Opinion | The Best of 2024: The Books, Movies, Habits and Hobbies We Loved This Year

Phone a Friend

My oldest friend and I do synchronized viewing of each new episode of the show ‘Shrinking’ (which follows a rogue therapist and his patients) and text commentary and our fave quotes back and forth. We definitely want our own Derek. (IYKYK.)

Setting Sail

In the dark months of the sailing off-season, I get my fix from the Sampson Boat Co. YouTube series. It follows a shipwright and sailor, Leo Goolden, as he rebuilds a historic wooden gaff cutter designed by the renowned yacht designer Albert Strange. From the bowsprit to the capstan, every detail of the boat is lovingly crafted and joyfully documented. This year the team finally launched the boat, and watching it sail in all its glory has been a true joy.

LOLs for Days

The streaming service Dropout, formerly known as CollegeHumor, offers delightfully smart, unscripted comedy and is my go-to when I need a laugh.

Gotta Catch ’Em All

I got my dose of peace by watching the Netflix show ‘Pokémon Concierge’ while playing Pokémon on my Nintendo Switch. The double distraction blocks any thought from entering your head, and the low-stakes, low-conflict world of cute little guys provides a needed infusion of bliss.

Oui, Oui

‘L’Agence,’ or ‘The Parisian Agency,’ is a Netflix reality show about a family-run high-end real estate agency at the edge of Paris. It refreshes my French slang, the B-roll boasts endless views of Paris, and it allows a voyeuristic look into apartments and homes worth millions of euros.

What Goes Around Comes Around

JoJo Siwa’s single “Karma” signaled her queer reinvention, from a ponytailed princess into something resembling a Gene Simmons-ified K.D. Lang, but Ms. Siwa’s new persona provoked relentless, unfair bullying from critics and, well, the entire internet. If you can get past her Kidz Bop-style sound, her naïve campiness perfectly embodies L.G.B.T.Q. culture. This year I found comfort in her transformation’s implicit story: There’s a greater future ahead if you shamelessly claim it for yourself.

Fact or Fiction

The novel ‘All Fours’ by Miranda July was the most revelatory, exciting book I read this year.

Night-Night at the Museum

If my mind is too busy to sleep at night, I turn on the Met’s YouTube art lectures — the longer, the better. The videos’ tone is soothing, and the content helps me connect with something beautiful and interesting from another time or place. Once my mind is immersed in, say, Greek vase paintings, I’m out like a light.

Check Mate

I’m still a pretty terrible player, but spending 30 minutes playing virtual chess with a stranger on the Chess app makes for a better commute than yet another half-hour wasted on Instagram.

Wake and Bake

This year, as ever, I found distraction and refuge in the stalwart comforts of ‘The Great British Baking Show.’ It won’t be lost on future cultural historians that a decade of unceasing global tumult coincided with the sturdy popularity of a TV series about a bunch of collegial normies in a tent in the English countryside, seemingly far from society, being nice to one another and baking pies.

This Ain’t Texas

Nobody needs this recommendation — Beyoncé’s album ‘Cowboy Carter’ — but it has become my go-to, regardless of my mood. I start humming some tracks before they even begin. I look forward to the reformulations of classics like Dolly Parton’s “Jolene” and the Beatles’ “Blackbird” and the nods throughout to greats like Linda Martell and Patsy Cline. What makes me smile every time is the quiet confidence Willie Nelson exudes (and, behind the scenes, Beyoncé herself) in his interludes. “And go to the good place your mind likes to wander off to,” he counsels. “And if you don’t want to go, go find yourself a jukebox.”

Rom-Com Binge

Given the scale of violence in Gaza and the fallout from it in the United States, it’s a weird moment for ‘Nobody Wants This,’ the Netflix series about a blond shiksa podcaster (Kristen Bell) who falls in love with a rabbi (Adam Brody). I kept waiting for the series to grapple with the issues in Israel and Gaza, but the moment never arrived. Maybe that’s part of the charm: The series is a fantasy about how true love can transform us.

Bonjour Duo

I have a 1,726-day (and counting) streak on Duolingo French — screen time I don’t have to feel bad about.

Perception Deception

I love everything Alfonso Cuarón does, and that’s held true for his TV series ‘Disclaimer.’ On the surface, it seems like a soapy tale of infidelity and betrayal, but it’s actually a deeper, “Rashomon”-like examination of how our biases shape the way we interpret events and then create stories out of them. It’s the kind of show you immediately want to rewatch when it’s done.

