Currently Reading: What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat by Aubrey Gordon Decolonize Museums by Shimrit Lee Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk
Read: The Story of a New Name by Elena Ferrante Liberation Day by George Saunders The Office of Historical Corrections by Danielle Evans Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire Down Among the Sticks and Bones by Seanan McGuire The Power by Naomi Alderman (re-read) Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret by Judy Blume (re-read) Victories Greater Than Death by Charlie Jane Anders Annihilation by Jeff Vandermeer
I’ve been trying to write a “2022 in review” post for a week now. Everyone talks about the fuzziness and blobbiness of time and how it doesn’t seem to mean much since 2020. Instead of time traveling in a line, it feels like Everything Everywhere All At Once, so to speak. Did that happen yesterday or 3 years ago? What’s the difference? I have to look at my calendar, or the photos in my phone to try to remember what order things happened in, if I remember them at all.
(I’m also writing this while the House takes their 14th vote to elect a Speaker. Another unending time loop.)
If you asked me to describe my 2022 experience my instinct is to respond with a shrug and a “meh.” Not that there was no joy at all. I saw some great shows, I remember laughing a lot, I listened to a lot of comedy & watched a lot of stand up specials. But comedy is one of the coping mechanisms I use when things aren’t great.
In the last few months of 2022, I just felt like I was on autopilot. Going through the motions, feeling kind of paralyzed. Disappointed with some aspects of my life but unable to do much about it. Feeling like a ghost, appearing briefly to selected people on rare occasions, but mostly invisible and unnoticed. After 2020 it just became easier and easier to forget about what life used to be like. I’ve been working at home for over 2 years now, at a job where I’ve only seen some of my co-workers in person one or two times, some I’ve never met at all. It’s easy to feel very detached. I talk to my best friend on the phone every day, and my mom every day, and my therapist once a week. Aside from that, my socializing has been very limited. I’m not posting on social media as much either. I haven’t posted on Facebook at all for at least 2 years. I post on Instagram and Twitter sporadically at best and get little engagement. I don’t do much so I don’t have much to post about. Sometimes I’ll tweet something and then sigh heavily and say, “who fucking cares?” and delete it because who fucking cares? More people should have that reaction to their own opinions.
What I really need in 2023 is to SNAP OUT OF IT. No more of this aimless floating in space, no more autopilot.
The first step is reconnecting to my physical body. I’ve lost so much strength and stamina from being at home all the time, combined with my natural laziness and a bad case of arthritis in my lower back. There is only one way to get my strength back and that is to MOVE MY FUCKING ASS and it will be horrible and I will hate it. Until I see any improvement it will be a constant reminder of how much I neglected myself for two fucking years and I cannot allow it to continue. It’s so embarrassing and shameful, and I really hope I’ve hit rock bottom. Falling further is not something I want to think about.
What I will not be doing is dieting. There will be no counting of calories or weighing myself. Those days are over. I will always be fat, but I was also fat when I walked 10 miles a day in Italy seven years ago. If I could just return to that level of fitness I would be incredibly happy. I couldn’t walk half a mile today even if I wanted to. The work must be done, and I’m the only one who can do it. There’s no prize for inertia, sadly.
The second step is reclaiming my apartment from its Miss Havisham cobwebs and dust era. The pandemic gave so many people inspiration to improve their homes because they were spending so much time there. I, on the other hand, let mine slowly fall into piles of clutter and neglect. Occasionally I would have a burst of closet-cleaning, or shelf organization, but nothing substantial enough to make a real improvement.
The third step is getting creativity back into my life. Writing, photography, making a zine, trying illustrations again, something. Creative work is another thing I seem to have forgot about doing these last two years.
What have I been doing? I have no idea. Watching a lot of TV, listening to podcasts all day while I’m working at home, (Despite my general love of not being in an office, I guess I still need chatter around me.), doomscrolling, going to doctor’s appointments, lying paralyzed in bed trying to decide what to do and then not doing anything, snacking, playing with the cats, and. . . I guess that’s about it.
I hesitate even putting this in writing, because I don’t want it to become just another set of New Year’s resolutions that start strong but end up in failure. The only option is to try, and if you read this you are allowed to ask me how any of these things are going, in order to keep me somewhat accountable.
