Listening to: “Lip Job” by MISS WORLD from her 2018 album Keeping Up With Miss World. Natalie Chahal makes lo-fi rock for dead-eyed e-girls to Juul to in Brandy Melville dressing rooms.
Currently Reading: Desperate Characters by Paula Fox. Side note: another publishing house reached out to send me Rachel Kushner’s forthcoming collection of essays for review, so perhaps we’ll see a #bbmbooks revival on my IG? Please don’t hold me accountable… for this, or for anything.
Weekend Recap: Andrew and I spent the weekend in my hometown. On Friday night, we met my girlfriends at a bar in the coal region—a corner dive with wood-paneled walls where you can still smoke cigarettes and get four drinks for $12. If I’ve ever tricked you into believing I possess any degree of refinement, it was just that: trickery. I’m most at home in bars where I can chop it up with people who’ve flown under the cultural radar. How do us simple folk get by in large cities, with all their stress and oat milk and Canada Goose jackets? Isn’t life about cheap beer and A Boy Named Sue on the jukebox?
Anyway… the real reason we went home was to spend time with my nephews. Saturday night we took them to see Sing 2. If you’re unfamiliar with Sing, it’s an animated musical about animals holding a singing competition to save a floundering local theater. It is perfect whimsy. The sequel, Sing 2 might be even better. After a feast of popcorn and Twizzlers and cherry coke icees, we went for burgers at Red Robin. The great thing about kids is they obliterate the part of your ego that yearns for culture and spotless health. You can just catch a movie and eat at a chain restaurant unbothered, playing each other in tic-tac-toe before your food arrives unapologetically greasy.
Normally I’d describe this whole scene as nostalgic, but this isn’t my past anymore. It’s the here and now that I keep hopping in my car to drive three hours to savor and it’s just as exciting as any house music show or robatayaki. Every sacrifice is affirmed when they’re giggling and snuggling up to you like you’re the only person in the world who can relieve them of a certain hell.
While we waited for our burgers, Jaxon asked me, “Can you hug people when you get to heaven?” I said most certainly. You live together in everlasting harmony (however much I buy that). He gestured to a fake notebook and pen in his hand and said, “...’cause I got a LIST of people to hug.” Me too, buddy. Me too.
Eating: Those pink and white iced animal crackers with sprinkles. You know exactly what I’m talking about. Which brings me to…
Feeling: Some of the worst PMS I’ve had in months. I’m pushing through episodic mania and boobs so sore, I can barely take the graze of a worn-in, XXL tshirt. I cried at the movies at least four times, shielding my face with the hood of my sweatshirt. No one cries during Sing.
Thinking: 1.) About war and loss and power and racism and family and propaganda and hysteria and imperialism and dark psychic forces and holy fuck, the internet is a fraught locale during geopolitical warfare. Helpless beyond our credit card numbers, we watch tragedy unfold, post infographics to signal morality. It’s impossible to maintain coherence, to step into this little space of self-reflection while Ukraine burns. I pray this ends and I pray anyone reading this finds some way to stoke your interiority with hope and love.
2.) Isn’t it crazy how we’re all “walking on eggshells” with someone in our lives? Observing different dynamics in my orbit (not excluding my own relationships), I’ve noticed this common denominator: there’s awkward tension between X and Y and at least one party cares too much to address it and smooth things out, or to simply cut the cord. What they care about varies in everything from friend group optics… to length of the relationship… to not wanting to be alone… to (most optimistically) genuinely loving the person. Sometimes you find yourself along for a ride that’s grown so dizzying, you can’t even articulate why you stick around.
We are selfish, opinionated creatures, lumbering through our days on a diet of force-fed chaos. There are knives in our backs and lumps in our throats, and still, we cave under the pressure to please people who hurt us. It’s not sustainable. Of course, it’s gutless to think every relationship should be a walk in the park. But at the same time, relationships should, at their core, free you to be yourself (healthily, happily, harmlessly). So when you find those eggshells have cut the soles of your feet and you can no longer walk toward a glittering vision of Future You, maybe it’s time to take stock.
Loving: Makeup ASMR. My friend sent me this video wherein a girl pretends to do your makeup all whispery and it seriously dissolves the tension from my body. I realize more and more how much of a sensory person I am, from being really drawn to people’s voices to watching massage porn. Realistically, I think most people are, it just takes tapping into that inner quietness to achieve full tingles.
Just Purchased: Not one, but TWO vintage leather trenches from my hometown thrift store. I thought I was hot stuff for these finds until I Googled them and found a wealth of similar pieces on eBay (here’s a cool one). Altogether I spent $45 on those jackets, four blazers, and two shirts.
Ooo… the first paragraph of the weekend recap! I honestly believed you were a bit posh but now that the bubble is popped I’m actually a bit relieved because A Boy Named Sue is a good song.
On the subject of oat milk: Califia Farms Cinnamon Roll Oat Milk Creamer. You’re welcome.