Melissa Kirsch

The season’s new releases give us a cultural road map, but the most rewarding reading, listening and watching comes from the detours.

How do we balance our desire for modern conveniences with our nostalgia for the uncomplicated felicity of our pre-internet past?

What makes a movie a summer movie? Is it the time of its release, or the way that it depicts the season itself? Or something else entirely?

There are good reasons to abandon books we’re not enjoying, but our attenuated attention might lead us to tap out too early.

Errands get us out of our homes and into the world, on missions providing both serendipity and satisfaction.

The answer is something specific, personal, instantly familiar.

A summer weekend offers a bounty of daylight that we feel duty-bound to exploit properly. But sometimes the sun-and-fun mandate becomes an unnecessary burden.

We think and dream and fuss and project entire worlds into existence. Meanwhile, the earth’s orbit continues and the sun goes on shining.

Sometimes, our preference for certitude, our need to define things with conviction, closes us off from possibility.

New York City’s temporary transformation by the Knicks’ resurgence offers a glimpse of a kinder, more connected world.