Give Yourself a (Pointless) Mission

Vincent Van Gogh Belvedere Overlooking Montmartre, 1886

 

This is from Rob Walker's Art of Noticing newsletter (No. 72)

This is supposed to be a comparatively happy time — in the U.S., at least, it’s all about re-opening, rejoining society, reconnecting — but I’ve been cranky for weeks. This weekend, however, I had a mood-lifting moment: I gave myself a mission. It’s not an important mission, and in fact it might be sort of a silly one. But that’s part of the point. I’m really looking forward to it.

I like to swim, and I’ve visited all four of New Orleans’ year-round indoor public pools plenty of times. But there are also five outdoor public pools operating this summer; every year I visit the one nearest, multiple times. I’ve never considered going to the others because, you know, they’re farther away. I go to the convenient one. Efficient.

What happened this weekend is that I suddenly realized that’s exactly why I should visit the less convenient ones — all of them, the less efficient the better. That’s my new mission! Here’s some of what I like about it.

• First, it’s containable: just four steps.

• Second, it offers direct novelty — I’ve never been to any of these pools.

• Third, it offers indirect novelty (contact novelty?): they’re mostly in areas I don’t go that often, off my beaten paths.

• Fourth, there’s a deadline! They’ll all close up by the end of August, so I can’t postpone indefinitely.

• Fifth, while this is definitely doable, it’s challenging: obviously I have to balance the mission against my schedule, and since weather and other x-factors may close any given pool on any given day, that might not be easy.