The Sophie Johnson You Want Works For EatingWell Magazine And Is Not Me

PLUS: How to Make A Tree Ornament!

A NOTE FOR YOU, IF YOU’RE HAVING A BAD DAY

Dear Friend,

Of course there are other Sophie Johnsons. When Facebook was first available to me, I looked all of them up and Friended them. Facebook was small at the time, so there were twelve. I browsed all the other Sophie Johnson profiles and mentally ranked them and fantasized about throwing a party where only the best Sophie Johnsons were invited.

Then the internet ballooned and there were all-of-a-sudden too many Sophie Johnsons. When I wanted to be a standup comic (did you know this about me? It was a Significant Chapter), I was irritated to learn that there were TWO OTHER Sophie Johnson standup comics. And there were lots of other Sophie Johnson writers, and most of the Sophie Johnsons seemed superior to me. I was un-Googleable, and I hated it. That's why I added the Lucido — my beautiful middle name, which would have been my last name if it wasn't for patriarchy.

For the most part, this worked. Standup comedy hosts (white cis men with beards) didn't always want to say my middle name; they verbally accused me of "being extra." But I held firm. I remember reaching out to The New Yorker, too, asking them if they would mind adding the "Lucido" to my byline. I felt terrified that someone would write back: "HOW DARE YOU ASK FOR SUCH AN EXTRAVAGANCE! WE MADE YOU AND WE CAN BREAK YOU!" But my editor wrote back within minutes and was apologetic. The change was made. My identity felt under my control! When I was a newly-published New Yorker cartoonist, I felt powerful about this. The world was my oyster. I was the fair-haired boy.

But since I've had a baby, my identity has started to feel different. Pregnancy permanently changed my body such that I look like I am a mom, no matter how cool my glasses are. (Holding the hand of a toddler and saying to her, "Did you have a poop? Are you pooping?" in public spaces also makes me look like a mom.) I look like a mom, I act like a mom; I am a mom.

Having a daughter and living with a daughter and getting to know a daughter is amazing. But I wanted to be a writer, a comedian, a cartoonist. I recently learned that our now-former-roommate, whose name is not Leonard, referred to me in private as Sticker Mom. (I met Not Leonard because he ordered a sticker from me. You might think there's more to it than that, but there is not.) This is a sweet and fond nickname that makes me feel soft and grateful — and it is centered around my identity as a mom. It's complicated to explain how lonely all of this feels. Nothing in the world is better than my amazing daughter, who awes me in ways I clichely never thought possible. AND I feel I have been obliterated; turned into a mushy goo, the way a caterpillar gets in a cocoon, but instead of coming out as a butterfly, I have come out as a goo-person.

The weight of this was just beginning to dawn on me when I started getting emails saying that companies wanted to send me, Sophie, free food.

These were not promotional emails. They were emails sent from real representatives of real companies, asking if they could send me in the mail a ham, or a bunch of jars of mustard, or a Brand New Kind of Alcohol. If I liked their herb butter / rare pepper jelly / waffle cookies, maybe I could write about it?

I am a writer and I once did a series of essays for Bon Appetit, so at first I was thrilled to think that I had been moved on to some email list of Writers Who Can Cover Food Things. It felt like I had really made it! But then the emails started coming more frequently. At one point, I responded to Spindrift to tell them that, Sure! I'd love to drink their alcoholic Spindrift. Send it my way! I thought, "My newsletter readers will be psyched to learn about this cool alcoholic Spindrift drink." But they never followed up. The whole situation felt a little fishy. (No fish pun intended, although tinned fish was very popular at the time, and I was offered free samples from no fewer than seven brands.)

Then one day, I was browsing EatingWell Magazine (I subscribe!), and I saw it: my own name in the masthead. Well, sort of. I am Sophie Lucido Johnson, as we've clearly established; Sophie [no middle name] Johnson was (and still is) the Senior Social Media Editor at EatingWell Magazine. Ooooooh. OK.

I opened my computer and Googled "Sophie Johnson EatingWell." Her picture popped up immediately. She was a beautiful blonde curly-haired woman wearing the kind of outfit I always want to be able to pull off but cannot. (A crisp white t-shirt and jeans! But it's giving professional! How is she doing this!) In her picture, she's laughing and running her hand through her hair. This woman was living the dream. Light internet stalking taught me that she associated with a black standard poodle; she lived in Portland, Oregon; and she graduated from college in 2018. Based on these facts (and these facts alone), I concluded that she probably was not a mom.

