My tiny little tiny baby cat is curled up in my lap asleep right now being so much smaller than a ten year old has any business being, and so I am balancing my laptop over to the side of her, typing on an angle. I often contort myself to prioritize her warmth and comfort, and she deserves nothing less. It’s so funny what we let cats get away with. I went through a spell of sleeping really poorly once the weather started cooling off early in the Fall, because Squish (tiny cat) was back in bed snuggling with us all night long. Her worst habit is to steal my entire pillow out from under my head in the middle of the night, and I would wake up to see her body sprawled out across it, me displaced. She would refuse to budge, making her body the heaviest stone, absolutely planted whenever I would nudge her to move. I brought this up to my therapist in passing at the time because I couldn’t stop yawning in our 1pm session, and he asked if I had ever considered not letting the cats get away with everything they want to get away with, and the answer was (and is) no.
I am back on my learning German journey, and guess what….. this time I am really having so much fun doing it. I’m working with a mixture of daily duolingo* practice (of course) but also watching films in German, doing workbook exercises, and soon I plan to pick through some of the books I own in German and do some translation exercises. I can really feel myself improving, and my grasp on certain sentence structures and vocabulary coming intuitively through exposure. Something that is so satisfying about being at a place in my life where I’ve dabbled to varying levels of depth with learning ~10 languages (plus English) is that I’m reaching a place where the meanings of many words can be intuited from their roots and contexts. Last night when reviewing some German vocabulary I couldn’t remember what the word “vielleicht” meant, but what came to mind was the word “Belââks” which is used in the Lebanese version of the song “Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps”. The two words don’t seem all that similar at first glance, until you remember that B and V are basically the same letter, just that B is plosive, concepts that I learned in studying Russian and Japanese, and through this little rock skipping journey in my brain I pulled “maybe/perhaps” out for “vielleicht” and I was correct. I hope to only deepen this knowledge and intuition for the rest of my life, it’s one of the things that excites me most in life and makes me feel really proud/accomplished/satisfied.
*on duolingo: I have the little streak widget on my phone & this new affirmation of the day widget as well and those two in combination really keep me going. When you pass a 30 day streak you get really cute duolingo widget illustrations encouraging you to keep going :)
Last night as I was going downstairs to the basement to watch the RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 15 Meet the Queens coverage on Big TV™ with Daniel, I heard the doorbell ring, and it was none other than our ridiculously sweet friends and neighbors Brannon and Gracie delivering a box of homemade cookies and a block printed card with a carving of the two of them and their perfect dog Otis on it. I can’t think of a nicer thing to open the door to, and the cookies are so good!
I went on a classic 24 hour trip to New York City Baby this week, and had a really special time with my friend (and maybe yours too) Lucy. We really packed in as much good as we could in that one day and we went to a proper British tea room called Tea & Sympathy, we split afternoon tea for two and were brought a pot of tea, tiny cups and saucers, and a real 3-tiered tray full of treats like tiny sandwiches and scones with clotted cream and jam. Really special place! We then attended a special screening of Close (out late January), a new Belgian film about two 13 year old boys and their friendship, and so much more that I won’t say here, but just know we both wept through the entire film and I highly recommend it though it is both beautiful AND heartbreaking! We got to catch up with our dear friend Liza Anne afterwards and then sleep in a big hotel bed. The next morning we shared a proper Japanese breakfast at Okonomi with more special friends Sarah and Nicolay and then split to do our own things for a minute…
I rode the ferry for the first time! This was such a special experience (thank you Sarah for the suggestion). Taking the ferry has to be one of the coolest options available to you in NY and I can’t believe it took me so long to try it out. It was $4 and very fast and very very cool. No one takes it and you get to cut under the Brooklyn Bridge and see every side of the coasts of Manhattan and Brooklyn, highly recommend.
I went to Front General Store in DUMBO, which is a real hidden gem Japanese vintage and handmade menswear store where everything looks like it costs 3x what it really does. I was on a mission to go try on some pants that I saw on their website and had the hunch were the perfect pant, and I was right!! I bought these in black and in blue, 100% cotton, classic French work pants, and bonus they were even cheaper in-store than online, they were only $48! I also found presents for really important people while here.
I went to one of my favorite places in the entire world: Mast Books. I can’t speak highly enough of their selection so instead I will include a bunch of images here of some of the books I’ve picked up at Mast in the last few months (excluding secret selections I’m holding onto for christmas presents):
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I’m picking back up here five days later after spending the weekend in a snowy winter wonderland house in the Poconos for Addy’s birthday so item number 8 will be friendship :-) It was very cool to celebrate my friend’s 29th birthday with them considering when we met they were 16. And that is growth in the most classic, literal, and linear way. I am very lucky to have such deep connections with people in my life whether I’ve known them for 13 years or for 3 months. It was really cool to be silly with my friends in the snow and eat some weed and some mushrooms and sit in a hot tub and make soup and laugh so hard and play yahtzee and jenga and see and feel pure joy. Playing! and Resting! are very important!
I started antidepressants about 5 weeks ago and my life has truly and honestly improved. I would say that some major takeaways for me on this journey so far are that 1. The voice in the back of my head making me doubt every good and nice thing and only being able to focus on the bad things and assume everyone else is looking at me and also focusing on bad things, that voice is much much quieter, 2. I feel much less of a sense of urgency in a cool way, as in I can catch myself putting undue pressure on myself and I can pull back and say hey we don’t have to do that, 3. Instead of all of my emotions being trapped behind this pressure valve and then exploding every few weeks into this eruption of tears and hopelessness, I feel like I’m better able to express myself in the moment and also take things as they come and release them as they come, it feels easier to naturally express my emotions in the moment, and that pressure isn’t building. I think one of the scariest things about where my depression was heading was almost this reliance on the eruption as a sense of relief, which was actively damaging my relationships, and my ability to really address deeper issues, because that catharsis would step in instead.
I keep thinking about (Lucy brought this up the other night when we were talking about meds) the scene in Motherhood by Sheila Heti where she starts antidepressants towards the end of the book and realizes that things can just be different. She asks a question somewhat along the lines of “can drugs be the hero?” questioning whether that is a satisfying ending to this conundrum she’s been fixating on. I remember reading Motherhood when it came out a few years ago, but I don’t remember this part, probably because for years I’ve been trapped in the cycle of not accepting that drugs could just be helpful, that I don’t have to have this narrative arc of fixing myself, maybe the help is okay and also appreciated and also healthy? Something to consider, which I’m feeling very happy about. My answer is that sometimes things can be less complicated than you feel they have to be, sometimes you don’t have to create obstacles just so you can overcome them, sometimes removing the obstacles is actually really cool, and doesn’t make you less deserving of love, comfort, and/or joy.
Cooking and Baking round out my ten today. I’ve been doing a lot of cooking and baking recently and I feel like I’m getting better and better at understanding processes and intuiting how ingredients will interact with each other and anticipating what needs to come when to make something really pop and shine. The most special and satisfying moments I’ve had recently have been having a meal or a treat really come together and then getting to share that with people. I feel like I’m glowing when anyone eats something I made and comments on it being really good. I feel like I’m gaining confidence in the kitchen and just want to keep practicing and leveling up. I asked my mom for the Salt Fat Acid Heat cookbook for Christmas this year and I’m excited to learn more basic food science and really focus on the pillars of good cooking! My number one hack that I will share for satisfying cooking recently has been the tried and true: pick out recipes and make a shopping list first and then actually shop those ingredients so when the time comes to hop in the kitchen you’re already equipped and you don’t have to do any last minute substituting. Real confidence booster! Here are two recent highlights:
That is what I have for you today xoxo.