Attention Inventory: November

5 observed preoccupations including indecipherable penmanship, ugly meals, and a soundtrack of polished rebellion.

Nothing succeeds without taking stock. Below, this month’s “Attention Inventory” list of 5 clocked preoccupations, including: soft attire, indecipherable penmanship, ugly meals, and a soundtrack of polished rebellion.

1. WORKDAY SOFTNESS

My house gets cold. And for a moment there, amid mornings working at home, you’d find me in a monochrome grey cotton sweatsuit with the hood up (recently I saw a typo on an Amazon review that accidentally said “sweatshit” and that was deeply the mood). I looked like Justin Bieber. 

I’ve come to my senses and invested in a proper set from Lauren Manoogian. When I tell you this with this is absolutely perfect…trust me!

2. TWO DIFFERENT HANDWRITINGS

INTERVIEWER:

How do you write? How do you perform the physical act of writing?

CALVINO:

I would say I cross out more than I write. I have to hunt for words when I speak, and I have the same difficulty when writing. Then I make a number of additions, interpolations, that I write in a very tiny hand. There comes a moment when I myself can’t read my handwriting, so I use a magnifying glass to figure out what I’ve written. I have two different handwritings. One is large with fairly big letters—the os and as have a big hole in the center. This is the hand I use when I’m copying or when I’m rather sure of what I’m writing. My other hand corresponds to a less confident mental state and is very small—the os are like dots. This is very hard to decipher, even for me.

From issue no. 124 (Fall 1992) of The Paris Review