A note for you, if you’re having a bad day.
Dear Friend,
I finally got sick. It has been over a year since I’ve been non-pregnancy-sick — a product of being fairly vigilant about Covid-19 precautions, I’m sure — and I forgot how much it sucks. Now my body and my brain are going to have the fight that they have when this happens. Is it familiar to you?
BODY: I’m sick.
BRAIN: Do you have a fever?
BODY: No.
BRAIN: Then that’s not really sick.
BODY: I feel bad.
BRAIN: Do you, though?
BODY: Yes.
BRAIN: Are you maybe making it up? What if you just pushed yourself a little harder? What if you just went to work and did the normal things you normally did? Do you feel like you might discover that you are NOT actually sick? And that you’re FAKING IT?
BODY: No, I don’t feel like that, because I am not faking it, and I am sick. I’m not even capable of faking things.
BRAIN: Orgasms?
BODY: That’s you.
BRAIN: Right.
BODY: I would love if we could rest.
BRAIN: Well we CAN’T. And you’re not really sick, you liar.
I believe that sometimes sickness is your body telling you that you actually NEED to slow down.
—
Aaaaand that is all that I wrote of that letter, which I began last week. I guess I wrote that final sentence and realized that it was true for me — that I needed to slow down, and if I could advise you to take some time and space for yourself, I could heed the same advice for myself.
Honestly, who isn’t struggling right now? The weight of the news is (once again) too much to bear. It’s difficult to find solid ground. And there’s a real domino effect, too: if you feel like you can barely hold yourself together, and everyone around you feels like they can barely hold themselves together, then solid ground — general togetherness to rest on or in — ceases to exist. It feels like a big free-fall through space. There are days where I run out of things to say to my students, my friends, my self. “This just sucks. It’s just a hard time. We have no way to know when it will end, and that’s not very comforting.” And that’s not very comforting.
But things will change, they always do. That is the only thing that things do with any reliability. And that’s been my mantra lately; it’s what I’m leaning on. You aren’t going to feel this way forever. Or: The big stuff will get small. Or: Something wonderful is going to happen. That last one is a little more optimistic and future-telling, but it has never not been true in the history of the world, so let’s go with it. Why not?
This is some real bottom-of-the-barrel positivity, but there it is, reliably present at the end of the world. The reality that things are going to change. Even if you stay perfectly still, change will come.
Love,
Sophie
PS - I was wondering about the origin of the phrase, “This too shall pass,” and came up with this from Wikipedia: Its origin has been traced to the works of Persian Sufi poets, such as Rumi, Sanai and Attar of Nishapur. Attar records the fable of a powerful king who asks assembled wise men to create a ring that will make him happy when he is sad.
A note about me.
Dear Friend,
OK. I’m going do something here that my publicist would probably discourage, but the thing I’ve been craving more than anything else lately is transparency, and writing all these vague “you can do it” emails is making me feel opaque as can be. I’m supposed to, at some point, write you a whole email encouraging you to buy my forthcoming book. Apparently, that’s what newsletters are for. So maybe I’ll do that at some point; I’m not the best at self-promotion but I’m also not the worst at it, and truthfully, I’d been feeling proud of this book. It was a heavy lift, to draw a whole book. Drawing takes so much time, but that’s kind of what I love about it: you put so much in to something intended for someone else, and they will not take nearly as much time consuming it, but there’s a generosity about that that I have always felt grateful for in my own consumption of art. It was something I wanted to be able to do, too.
But you guys: the book got a not-great review. It didn’t get a TERRIBLE review; the review did say some nice things. But it also accused the book of being overly didactic. And I read that and thought, “Oh my GOD! That’s ME! I AM overly didactic!” And then I thought, “This is the wrong response to have. I am supposed to think, ‘Fuck Publishers Weekly. What do THEY know?’ I don’t even know how to stand up for myself in my own mind.” Then I thought, “But still: I AM overly didactic. That is the thing that I am. And now I have put a whole book into the world that is going to be patronizing and boring and eye-rolly [all my own words, to be clear], and no one will have the patience for it, and I’LL BE FINISHED.” Also, the review said that the book had a “cute setup.” Which is not an insult, but made me feel small and like a person playing dress-up. And a book with a “cute setup” is not a serious book that serious people would buy or read or have interest in.
So I sat down to write this newsletter and all I could think was, “The WHOLE PREMISE of this newsletter is overly didactic.” So the words wouldn’t come. I didn’t know what to write to you. I got stuck.
