The Prairie Panicle No. 11
A monthly roundup of thoughts, links, and reads
First Things First: Welcome
Welcome to all my new subscribers! This has been a banner month for West of 98 (more on that below). Many readers are receiving The Prairie Panicle email for the first time. I send this newsletter on the 15th of each month and it’s a “potpourri” with links to my own writing and podcasts, recommended books and online reads, and whatever other ideas are rattling around in my hand and worthy of a short commentary.
What is a “panicle,” you ask? It’s a type of flowering seedhead with many branches. This is meant to symbolize the complexity and layers of life beyond the 98th Meridian, with a side of amateur obsession with the American grasslands. I’m thinking on a logo for the Panicle, but until then, here’s a scientific sketch showing the panicle nature of switchgrass, one of the so-called Four Horseman of the Prairie":
An Olympic Month
We ditched our satellite TV in the fall of 2022 after being displaced by a small housefire (actually, we just never hooked it back up) and I have rarely regretted it. I still occasionally lapse into mindless television-watching via streaming, but loading up a streaming service requires more intentional effort than flipping through the channels or the DVR. That serves as a nice barrier to limit my consumption.
My wife had some trepidation about watching the 2024 Summer Olympics with our arrangement, but NBC’s Olympics setup on Peacock has received rave reviews and rightly so. The regular daytime/evening coverage and the new “Gold Zone” feature were first-rate. There was no Usain Bolt effortlessly toying with everyone but the American female sprinters did a fair job of shaming their competition in a few races. I could write much more on individual athletes and competitions, but I’m no sportswriter and you probably don’t want to read that.
However, I was particularly struck by this heartfelt and accurate comment from USA Basketball star Kevin Durant:
Too many people in this country spend way too much energy trying to tell us that America is fully bad or fully great. We know that neither is true. Durant bluntly say something that we can all get behind.
What I’ve Written
In the aftermath of my essay last month examining Wendell Berry’s “The Work of Local Culture” through the prism of a major local event, I dove deeper into that essay. I examined how local culture has been disrupted by television (“Rebuilding Local Culture”) and the internet (“Do the Tools Control Us?”) and how we might overcome that disruption.
One year ago, Stamford suffered a significant local crisis. I reflected on that moment and the lessons learned in “One Year Later.”
Wendell Berry turned 90 on August 5. My essay to mark the occasion is the most-read essay in the history of this Substack! “Plant Sequoias” was also one of my favorite essays to write. I want to share more about that and my ultimate vision for West of 98 in a future essay, so stay tuned.
Last year, I kicked off the new school year with an essay called “The Meaning of Education.” I wrote a sequel this year, “The Quality of a Local School,” probing the very purpose of education and sharing a personal story about the downside of educational expectations. Our household’s newly-minted first grader makes an appearance for the photo to boot!
Online Reading: Improving Our Faith
This link is several years old but it’s new to me: a Front Porch Republic read on the brief 1960s encounter between Wendell Berry and Thomas Merton.
I could say many unpleasant things about the people who profiteer off a culture of grievance and victimhood, particularly the ones who profess to speak for my own values. As an aside, Wendell Berry’s “In Distrust of Movements” is a great read on this point. If you were on the internet at all in the last several weeks, you probably saw some grievance marketers trying to make hay off some controversial imagery at the Olympics Opening Ceremony. I didn’t watch it, but our friend Myles Werntz did a great job putting it into perspective:
The great
, among others, makes use of the phrase “The Machine” to denote the manner in which we we are subjected by and dependent on technology and large economic forces beyond our control. My friend has written an excellent essay about how to deal with the reality of The Machine’s existence and make a good life even if it cannot be realistically escaped:
What I’m Reading: Hard Copies
I have previously attested my lifelong tendency to reject books that I am “supposed” to read. Tell me *why* I should read it, not just that I am required to read it. John Steinbeck is an author who has gotten lost in that hardheadedness. My friend Luci Wedeking (an extraordinary professional artist) is a huge Steinback fan, in part from her California upbringing and she recommended that I start with “Cannery Row.” I plowed through it as fast as I’ve read any novel in a long time and I could not recommend it more. It’s an enthralling tale of the people inhabiting a neighborhood of Monterey, California during the Great Depression and it’s partly based on real people who were Steinbeck friends and acquaintances.
I’m adding more Steinbeck to my queue, but if you were turned off by mandatory Steinbeck reading at a younger age, give this a shot!
Listening Recs
The West of 98 podcast is chugging along with an audio version of my weekly essays. If you would give it a rating and a review on the Apple podcast store (even if you don’t listen), I would be grateful!
The Rural Church and State podcast took a summer hiatus due to Dan’s summer pastoral/church camp/etc. duties and a variety of other delays, but we returned to the recording studio last week and started our dive into viewing politics through the prism of the Gospel. These conversations are very enjoyable for me, so I hope our listeners find them meaningful as well.
Since I last published The Panicle, I saw “Twisters” at the Grand Theatre here in Stamford. Twice. It’s fantastic. If you haven’t seen it and if you even remotely enjoyed the first one, go watch it. It turned out to be one of our top-performing movies ever since we re-opened the Grand as a community-owned theater in 2018. Charley Crockett covered the legendary cowboy tune “(Ghost) Riders in the Sky” as part of the soundtrack and it is just as brilliant as you’d expect from Charley. The placement of the song in the film is equally superb.
West of 98 Store
The West of 98 bookstore at Bookshop.org has three lists: my Top Texas Books, all the books referenced on the Rural Church and State podcast, and a catch-all Essential West of 98 reads. I’m hoping to steadily convert and expand that final list into a series of lists categorized by topic, as my time allows. We’ve sold several books so far (perhaps more than I anticipated) and I greatly appreciate the support! The commission on these purchases go towards towards the West of 98 project. Even if you never buy my recommendations, do your online book shopping at Bookshop! Their profits support independent bookstores. Amazon doesn’t need more money.
As always, thanks for reading along and supporting my work! Your feedback is always welcomed and appreciated.
James Decker is the Mayor of Stamford, Texas and the creator of the West of 98 website and the Rural Church and State and West of 98 podcasts. Contact James and subscribe to these essays at westof98.substack.com and subscribe to him wherever podcasts are found.