How do I browse the Marlo and Leta archives on dooce.com?

Updated

The dooce.com homepage links to two named archives — [ MARLO ARCHIVE ] and [ LETA ARCHIVE ] — placed just under the post title and date, above the body of the current post. Selecting either link is the direct route into that archive; the page also offers Posts navigation for moving between entries in the main post list. These are the only archive entry points visible in the page evidence, so treat them as the starting points rather than a complete index of everything on the site.

Where the archive links appear

On the homepage, the structure around a post runs in this order:

  1. Post title (for example, "You're the one that I wanted to find")
  2. Author and date line — "Heather B. Armstrong | April 6, 2023"
  3. The two archive links: [ MARLO ARCHIVE ] and [ LETA ARCHIVE ]
  4. The post body
  5. Posts navigation at the end of the post list

Because the archive links sit above the post text, they stay visible even when you are reading the current entry — you do not need to scroll to a sidebar or footer to reach them.

What each archive covers

The names Marlo and Leta correspond to people whose material is grouped separately, which is consistent with the site's habit of organizing older writing by subject or family member. The page evidence does not describe the contents, date ranges, or number of posts inside either archive, so the reliable way to find out what each one holds is to open it and scan the entries.

Entry point What it is How to use it
[ MARLO ARCHIVE ] Archive associated with Marlo Select the link to open that archive
[ LETA ARCHIVE ] Archive associated with Leta Select the link to open that archive
Posts navigation Paging control for the main post list Use it to move between posts on the homepage

Browsing and paging

Once inside an archive, read the entries in the order presented. To move through the main feed instead, use Posts navigation, which appears after the posts on the homepage and lets you step between pages of entries. If you are looking for a specific person's writing, the named archive is the faster path; if you are browsing generally, Posts navigation is the tool for that.

What you will find alongside the archives

The current homepage post is a first-person essay by Heather B. Armstrong dated April 6, 2023, describing six months of sobriety on October 8th, 2021, the grief and isolation that followed, and a metaphor — early sobriety as "living life as a clam without its shell" — credited to an online friend referred to as Hanky Plankton. This confirms that the site carries personal recovery writing in addition to the archived family material, so an archive visit and a general read of the feed surface different kinds of content.

Common snags

  • The archive links are easy to miss because they are small bracketed labels rather than buttons. Look directly beneath the post title and date.
  • No search box or category menu is shown in the page evidence, so do not expect to filter an archive by keyword or date — browsing and paging are the available methods.
  • The archives may not be complete. The evidence only establishes that the two links exist; it does not promise that every older post is filed under them.