Just A Peck 0051 // Fatherhood, Surgery, Recovery

6/28/26

Welcome to the latest issue of Just A Peck. I’m glad you’re here!

JOURNAL

Last Sunday was Father’s Day. I called and chatted with my dad, talked to all of my amazing kids, and got some work done around the house. Jody and Kaylee made crepes. I had one savory and one sweet. (Both delicious!) Then Jody and I managed to get out for a paddle. It will be the last one for me for a while, since my upcoming surgery prohibits me from lifting, twisting, pushing, and pulling for the next 6–8 weeks. A really lovely day.

Crepes made by Jody and Kaylee for Father's Day

I spent the week scrambling to get everything ready before surgery. On Thursday morning, I reported to St. Luke’s with Jody at 5:30am. The nursing team got me prepped and into a fancy, high-tech surgical gown with ports to which they could hook air circulation equipment. The procedure started at 7:30 and lasted for three and a half hours. Double ventral hernia repair for the recurrence of a hernia I had repaired laparoscopically a decade ago. The recurrence meant that this time they had to take a more serious approach and really split me open and sew me up for good (knock on wood). The procedure seems to have gone well, and Jody has been taking really good care of me. I’ve mostly been sitting and reading (or walking around slowly). So far, the pain has been manageable. Now I just need to remember to be careful for the rest of the summer while I heal.

WHAT I WATCHED THIS WEEK

The Stunt Man (1980). Recommended by a friend. Peter O'Toole and Barbara Hershey were great. Loved Allen Garfield (always). Steve Railsback was pretty bad—still channeling Manson a bit, it seemed. Somehow both tonally cohesive and all over the map at the same time. "Eli Cross" in a literal deus ex machina.

The Color of Pomegranates (1969). An embarrassing blindspot for me. Often considered one of the greatest films of all time, and filled with absolutely incredible visuals, but I understood very little of what was going on from moment to moment. An Armenian film about the life of an 18th-Century Armenian poet (of whom I'm completely unfamiliar) depicted poetically through a series of avant-garde tableaus in the style of Orthodox Armenian iconography (of which I'm largely unfamiliar) and tied thematically to the survival of Armenian culture throughout a history of persecution (of which I'm mostly unfamiliar). Beautiful but largely opaque for me.

WHAT I READ THIS WEEK

Lots of recovery downtime this week, so I had more time to read than I usually do.

Finished:

I Who Have Never Known Men, by Jacqueline Harpman (audiobook). I don't know what I expected this book to be, but it wasn't this. What a tiny marvel. Technically post-apocalyptic, I suppose, but the details of the apocalypse are so scarcely present that it's primarily metaphorical. Is this book a look at female friendship within the confines of the societal cages in which women find themselves? Is it an allegory for the dehumanization the author experienced as a child fleeing from the Nazis? It might be both of those things, but it's also a meditation on the confusing, wonderful, inexplicable experience of being alive.

The Vegetarian, by Han Kang. This book was described as a "darkly allegorical, Kafka-esque tale of power, obsession, and one woman's struggle to break free from the violence both without and within her". All of those things are true(ish), the body horror elements were intense and traumatizing, and the writing was beautiful (the Nobel-Prize-winning Kang won the Booker for this novel), but I suspect that I would have been more taken in by The Vegetarian had I not just finished I Who Have Never Known Men, which touched on many of the same themes in ways that were more effective for me.

Piranesi, by Susanna Clarke. Another stunner. I had been meaning to read this since it came out, and when I had to pick one book to bring with me to the hospital, this was the one I went with. I love Susanna Clarke, and I loved this astonishing book. It also made me aware of the Imaginary Prisons etchings by Giovanni Battista Piranesi to whom the title (sort of) refers. "The Beauty of the House is immeasurable; its Kindness infinite."

Beloved, by Toni Morrison. What a week of books! Beloved has long been another embarrassing blindspot for me, so I finally rectified that. It was often painful in the ways that a story involving the horrors of slavery need to be, but the prose is stunning—working at such a breathtaking level of technique as it shifted from viewpoint to viewpoint that I sometimes felt unworthy to be reading it. I've never seen the movie adaptation, but there's no possible way it could come close to what this Pulitzer Prize-winning masterpiece accomplishes. I completely understand why the recent Guardian poll of authors, critics, and academics picked Beloved as the second greatest novel of all time (after Middlemarch).

In Progress:

The Fortunate Fall, Reed
How Plays Work, Edgar
Gödel, Escher, Bach, Hofstadter
Hollywood: The Oral History, Basinger, Wasson

MEMORIES

Five Years Ago:

Five years ago Jody and I were in Maine to see Spencer perform at the beautiful mountain resort Quisisana. The location was stunning, and it was great to see Spencer in his element. The biggest treat, of course, was getting to see him in one of his first professional gigs as Barfée in Putnam!

Spencer performing at Quisisana in Maine

QUICK LINKS

WHAT I'M EXCITED ABOUT

Chrono CCG, the game my friend Matias has been working on for over two years, launched in Early Access on Steam and Epic Games this week. The splash screen even features a character inspired by Lark Wavesilver, my character on the Twin Portals podcast!

Chrono CCG, now in Early Access on Steam and Epic Games

Concerts on the Pier kick off this week with Danny Frank & the Smoky Gold!

Criterion announced a 30-disc box set of all thirteen of Stanley Kubrick’s features “restored in 4K, with their original soundtracks alongside the 5.1 mixes, restored and remastered; over twenty-five hours of interviews, documentaries, and behind-the-scenes materials; and deluxe packaging illustrated with rare photographs, artwork, and documents annotated by Kubrick himself, all housed in a singular box inspired by the director’s legendary archive.” I mean, my god, look at this thing.

Fourth Fest is this week in Duluth. The fireworks over the harbor are always pretty spectacular.

Fourth Fest fireworks over the Duluth harbor

MY FAVORITE QUOTE(S) OF THE WEEK

In celebration of Father’s Day this week, I’m sharing a bunch of quotes about fatherhood compiled by Austin Kleon.

"...it seems as time goes on that the deepest good for me as a man and a writer is to be found in ordinary life. It's the gravity of daily obligations and habit, the connections you have to your family, your place—even the compromises that are required of you to get through this life. The compromises don't diminish us, they humanize us—it's the people who won't, or who think they don't, who end up monsters in this world."

— Tobias Wolff

"You always hear people saying that classic parent attitude to a kid, like, 'I brought you into this world! I gave you life!' I think completely the opposite. My kids gave me life. You know? They gave me a reason..."

— Flea, wiping away tears, in The Other F Word

"(Becoming a father) kind of fixed every mental problem I had within an hour.... It immediately sets you aside from yourself and you're no longer the star of your own mind."

— Chris Ware

That’s it for this week. Stay safe, friends. Thanks for reading!

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