This kind of feedback will probably help me grow. I don’t have a thick skin, but it’s porous, and everything I’ve made with the help / editing of others is so much better than anything I’ve ever made by myself. And I want to assure you — because you’ve been with me through all my “soliloquizing” (another complaint from the review) — that I am resolved to grow and be better for you. I still hope to draw and write in a spirit of generosity. I may not be there yet.
Alright. I’ve almost deleted this letter (or paragraphs of it, at least) several times. But this is some of my truth right now, and I want to share it with you. It’s not lost on me that THESE ARE THE SMALLEST POTATOES IN THE WORLD. Like… a not-great review from a publishing website up against everything else right now? It’s TINIER THAN NOTHING. And yet, most people get stuck on somethings that are nothing, so I’m telling you my sticky nothing-something, with a great deal of embarrassment.
Also, let me brag on this book, too and say: CHRIS WARE LIKED IT. And, like… he’s Chris Ware. Here is a “social asset” proving that Chris Ware is charmed by my didactic nature.
Also, I made a cool fill-it-in-yourself printable journal for anyone who pre-orders. (Picture below.) (If you’ve already pre-ordered, fill in your information on the form on this page! I’m sending these out this week.)
Add this to your to-do list.
Watch, listen to, read, or look at something that makes you laugh — or at least smile. I recommend typing “funny [your favorite animal here] videos” into YouTube.
Give someone a hug, if that’s physically accessible to you these days. Count to five while you’re hugging. Our bodies need that kind of thing.
A drawing.
What’s on my mind this week.
(This will be about new parenthood. Skip it if you don’t want to read about new parenthood.)
Something I have been thinking about a lot lately is that there was really only one piece of advice or information that was useful to me at all when it came to being pregnant, giving birth, and living with a baby, and that was this: literally everyone’s experience IS TOTALLY DIFFERENT from everyone else’s. Seriously: snowflakes have NOTHING on child-making. I looked at so many statistics and read so many books; the only one I really think about anymore is “What No One Tells You,” which my friend Jen recommended to me. The thesis of that book is, “LOL, don’t try to anticipate anything, because everything could and might happen, and there’s really NO WAY to predict any of it. Except that if you are really sad, consider the fact that you are almost certainly not getting enough sleep.” I actually AM getting enough sleep, which is a perfect example of how nothing is predictable at all. (And I am also sad. And I am also totally in love with T. And also my love for her has changed a lot in four months, but most notably it’s gotten incredibly swollen.) All there is for now is now, and nothing was how I thought it would be, and it’s better, but I regret reading all the books. (That said, I loved loved loved hearing people’s stories, and I continue to love it. I loved every birth story I heard; they always made me feel like bodies can be SO POWERFUL. I love hearing about how people managed difficult times. I love knowing about individual other parents, and observing all the radical differences. It’s the applying-it-to-my-own-life stuff that I’ve found more grating.) (Also, this has been kind of a cheat, because T is going through a really fun time. She’s smiling and laughing a lot, and IT IS EVERYTHING. She has preferences. She is engaging. She sleeps. She cries a lot less than she used to. It’s a big sun splotch in my life, and I’m trying to hold each moment as close to me as I can.)
Extras.
Some of my favorite change-related media: “When It Don’t Come Easy” by Patty Griffin and the poem “Prayer” by Galway Kinnell.
Branching out from my genre of super-long oral histories, I’m listening to “The Comedians” — a gigantic book about the history of comedy in America. I wouldn’t to necessarily recommend listening to it (because the author reads it and he does a lot of impressions that he just shouldn’t do), but the content is so incredibly interesting.
I’m reminded this week that salad rolls are very easy to make and a good way to get salad in your life.
The musician Annie DiRusso only has six songs and she is only 21 (which is lyrically obvious), but every one of them is a BANGER. I can’t get enough.
In the humor writing class I teach, we analyzed Jamie Loftus’s Shouts piece from last year about pandemic American Girl Dolls, and it is actually AMAZING, in case you missed it.
After a slow start, I’m really digging “The Afterparty,” if only for the masterful comedic performances delivered by everyone’s favorites. “Someone Somewhere”’s season finale likewise did not disappoint.
This is a decent article about the commodification of witch culture.
It’s time to start noticing plants. Get a plant identifier app and start taking walking scavenger hunts for new growths. This will make spring start earlier and last longer. It is the best life hack.
The inimitable Eugenia Viti and I are hosting a ZOOM PICTIONARY NIGHT! We’re giving away copies of our books as prizes and having you watch us draw while we all play a rousing guessing game. You need this in your life. The poster is below, and you can register here.