Otherwise and elsewhere

Thank you to everyone who signed up for - and especially those who showed up for - the first meeting of the PBC (Philanthropy Book Club). I appreciate the time people took to read the book, prepare questions, and engage with each other. Thanks in particular to Claire Dunning, author of Nonprofit Neighborhoods for joining us.

As most readers know, I have long covid. This means that after preparing for and hosting a one hour zoom last night and participating in one this morning, I'm completely wiped out. I am - literally - squinting at the screen with my one working eye to write this. I'm not looking for sympathy - I want readers of the blog and participants in the PBC to get familiar with my likely rhythm of posting, participation, etc. I simply cannot show up, engage, and then do it again. My most recent estimate is that a one hour zoom that I actively participate in requires 48 hours of repair. But I was raised to send thank you notes, and so to the keyboard I took.

I'm only here now to say thanks and....I've been musing about the PBC and what I learned last night. I will be back soon with both suggested next dates, next books, ways to better engage across time zones, etc. I've said it before, I will say it again, I need all the help I can get to do this. If you're interested, please reach out. If you can help support the cost of this website and the book club, you're welcome to sign up for the blog as a paid member.

In the short term, let me share a podcast that I deeply respect and which is shaping my thinking about the PBC. The podcast is called Between the Covers and is put out by David Naimon and Tin House Publishing (there are lots of other pods with similar names). In this episode, David talks with Omar El-Akkad, fiction and nonfiction author. It is provocative proof of the criticality of art and artists in crises and an invitation to everyone to re-inspect your deepest assumptions about what you believe in and what lines cannot be crossed. There's also a great little exchange about how funders need those they fund more than vice versa (with specific reference to The Giller Prize, writers refusals, and the work that change requires.)

Finally, I shared a playlist of songs about books last night. You can access it here. If you can identify which book each song engages with, I'll reward you with something. (Yes, using a search engine is cheating. How could you live with yourself?) I'm also taking song suggestions - especially music not in English.