Missed you...

Image: Cypresses, Vincent van Gogh, 1889, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1949. Public domain.

Image: Cypresses, Vincent van Gogh, 1889, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1949. Public domain.

Hello my friends! I missed you. I hope you've been very well. 

Things are okay here, if a little subdued. Still enjoying that #atlanticbeachlife and feeling grateful because you know: It could be really GRISLY and right now it's not. Yes, I'd like to be with babyfam in the East Bay. But I have family here too, still among the living. Praise hands.

Anyway. I've been working on the book. That's coming along. I have been low-key working on a weight series for you. That WILL be coming along. And I have been doing a lot of reading and relaxing. Some details and recs for you:

This is what I read in July:

  • 🌈  Cha-Ching!, Ali Liebegott 

  • Your Art Will Save Your Life, Beth Pickens 

  • Big Friendship, Aminatou Sow and Ann Friedman 

  • On Being Human, Jen Pastiloff 

  • How to Resist Amazon and Why, Danny Caine 

  • Oligarchy, Scarlett Thomas 

  • This is Big, Marissa Meltzer 

  • Dead Soon Enough, Steph Cha 

  • Beware Beware, Steph Cha 

  • Wolf Pack, Abby Wambach 

  • 🌈  Priestdaddy, Patricia Lockwood 

  • The Hazel Wood, Melissa Albert 

  • Save Yourself, Cameron Esposito 

  • Buy Yourself the Fucking Lilies, Tara Schuster 

  • The Hand on the Wall, Maureen Johnson

  • Self-Care, Leigh Stein 

  • 🌈  We Ride Upon Sticks, Quan Barry

  • A Week in Winter, Maeve Binchy

I liked everything except the Binchy novel, and The Hazel Wood. I can recommend the rest...depending on the sort of thing you like. (Obviously I read a lot of self-help and memoirs.) But the books with rainbows really wowed me—not all for the same reason.

(I wrote about We Ride Upon Sticks and Self-Care for Modern Daily Knitting here. There are many more great recs in the comments section.)

Also I watched a few things I loved. In particular, The Old Guard (streaming on Netflix) is a superior superhero movie with female leads (Charlize Theron and KiKi Layne, so good), directed by a Black female director, Gina Prince-Bythewood, about a group of near-immortal, i.e. VERY old and well-preserved warriors. Fingers crossed for a sequel.

And I really liked Straight Up, a 2019 indie film about two awkward 20-somethings who try hard to make a relationship work. Sounds grueling maybe? It was funny and sweet, and features Randall Park (of Always Be My Maybe) as the backwards-thinking dad.

To help with writing the book—courage has been needed!—I turned to Holly Wren Spaulding's A.I.R. @ Home workshop / class / residency situation. I don't think I've ever had a better online experience. If you are a writer—particularly a poet—Holly's Poetry Forge would be a very good follow.

I took a very fun workshop with Liz Gilbert!!! (and Jen Pastiloff). Just lovely.

I tried going back to the gym again because guess what you cannot order a trap bar right now to save your life and without 100lb+ weights I am straight hemorrhaging the motivation, but it just didn't feel safe. I told my friend who works in public health that I had gone back. And dear heaven: THE LOOK ON HER FACE. That, and the casual closeness of the other gym folks, was enough to drive me back to the attic. Pray for a vaccine with me.

The Crone-ometer turned over, and I had a really great birthday. 

Finally, I am still eating meals! Are you eating meals? Are you able to feed yourself well? I really hope so. Let me know about that. We'll go back to talking about eating and nourishment and taking ourselves seriously again next week. 

Max DanielsComment