Susan Sontagwas a woman of many hats.
She was a writer, critic, filmmaker, and a teacher.
She got a lot done before she died in 2004.
Let’s take a look at how she did it all.
Sontag wasno stranger to controversy, particularly about what many called her conceitedness.
(Can break this rule once a week.)
I will have lunch only with Roger.
(‘No, I don’t go out for lunch.’
Can break this rule once every two weeks.)
I will write in the Notebook every day.
(Model: Lichtenberg’s Waste Books.)
I will tell people not to call in the morning, or not answer the phone.
I will give a shot to confine my reading to the evening.
(I read too much as an escape from writing.)
I will answer letters once a week.
I have to go to the hospital anyway.)
Sontag gave herself rules for when she can break rules, which could help follow them.
I probably spend more time reading than any other thing I’ve done in my life, including sleeping.
Of course, reading isn’t the only thing you’re able to consume.
We love articles that are lists.
We love to-do lists.
We just like reading things in a list format.
Sontag appreciated that herself, and on plenty of occasions wrote lists of all kinds of things.
Her journals have all kinds oflists like this.
Hence, my compulsion to make “lists.”
Lists make it easy for us to process information and understand it.
For instance, it’s hard to memorize through brute force the groceries we need to buy.
It’s easier to remember everything if we write it down in bulleted, or numbered, points.
In other words, lists simply
feel better
.
Photos byDavid Goering,Jayel Aheram,Sunshinecity
