i wrote this jumble of words recently! enjoy.
a small good thing: marigolds in the bed of a chevrolet pickup truck that i pass on a short walk to get coffee.
a state of anxiety that feels more nebulous than usual—second guessing myself, insecurity about the smallest of things: butter or jam on top of my toast?
everyone is reaching back into the past, pulling the covers of memory up over their heads, burrowing down. how do we know who we are? a question that i’ve been returning to repeatedly in recent weeks: have i ever had a single original thought? are all my tastes simply made up of media that i’ve ingested and regurgitated, in some different form, and had the guts to call mine? is that what taste is? why does that feel so unsatisfying? i’m left feeling hungry.
the small relief of finishing one book and starting another in the span of hours and feeling a sliver of my old self returning to the one that exists now. what feels like a miraculous convergence. falling back into the same material although i’ve expressed a need to read something different. syntax as a salve.
.
a conversation about not dreaming—sleep as a comforting but infinite abyss. knowing that i’ve never dreamed with any sort of frequency and talking about that with friends. positing that patterns will arise if you write about your nightly visions for a decade; a task that might reveal more about who you are or what’s in store. going home to google, “consciousness and dreams.” the next day, i consider buying a small book titled understanding philosophy through jokes.
having a dream, shockingly, following the conversation about dreams. a scene that combines the setting of a video game i once played as a kid, in which contestants guide speedboats through channels of water with increasing difficulty. my copilot, a friend’s boyfriend who i haven’t yet met, talking to me as if we’ve known each other for years. we patronize a series of malls with only one store and buy armfulls of records. the dream ends and i wake up wondering what it means.
.
being unable to form coherent sentences when i’m asked how i’m doing, resulting in a minor panic about time spent alone and how it might be affecting my work and the conversations i have in interviews. at the beginning of the year, someone told me i was a “good conversationalist” and i told him that it was only because my work involves asking people questions. do i sound like this to other people? am i really a writer?
are you questioning yourself too? is that why we look back into our instagram archives, search past emails, wonder about that single text message that we sent on monday? in order to anchor ourselves—to remember one concrete moment when we were assured that we have been a human being alive in the world. something that feels less certain to exist as we continue to flounder.
.
this past summer, i developed a habit of interviewing my mother. i said it was for an essay i was working on, but now that i think back, perhaps it was just a way to witness myself—past and present. “you were always a reader,” she says. “you would go up to your room and close your door and not come out for hours.”
it feels jarring to recognize yourself in a new way. it’s easier to look back on last november, or three or seven novembers ago. i’m appalled every time i realize i am not still 23 years old. six years ago today i was sitting in a city cafe that no longer exists, writing a paper and eating a donut. last november i was learning how to be alone again. three years ago i went to a concert at the hollywood bowl and felt that same familiar hum build behind my eyes as a song i loved approached its final chorus.
if you and i are similar, at least we can take comfort in being moved by the same things that moved us years ago. for me, it’s the outro of camera obscura’s “razzle dazzle rose,” when the camera lingers longer than usual on monica vitti’s face, and a well structured sentence in an unassuming paragraph: “the robin so red brought strawberry leaves, lucille would sing.”
maybe that’s all there is to it.
tiny morsels
MUSIC: gia margaret lost her voice while she was touring and made this ambient album that i can’t stop listening to, a romantic song for evenings spent alone, and a really lovely ep that came out in july.
BOOKS: never have i ever disliked a protagonist and loved a book so fully. currently reading this memoir, which begins with a map of los angeles freeways and a joan didion quote. and this one is batting second.
MOVIES: drawn to hours-long segments of people touching—a summer’s tale and hiroshima mon amour—and well-lit southwestern lullabies. also very excited for this avant-garde bro tale and a lesbian christmas !
INTERNET: recently finished watching the queen’s gambit and am still shocked that anya taylor-joy is a real person and not generated by a computer. a few treats from the new york times, including a lovely feature on joni mitchell and crowd-sourced quarantine soundscapes.