Home – Julian Wise

Elbows and Existence (Feb 20 2026)

February 20, 2026 JulianLeave a comment

An infinite array of options; I’ll be aye.

My elbow tenses.

At 32 years old, my first repetitive stress injury.

Second, after a pickleball shoulder.

But this elbow is also a pickleball injury.

Squeezing paddle, sure.

But also the orientation of my elbow as I laid on my back, my computer on my chest for too many hours: the hunched-over curl of a crone despite my then-13 years old.

I hunched today as I did then.

Now I pay.

It’s odd to grow old. To scrape off one’s vigor and exchange passion for comfort. To realize my mind may be and continue to be heading farther away from me, not nearer.

To replace exuberance with action.

Having finished most of the big explore, to replace it with exploit.

Enjoying everyday enough to select it among the infinite.

To have experienced enough to know.

How many have made pilgrimage to Seoul for the finals of your favorite childhood sport?

Ran shirtless in Indonesia?

Meditated in Thailand?

How many have eaten pasta two blocks from the Vatican?

Kayaked the arctic ocean?

Swam the Great Barrier Reef?

Negotiated for tee shirts in Mumbai?

I don’t feel like a life unlived.

I feel like the foundation; the fundamentals of everyday existence:

That those thusfar empties are slowly seeping solid.

I don’t need to see the thousand buddhas again.

I’ve seen them, snapped selfies with silly smirks, stumbled upon the graveyard, and biked home.

Share these with a future wife and children, sure.

Invite my extended family to duck and cheese at my Paris pied-à-terre.

Learn what makes my new brothers laugh.

When the door has opened, why keep knocking?

Another Day, Another Deep Dive! (Feb 19 2026)

February 19, 2026 JulianLeave a comment

In which Our Hero works hard (or hardly works?!)

Remodeling an apartment is hard work.

Between 10:05am and 6:30pm, non-stop (with breaks only for bathroom; no food), I…

Rejiggered my apartment floorplan, composing a total of 32 different line-item changes, including
1. Selecting an oven.
  1. This was easy because 1) we want it mounted below the cooktop, and 2) our cooktop has a list of 20 different models that could safely be mounted below the cooktop.
  2. This was difficult because our cooktop has a list of 20 different models that could be mounted below the cooktop.
  3. All-in-all, a combing and comparing game.
2. Selected two dishwashers (my apartment will have two! :D)
  1. Did you know you’re supposed to clean your dishwasher filter regularly? Did you even know your dishwasher had a filter? Did you know they now make dishwashers that have basically garbage disposals in them so you never ever have to clean the filter again???
3. Removing one refrigerator, but leaving its dedicated power supply and also placing another dedicated fridge power supply elsewhere. (I suspect I will eventually want to have two fridges, maybe two fridges and a chest freezer, maybe two fridges and a chest freezer and half a cow. That is a later problem.)
Crunched through 8 different general contractor proposals with the help of Claude and ChatGPT, resulting in
1. Almost definitely selecting my contractor to hire.
2. A list of 44 open questions and contract terms to adjust with him.

After that work sprint, I…

Completed a 20min Peloton Max ride and a 5min Peloton core workout.
Played penny poker for 2.5hrs. Lost $71. Played very well, except for one call. That call cost me $45.
Played dollar poker for… I’m still playing while I write this. Lol. Currently down $37.

My Partner has a rule: She goes to Central Park every day. It’s less than a block away. I support this rule.

I do not have that rule.

Today, the farthest outside that I went was to drop trash off in our building’s bins.

I have a rule: Live a good life.

Today I did.

Homeful (Jan 29 2026)

January 30, 2026 JulianLeave a comment

In which Our Hero lands.

Today… I bought a house!

A home, to be precise. (It’s an apartment.)

It’s in New York, a block from Central Park.

It’s big enough for a family, and gets great light. I’d love to live with roomies 🙂

Here’s what happened (all numbers are approximate).

I arrived at 11:27 for a 12noon closing.
From 11:30 to 11:53, my attorney walked me through the financials.
- One fun exchange:
  - “This was more work than I expected,” he said. “Do you want to increase my fee?”
  - “No,” I replied.
  - “Fair enough.”
- And another:
  - “I know people,” he told me. “You’re smart. You went to Harvard.”
  - “I went to Yale,” I replied. “Don’t insult me.”
  - He laughed.
At 11:53, the title company transfer agent arrived.
From 11:53 to 12:10, I signed some necessities (her notary book, for instance).
From 12:10 to 12:25, we waited.
At 12:25, the vice president of the co op board arrived. He brought soup for lunch.
From 12:25 to 12:35, the vice president and I signed a few documents.
At 12:35, the attorney for the co op arrived.
From 12:35 to 12:45, the attorney and the vice president and I signed a few papers.
At 12:45, the president of the co op board arrived.
From 12:45 to 1, the president signed a few papers.
From 1:00 to 1:17, we waited.
At 1:17, the lawyer for the bank arrived.
From 1:17 to 1:50, I signed 50 documents totalling over 200 pages.
- Many of the documents requested of me were inaccurate, either procedurally or factually. For example, the bank attorney wanted me to sign a document saying that my ID was correct as written. But he wanted me to sign the document *before* he wrote the details in. I said no: he should write it in, then I sign. And he WROTE IT IN WRONG.
At 1:50, we faxed the information to the bank.
From 1:50 to 2:10, we waited for confirmation.
At 2:55, my attorney’s receptionist suggested I leave. “We’ll call you back if we need anything from you.”
At 3:45, I received the confirmation.

I now own a home.

Well, technically, the bank owns the home, but they’re going to let me live in it while I pay them back!

Going Places (Jan 28 2026)

January 28, 2026 JulianLeave a comment

In which Our Hero voyages through space and time

Theo works nights at the front desk of the only hotel in this small French town. He works days at the car dealership, cleaning cars. He also works days on his talent management company. He wants to build the ROC Nation of France. He is 23 years old and wants to retire by 40. He prefers the American work ethic to the French one. I tell him to make sure to increase his hourly wage, not merely his number of hours worked.

—

“You sleep when you can.”

The businessman in the neighboring airplane seat says he lives his life out of suitcases, in identical rooms in identical towns. He changes time zones frequently: today Munich, tomorrow Mumbai. After years of struggle, he gave up on circadian rhythms. He sleeps when he sleeps and works when awake. One day, maybe he’ll have a partner. I wonder how old he is.

—

Ilian is 21 years old, on an airplane for the first time. He’s snapping pictures out the window as the plane lifts off, and sets his phone to record video when he’s sleeping. “Comme un gros oiseau”, he says. Today he goes to Iceland. Next year, to Switzerland. Also on his list: Japan. I tell him Japanese pork was my surprising highlight of the cuisine. He doesn’t eat pork. “You’re Jewish?” I ask. His eyes widen in what looks to me like repulsion. “Muslim,” he corrects. He shares with me a breadstick he brought for the trip. We exchange phone numbers. When I return to Paris, we’ll go to a museum. Maybe one day I’ll tell him I was raised Jewish.

—

Somehow I became 32. I don’t remember 31 from 30. I can’t parse 29 from 28. I suddenly understand why my father takes a moment to isolate what year an event happened. “It was nineteen … (pause) eighty … (pause again) seven,” he’ll say, and then be proud he pinned it down.

Six years ago I didn’t want kids. Five years ago I didn’t want a life partner. Four years ago I started taking exogenous sex hormones. Three years ago I flew to Australia to escape heartbreak. Two years ago I met my now-partner. One year ago I still lived in a van.

Tomorrow, I buy a home.

And the day after?