomato Coulis, and Olive Oil. I don’t know how to write about food so I’m not even sure I should try but imagine the undefiled essence of peak season tomatoes turned into art and then turned back into food while remaining a work of art. My soul melted into my chair. See also: Whipped Goat Cheese with Tahini Dressing and Honey, Roasted Chicken with Warm Harissa Vinaigrette, Lebanese Lamb and Pork Sausage with Summer Bean Cassoulet, Muhammara Jus and Mint Chimichurri.

Letter From A Stranger: Drawings by a 14-year-old girl named Anna Jensen from 1870. My mom found these at an estate sale (the same one from last weekend, we went back a second time) and we both died over them. I’ve spent a long time trying to decipher what the vertical page on the left says, ___s of Anne Jensen ___ 1870. Let me know if you have any ideas. The writing is spectacular though, all made up of little scallops and polka dots done in the finest tipped pen. I plan to frame them and love them forever.

Until next time, wherever the thread leads,