but enough about that

(week of 8/10)

Last week was rough but I’m back for yaps this morning hey

...what I'm reading (books): Finished A Good Person by Kirsten King, which made my life feel less fucked up in comparison. Currently reading Stop Me If You’ve Heard This One by Kristen Arnett, which is somehow relatable despite me being a little bit scared of clowns. I’m also really trying to savor every story in Fat Swim by Emma Copley Eisenberg. Her writing is so deeply compelling to me, there’s something so tactile in how she describes bodies and the ways we live in them, and something so evocative but never flowery or dramatic in how she puts sentences together. Forever taking notes from her.

...what I'm reading (fic): The fic reading and writing part of my brain is off right now. I’ve been in the kind of depleted, burnt out, whatever-you-want-to-call-it headspace that makes it really easy to poison the things I love, if that makes sense? What's the word for that again? Depression? Yeah. Keeping all things fic safely tucked away on a high shelf for now.

...what I'm listening to: I struck thrift store gold last last weekend with a CD haul that includes Weezer’s Green Album, Bowie’s The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust, Belle and Sebastian’s The Boy with the Arab Strap, Beastie Boy’s License to Ill, and Yo La Tengo’s I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One. I had all of these albums on repeat constantly when I was in college. Listening to them now feels like time traveling.

...what I'm watching: Oregon is in the middle of its worst wildfire season on record and the air quality was bad enough last week I didn’t open my windows once from Monday morning through Friday morning. Temps were also in the 90s. It sucked. In an effort to make it suck less, I had movie night every night. I watched: Red Eye (still fun), The Devil Wears Prada 2 (boring), The Drama (way better than I expected), Trap (so bad), and Skate Dreams (very cool).

...what I'm eating: A lot of froyo. Also these spring roll bowls because if you add pre-cooked shrimp (or chicken or whatever) there’s zero stovetop/oven required.

...what I'm working on: Please refer to what I’m reading (fic). There was a faint spark when @dags-over-caravans posted a little update of the final chapter of BLP but a very distant spark. Like watching a wildfire start in eastern Oregon, but in a good way. See, that was a horrible metaphor. That’s why I’m not writing right now.

...what I'm doing to touch grass: I spent most of the weekend outside after being cooped up inside all week. Went on a Cat Walk on Saturday, where a bunch of neighborhood families had their cats in windows or on leashes outside for people to say hi to and it was very wholesome. And yesterday I walked around Mount Tabor Park and watched preparations begin for the soap box derby next week, which is a whole fun weird thing. Being in community for fun weird things is one of the best ways to touch grass imo.

...what's making me laugh: Last week a coworker (who is weaponized incompetence personified) kept asking if July had 30 or 31 days (because he’s dumb) and after multiple people tried teaching him the rhyme thing, my manager just quietly, politely said “Have you tried checking your calendar?” and I’m still laughing about it. It was the sickest corporate burn I've ever witnessed.

...what's giving me hope: Firefighters? Idk dudes. Wildfire season is always tough but it feels extra tough this year for some reason. Maybe because we’re building data centers that use up so much water and worsen the conditions that make it possible for one little lightning strike to set hundreds of thousands of acres on fire? Wait, this was supposed to be about hope. Firefighters. Right.

...what's so true to me right now: Say hi to people. Yesterday I ran out to grab some lunch and I smiled at an older woman who was passing by on the sidewalk, and she stopped and said hi, so I said hi, and then she started talking about how no one ever says hi anymore. So then we chatted for a little bit about the library because she had a few books in her hand that she was on her way to return, and then she went on her way, and that was that. It was just a nice little moment. And everyone has countless moments like that all the time, but maybe not as much as we should, maybe she’s right.

Time isn't real this week (this summer? this year?) but it's been cloudy and a little cooler in the mornings so I'm starting to think about fall sooooo I'm starting to think about the Monday the 13th sequel again. @dags-over-caravans and I are noodling about it. Just a little bit. Here's a little bit of the psycho killer Lucanis prologue that got the creative juices flowing yesterday...

In his dreams, he slits throats. The blade changes from one slash to the next. Pointed, serrated, a paring knife, a machete. The shape is impermanent, inconsequential. They all cut through flesh as easily in dreams as in the waking world. They stab, and slice, and saw. Blood coats his face, dripping down his cheeks into his bared teeth. This is what we were made for, his dreamself (himself, themself, the demon) purrs in his ear (from within his head, from his own wet lips). In his dreams, he is in control. His grasp on the waking world is a slippery thing, wriggling, eel-like, but his dreams belong only to himself. The time he has lost floods back in. He wades through his own memories, picking through the flotsam, finding the details that matter and turning them over and over until they become something new. This is where you hide, his dreamself reminds him (and they are correct). They abandoned guilt and shame long ago, but some memories hold more comfort than others. He revists those often. In his dreams, he hugs a body. Fabric separates them. Thicker than he would like (than he remembers) but it's fine. He's fine. With enough time, he will dream of the skin underneath, the softness and the sweat and the stink of fear. He holds the body close, tracing curves etched so deeply in his memory not even the demon can erase them. Nothing can erase what you've done. What they've done. Together. The body is warm beneath his fingers. Alive. When he wakes, he's hugging himself. The straitjacket is tight this time. His hands are trapped at his sides and no amount of tugging will loosen the ties. There's nothing in the cell to help him. A cot. A toilet. No windows. A harsh, glowing fluorescent light in the ceiling that throws his shadow against the wall behind him. Solitary confinement. Again. You stabbed a guard. Again. What kind of blade was it, he wonders? All the shivs he's made over the years blend together in his mind, held in a hand that he knows is his own but belongs only to the demon. He stares up at the ceiling light until tears leak from the corners of his eyes, staining his cheeks, salting his lips. He feels nothing. Did he cry when he stabbed her? He can't remember. You can. And you can try again. Because she's still alive.