Circle Time // 6.18.26

TED talks, necessary horizontal floor time, the *shart* of the deal, warm weather staples, and words from Ann Patchett and Emily Ratajkowski

Circle Time is our weekly huddle / digest every Thursdays, in which I share the things bringing me joy, current events to stay informed, recommendations, and thought starters!

I watched TED talks online all the time in my early to mid-20’s, while laying on the floor of my studio apartment in NYC, so it was very cool to attend one in person for the first time!

Last week kicked off a busy few days of work events, between an event for Planned Parenthood in the city and then I headed to Philly a few days later to attend that TED Democracy event with the Pew Research Center.

Factors like being masked (and thus limiting my water / food intake during the event), the extra time spent commuting, are all extra factors that test my body’s endurance as a chronically ill gal and then my social anxiety / sensory overload at these types of events takes me OUT for days afterwards. I shared a bit more about disability support and understanding the silent extra demands and preparation people like me go through in order to participate in what other people consider basic things in this Instagram post— the response to this in my DMs and comments, with the amount of fellow disabled/chronically ill people that reshared this was so affirming.

My body needed many hours of horizontal floor time to recover afterwards, but I’m so glad to know my limits a bit better now and practicing advocating for my accommodations and limits—a huge challenge for a recovering people-pleasing high-masking autistic person who hates potentially being perceived as demanding or diva-y (especially given the industry I’m in), but I keep reminding myself that asking for accessibility accommodations is LITERALLY a basic health support that no one should take issue with!

Onto this week’s issue, we go!

• More garden delights, surprise! These poppies that I spontaneously and poorly scattered seeds for suddenly produced a few late surprise blooms—their crazy stems are a delight. Harvested a bunch of romaine and Korean red leaf lettuces, spinach, and basil, with Benny waiting to receive his agricultural tax, of course.

• There’s nothing I love more though than when this anxious boy is utterly relaxed and at peace in a patch of sun. We just sat together to soak up some vitamin D while I sipped on a sparkling basil lemonade. These are the joy-bringing “touch grass” moments I’m lucky to have in spades.

• Elections news:

  • Democratic socialist Janeese Lewis George is leading in the Washington, D.C., mayoral primary! Would be the first Democratic socialist mayor of D.C., and the first time their election has used ranked-choice voting for the mayoral race.

  • Trump-backed Mike Collins (who authored the Laken Riley Act) beats Kemp’s pick in the Republican primary runoff to take on Jon Ossoff for Georgia Senate. Ossoff has a massive campaign fund war chest compared to Collins ($32M to $1.2M), but this will be a contested race in Georgia and crucial to our hopes of re-taking the Senate.

• Congress, currently:

  • Trump had nominated Jay Clayton for Director of Intelligence (after withdrawing his initial nomination of loyalist, no-experienc Bill Pulte that was a non-starter for Dems)— then announced yesterday morning he was delaying this unless until his pick for the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, James McDonald, is approved by the Senate (with Schumer and Gillibrand’s approval). Key thing here is that this position is the successor to the Justice Department position.

  • This position being filled by an appropriate person was the contingency to getting the now-expired Section 702 of FISA re-authorized. And to make Senate majority leader Thune’s head throb even more, Trump is now insisting on attaching the SAVE act (the voter suppression act, essentially- refresher videos here and here) to FISA’s passage— which will 100% not happen.

• Trump’s “deal” with Iran. We are still in a TBD phase of how this deal will shake out as there is a 60 day window to negotiate final terms once the deal is signed (scheduled for Friday), but so far:

  • The official 14 point agreement has been released, read it here (via CNN)

  • The CIA director even doubts Iran’s intentions for nuclear concessions for a deal.

  • This post by Nathan Jun does a great job illustrating and naming the truth of this deal:

• And speaking of that man’s grifting business, he has now profited $4 billion off the presidency, that’s on record:

• The death rate in ICE detention facilities have more than doubled since Trump took office.

  • ICE has relaxed detention standards ‘reduce the burden’ on for-profit contractors running its lockups, including using AI to process intakes and respond to detainee grievances. As if the conditions needed to be worse.

• More than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the “ceasefire.”