It is 2023 and I would like to use this newsletter as a blog. Which is to say, I don’t want to write you a hot take or a well thought out essay or an inspirational missive about the beginning of the year. I just want to tell you some things about my life. I complain about the internet all the time (and there is much to complain about) but the truth is I’ve been enjoying my time “here” on the internet since 1999 when my dad let me make an AIM account and use the family desktop to chat with my friends, and while “here” has changed so much in the almost 25 years since then, the internet has remained the number one way I connect with lots and lots of other humans. Though I maintain there is much to complain about when it comes to the internet, more now than in 1999 to be sure, I also have to admit I generally still like it here. At least, I like sharing bits and pieces of my life and reading about bits and pieces of other people’s lives. Which is what blogging was. It’s annoying that blogs are sort of dead now, and that we’re currently all using newsletters instead, but it’s also fine. “Here” moves and shifts and transforms frequently, and I’m sure in a few more years we’ll all be doing something different and I’ll accept it and participate, or maybe I’ll try to bend it back to blogging like I’m doing now. Or maybe I’ll be pregnant and finally free of my internet addiction, too sleep-deprived and obsessed with the idea of keeping my future child’s face off of Instagram to even open up my laptop. Who knows! Today, I’m “blogging.”
Books I’ve Read So Far This Year
Many people started reading a lot more during the pandemic, but I’ve been embarrassed to admit that over the past few years I’ve read fewer books than ever in my whole life. I was in grad school when the pandemic started, which didn’t leave very much time for leisure reading, and when I graduated on Zoom in May 2020 (lol, remember that terrible unhinged time, I almost do!) I was so burnt out on words and sentences and writing that I just took some time to zone out. I read a few books that summer — most memorably You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson and Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid — but I mostly just stared at my phone. That is something I’ve been doing for years that I am always trying to do less. I don’t really believe in New Year’s resolutions, especially now that New Year’s Eve will forever be The Anniversary of My Dad’s Death, which really undermines one’s desire to jot down a pithy little list of goals and hopes and dreams, but I do believe in ritual. Because so many of us buy into the ritual of The New Year on January 1, I do find the month of January to be a magical time to reshape our personal worlds. I’m not a “new me” for the new year — I’m simply taking stock, reevaluating, aiming to start some habits that will hopefully make my day to day living more joyful and easy throughout the year ahead. Which brings me to books!
As writers I admire published their “Books I Read in 2022” lists last month, I felt this horrible guilt and shame that I couldn’t produce anything similar because I just didn’t read very many books last year. In some ways, who cares, give yourself a break, I read the internet as a job and for pleasure daily, but in other ways: I care. I am a writer, a person who loves words. I have dedicated my life to the practice of writing. I do believe that good writers are good readers, and I believe reading books shapes your brain in lots of good ways. (I also believe listening to audiobooks counts as reading if you want it to, and I’m also uninterested in arguing with anyone about if you have to read to be a good writer, but since this is not Twitter it’s probably unnecessary to be so defensive. Just wanna be clear though!) Anyway, the main reason I don’t read the enormous amount of books I have collected in my house is, of course, because of my internet addiction, because I’m always scrolling and scrolling on this terrible excellent shiny device that I constantly hold in my hands, and I am taking the power of ritualistic January to break that curse. I will read more books this year! I simply will, because I want to! I miss reading books! I can fix this problem easily: I can read more books!
The funny thing about this whole “put down my phone, read more books” thing is that I was away when I made the decision, visiting my fiancée’s family in California and very far from my extensive physical book collection, so I ended up reading on the Libby app on… yeah, you guessed it, my phone. But I set the device to airplane mode and snuggled into bed with my cold hard screen and I felt ecstatic to be reading! I even quite enjoyed watching the percentage of how far along I was in the book, which is probably a symptom of my gameified and broken brain, but listen, I’m reading again. I will accept this victory for now.
So the books I’ve read so far this year are People Change by Vivek Shraya, essays that spoke to the very depths of my soul, essays that made me want to underline every sentence, essays that made me want to write essays again! I cannot recommend this book highly enough. I adore everything Shraya writes — her brain is just so brilliant! One of the few books I read last year was The Subtweet, her most recent novel, and I remember thinking wow, if my novel could just be half as good as this one, I will die happy. I just took I’m Afraid of Men (also by Shraya) out the library on Libby and I’m sure I’ll speed through that one this week. Vivek Shraya is a genius! Read everything she writes, I’m serious.
