Birds, Loves, and Obscure Sorrows: The Best of The Marginalian 2024

Hindsight is how we connect the dots that figure our lives. To look back on even a single year is to see clearly the contour of who we are in its points of attention and priority. “How we spend our days,” Annie Dillard wrote, “is how we spend our lives.” How we spend our minds is our primary purchase on our days.

In the annual hindsight ritual of distilling the “best” of The Marginalian, here is a Venn diagram of the most read pieces and those I most loved writing, which never perfectly coincid...