October
Good leaves, man
The leaves this year! Holy shit! They were extra good because of some early cold snaps, and while the fast cold slapped me around a little mood-wise, the beauty of the trees pulled me back up many days. I saw a lot of them because I stumbled upon a tweet thread that recommended morning walks as a scientific way to stave off winter blahs. Reading that made me remember Casey Johnston’s mid-girl walks (“A 10-minute loop around my neighborhood in essentially my pajamas, during which time I only look at plants and think about nothing at all.”) I’m lucky to live across the street from a park, and I started walking there most days. It’s been very good.
Every time I start some form of blogging (and then peter out, haha), I do a post about my cyclical relationship with good habits. So here I go again. In addition to my mid-girls, I did “Sober October” (okay, save for weed), I started lifting weights again, and tried a new “time blocking” app. I doubt any of it will last forever, it feels embarrassing to be perpetually starting again, but as a wise friend once said to me when I bemoaned this shame, “What would it be like if you never started any of it at all?” I mean, it would, indeed, be worse. So I’ll cycle through my cycles, do my dumb little habits, and take care of myself a little as the days darken and the leaves fall, till it all falls apart again.
Writing:
I recently rewatched Hayao Miyazaki’s Kiki’s Delivery Service, an all-time fave. I love how things generally go well for Kiki and how she’s so dramatique and gets depressed, and I love her talking cat. A particular bit stood out to me on this re-watch: when Kiki visits the artist Ursula in her cabin in the woods for the second time, Ursula tells Kiki about her painting trajectory, and says of her younger days, “I loved painting. So much that I couldn’t sleep.” Ursula is probably saying that she stayed up late actually painting — that’s how the dubbed version translates it in fact — but in my imagination she was lying awake in bed, too excited to sleep because of the very concept of painting burning inside of her, lighting her up.
Watching this, I had a couple of thoughts: First, “That’s pretty embarrassing to not be able to sleep because of a thing as inconsequential as art,” and also, “I totally relate to that feeling and am so grateful to Miyazaki for putting this in the movie; for taking art so seriously; for giving me a role model in Ursula who tells me not to be embarrassed for caring about this weird thing so much I’ve built my life around it.” I’m glad the latter was clear, but was surprised that the former still easily creeps in, lurking around my Bad Brains.
This month I had some articles to write for Vegetarian Times — the bratwurst recipe I mentioned in my last dispatch and this thing about nutritional yeast. They were fun to write, but I missed my novel — the wildness of which is The Thing that makes me too excited to sleep sometimes. I truly can’t wait to spend time together. It feels like looking forward to hanging out with a person, even if you know, too, that the person is grumpy and hard to communicate with sometimes. That Kiki scene just made me feel so okay about missing it like this, reminded me how even though I don’t always love it, I also do. I just do. And that’s legit.
The form of the scene stayed with me just as much as the content. Two women friends talking so seriously about art! In 1989! Blasting through the Bechdel Test!
Later in the month, I was wrestling with a particular conundrum regarding my work and asked my friend and brilliant writer Fiona King Foster (Buy her book! It’s so good!) her opinion. We ended up talking for over an hour, then proceeded to discuss a problem she’s wrestling with in her new project. When I walked home that day I felt like I could breathe again. Having people I can talk to without shame about the intricacies of this compulsion that makes no logical sense is such a goddamn gift.
I had envisioned this newsletter including “writing tips,” so framed that way, what have we got? Consume art about artists and talk to artist friends to feel less lonely in one’s intense commitment to this work no one asked for and yet strongly propels one’s life choices? Seems right.
Reading:
I read Eleutheria by Alegra Hyde this month and it really blew me away. I’m reading more speculative stuff to learn how for my own book, and I was so impressed by Hyde’s near-future, just-off-reality world-building. I kept thinking, “Yes, this is how it will be!” and sometimes, “Oof, this is how it already is!” and that’s what I’m hoping to achieve in my new thing, too. I think.
While the believable tyranny, greed, and environmental breakdown elements were depressing, there’s so much funny stuff, too, like the protagonist’s cousins — adult sisters who dress identically and pose all over Boston, hoping against hope for influencer careers. Or the leader of the enviro-commune the book’s plot revolves around — a Tony Robbins level of physical largeness and terrifying charisma and a keep-you-guessing-to-the-end code of ethics. Delicious and satisfying.
For my day job I had to work a bunch of grad school recruitment fairs this month. At one, I met a guy doing his PhD about trees that will thrive in cities in the coming climate — many of our current urban trees will not. I hauled the book out of my bag to show him, exclaiming, “This is about people like you! You should read it!” Hahaha, I’m very sure he did.
Eating:
Due to Sober October, I appreciated places with nice non-alcoholic drinks, such as Burdock Brewery which always has kombucha on tap and had a dill pickle soda water available earlier in the month, which was very good. A salty non-alc option is welcome and rare.
Also I am becoming convinced that Tsuchi Cafe has the best vegan food in Toronto. Period.
Finally, a shout out again to Burdock, and to the Greater Good Bar / North of Brooklyn Pizza, Bar Neon, Parallel, Chadwick’s, and Fet Zun both for their yummy vegan offerings and for keeping their heated patios going this fall. It feels decidedly less socially acceptable this year to not want to gather maskless indoors; I feel increasingly fringe-y; I am worried about others’ perception of me — that people are chalking my reticence up to a titch of pathological medical anxiety — something to be stamped out, resisted for the good of my health. I certainly have struggled with such anxiety before — a bout of acid reflux a few years back got my brains boiling so fast I couldn’t breathe right. It wasn’t good, I needed help, I got it.
I do feel this is different. For me, continuing to wear my N95’s and mostly gathering outdoors is motivated first by solidarity with disabled and chronically ill people, including some people I personally know. The less I catch the thing and spread it around the better for us all. But I am also, frankly, not that pumped about getting covid again as evidence mounts that the long term impacts on our hearts, brains, and immune systems can be severe. People in my age group are dropping dead at a pretty weird rate and, well, that does freak me out. Writing this, I worry I appear like the weirdos shouting that it’s the vax what’s killing people, shaking my sheaf of studies around, giving, “Do your research!” vibes. Part of my goal in writing this out is to ground myself in my belief that it’s not that; I know peer-reviewed science isn’t infallible, but it seems like less shaky ground than YouTubers who drink their own piss.
It does give me anxiety to have a public political stance, to voice a belief on the internet. Everything is complicated, I’m not trying to be prescriptive. Gathering in indoor groups to enjoy live entertainment or commune with others is way more vital to some people’s bodyminds than it is to mine, a born introvert/homebody/hermit. I also sometimes make exceptions to my general rules based on personal risk/benefit calculations. It’s the failings of leadership that have led to having to either accept ongoing danger of disease or avoidance of social settings. So much more could have been done toward indoor safety that isn’t on us. I am grateful to my many friends who respect my boundaries without making me feel weird; I am not trying to shit on anyone else’s.
Which, right, brings me back to heated patios. Basically, I just wanted to shout out these places that have them, and if you know of more good ones in Toronto, please tell me! I appreciate having restaurants to visit with friends more vulnerable to serious outcomes where I feel safe and comfy, too. I know restaurants are already so slammed; they can’t all have patios, let alone heat them. Of course I’d love if our government subsidized such efforts, and would love even more if they mandated — again with financial support — appropriate air quality in public settings as Belgium has done, making indoor air safe for all to share. But in my province it’s apparently a much higher priority to keep education workers from earning a living wage and to rob us of our constitutional rights.
Anyhoo. I also made these shio koji mushrooms and they were really bomb!
