Coffee Letter #016: Gentle January
Looking forward to spring, while also enjoying the coldness and slowness of winter.
“No need to hurry. No need to sparkle. No need to be anybody but oneself.”
— Virginia Woolf
I’m reading Katherine Mansfield’s Journal and she is very into resolutions. Whenever someone talks so passionately about a subject, I can’t help but wish to partake. Except she’s human and she fails a lot too. At one point she writes “I begin hideously unhappy, make God knows how many resolves, and then break them! One day I shall not do so…”, a good reminder for yours truly that she also sets herself for failure whenever she gets a wave of excitement and wants to conquer the world with her goals. In such moments it helps to return to the words I chose to guide me this year: gentle and intentional. Virginia Woolf’s resolutions also come to mind:
January is cold and long, and I don’t know about you, but I’ve come to love it for that. I lean into the darkness. I take my first sips of tea when the sun is not out yet, I catch the sunrise leftovers on my way to the bus, I love the cold touch on my cheeks as the outside air hits me on my way to the office.
Whenever it’s frosty outside, it really looks like January is trying its best to create something beautiful for us — especially since snow is scarce these days. I’m also fond of foggy mornings, probably why I insisted we find an apartment in this area, because this part of the city seems to have its own weather report and 90% of the time it’s foggy, hence why I refer to it as Silent Hill.
Imbolc is near, the halfway point between the winter solstice and the spring equinox, which only means that spring is almost here. I saw snowdrops this week and I literally ran home to my husband to announce that spring is coming. I’ve celebrated the first snowdrop spotting since I was a little kid and I’m still embracing this childish enthusiasm for snowdrops and the excitement that spring is coming. Two things can be true at the same time: just because I’m excited for spring, does not mean that I dread winter, and I can enjoy the slowness of winter while still looking forward to spring.
~ read
I’m currently reading a lot of things — which seems to be the theme of the month: a cute fantasy novel, an atmospheric horror, a lot of Katherine Mansfield, and a Japanese magical realism novel. I hope to share these soon, but for now let’s talk about the two books I read this week, both so beautiful and tender that they broke me:
The Dutch House by Ann Patchett. The first book that made me cry this year. I guess I have to thank Mads for the recommendation — where would we be without friends who read a devastating book and then they share it with us too?
This is a book about family and growing up and turning out like our parents or not turning out at all like them. It was a fascinating read and you could go so deep to dissect the characters and try to understand them - and in spite of all the evil and the hurt some characters are guilty of, you kinda get them and feel for them?
And it's a book about a house and a portrait and how nothing is set in stone and our fates can change in an instant. I was devasted but I also loved every second of it?
De ce fierbe copilul în mămăligă/Why the Child is Cooking in the Polenta by Aglaja Veteranyi (translated in Romanian by Nora Iuga). Aglaja Veteranyi left Communist Romania when she was a child and started writing in German, actually. This is my second time reading it, and I loved it just as much as the first time (I was in high school when I first read it).
The novel is slightly autobiographical, and it follows a Romanian family travelling around Europe with the circus, running away from the poverty and oppression in their home-country. It’s a sad slightly surrealist novel full of nostalgia and melancholy. Narrated by a child, the novel is both childish and profound at the same time, the narrator making sense of things in a whimsical way. It’s about being a refugee, missing a home you never actually knew.
I never quite know how to talk about the books that mark me in the way this one did, all I can tell you is that it’s a short book you can read in one day.
~ watch
I watched a lot of things. Whenever I have a very busy week I recharge at the end of the day by cuddling with my cat in front of the TV. Plus this week SkyShow aired the finale of The Day of the Jackal! So let’s start with that:
The Day of the Jackal (TV series, 2024-). Actually this series ended in December last year, but SkyShow was behind on airing the episodes and I enjoyed the week-long wait for my Jackal-fix. When you have to wait for an episode, you can make it special in some way — it’s all about the anticipation. To celebrate the finale I made myself some pink ravioli (filled with radicchio and guanciale) that I served with some olive oil and burrata. Let’s bring back tuning in for our favourite TV shows on a random night per week instead of binge-watching!
I talked about this series a bunch of times in past letters, it’s all about an assassin killing people all over Europe and a smart British intelligence officer trying to catch him. Well, let me tell you, I did not expect that ending. It’s a really fun spy-thriller and it toys with who you root for. Available on SkyShow.
Only Murders in the Building (TV series, 2021-). I finally finished season 4 - of my own accord I also watched this one on a weekly-basis. I liked this show since its first season because I like cozy murder-mysteries and I am fascinated by old apartment buildings with a history like the fictional Arconia building in the series. The show follows three neighbours who create a true crime podcast together after a murder takes place in their building. And then there’s another murder, and another murder and so on.
Season 4 had too many celebrity guests for my liking and not enough focus on the mystery — if the mystery was still central and charming like in the previous seasons, then I wouldn’t have minded the celebrity guests. I hope season 5 will bring back that charm that first capture me, especially since I’m fond of mafia mysteries. Available on Disney+.