I did make a list of good things that happened this year because my memory feels like a vast, empty desert with tumbleweeds blowing through: Mom & I drove to Minnesota to see my nephew graduate from high school. This was the first time I’d seen my brother and his family since pre-pandemic Concerts! Duran Duran, 2 CHAI shows, 2 Godspeed You Black Emperor shows, and Roxy Music A friend published her first novel! (of course I had absolutely nothing to do with this but it brings me joy. Also it’s a really good book.) I took a road trip to Lake Geneva which was *okay*. Not bad enough to put in the bad column. I think my expectations were too high, and I had a triggering experience that started things off on the wrong foot.
And the bad things: Aunt Rose passed Mimi Parker passed a lot of other important people passed ongoing chronic health stuff Oh and I lost the right to my bodily autonomy, can’t forget that one!
2023 goals in summary: stay awake, make conscious choices, take care of yourself
P.S. So after 15 rounds of voting there’s finally a new Speaker of the House, ushering in a new chapter of the Chaos Era in which we live. It’s been super uncomfortable watching someone want a job so badly that he will sign over everything to the worst people that will ruin his ability to do this job with any effectiveness (not that i want him to be super effective). He will have no respect from anyone, not even his own people. It gives me the willies. I can’t imagine wanting anything that much.
Currently Reading: The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story edited by Nikole Hannah-Jones, Caitlin Roper, Ilena Silverman & Jake Silverstein What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat by Aubrey Gordon The Story of a New Name by Elena Ferrante Decolonize Museums by Shimrit Lee
Read: The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa Anatomy: A Love Story by Dana Schwartz Matrix by Lauren Groff Cinderella Liberator by Rebecca Solnit 33-1/3: Rio by Annie Zaleski Sinkhole by Davida G. Breier I Can’t Date Jesus by Michael Arcenaux The Man Who Fell to Earth by Walter Tevis Clark and Division by Naomi Hirahara Shit Cassandra Saw by Gwen E. Kirby My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante
Gave up on/will get back to later The Flowering: The Autobiography of Judy Chicago by Judy Chicago Black Tudors: The Untold Story by Miranda Kaufmann The Impossible Girl by Lydia Kang
Currently Reading: Black Tudors: The Untold Story by Miranda Kaufmann The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story edited by Nikole Hannah-Jones, Caitlin Roper, Ilena Silverman & Jake Silverstein The Impossible Girl by Lydia Kang What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat by Aubrey Gordon
Read: The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa Anatomy: A Love Story by Dana Schwartz Matrix by Lauren Groff Cinderella Liberator by Rebecca Solnit 33-1/3: Rio by Annie Zaleski Sinkhole by Davida G. Breier I Can’t Date Jesus by Michael Arcenaux The Man Who Fell to Earth by Walter Tevis Clark and Division by Naomi Hirahara
Gave up on/will get back to later The Flowering: The Autobiography of Judy Chicago by Judy Chicago (am I still reading this? I don’t know)
Currently Reading: The Flowering: The Autobiography of Judy Chicago by Judy Chicago (am I still reading this? I don’t know) Black Tudors: The Untold Story by Miranda Kaufmann The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story edited by Nikole Hannah-Jones, Caitlin Roper, Ilena Silverman & Jake Silverstein The Impossible Girl by Lydia Kang
Read: The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa Anatomy: A Love Story by Dana Schwartz Matrix by Lauren Groff Cinderella Liberator by Rebecca Solnit 33-1/3: Rio by Annie Zaleski Sinkhole by Davida G. Breier
(omg I’ve already finished two books this year! It’s sad how proud I am of this.)
