February

On Now: Emotional whiplash, author portraits, and holding back love

Mar 02, 2024

February was not running away from the hard conversations and reaping the bounty from pushing through to the other side of love. It was a bonfire under the night sky and crying at my writing desk. It was hosting brunches and watching my son fall in love with my friends the same way that I have. It was sourdough cinnamon rolls and kimchi eggs and pizza beneath the magnolia tree. It was the sound of water in every direction and sunlight on the deck and my arms full of flowers. It was falling into the fantastical world of my son’s imagination and setting up pretend record stores in the living room. It was clearing space and not doing it alone. It was new business collaborations and play dates and four days straight of long, leisurely dinners with friends. It was the full moon and being wholly present and sex well into the late hours. It was empty bottles of wine and crushing tomatoes with my hands and allowing myself to rest. It was mammograms and Spanish music class and late-night writing workshops that gave me emotional whiplash. It was fresh flowers on the table and having an author portrait taken for a book I don’t have published. It was infrared saunas and sexy looks from across the table and naked cold plunges. It was the all-encompassing fear that comes with my son growing up and realizing that I won’t be able to protect him from every bad thing. It was throwing rocks in the river and our shadows in the sun and sending cotton-candy-colored handprints through the mail. It was summer flowers in winter books and too-strong Old Fashions in swanky hotel bars. It was sitting at the dining table for no other reason but to laugh together. It was listening and waiting for answers and trying to be okay with the not knowing.

WHAT I’M READING

Human Blues by Elisa Albert

I paused this book because its voice is so powerful that I found it trying to seep into my own work. I’m deep into some scene writing and need to remain true to the voice of my character. I have another writing project for which this book would be the perfect companion, so I’m going to revisit it once space allows. Thanks to Rachel Larsen Weaver for recommending it. Her book recommendations have never led me astray.

I Love You But I’ve Chosen Darkness by Claire Vaye Watkins

After setting aside Human Blues, I found myself drawn to I Love You But I’ve Chosen Darkness. This book seemed to follow me, appearing repeatedly, urging me to delve into its pages. I’d seen it in the bookstore, read the back cover, and found so much of it had similar themes and vibes to my memoir—identity, addiction, the Mojave desert (how a place shapes and breaks you). Something held me back from buying it, probably the title, because it reads like a cheesy emo song that I probably would’ve loved twenty years ago.

It was during the intensive Shit No One Tells You About Writing Deep Dive Workshop, an enriching three-hour weekly session filled with craft lectures, industry insights, and writer camaraderie, that I decided to finally embrace it. These workshops always leave me buzzing with ideas and grappling with the emotional whiplash that comes with talking about making art and making a living. Oof. But that’s a subject that warrants its own dedicated piece. Maybe I can try to find time to dive into this for an upcoming Substack.

I came to the Deep Dive workshops with a rough outline of a novel I was working on and a quick "Here’s what my novel is about" statement. I told myself I would not talk about my memoir. That I was moving on. Finally. I was going to write something new. Something different. But as I navigated my way through the breakout sessions, my memoir kept coming up. An author who has a book coming out next year asked about where I was at in my memoir’s journey. I told her about how I’ve queried at least 80 agents (I’ve lost count at this point), how I’ve been told “It’s a hard time for memoir,” and how I’ve been encouraged to rewrite the memoir as fiction. Her face lit up. She said that was basically what she did with her book. It’s based on her life, but y’know, fictionalized to sell. She said, “Hell yes, you should turn your memoir into fiction. Why not?”

I've been grappling with this decision for almost three years, ever since an agent I highly respect first suggested it to me. THREE YEARS. Why does it take me so long to make decisions? Why do I have such a hard time letting go? Why do I struggle with making commitments? I don’t know. Maybe because I have attachment issues. Maybe because, in those three years, I got pregnant and gave birth to the most magical human being who has since captured my entire heart. Maybe because I’m someone who will hold out hope long after the silver lining has vanished. Whatever the reason, I’ve finally decided to go for it.

The author had suggested that perhaps I should rewrite it and market it as auto-fiction, which is essentially a blend of memoir and fiction. She thought maybe that would be an easier transition. Then another author in the breakout group suggested I Love You But I’ve Chosen Darkness because it’s auto-fiction and she noticed the similar themes to my memoir. And so, here I am, finally having read and finished this book.

I was curious about how auto-fiction would read and, really, it just feels like a novel, as it should, but maybe a little quieter. Mostly, I appreciated the writing style and the dialogue, both outer and inner. The protagonist’s inner dialogue had me gasping with resonance and laughing out loud. It is not much like my memoir, other than the fact that her mother was an addict too, and it affected her life in more ways than one.

The whole book reads like a conversation with an old friend who is in the midst of a crisis, and she tells you every single writhing detail, completely unfiltered. She says the things that people think but are too afraid to say out loud. She talks about sex, marriage, grief, regret, and motherhood in all the ways that are sometimes true but we don’t know how to say it, how to admit it, or how to even think about it without feeling guilty.

I will say that I didn’t love the structure as it felt meandering and dipped in and out of things that didn’t seem that relevant to the story but were maybe just kind of edgy. I get the allure of doing that in a story; trust me, I do it all the time and then kick myself for it. But in the end, these meanderings need to serve a greater purpose, a goal, and some of her meanderings missed the mark for me. Nevertheless, I liked this book. It felt intimate in a way that many books aim for but fail.

Wow. Speaking of meandering, this ended up being a long write-up about a book, but also about a workshop, about rejection and commitment, and starting over.

