A year ago, during an evening walk, I met a man in the city — probably in his sixties. He didn’t block my way, but his eyes held a quiet wish to speak.
I stopped, took out an earbud, and let him know I was ready to listen.
You’re not planning to drink, are you? (tomorrow, the day after — during the holidays)
I told him no.
He said:
Don’t be afraid. You hear me? Don’t be afraid of anything.
I replied:
Thank you. All the best to you!
He answered:
No — all the best to you.
An ordinary evening. An ordinary passerby. But there was something in him — something real, calm, and wise. He didn’t impose, didn’t ask for anything, but it felt like he wanted to say something important.
Unfortunately, in the flow of life, we often fail to notice His presence — in passing strangers, in other people.
Finally, I kicked off the cycling season! The hardest part of the first ride is getting in the zone. I try to recall the route, listen to the bike after the repair, and stay focused on the road. Physically, it’s not easy either — my heart rate spikes, my breathing’s off, and my legs burn on the very first climb.
But I love these first rides for that childlike feeling of freedom.
I stopped to catch my breath and figure out how best to continue driving.
In the end, I rode 28.2 km. For the start — great! I’m in the season now.
The bike performed well (knock on wood!). I was worried that problems would pop up after the repair, but everything went smoothly. The upgraded transmission is a joy: you can really feel how all the power from my legs goes straight into the wheels, with no slippage or play.
The bike computer shows 24 km, but this is not the end of the trip
I had the idea to take a new route, but decided to stick to the familiar one for the first ride. In the end, it felt like a new route — I was surprised to see how much the city had changed in a year1 — where there used to be shacks, now there are (monotonous) high-rise buildings and bike lanes.
Finally got my steel horse back from the shop. Yep, that legendary blue Merida ;-). I skipped the last season — no time for rides — but this year I’ve got big plans: so many beautiful places to visit and many kilometers to cover.
That legendary blue Merida
A word of advice for everyone in the saddle: don’t put off maintenance. Otherwise, you’ll end up replacing not just the chain, but the cassette and chainrings too — speaking from experience.
It’s become a tradition: spring for me comes with a French soundtrack. Today it’s Juliette Armanet and her À la folie.
Juliette Armanet - Petite Amie (2017) Album Cover
A beautiful song — a great melody, beautifully sung, incredibly well put together!
Notice how Juliette emphasizes the endings of words. She marks them like punctuation at the end of sentences. It adds clarity, transparency, and creates the right rhythm for this song: a heartbeat, a dance, passion.
What’s interesting is this: the song is about losing control, yet the delivery is meticulous. It sounds like an attempt to hold oneself together through the music, to stay afloat. Like a spell. Like a ritual chant:
Without those crisp endings, everything would fall apart — the words would blur together, losing their shape like hazy memories.
And the words themselves form striking contrasts:
fête / défaite — celebration and defeat
tête-à-tête — intimacy, closeness, but also enclosure
danse / cadence / chance — everything spins and moves, like life or fate
French speech usually flows — soft transitions, fluid connections, as if everything melts into everything else. But here, it’s different: the endings cut through. The rhythm becomes broken, almost sharp — like breath caught at an emotional peak.
The stress on endings feels like a fixation of tension, like a point of no return.
A great example of how form serves content. In a song about mad love, where everything might fall apart at any moment, these precise endings bring ritual order.
If the crowd doesn’t like (approve) - most likely, everything is done correctly. There is only one criterion of quality - sincerity. That’s it.
I’m on my way to this, but I can’t yet throw off my dependence on approval and come to crystal sincerity. We are social creatures, which means we depend on the opinions of other people. Conformism is encouraged in systems.
At first glance, it may seem that it is easier for an introvert to run away and hide from the world - “I’m right, and you’re all assholes!”, “Nobody understands my genius!” And indeed, you need to avoid the crowd so as not to lose yourself. But you definitely can’t hide from one person. I talk to myself for hours every day – in text, in my head, and even out loud. The arguments there are more intense than those in your get-togethers with colleagues at planning meetings, with friends in cafes, or cute purrs in the comments. I have nothing to fear – there is blood and flesh, joy and pain, a black abyss and blinding light. Most people avoid all of this in themselves, keeping it on the farthest shelf, never approaching or opening it. But it’s all here. It’s all already in me. This is me!
A constantly open daily note on my phone, so that I can catch the flow. If I sit down to write on purpose, I’ll end up with a plastic piece of crap that can collect a lot of likes, but will kill me as a person, a human being, a creature.
So likes aren’t important? It’s a paradox, but they are important. A like is one form of showing love1. This is a good person and I want to express my love to them. It’s nice to receive this because it required an internal dialogue and awareness on the other side. So, there is a similar person there.
I know people who never like. I know people who like everything. I know the mechanisms of both.
In the meantime, all I can do is try to push people away, because attracting people who don’t resonate with your personality will always lead to negative friction. I call it Anti-Marketing.
P.s. This topic is very interesting to me and I will definitely continue to think about it and share it with you. In the era of marketing, we have forgotten about sincerity. In the era of likes, we have stopped valuing feelings.
Instead of a like, write to me and tell me what you think.
