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Arthur Ashe Boulevard highway exit, 2017

Hello and happy new year, if we haven't spoken since 2022. I, for one, would like a medal for writing a newsletter about a given month before the month is out. Keeping it short today because today is a day to get out and enjoy the world. (I am procrastinating from doing that by writing this letter.)

This month, my self-appointed job has been to think more clearly about what I love and why, and allowing myself to love them even more deeply. This does apply to things like video games, but also, I've made a real effort to read more this month.

Part I from 12/28/2022:

June 2022, Silver Spring, MD

Housekeeping: this letter comes to you from the tail-end of 2022. I am on an Amtrak train between Richmond and Baltimore. I’m grateful to crash on Nora’s couch tonight before getting an absurdly early flight tomorrow morning, from Baltimore to Albuquerque (via Chicago). I will then go to San Diego two days later (via Phoenix). I have four flights in three days. If you have good sentiments, vibes, prayers, or feelings to send my way, I am welcoming them.

Two full months have jolted and staggered past. I’m writing to you from a jumpy Amtrak train en route to New York for the first time since I moved away. I wanted to share some updates and to check in. How is life? Did you vote today? I finally got my living room set and can now entertain company. I am excited to scan beach photos in New York, but for now here is an iPhone photo of one of many sunsets I’ve enjoyed over the last two months.

September 2022, Ocracoke Island, NC

For September, I largely took a break from writing, but I wrote a few poems while at the beach, including this one.

(Written between 8/19/2022 - 8/23/2022. Photographs from August - October, 2013.)

Manhattan, August 2013

Before I moved to New York for college in August of 2013, I was working part-time as an education intern at a children's’ theater program. One day in June of that year, while we were waiting around for the kids to get picked up, I was goofing off and checking my phone. I noticed the Yeah Yeah Yeahs had put out a video for a new song from their upcoming album, Mosquito. The song was called "Despair."

I don't owe anyone an explanation, but here is where my newsletter-type thoughts have been for the last six weeks:

(unedited transcript below)

July being the month of breaking hearts while healing my own. July being the month I quit my shitty job. July being the month that was unforgettably hot - as though New York heard me sign a lease in another state and said, “fine, but you’ll have to go through hell to get there.” “Fine, but we’ll have the last sweaty pee-smelling loud laugh.” July being the month I saw Lucy Dacus on a hotter-than-hell night when I saw someone pass out at the show and on the way home. July being the month where I decided for the first year to truly celebrate my mom’s birthday instead of the day she died. July being the month my black sunglasses broke, the month I retrieved my prom dress from my old place and saw my ex likely for the last time. July being the month an orthopedist told me my X-rays were fine and that I may benefit from taking fucking Aleve. July being the month I visited Roosevelt Island for the first time, somehow, defying gravity on that rickety little tram. July being the month of one million egg sandwiches from Gourmet Deli on Broome at Ludlow, and I think the month I discovered Zefe’s on Myrtle is still in business, they were just closed temporarily for Covid. July being the month I started to let go of expectations (and still hung onto some). July being the month I began to let myself love again, and the month I began to let one of my biggest, oldest loves go (Brooklyn).

An iPhone picture of my aunt's yard on June 17th 2022; film scans to come soon.

Some housekeeping:

I'm in a critique group that has put out a wonderful exhibition, Wildness, and an accompanying book. The exhibition closes 6/29! Reach out if you'd like to buy a copy of the book.

"The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men

Gang aft agley,

An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain,

Central Park, February 2022

It's been a good ten months since my last newsletter, a long-form essay about 2020 and the books I read over the course of the year. Unless I put down all of my other distractions (including finishing , trying to roller skate while it's still vaguely warm, and reading ), I will not have read sixty books by the end of 2021. It is also worth noting that many of you are following this newsletter because of my photographs. I am working on a very cool book project with a critique group I'm part of, and I have been thinking for a while about doing my own small book of grass photographs. Stay tuned for more info on both of those; future newsletters will not be this lengthy.