By the way, Sophie Johnson (that Sophie Johnson) did write an article about the Spindrift hard seltzer. Can you believe it?

The right thing to do would have been to immediately shut down the steady flow of complimentary food offerings. But I didn't want to. I wanted to be Sophie Johnson, senior social media editor at EatingWell Magazine. I've dreamed about working at a newspaper or magazine since I was five and I knew what one was. I occasionally made moves toward that path for myself — I applied to (AND GOT INTO!) the Columbia Journalism School; I interned at The Nation; I took as many freelance reporting gigs as The Powers That Be would give me. But anytime I moved toward my dream, I'd panic. "What if I fail. I will probably fail. I've already failed," I'd tell myself. “And besides,” myself would add, “I can’t go out and do a job that I want to do. It would be selfish and bad. My job has to be a helper job."

Such as teacher. Always be teacher.

So I kept receiving the emails. I read every one of them. When I read them, I pretended I was the other Sophie Johnson, who had ended up at a magazine and now gets to eat a lot of free novelties, and then write about them and get paid for it. Meanwhile, my Sophie Lucido Johnson life was getting gooier. When T was a baby, there was a lot of support. People know that people with babies are going through a hard time, and they bring over casseroles, or bend over to accommodate your needs. But now that T was a toddler, it seemed like everyone expected me to be able to do everything I used to do, even though now at least eight hours of every day were spent giving my sole focus and attention to another human being who depended on me for survival. There were not suddenly eight more hours in every day; there were, however, suddenly an amount of expenses that I wasn’t fully prepared for. Hustling was so much easier when I could hustle all day every day, and not just when my daughter was not sick and at daycare. At least I had my other-dimension life to fantasize inside.

Lately, though, the books I’ve been reading have been sending me signs. Real Self-Care by Pooja Lakshmin, On Our Best Behavior by Elise Loehnen, and Atomic Habits by James Clear all emphasize the importance of knowing who you are, what you value, and what you want. Don’t be ashamed of wanting, they are saying. Don’t be ashamed that you are still becoming.

Lakshmin suggests making a very clear moral inventory. She says you should know what your values are. Write them down. Who do you want to be? (Mercifully, she has activities for this.) James Clear says that the first step to changing your habits is changing your identity to reflect the person you want to be. Instead of telling someone you are trying to quit smoking, tell them you are not a smoker. And Elise Lohnen writes that women are often envious of other women (and subsequently shoot them down) because these women have something or are doing something that we want to have or be doing. All of these brilliant writers are saying a version of this: You want things. There is nothing wrong with wanting things. In fact, please get clear about the things you want! Then go embody those things.

Clear even cautions away from setting goals. He didn’t write this, but here’s what I took away from that: Essentially, you are already the person you want to be. You are sometimes afraid to admit it to yourself. And when you won’t name yourself as a person who values creativity, or health, or making comic strips, then you won’t get to be that person — even if that’s who you ALREADY ARE.

Reading these books cracked something open in me: a reminder, from the days when Sophie Lucido Johnson felt powerful. At the beginning of 2020, I decided to stop telling people I was a teacher, and start telling them I was a cartoonist. I had not sold a print cartoon to The New Yorker yet, but, along with my writing partner Sammi Skolmoski, I was trying. We wrote over 100 cartoons before we sold even one. But I started introducing myself to strangers by saying that I was a cartoonist. And do you know what comes up when you Google me now?

You get to decide so much about your identity. Your values are up to you. You can find values inventories online (I’ve linked to one), and they usually come with quizzes to help you determine your values — but just reading the list and thinking about which values resonate with you is probably enough.

I want to tell you this, because it is important: if you are putting all of your energy into taking care of other people, there is a good chance you’re out of touch with your own values and your self identity. You may have fallen into the trap of saying yes because it’s polite or kind or will help someone out. I know this, too, from experience: the people who love you want you to be in touch with yourself. They want you to take the time it takes to know the things you want, and to fully understand the person you hope to become. Take the time. It may not always feel like it, but that time belongs to you.

I was a goo-person. I deserved to be Sophie Lucido Johnson, a cartoonist and writer who cares deeply about the people she loves. (That’s what I came up with when I went in search of my identity.) One by one, I went through the emails and told the senders that they had the wrong Sophie Johnson. A representative from Banana Bread even wrote me back:

You know, I almost archived this email. But then I thought, “Why shouldn’t I get an ‘apology loaf’ of banana bread?” So I wrote Lauren back and said sure! Send me banana bread! After all, I may not be that Sophie Johnson, but I am a writer.

