I’m All Lost In, #138: Stealing pens; Lists; and Roland Garros. Plus This Week in X>Y.

Mom, 15-years-old, Brooklyn, 1949. Roz was one of the great ones.

I’m All Lost In…

the 3 things I’m obsessing about THIS week

#138

The Week in X > (is Greater than) Y

My Childhood Street Today > My Childhood Street 40 Years Ago Mom’s funeral this week brought me back to Beech Ave., a suburban stretch loaded with teenage memories. The old neighborhood is still lush and idyllic. But it seems even better these days than it was when I lived there decades ago. There’s a rail-to-trail bike route where an ad-hoc path behind the YMCA used to be. And even more, there’s a bench and micro-park at the corner where the trail crosses Beech. I imagine this spot would have been a midnight temple for me.

If You’re a Wallflower: Dancing > Not Dancing If you’re uncomfortable at a club or an ‘80s dance party, boogieing and gavotting by yourself is the best way to hide from people. Bonus: The exercise will put you in a good mood. I’ve taken this step a couple of times this month. Once in Queens and once in Chicago.

Remaining Silent > Responding There were two instances this week when upon being bullied, I mostly (and atypically) remained silent and let my antagonist talk on and on, unspooling as they tied themselves into knots. Initially, I was kicking myself afterward for not having the presence of mind to call out their audacious behavior. But later, when it occurred to me that their hot words and my cool stoicism were all that remained, I realized their inappropriate lecture became more evident to all.

This Week’s Obsessions

1) Stealing Pens

I love being able to reach into my backpack and dip my hand into a reservoir of pens. Until about a year ago, this option was readily available to me.

I’m not sure why this is no longer the current state of affairs, but I’ve been frustrated by the lack of pens in my life lately. Is it a sign of the digital age; i.e., are there not as many pens floating around in 2026? I’m not sure, but my supply always seems low.

To address this persistent shortage, I’ve resorted to a tactic I perfected and enjoyed years ago: Stealing pens. Actively. Apparently I’d been neglecting this pastime lately. Until this week.

So far, my pen pilfering spree—at restaurants, at the CVS, at hotels, at convenience stores, at airports, at bars—has netted a respectable cache.

2) Lists

It started two weeks ago and has continued with abandon.

After noticing a pair of colorful lists that were included as part of the small explanatory cards alongside two separate art pieces in two separate MoMA exhibits, I’ve started seeing lists everywhere.

In a card describing Duchamp’s female alter ego, Rrose Sélavy, the MoMA exhibit curator wrote:

She occupied roles as wide-ranging as the head of a perfume house, a publisher, the administrator of a joint stock company, and a filmmaker.

Six floors down, in the museum’s exhibit about the Nakagin Capsule Towers [I’m All Lost In, #137, 6/2/26], an accompanying card explained:

Initially marketed as micro-dwellings for commuting businessmen, they were repurposed into second homes, offices, student housing, and even tearooms, libraries, galleries, and DJ booths.

As I set out to concoct a poem through a mash-up of these two inventories, more lists caught my attention. In the Iliad, in Book 13, Homer gives us a list of human pleasures:

A person can get tired of anything—/of sleep, of sex, of dancing, of sweet song,/far better objects of desire than war./ But Trojans are insatiable for battle.

And just three pages later from the same chapter, a list of talents:

You cannot have it all!/A god give one man skill to fight in war,/ another may be talented at dancing,/another good at singing and the lyre, and in another heart, farsighted Zeus/places good judgment…

Of course, there’s also the famous catalogue of ships in Book 2.

This week, the lists have been showing up in real life. As we boxed up my mom’s apartment (RIP Roz Feit, June 8, 1934-May 30, 2026), I found myself cataloging everything we schlepped down to the cars: Two black wooden chairs; a recliner; two boxes of kitchenware; a flat-screen TV (which she hadn’t turned on since my dad died two years ago); a couch; a rolling table; several double-tied contractor’s bags of clothes; several double-tied contractor’s bags of trash; several more of recycling; and one contractor’s bag of towels. An end table. A box of hangers. An antique set of Jewish encyclopedias. A bed.

Roz Zivotofsky, Thomas Jefferson High School, Brooklyn, NY, graduation, 1951.

And on Friday afternoon, June 5, in a quiet room at Rockville’s Sagel Bloomfield Danzansky Goldberg Funeral Home on Rollins Ave.—where putt-putt golf and Ernie’s Pizza used to be in the 1970s—they gave us a formal list confirming the items of Mom’s clothing we’d chosen for her burial.

3) Roland Garros

My therapist likes to tell me “Josh, you know: You can’t predict the future.” But I can!

And I have been for the past fortnight as I constantly tuned in the French Open, pro-tennis’ spring grand slam. In fact, I’ve been predicting the future much longer than that; at least for the entire time I’ve been an Aryna Sabalenka fan.

From the moment I first happened to see one of her tortured matches on the restaurant-bar TV in September 2023 and instantly became an unconditional fan of this jinxed supernova, I have foreseen the kind of naked implosion that went down this week on center court in her Rolland Garros quarterfinal match.

Just two points away from victory—up 6-3, 5-3, 30-Love—World No. 1 Sabalenka tanked against No 25 Diana Shnaider. Daffy Saby, as we call her in my home, lost the next 9 games in a row. Her quest for an elusive 2026 grand slam victory went kaput 6-3, 5-7, 0-6. Yes, 0-6, the ultimate example of being tilted.

Had she won the match, her subsequent route to the championship trophy would have been tantalizingly close. The coast was clear. All Saby’s main rivals—Rybakina, Coco Gauff, Iga, Mboko—had already been knocked out in earlier rounds. But the tennis gods love steering Saby into the rocks (or guiding her forehand into the net). Especially in the big moments. With all eyes on her in the runup to the final, there was no escaping the pending reality of a high-profile meltdown and defeat.

Yes, she’s already a four-time grand slam champion, including winning the 2024 and 2025 U.S. Opens. And yes, she’s risen to World No. 1—and has kept the spot for more than a year and a half. But I have long known Sabalenka’s true fate: She is doomed to botch things in glorious fashion.

For the record: Much like former world No. 1 Iga Swiatek, who has never been the same since losing to Qinwen Zheng in the 2024 Olympics, Saby’s downfall was set in motion when World No. 32 Hailey Baptiste beat her last month in the quarterfinals in Madrid. Sabalenka is still World No. 1 and will be considered a favorite to win Wimbledon next month (and the U.S. Open in September).

But a note to my therapist: I know Sabalenka won’t win either tournament.