I also watched the two season of XO, Kitty (TV series, 2023-) and it’s nice if you want some quick mindless fun full of teen tropes. It follows an American high-schooler studying at an international school in South Korea; it’s a spin-off of To All the Boys I've Loved Before, but you don’t have to be familiar with it (I wasn’t). Available on Netflix (the films too, I reckon).
Yesterday I finished the 2nd season of The Night Agent (TV series, 2023-), which I watched mostly as a background show (although it sets up the 3rd season nicely). From the start I did not care for our main characters and the writing is a bit choppy. This time around I was somewhat invested in some secondary characters.
I guess we are past the cool spy-thrillers and into the bureaucratic American spies. The 2nd season of The Recruit (TV series, 2022-) will be out at the end of the month, but this one is more fun than The Night Agent, due to Noah Centineo being very charismatic in it. I’m currently rewatching the 1st season. Both shows are on Netflix.
Oh, and a friend recommended me The Pitt (TV series, 2025-), a medical drama where each episode is one hour of a 15-hour shift in the ER. A new episode comes out each week. This time format makes it a lot of fun. It’s chaotic, it’s funny at times (there’s a lot of banter), but also intense as it mixes mundane activities with, I don’t know, a GSW emergency! It’s a new medical drama I’m actually excited about! Watch weekly on Max.
~ and other things I did last week
Music: This week I had a mix of albums on repeat, and soon I will probably start hunting them on vinyl too: Different Class by Pulp — cool britpop, A Hero’s Death by Fontaines D.C. — recommended by Andreea Marlene after my last letter, music from them is also featured in the film Bird, and Parallel Lines by Blondie — well-loved at the office this week (we also listened a lot to the Twin Peaks soundtrack and even convinced a colleague to watch the show).
Food: I went to Cimbru Author for the second time this month — I’m obsessed. The food is so good and their full menu is really well-priced for what they offer. Plus the fact that they change the menu weekly is amazing. Next I want to go to one of their carte blanche events.
Other things consumed last week:
The Cruel Story of Gisèle Pélicot (Alice Cappelle - YouTube). I followed this trial closely last year and Alice Cappelle starts from the trial, while also touching on subjects as the ‘perfect victim’ and ‘rape culture’.
Kitchen Project #158: All About Buttercream (Kitchen Project - substack). Kitchen Project is the first substack I read and the first one I paid for a subscription and that’s because Nicola Lamb writes a weekly free substack that’s a well-researched deep-dive into something pastry related — this week a guest wrote about buttercream. What a subscription gets you is an extra post each week related to the main free post, basically instead of one recipe, you get two (this week we got KP+: Chocolate Cake with Soy Caramel French Buttercream). I discovered Nicola Lamb a couple of years ago during her Christmas biscuit bonanza on Instagram, a biscuit box she makes every year (Kitchen Project #155: Christmas Biscuit Bonanza).
Tokyo drift: what happens when a city stops being the future? (The Guardian). Everyone who knows me knows that I dream of going to Japan so lots of people asked me if I’m going to Tokyo this year. My answer is no, mostly because I have an anxious cat and my dream trip to Japan is for at least two weeks (my cat would never accept that) but also because for the past couple of years I thought a lot about tourism pollution and how I could be a better tourist — personally I don’t day trip, I don’t need to see everything a place has to offer (I prefer to take it slow and enjoy the moment instead of rushing around) and I avoid airbnbs (this also comes from being a hotel lover). It goes without saying that the places you visit are first and foremost someone’s home, regardless of how much their economy is based on tourism. If you are curious about being a better tourist I also recommend this article from the Guardian: Be a better tourist! 28 ways to have a fantastic holiday – without infuriating the locals.
An oral history of Twin Peaks by its unforgettable stars: ‘I put my waitress uniform on and began bawling’ (The Guardian). Maybe I’ll start my Twin Peaks rewatch earlier than planned.
Why Stoicism will always be in vogue (El País). Each week I read a few pages from The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman and then I complain to my friend Bogdana about the book — there are parts from the book I really enjoy, but mostly I find it shallow and by that I mean the authors’ interpretation, not stoicism itself. Bogdana shared this article with me and I decided to pass it on.
An Honest Conversation about Why I Quit Social Media (a life with no Instagram or TikTok) (Ana Wallace Johnson - YouTube). This month I though a lot about giving up Instagram because I despise Meta (I don’t use Facebook), but there are so many cool people I keep in contact with on that damn app and I like seeing what everyone is reading and doing, plus I enjoying sharing the mundane things that bring me joy in my life.
Somehow, it is still January. Here are my nine wellness-free survival tips (The Guardian). In case you don’t enjoy January, a funny article on how to survive it.
I always have trouble with this part… Ending things. Saying goodbye. It feels too abrupt to not say anything, but there’s also not much else to say. Does it make sense?
I know I said January is slow and cold, but I’m back to my unusual social butterfly shenanigans. I’m ready for a week full of book clubs — although I’m still reading Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami for the book club on Thursday. It’s a big book, guys. And coffees with dear friends. At the end of the week I’m going to a cabin — and I’m hoping for snow.
Thank you for reading!