This:

“Toxic masculinity is a contradiction in terms, it's a non sequitur. In order for a thing called ‘toxic masculinity’ to exist you'd have to have a thing called ‘positive masculinity’, and you'd also have to have toxic femininity, and positive femininity.
There is no reality in which positive masculinity isn't synonymous with femininity, because a trait cannot be gendered equally masculine and feminine at the same time, or it ceases to be gendered at all. That's the entire point of a dichotomy: it's one or the other.
If a trait signifies masculinity, it cannot simultaneously and to an equal extent signify femininity. Aggression is not good or bad — it's good or bad depending on the circumstances. Nor should it be good or bad depending on the genitalia of the person exhibiting it.”

It's strange that someone who loves books as much as I do reads only 7–15 books a year. There are two reasons for that.

The first reason won't surprise you: like virtually everybody else in the world, my attention span and my ability to focus on reading have diminished in the last two decades or so, as a side-effect of constant screen exposure. I'm not too concerned about this, though, because at least I keep on reading. Not only that: about half of my reads are difficult, stuffy, old books — and often on paper, where there are few distractions available. (In contrast, many people nowadays seem to read non-fiction only, or contemporary literature only. Some of my fellow nerds read mostly — or only — technical books, articles, or blog posts. And there are even people who seem unable to read text for more than two minutes unless it's displayed on a bright, colourful piece of glass.) But even I don't seem to be able to read for hours on end like I used to in my youth. On my ~2h30′ flights to and from Frankfurt, I usually read most of the time, but not all the time. I manage to read for around one and a half hours or so, and then get distracted by my phone — like everybody around me.

Inspired by my friend Fidel, I'm publicly sharing some of my resolutions for the new year.

This (turn of the) year I have not thought much about this nor made an actual list, unlike some other years. But certainly there are a few concrete goals in my head, some of which I already mentioned on my recap of 2024.

Here go some of the goals I can divulge, hoping to put some social pressure on myself.

The year comes to an end in a few hours, and some of the digital services and apps that I use on a daily basis started nudging me as early as one month ago about my various stats and achievements throughout 2024, with the hope that I'd boost them on social media. I'm old school and prefer blogs to walled gardens, and since I have not been writing here much as of late, I thought I'd use those stats as a way to recap my year.

So here go four apps I use a lot, and my “achievements” on them during the year — in increasing order of importance to me.

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Regalé esta novela a mi mujer por su cumpleaños porque yo llevaba una temporada leyendo cosas muy buenas sobre el libro (sí, tengo la desfachatez de regalar a la familia libros que luego pretendo leer yo también). Especialmente en redes sociales no hacía más que encontrar alabanzas a la novela. La premisa me parecía intrigante y muy alejada de mi mundo, y al estar basada en la experiencia personal de la autora, yo anticipaba aprendizaje y estímulo. Además, Alana S. Portero es madrileña como nosotros y solo un poco mayor que nosotros, así que esperaba encontrar referentes comunes (hasta donde su vida y las nuestras se intersecan, que tampoco es tanto).

⭐⭐⭐

I always thought I had read this short story thirty years ago or so already, because it was included in a volume that my parents had at home… but I could not remember much. I had a vague image of a decrepit vacant mansion being invaded by the surrounding vegetation, and ultimately destroyed by it.

Then in December last year my wife and I visited Ronda in Southern Spain, and I was fascinated by this old mansion, Casa del Rey Moro. Visiting the house, and reading about its history, the House of Usher (or the distorted memory I had of it) came to my mind immediately, and I resolved to read Poe's story (again?) soon.

Is it me, or is this getting a bit better?

Still too damn long and still too damn detailed. And too damn overemotional (the amount of stress it can still cause grown-up Proust that one time that his mum didn't show up in his room to kiss him good-night that summer evening when he was a little kid!). And too damn posh and affected.

But on this fifth volume there were a dozen pages here and fifty pages there that were real engaging or real funny. And a few memorable quotes and brilliant reflections on life and love (of which I share a few at the end of this post).

“Love, what is it but space and time rendered perceptible by the heart”

(Ver mis subrayados en el primer libro y en el segundo libro.)

Ideas que me hicieron sentir reivindicado en alguna convicción mía previa (por ejemplo, cosas que escribí hace ya años en Vīta), ideas que me hicieron gracia, ideas que me inspiraron, o ideas que me espantaron.

(← See the third week)

(← See the second week)