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Here are 5 things I was looking at and loving this week:

A few months ago, Travis Huggett posted about his new habit: reading books (most are text-heavy books on photography and/or art) while his daughter is at her dance class, followed by another new habit of giving them away after he’s done. He lets his daughter choose if more than one person is interested. I was the lucky recipient of his first book giveaway. (YAY!) I look forward to digging into This is My Life I’m Talking About by Danny Lyon soon. When I’m done, I’ll follow Travis’s lead — I’ll post here and give it away. It also makes me want to look through my bookshelf and see what else I can offer. What a fun way to cultivate community… Thanks Travis! (P.S. He just posted Daido Moriyama’s How I Take Photographs — aka book #3 — that he’s giving away. So if you’re not following him, do it. The books are a bonus; his Substack is always great.)

Baltimore street photographer Michael Wriston is on the Foto podcast. I like his Baltimore streetscapes (think: long-exposure, night photography). But I really love his street portraits. You should follow him, too.

Unfortunately, I missed the exhibit A Long Arc: Photography and the American South since 1845 at the Virginia Museum of Fine Art in Richmond. Though, I’m thankful there’s an excellent roundup of the images and thoughts on them online. The South is complicated and complex, and this exhibit doesn’t sugarcoat that.

Last week I mentioned that I got a lovely email from an old friend that reminded me of R.E.M.’s Green album and took me back to the music I was listening to in the 6th grade. For one thing, I was forced to play the flute that year in band (I say forced because I wanted to play the drums and ended up with the flute… forced). And my dad, trying to encourage me, told me, “If you’re going to play the flute, you’re going to play it like fucking Ian Anderson.” So I was probably the only 6th grader I know with a Jethro Tull tape in my Walkman. I was also 10 going on 11, so I had a New Kids on the Block birthday party that year. Anyways, my listening tastes were expanding and vacillating between two poles. So it was fun making this playlist… here’s what 6th-grade Melissa was listening to.

Speaking of Spotify playlists, did you know that Barilla pasta is on Spotify?! Each of their playlists is the exact length of cooking time for specific noodles. #aldente