Currently Reading: The Flowering: The Autobiography of Judy Chicago by Judy Chicago (am I still reading this? I don’t know) Black Tudors: The Untold Story by Miranda Kaufmann The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story edited by Nikole Hannah-Jones, Caitlin Roper, Ilena Silverman & Jake Silverstein
Read: The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa Anatomy: A Love Story by Dana Schwartz
This is a truly sad, puny list by my usual reading standards. For the most part these are all relatively short and not particularly challenging books, and it’s a real testament to the difficulties I had this year that this is all I managed to read. I had no ability to focus and it would take me weeks to get through a couple hundred pages. Like so many things this year, it makes me want to cry. Currently Reading: The Flowering: The Autobiography of Judy Chicago by Judy Chicago Black Tudors: The Untold Story by Miranda Kaufmann
Read: Lovecraft Country by Matt Ruff (re-read) Trick Mirror by Jia Tolentino Women and Power: A Manifesto by Mary Beard The Deep by Rivers Solomon A Beautiful Poison by Lydia Kang Dapper Dan Made in Harlem: A Memoir by Daniel R. Day Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel Garcia Marquez Black Enough: Stories of Being Young & Black in America edited by Ibi Zoboi This is How You Lose the Time War by by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead The Fran Lebowitz Reader by Fran Lebowitz Evvie Drake Starts Over by Linda Holmes Eat a Peach: A Memoir by David Chang Crying in H Mart: A Memoir by Michelle Zauner
Gave up on: A Promised Land by Barack Obama (I’ll read it someday, it’s just not the right book for me right now.) Before and After: Stories from New York (Mr. Beller’s Neighborhood) edited by Thomas Beller (not in the best frame of mind for reading this right now.)
Currently Reading: Crying in H Mart: A Memoir by Michelle Zauner The Flowering: The Autobiography of Judy Chicago by Judy Chicago
Read: Lovecraft Country by Matt Ruff (re-read) Trick Mirror by Jia Tolentino Women and Power: A Manifesto by Mary Beard The Deep by Rivers Solomon A Beautiful Poison by Lydia Kang Dapper Dan Made in Harlem: A Memoir by Daniel R. Day Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel Garcia Marquez Black Enough: Stories of Being Young & Black in America edited by Ibi Zoboi This is How You Lose the Time War by by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead The Fran Lebowitz Reader by Fran Lebowitz Evvie Drake Starts Over by Linda Holmes Eat a Peach: A Memoir by David Chang
Gave up on: A Promised Land by Barack Obama (I’ll read it someday, it’s just not the right book for me right now.) Before and After: Stories from New York (Mr. Beller’s Neighborhood) edited by Thomas Beller (not in the best frame of mind for reading this right now.)
Two of the biggest effects the pandemic has left on me: my relationships with exercise and reading. I’ve gone on at length about my struggles with exercising and getting my body moving again, but honestly my inability to do much reading bothers me more, because it’s more out of character. I’ve always hated exercise, so being extra uninterested in it isn’t that surprising. But reading has been one of my most favorite things for my entire life (as soon as I learned how, anyway).
But here we are seven months into 2021 and this is all I have to show for it. None of these books are particularly lengthy. In normal times I think I could’ve read the entirety of this list in 2-3 months. But right now I have to really force myself to pick up a book and read. I’d rather do the NYT Spelling Bee puzzle or scroll through instagram looking at cat pix, or if I do manage to read a few pages, I end up falling asleep.
I have a constant feeling of both emptiness and anxiousness and somehow I’m struggling to utilize one of my favorite comfort tools, the joys of reading a book.
Currently Reading: The Fran Lebowitz Reader by Fran Lebowitz Before and After: Stories from New York (Mr. Beller’s Neighborhood) edited by Thomas Beller
Read: Lovecraft Country by Matt Ruff (re-read) Trick Mirror by Jia Tolentino Women and Power: A Manifesto by Mary Beard The Deep by Rivers Solomon A Beautiful Poison by Lydia Kang Dapper Dan Made in Harlem: A Memoir by Daniel R. Day Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel Garcia Marquez Black Enough: Stories of Being Young & Black in America edited by Ibi Zoboi This is How You Lose the Time War by by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead
Gave up on: A Promised Land by Barack Obama (I’ll read it someday, it’s just not the right book for me right now.)
after a year of severely neglecting my body, I started exercising last week. Nothing insane, just 25 minutes of low impact cardio every day. In the pre-pandemic past this is the kind of thing I could do and it would feel like I did *something* even if I didn’t want to do anything, but now it is the HEIGHT of effort. I try not to stare at the little clock on the video because when I feel like five minutes have passed it’s only been ONE minute and I want to cry.
My core has turned into mush and my lower back is trying valiantly to pick up the slack but there’s only so much it can do, and I don’t want to hurt myself even more than 14 months of sitting on my ass already did.
I don’t even seem to get a good endorphin high after exercising. Just a wave of despair that I allowed this to happen.
SemiBold 