Who cares deeply about the people she loves. Which includes you, wherever you are on your particular path of becoming.

Good luck out there, bravely facing all that breaks your heart.

Love,

Sophie

HOW TO: Make An Ornament

Our first Christmas tree at our first apartment, with all homemade ornaments. Nothing but.

I’ve started asking for tree ornaments for Christmas from everyone. I like to see what people get, and I appreciate that this a meaningless adult collection of weird baubles that no one seems to take issue with. Personally, I think everyone of every faith ought to hang ornaments in interesting public locations at all times of year. But the winter is especially dreary, and so I like that there are ornaments.

You can make them. I have started doing this every year! Last year I bought 20 wooden ornaments from Michaels (there was a sale), with the intention to paint one a year for the next decade. When T is old enough, I hope she’ll join me. I love these paint pens for this task.

There’s also birdseed ornaments, which are very fun. I like this recipe that doesn’t use gelatin, but there are hundreds of recipes out there, so take your pick!

Finally, our friend Kristen (who is also a reader of this newsletter! Hi, Kristen!) last year made the coolest ornaments I’ve ever seen. They filled clear plastic ball ornaments with tiny versions of all the best books the recipient of the ornament had read that year. You can buy one of these on Etsy, or at least click on the link to see what they look like.

HOUSEKEEPING

• If you are interested in buying a GIFT SUBSCRIPTION for a friend as a holiday present, GREAT! I’ll be mailing Gift Cards to people who are given gift subscriptions this year. The cards will come with a sticker and some little ephemera, and a note about all the things that come with a paid subscription, and I’ll send these gift cards IN THE MAIL! I like when someone gets to open something, and a gift subscription doesn’t usually offer that, so why not change that? If you order a gift subscription for a friend, I’ll follow up with an email asking for a mailing address for the gift card pack! If you don’t get an email from me within three days, assume I somehow lost the alert from your subscription, and send ME an email. WE WILL MAKE SURE THESE ALL GO IN THE MAIL! (You can also buy a gift subscription for yourself, which is also known as a paid subscription, and I’ll send you the SAME WELCOME CARD WITH TREATS! This is a deeply limited time offer.)

  (Because it costs more than $5 to make these packs and mail them, this offer is only for the $50 yearly subscriptions.)

• I thought I’d made enough calendars, but I got way more orders than I expected or could handle! So I ordered 40 more. As I write this, there are 25 units left, and then that’s it; there are no more after that. Thank you for your patience while I send everything out!

• There is also a new t-shirt! I feel shocked to have barely sold ANY of these t-shirts on Black Friday, because I really do think it is the coolest t-shirt I have ever made. It has edible flowers and a bird on it! And it says EAT MORE FLOWERS! And it is PINK!!!! Anyway, inventory is heavily stocked on these.

  

  

• There is also a new card set! And I restocked the old one! So if you have people you want to send really nice Christmas cards to, boy, am I ever your girl.

  

• I am also selling all the art I made while I was teaching the first bird class (as well as a few other things). These are original paintings, and I think that I have probably not priced them correctly, since they’re all between $25 and $65, and that is apparently not enough for original artwork. Maybe I’ll reexamine this model in the future.

  

• Finally, if you want to make your OWN bird artwork, I am offering THREE NEW BIRD PAINTING CLASSES. One is a one-day workshop that takes place on a Saturday in January; one is a four-session Tuesday night class; one is a four-session Wednesday afternoon class. All classes take place over Zoom. If you want to buy one of these as a gift for a friend, just make a note for me! I’ll send a gift card to you that explains what the class is and that it has been a gift FROM YOU. Even if you took the video classes offered to paid subscribers, I suggest you try a live class. I’m shifting the class based on what I learned the first time around, so it will be different; and you’ll get to choose a bird you want to paint if you take a four-week session.

LOOSE THOUGHTS

• You really can only do five things in one day. This is something I keep forgetting, even as I peddle this idea to the masses.

• T is getting her last two teeth, and it really sucks. She balls up her little fists and is clearly in so much pain. You want to explain what’s happening in a way she can understand, but it’s not possible, and also IT IS DISTURBING. “There are little bones sprouting out of your gums like wings.”

• I’ve been taking cold weather walks, and strongly recommend them. The cold doesn’t seem like it can hurt you quite so much when you are out in it, refusing to let it win. The way to do this is to get a coat that goes all the way to the ground. This is a hill I will die on.