A Few Things About Me
I’ve been a reader for as long as I can remember. When I was little, I would beg my mom to take me to the library. Somehow, going to the library became my reward for finishing my chores—which, in retrospect, was either excellent parenting or evidence that I was a slightly unusual child.
It meant everything to me. I could sit in a corner with a book for hours and disappear completely. I still remember the feeling of opening a new book for the first time: wondering where it was going to take me, who I was going to meet, and what I might know by the end that I didn’t know before. And yes, I still love the smell of books. I realize this is not an intellectual position. I’m standing by it.
What I read has changed over the years, but the reason I read really hasn’t: I like discovering things I didn’t know I wanted to know. These days, I find myself especially drawn to neuroscience, psychology, human behavior, and the science of how we think.
I’m fascinated by neuroplasticity—the fact that the brain can continue to change and adapt—and by the possibility that some of what we think of as simply who we are may actually be patterns our brains have learned and reinforced over time.
Then there are the questions that send me down rabbit holes: Why do intelligent people make irrational decisions? How reliable are our memories? Can we deliberately change the way we think? What actually makes people happy? How much of our behavior happens before we’re even conscious of deciding? One question usually leads to another, which leads to another book, which leads to five more books I apparently need to read.
This site is a place for all of that: books I’m reading, ideas I’m thinking about, things I’ve learned, and things I’m still trying to understand. No grand thesis. Just curiosity—and a reading list that has gotten completely out of hand.
Where it began.
My love of books began with two women: my mother, Raquel, and my aunt Rosa.
My mother raised my brother and me while working twelve-hour shifts. She would come home, cook, help with homework, and somehow, at the end of all of that, find a few quiet minutes to read before bed.
We couldn't afford much, but the library was free. Because of her, that felt like more than enough. A library card meant I could go anywhere. I could sit in a corner for hours and travel through places, lives, and ideas far beyond my own little world.
My aunt Rosa was the other constant. She helped raise me while she was still young herself, giving me the structure and steadiness I needed while my mother worked to support us. She was—and still is—an avid reader. With her, reading was what you did when you finally had a moment to yourself. It was our break.
I think that's why books have always meant something more to me than entertainment.
Before I knew reading could teach me about the world, I learned from them that it could give you a little world of your own.
For Raquel and Rosa, who taught me that there is always room for one more book.
Current Curiosities
Neuroplasticity · Human behavior · Happiness without the clichés · Cognitive bias · Memory · Behavioral economics · Why we repeat patterns · How the brain changes · And why old books smell so good
For the curious.
Good books, strange questions, and ideas worth following tend to find their way here.