Poetry, always poetry

WHAT I’M LISTENING TO

I've had this song on repeat since its release. It's a Radiohead cover by Jeremiah Fraites of The Lumineers, featuring one of the great loves of my life, Gregory Alan Isakov. This rendition adds a new depth to an already profound piece, making it into a true masterpiece.

To celebrate the extra day we were gifted this month because of the leap year, we made a bonfire in the backyard and sat around listening to music, trying to slow down time while our son ran around in the yard, his light-up shoes flashing green along the path. When my partner brought our son in for bed, I stayed out, listening to this song over and over in the dark, and it was the perfect way to end this extra day.

OTHER THINGS

Brand photos + author portraits

We rented a studio to create some brand portraits for redesigning our Lume website before launching the summer retreat. It was so rewarding to have a vision for something and to have the means to see it through. I love how the rebrand came together, and we're thrilled to be launching our summer retreat next Friday! You can sign up for the interest list here. Here's one of my favorite images from the photo studio. It’s an outtake with my son peeking out from behind me. I love being able to create alongside him, and I can't wait to see what he creates as he grows. I only hope he includes me.

After we took the rebrand photos, Briana took a few moments to take what I was calling author photos, which is funny because I don't yet have a published book. I do, however, need images for when I publish essays in literary journals, and it was just nice to have some photos of me alone. Every single one of my photos either has Perry or Pressley in them, or they're too sexy because Perry is behind the camera and always shoots when I'm barely clothed.

It feels good to have a photo of myself during this time in my life. This time when I'm putting my whole heart into mothering, writing, and aligning with my whole, worthy self. And this is what Lume is about—coming back home to yourself. Your WHOLE self. Your TRUE self. At the retreat, Briana will be taking private portraits of each woman to capture who they are at this moment in time. It's such a beautiful practice, an heirloom to pass down to our future selves or our children. That's what this photo felt like for me—a gift for myself, and one day, for my son.

I'll tell him, “This was your mom when she was trying to believe in herself, even when it was hard; when she was trying to follow her dreams, even when everyone said the chances were slim—less than 1% to be exact. This was when she did it anyway.”

Therapy

I cried in therapy earlier this week, which is something I never do. Not because I don't feel like crying, since I often do, but because I've never been good at crying. Maybe it's because when I was a baby, no one came when I cried. Or perhaps it's because when I was a child, my father told me to "suck it up, little girl." Or maybe it's just because crying is a lot of work and most of the time feels like more hassle than it's worth.

The things that make me cry are never the sort of things I'm ready for. I cried earlier this month when my son was bullied at the park—pushed down the playground stairs by a much older kid. I cried because of the look of shock and terror on his face at the cruelty he experienced at the hands of someone else—something he's not only never felt but never even knew existed. I cried for his lost innocence but also over the heavy grief I felt after realizing that I wouldn't be able to protect him from every bad thing. What am I going to do when he's a teenager? When I'm not there to see and fix every single thing he goes through? Sorry. I digress. This is not the reason I cried in therapy.

The crying took me by surprise. I was telling my therapist how that morning, before I left, everyone was sitting in the living room—Pressley, Perry, my mom, and my four dogs. I kissed Pressley, kissed Perry, kissed the noses of my dogs, but when it came to my mom, I walked away. I felt the pull to hug her, to kiss her cheek or her forehead, to make her feel loved just like I'd made everyone else feel loved. But I stopped myself. I walked out of the room, shouting "I love you, Mom" before shutting the door.

During the thirty-minute drive to therapy, I thought about why I did that and I felt guilty for holding back love, especially from my mom, who I love so deeply. Our relationship is sometimes complicated, but the love has always been present, and it still is, but something about it, especially after the birth of my son, feels fleeting and unsafe. Maybe she's just let me down one too many times. Maybe I'd just reached my limit. But still, I thought of her feeling left out, feeling unwanted, unloved, and I think that's what must have brought on the tears.

What do I gain from holding back love? Protection? Safety? Maybe. But at what cost? What do I lose? Something tells me I lose more than I gain, so, how do I let myself love without fear? Without holding back?

From The Dust

I received a message from someone who ordered my little book of short stories recently. They had ordered it a few years ago and said that it was so impactful and reminded them of their childhood. She wanted to buy the book for her sister but couldn’t afford it. Now, finally, she was able to send it to her sister for her birthday. She had kept a piece of paper stashed in her copy with an old discount code that I had offered, and she kept it all these years in hopes that it would still work (it did!). I love the intention behind this so much, the thought to save the discount code and the held hope to one day gift this to someone she loved, someone who could resonate with it in the same way that she had. It really put me in my feels.

I’ve received so many beautiful messages like this over the years about this book and my writing, with people finding themselves in my work—their young selves, their families, people they love. It always warms my heart to know that this life I’ve lived resonates with others, that I didn’t live it for nothing, and that I’m not alone in my experiences.

This is why writing is so important, why I keep telling these same stories over and over but in different ways. Maybe I only have one story to tell, but it is true and it is felt in lives other than my own, and connection is really what I’m after. Resonance. The moment when someone feels seen because of something I’ve written. When they feel understood. When they feel held. This is what it’s about for me.

I still have a few of these books left. You can order them here and use code DUST at checkout for a discount.

BUY THE BOOK

A portrait a day with my son

We’re still going strong with our daily portrait. We missed one day this month which was a shame because it was so full and so beautiful I wish we would’ve captured it.