Our Lips Are Sealed

I loved ‘Say Nothing,’ the TV series based on Patrick Radden Keefe’s book about the Troubles. Both actresses who play the I.R.A. bomber Dolours Price — young and older — are amazing.

La Dolce Vita

The novel ‘Last Summer in the City’ by Gianfranco Calligarich is a master class in dissociation. Avoidant lovers, alcoholic friends, an uncertain career in journalism — this book has it all.

Pelican State Politics

Nancy Lemann’s ‘The Ritz of the Bayou’ is a hallucinatory, gin-soaked account of the trials of the former Louisiana governor Edwin Edwards.

Olde English

The novels of Anthony Trollope pulled me away into a tranquil setting in the 19th-century English countryside populated by squires, churchmen and minor nobility. The milieu is rarefied and the language gentle, but the matters are serious: ambition, arrogance, resentment, love. Trollope has a charming habit of finding the positive in his most odious characters, and there is something calming about how he injects his authorial voice into the narrative, like a confiding friend.

Escapist Dark Humor

The books of David Rakoff, particularly “Half Empty.” Hyperarticulate, hilarious and eerily prescient.

Enter the Void

When I checked out Doug Wheeler’s latest exhibit, ‘Day Night Day,’ at the David Zwirner gallery, I walked into an empty, glowing, immaculately white room. I kept my eyes trained forward, and the light seemed to radiate through the space, which has no corners or edges. As I walked in, my depth perception became warped, and I lost my sense of spatial awareness. I raised my arms, afraid I might run into something or perhaps fall off the edge. I’d like to keep that sense of wonder and timid delight as I move forward into the unknown next year.

‘Concerning the U.F.O. Sighting Near Highland, Illinois’

I worried that ‘Illinoise,’ the musical based on the 2005 Sufjan Stevens album “Illinois,” was just a ploy to make money off millennial nostalgia. But “Illinoise” was just so well done — infusing new and bold artistry into a stream of songs. Though the music was familiar, I responded to it in an entirely new way.

It’s Giving ’90s

I’ve been ditching my smartphone every Saturday in a ritual I’ve dubbed No-Scroll Saturday. Want to listen to music? Put on a record. Read the news or cook dinner? Grab a newspaper or a cookbook. I do allow myself to call my mom or look up directions. The one sacrosanct rule: Don’t scroll.

Home Envy

I found a level of peace and serenity I didn’t know I was missing when I finally kicked my habit of browsing property websites for fancy houses I had no intention (or means) to buy.

Piano Over Podcasts

I’ve started listening to classical music in the morning instead of jumping immediately into news podcasts the way I once did. It creates a peaceful, slightly romantic way to start the day.

Hard to Zip

In 2024 I accepted that I am an overpacker. Small bags just do not work for me. I need space for my portable bidet, mini prayer mat, four lip glosses, dental hygiene supplies, a snack, hand creams, sticky notes, phone wipes and much, much more.

Don’t Ask Me

To combat the feeling of being overwhelmed that comes with endless daily decisions, I outsourced some by asking friends for recommendations and following them. I’ve added music to my playlists, purchased art, tried (and fell in love with) oysters and added healthy habits to my routine. Saying yes to their suggestions has made my life richer.

Impromptu Hangs

Like many middle-aged people, my schedule is both packed and unpredictable. I used to think the best way to see friends was making explicit time for them days or weeks in advance. But inevitably, something gets in the way — a sick kid, an extra work deadline — and that long-awaited hang gets canceled. I have had way more luck randomly texting my local pals with an hour’s notice.

Water Into Wine

These difficult days, it’s wonderfully distracting to tend the cider apples and wine grapes on our family farm. In my day job, I shout at the world, and it pays no attention; on the farm, the grapes obediently turn into fine pinot noir. It is refreshing to duck from a world whose problems seem overwhelming and find my own nook with problems that are solvable — and when solved can be celebrated with a glass of pinot.

Motorcycle Diaries

This year, I bought a Triumph Bonneville and keep it in Southern Indiana, where I regularly spend time. Riding country roads and rolling hills led me to conversations I never would have had otherwise — with the burley Harley rider by the lake, the couple at the gas station or the young girl who also always dreamed of having a bike of her own.

Pick a Card, Any Card

Every morning, I choose a card from Oblique Strategies, a card set created by Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt in 1975 to help break creative blocks. Prompts range from “Use an old idea” to questions like “What would your closest friend do?” and occasionally surreal statements like “In total darkness, or in a very large room, very quietly.”

