Reading My Way Through August

Reading for rest, resilience, and the strength to keep going

Aug 14, 2025

Summer’s winding down, and I’ve been watching it go by more as a witness than a participant. Friends’ summer plans include glamorous trips to Greece and Portugal, west coast jaunts, a cruise, and family visits to Florida. The natural cadence of other people’s summer plans feels so out of reach to me, tethered as I am to my mother and her care needs.

I feel guilty to admit that I feel envy. When my son grouses about attending his city-run camp, it bums me out even more. Not because I begrudge him the honesty, but because I know what he means. I’ve long thought of summer as the season that rewards people with the time and means to roam, while the rest of us make do in the heat, finding our own pockets of amusement close to home.

Also for me, this summer has carried sad news. After multiple rounds of testing, we’ve learned that my mom’s cancer has come back. I’ve also weathered more mundane stresses that nonetheless chip away at the core of my resilience. Pet-sitting a dog with dementia, losing my own dog for a few hours, flooding basements, and discovering a mouse likely driven indoors by the constant street construction that seems to vibrate through every block of my neighborhood. Somewhere in there, I’ve been trying to keep up with life, caregiving, and the occasional moments of joy.

If I have a personal brand at all, it’s the easy-going but go-gettery type: in charge, good in a crisis. But after a decade’s worth of chronic stress and cortisol spikes, I’m not as resilient as I used to be. Case in point — when my dog Lily slipped out of her harness and sprinted to parts unknown, I responded with overwhelm and hysteria — not the calm, quick-thinking problem solver I’ve always been in life’s emergencies. It was a clear sign that I need respite.

My hope for the last two weeks of August is that it’ll give me just enough space to reset, so I can return to the normal speed of life in September.

Through all of this, I’ve been trying to read. Not as a checklist or a productivity badge, but as a way to feel connected to something outside my own anxious mind. Some books I’ve picked up, others I’ve only managed to keep on the nightstand but each one feels like a little act of hope. As I dive into being a writer again, I’m hoping for creative inspiration.

Here’s my August sustenance list:

God of the Woods by Liz Moore— When I picked this up months ago, I was enthralled 30 pages in. I never went to summer camp as a kid but man, I think I would’ve loved it. Normally I’d tear through a book like this, but in this caregiving season my focus keeps getting interrupted. I’m giving it another try before summer’s out.
Emperor of Gladness by Ocean Vuong — I have only managed to get to page 1, but one of its themes is a caregiver relationship. I’m saving it for a moment when I can actually sit and appreciate Vuong’s poetic language.
Ambiguous Loss by Pauline Boss, PhD — I haven’t gotten to it yet, but I’m living with the feeling of it every day. (H/T to my friend Edward for the recommendation.)
Stand by Me by Allison Applebaum — part memoir, part caregiving guide. I’m curious how her personal story connects to her work leading a caregiving research and support center at Mount Sinai Hospital in NY.

Caregiving often steals the simplest joys. Reading, even in small doses, is one of the ways I hoping to get outside of my head and recharge.

Articles I’ve been reading & thinking about:

The Economist: Why Gen X Is the “Real Loser Generation” (paywall)— They’ve crunched the numbers and decided we’re coming up short. But as I said in my recent Note, I think the author is missing the intangible wins, the things you can put on a scorecard — the grit, adaptability, and bridge-building that define so many Gen X caregivers I know.
The Commune of 11 Women, 9 Dogs, and One Tiny House (paywall)— A wildly unconventional setup that doubles as a mutual aid network. My friends and I have long talked about setting up our own commune in our senior years to spare our kids the caregiving burden, so this piece felt like a glimpse of maybe a larger trend. It also makes clear how little systemic support exists for caregiving. When there are no clear solutions, so many of us are going to hack our way out of the problem.

What about you? What’s one book, or one small but important ritual, helping you get through these waning days of summer?