The other day I voiced my short film “Sunset (I know it will happen again)”. It was very important to me that the voice sounded natural. I did several takes1 - where I feel relaxed, there are always rough edges and mistakes - here you can’t hear a letter, there the accent is wrong. It seems simple - try and everything will be great, but then the soul is lost and I hear artificiality. There are projects where this is not so important, but here it was extremely important, and I am my own strictest director.
This makes you think about the fact that the present is imperfect. Expressing yourself honestly may lead to dissatisfaction with the result, since it is human nature to make mistakes.
Since ancient times, people have tried to illuminate their lives as much as possible, because darkness is frightening and arouses exploratory and conquering interest. But today this leads to light pollution 1 of cities. And if we understand light not literally, then it is the desire to “illuminate” as much as possible around us - more information, more “useful” surfaces and screens, more contacts with people per unit of time. Sounds good, but it has a terrible effect on us every day - defocus, laziness and loss of interest, because there is so much around us right now.
You need to be able to turn off everything for yourself, and then gradually return only what is truly significant. Here is your true interest right now and nothing else exists at all - the candle flame. At this moment, the surrounding emptiness creates space for perception of the most important thing. After a while, when your eyes get used to it, you begin to distinguish the details of the space, you will see more context, more colors. The space will acquire more meaning, because it surrounds the object of your interest now.
For example, you are sitting opposite another person. You are calmly communicating. Pay attention only to this moment. Turn off and remove your smartphone from the table. Instead of a noisy and crowded cafe, sit on a bench in the evening park or in the kitchen with a cup of tea. The person opposite you is a candle flame - only its light is important now, only it illuminates the space.
This can be applied to the project you are working on, to information, to rest. It is not for nothing that people prefer a paper book instead of a digital one - nothing should distract attention, including the medium.
Photography and poetry: reflection of the external and internal
Photography is an opportunity to capture a moment as I see it. A reflection of the external. I am only an observer.
Poetry is an opportunity to capture thoughts and feelings so that they do not scatter across a sheet of paper. A reflection of the internal. Again, I am only an observer.
I remember the good times of LiveJournal and autonomous blogs1. I met people without saying “hello” to them. I read their thoughts, encountered oddities and stupidities that gradually revealed the author’s personality. They were my friends!
Then came marketing. Marketers taught how to write better - this was the beginning of the end. Blogs became like plastic “Barbie houses”. There is no need to be afraid that artificial intelligence will replace writers, because the writer has already been replaced by a marketer.
Instead of creating a place to express (or find) themselves, authors turn their blog into a glamour magazine, “business media”, or a verified dry document. They try to find a better voice and correct mistakes, but in the end they lose both their voice and the opportunity to make mistakes (because we must make mistakes in order to grow).
Notes are not a work of art - they are ore.
Yes, you need to learn to write well — good text helps to structure thoughts. But the “editor-in-chief”2 cutting up the text in pursuit of points is extreme. Read the “editorial”3 texts — dry, documentary, with an artificial note of soul.
I was surprised to notice that I find it interesting to reread the drafts of my notes (notes that I did not publish for some reason). This is ore — black, dirty, but with value inside. Or without value, but this remains to be seen. There are real emotions there, because they are still very fresh; thoughts that lead to a dead end or to the top of the mountain.
“Ore” is needed for production. News, thoughts, links. For example, I’m working on a podcast right now and have to process a lot of that ore. Of course, you can rebroadcast it as is, but then I won’t be in it. I want to be a source, not a channel - that’s very important!
To have the courage to publish a draft as soon as possible, you need to work with the garage door open.
Here’s what Andy Matuschak4writes about public work:
There’s a scientific glassblowing studio north of us; I walk past it on the sidewalk often. By simply existing, and having a nice sign that faces the street, they are doing a small public service every day. We are here, working.
In the same light industrial complex as the Murray Street Media Lab, there’s a woodworking shop, and the man who runs it always keeps his door propped open. Simple as that. What a delight, every damn day, to ride my bike past that door and peek inside and see all his tools, the boards stacked up for whatever commission he’s undertaking. I am here, working.
For me, Andy’s evergreen notes is a great example of public service.
I don’t know where my thoughts will take me. I just create a new text file in Obsidian and start writing - whole thoughts or fragments, links and feelings can go in there. Tomorrow, I or someone else will find a gem in this ore. Or not.
I love listening to music and I am convinced that a good cover hides good content. Not always, but usually so, because the external reflects the internal. If the cover was made with taste and soul, it hides the “tasty” and lively content of the album. In the ocean of information, one cover seems to shout at you “Hello! I’m here! Let’s get acquainted!”, the other quietly and modestly stands aside, waiting for attention.
With this note I open the sections “Cover of the week” and “Track of the week”. I will introduce readers to what I like. Not regularly, but now there is a place where I can share something interesting, and you know where to get acquainted with it.
I’ll start with Evvo - Physical L.U.Vl12 from the EP of the same name (2016)
I first found this album in 2016. Since then, it has accompanied me in various Spotify playlists and on my first (and last) hi-fi player. Then I left Spotify for another music service. There I collected a discography from scratch, but forgot about this EP. I remembered only in 2024.
I listened to it again. What can I say now? Good! The main track for me, as before, is Physical L.U.V. Of course, it does not evoke the same emotions, but it leaves a good impression.
But I still think the cover is awesome in 2016 and in 2024 - the colors, the style, the image of intercourse and love. Excellent!