‘Challengers’ IRL

It’s been over two decades since I tried a new sport. Learning to play tennis has been humbling, but it has provided solace in a chaotic year. The achievement, I’ve learned, is just finding joy through play.

Shred the Gnar

When I began kite surfing, I questioned why anyone would ever do something so difficult. It felt like taking a geometry and anemology course and simultaneously doing cardio and a functional body workout, all while calling on muscle memory. And yet when it all connects, I’m flying on autopilot on the water. You suddenly feel you can do anything in life.

Déjà Vu

I don’t have a great memory, and I often forget the content of a book once I finish it. I’ve started writing down quotes and leaving them in books when I’m done reading them. I keep a little bookshelf of my favorite books, with handwritten notes sprouting from most of them. When I pluck the bookmarks and read the scribbled quotes, I get instant access to the feeling I had reading it.

One Stitch at a Time

Needlepoint instantly clears my mind of any worry beyond where I am going to stitch next. The more detailed and fussy the design, the more I enjoy it.

Dewey Decimal

Growing up, I moved around a few times. In each new place, my mom would get both of us cards at the local library. As an adult, I’ve rekindled my love for libraries, but it’s more than just books. It’s one of the last places you can enrich your life for free.

Do You Hear the People Sing?

One-day choirs assembled by the Gaia Music Collective bring together hundreds of people to learn and perform arrangements in just a few hours. You don’t need singing experience to participate. Making harmonies with strangers is a welcome reprieve from our self-involved culture.

Good Sport

Wednesday is mahjong day: Each week, I’m either teaching someone about the complex game or learning as I lose to someone better than me. Either way, I become a more strategic player.

Spoonful of Sugar

Putting sugar in my coffee. Austerity is out. Smallness and sweetness — a teaspoon of turbinado — is in.

Pass the Presidential Casserole

Cooking through Dwight D. Eisenhower’s personal cookbook is not for the faint of heart — my guests are still recovering from the cavernous melon stuffed with Jell-O and grapes — but what started as a culinary curiosity has brought me immense joy and become a delightful way to bring friends together.

Shaken, Not Stirred

Fresh watermelon juice, gin, Lillet rose, a highball glass. I don’t know what else there is to say.

Tea Time

Tea is great. Tea with biscuits? Better. But what about biscuit-flavored tea? For a gimmicky product, Yorkshire Tea’s Malty Biscuit Brew is shockingly subtle — more malty than actively biscuity but still biscuity enough to live up to the promise on its package: “biscuity goodness that doesn’t get crumbs on your jumper.” You won’t get better momentary peace without a prescription.

Medium-Rare

Technically I can’t blame a cookbook for my 15-point increase in LDL cholesterol, but the recipes of ‘Meat Illustrated,’ a cookbook dedicated to meat, probably have something to do with it.

‘Gatsby’ Times Three

“The Great Gatsby” left me cold when I read it in high school, but ‘Gatz,’ the Elevator Repair Service’s seven-hour dramatization of the novel is — like the rich — different. I’ve seen “Gatz” three times, and on every viewing, I’ve been absorbed by Fitzgerald’s examination of Americans’ conflicted attitudes toward wealth and the elite, a conflict on vivid display in this year’s election.

Once Upon a Time in America

Over the summer I found a copy of J. Anthony Lukas’s ‘Common Ground’ in a little free library. It’s an immersive masterpiece in nonfiction that helps make sense of American life today, even though it was published 40 years ago.

Everyday Ecstasy

Simon Critchley’s new book, ‘Mysticism,’ has been on my night table for months. He is the rare philosopher who doesn’t flinch at religious experience. And this book does something miraculous: It saves the baby of mysticism from the discarded bathwater of institutional religion. It reminds us that our attention matters, that even in our fractured digital age, ecstasy is possible. That’s not religious hokum. It’s practical, and most of us need reminders of it every day.

Autocrats of Yore

‘The Oppermanns,’ a novel written in 1933 by Lion Feuchtwanger, revolves around the rise of the Nazis in Germany and the responses of one Jewish family — the Oppermanns, the owners of a furniture company — and the people around them. The book exerted such a pull on my psyche that I have been recommending it whenever the topic of books or reading or Nazis or danger has come up in conversation. Almost a century later, “The Oppermanns” remains resonant, no matter the country or the autocrat.