The other book I reread this year is The Boy with a Bird in His Chest by Emme Lund. I read this when it first came out last year, but I’m doing an event at Powell’s THIS WEEK with Emme to celebrate the paperback release, so I wanted to refresh my brain so I can be a worthy conversational partner to Emme on Sunday and also because it’s a treat to just sink into Owen’s story again. I devoured this book. I am a little bit in awe of Emme and a little bit nervous about being in conversation with her (!) at Powell’s (!!) on Sunday (!!!) but I am also incredibly mindbendingly excited, and if you’re in the Portland area and a fan of fiction and magic and queer coming of age stories set in the Pacific Northwest, I invite you to join us for what will surely be a delightful evening! Here’s a cool promo poster Powell’s made — put us in your calendar for 7pm on Sunday 1/15.
To conclude, books are awesome and I’m excited to have broken my curse of not reading very much over the past few years with the powerful collective magic ritual that the month of January brings whether we like it or not. Who would’ve thought? Portland Dyke Writer Pronounces Books, Particularly Queer Ones, Excellent — news at 11!!!
I thought I’d write more than this — I had some additional headers like “Games I’m Currently Very Into” and “Home Projects I’d Like To Eventually Get To” and “Food I’ve Been Making Since I Had My Gallbladder Removed And I Can Eat Again, Praise Lesbian Jesus” — but I’m actually quite charmed by the idea of making this blog (excuse me, “newsletter,”) a regular thing in your inbox again. Imagine if I could do what I did in 2019 and write to you consistently every 14 days! Imagine if I want to avoid revising my novel so desperately that I write to you every 7 days instead! What if this is the year I start reading and blogging regularly again! Truly, imagine.
Which is to say, I’m going to sign off now. I want to make dinner (broccoli and lemon pasta, shockingly not following a specific recipe, just my heart and the unquestionable reality that charred broccoli and lemon are fucking delicious when tossed around a bunch of spiral pasta noodles doused in butter and several teaspoons of red pepper flakes) and snuggle my dog and shower and get to bed at a reasonable hour, and I really should devote at least a few more hours to the book revision (which I have spent all weekend avoiding, our kitchen is so clean, I have been on so many walks, I even downloaded and started to use “You Need A Budget,” look at me go, the ritualistic moment of January is strong even when I try to tell myself resolutions aren’t real or necessary…).
I know I say this often, but I am really so glad you are here. I’m terrible at responding to emails which means sometimes when I write you these things (blog, newsletter, missive, whatever it is) and you write me back I don’t reply, but that is not a reflection of the amount of joy it brings me to hear from you (it just means that email is a broken device and I cannot force myself to change my relationship with it, no matter how many Januarys appear, I have accepted defeat when it comes to my inbox). Thank you for reading and thank you for responding. Thank you for making the internet fun, still, after all these years.
If you’d like to guarantee that I respond to your email because it will be my literal job, and also to spend time with me talking about writing, books, craft, and more, I am offering several classes this spring and I would love to see you in the Zoom Room. My classes don’t technically offer one-on-one meetings, but as a rule I make time to meet with all my students one-on-one (if they want to!) and I treasure those meetings. I also have some exciting plans for the future when it comes to writing and teaching, and I look forward to sharing those with you when they’re more fully formed. But for now, without further rambling…
Classes I’m Offering This Spring:
INSTANT FEEDBACK — INSTANT FEEDBACK is exactly what it sounds like — feedback in real time! This five week course will consist of writing prompts and then mini workshops all in the same class session. We'll write for a total of half an hour each class, and use the rest of our time together to share work and receive feedback. You can expect inventive prompts, a generous and compassionate workshop space, and to have many new pages and new ideas when the course ends. More info here.
YOU ARE THE EXPERT: A CREATIVE NONFICTION WORKSHOP — You Are The Expert: A Creative Nonfiction Workshop is a 10-week container for writers who want to dive deeper into their own stories with the support of literary community. Our mission statement lives in the title: when it comes to your writing, only you are the expert. Students who have experienced workshops that are heavy on the critique and light on the support will be pleasantly surprised here; our goal is to pay close attention to the work and offer support through the writing process, to work toward revision by emphasizing what is going right rather than what is going “wrong.” Whether you are writing a research-heavy personal essay, a narrative-driven memoir, or something in between, there is a place for you in this class. More info here.
ONE ON ONE WRITING TUTORIALS — Something I started doing last year that I really love is working with writers one on one. I can be a coach, an instructor, an accountability buddy, a guide, a friend… for most of my one on one clients they say I am a combination of all of the above! If you’d like to get unstuck with your writing, if you’d like someone to assign you prompts and deadlines, if you’d like someone to edit your work and suggest where you can pitch it for publication, or if you’d just like to chat about writing, books, and whatever you’re interested in today — I’m your girl. More info here.
Okay that’s all! See you next Sunday! (Either at Powell’s or in your inbox, depending on how you choose to live your own adventure.)