We’re told we live in unprecedented times, and there’s truth to that. It’s worth remembering, though, that it’s all a little less unprecedented than it feels.
The last track on Simon and Garfunkel’s 1966 album Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme is a little strange. For one thing it’s a Christmas song on an album without any other Christmas songs. The duo sings Silent Night in both the left and right channel, but the accompanying piano is only in the left channel. This creates a kind of void on the right side, until a monotone voice starts reading the news in that channel.
The effect, if you’re wearing headphones, is profound—you’re sitting between a beautiful duet in one ear and a garden hose of bad news in the other. Congress is watering down the Civil Rights Act (silent night); legendary comedian Lenny Bruce died of a drug overdose (holy night); the National Guard is being deployed during a social justice march organized by Martin Luther King (all is calm).
Try as you may, it’s almost impossible to focus on Silent Night—the headlines are too attention grabbing. What little progress America manages to make is watered down, our heroes pass away, and peaceful protests are met with militarization in the streets. I don’t have to tell you these themes all resonate today.
Beyond the literal content of the news, though, the feeling resonates today. The way the sheer volume of problems in the world can keep us from focusing on the profound, the beautiful, the spiritual. The trick this track pulls off is demonstrating to the listener how their own attention works. A timeless, beautiful song—one that’s been spiritually significant for millions for over a century—is drowned out by a monotone stream of information. I thought that feeling of context collapse making it impossible to focus on the profound was unique to the internet age. Apparently not. This is all a little less unprecedented than it feels.
In 2019 Phoebe Bridgers and Fiona Apple covered this track, using more contemporary news references. It’s almost heartbreaking how well it works—how we’re stuck in the same cycles we were in over a half century ago.
I know from the responses I got to my last newsletter that this has been a rough year for many of you. Maybe you’re volunteering, protesting, or otherwise doing work to make our world a better place. Or maybe you’re just doing everything you can to get by in a world that feels like it’s gone mad. Who has time for Christmas carols—the world is ending! We need to get to work.
But part of that work is taking care of yourself. Part of that work is experiencing joy, connecting with others, and engaging with the things that make you feel spiritually fulfilled. You can’t make the world better by making yourself miserable, by hollowing out what makes you unique. And that means giving yourself the space, the time, and permission to engage with the profound.
The production choice of both the Simon and Garfunkel version of Silent Night and the Bridgers cover to only put the news in the right channel allows for a useful exercise here. You can decide to only listen to the left channel, either by adjusting the speaker balance or moving the right side of your headphones off of your ear. Do that and it’s just a beautiful song. Go ahead: try it out.
I’m not saying that you should tune out the news entirely. The point of the exercise is to remind you that you have control over what you pay attention to, and that you should make sure you take care of yourself. Peace on earth is a goal worth striving for—one that takes all of us to work towards. But I hope, for your sake, that doing the work of improving our world doesn’t keep you from grabbing whatever peace is available.
It may not feel like a lot; it may not feel like enough. The world remains chaotic, and we’ve all gone through a lot. But there is peace to be had, here and there—in quiet moments with the people you love, in nature, in the intoxicating process of imagining better worlds. It’s beautiful, this life, and it’s important that we make space to remember and experience that.
Merry Christmas, dear reader. Whatever you celebrate this time of year, I hope you allow yourself whatever peace is available. We’re going to need it.
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