January 15th: Mir Jivotovski
The clock strikes midnight and my sister Sophie and I are watching The Truman Show in my parent’s basement. This film is for sure about your Saturn return. As Truman takes a bow, exits into the unknown, the credits roll and my phone rings. A midnight call makes sense when the caller is on the west coast: it’s Tracy, who I haven’t seen in months. We talk about the fires, how their sister, her husband, and their baby had to evacuate their Pasadena home and are off to Milwaukee for a month. I feel better about my decision to ditch LA, then guilty again for making it about me.
Tracy asks when my day for the Big Table Press article is going to be; theirs is sometime in July. Holy shit… it’s right now. We hang up and I lay in bed, reading about the fires in the city I just escaped, as I drift off to sleep. My dreams are weird. I’m at work but everything’s different and the point is I’m doing a terrible job and my coworkers are judging me.
A creature’s weeps wake me at 9:15 am. Oh duh, it’s Tula, my parents’ 12 year old, 3 pound teacup poodle. She’s crying because Sophie is heading into the city for work. I fall back asleep and am up again at 11 am. I take my dog, George, out on my parents lawn. It’s cold as fuck. 40 degrees less than LA. I write my morning pages. Kirsten offers me to sleep over at her place in Brooklyn this weekend; fun! Emma texts me they’re meeting a potential rescue cat tomorrow; exciting! My New York friends are a respite from fire talk.
At noon I eat breakfast: pumpernickel bread with avocado and lox. The dogs and I settle into the couch. I spend hours scrolling Instagram on my laptop, as I don’t have the app on my phone. I watch a video about re-seeding Altadena post fires. I giggle at memes of Gen Z on RedNote amidst the Tik Tok ban. I read a Wirecutter article where pulmonologists are recommending to stay out of LA for at least two weeks. I text my bosses at the bar I work at to let them know I skipped town and don’t know when I’ll be back.
My head feels cloudy: I need coffee. I put George into a sweater and Tula into a gray sling. She doesn’t go on walks, but I think the fresh air will do her good. Most of the road in my parents suburban town lacks a sidewalk. I call Sadie to wish her a happy birthday. She doesn’t answer and I leave a weird voicemail. I ring up my grandma and tell her I left LA for now, and I’m wondering how long it’ll be before I return. We talk until I reach the local coffee shop.
They don’t allow dogs so we wait outside for a barista to bring me my hot oat vanilla latte. I pop into a bookstore and buy an award-winning novel about Taiwanese lesbians during World War II. I promise myself I will read at least 10 pages tomorrow–I haven’t been reading much lately. I down my latte on the walk home and return ready to get down to business.
3pm. I prep for my interview and tutoring session which are taking place this evening. I have the interview, it goes well. A fully remote tech job, I fuckin need the money right now, and appreciate the flexibility to decide whether I’ll stay in LA or move back to NYC. They’re advancing me to the next round.
Downstairs my parents are home from work. Dad’s on the couch, mom’s in the kitchen, wearing her scrubs. The shrimp my mom pulled from the freezer this morning hasn’t thawed so we pivot: bean salad and buckwheat. Dinner is good - we sit for an hour and discuss My Future. I knit and my dad tells me that Trump brokered a ceasefire. Israel will stop bombarding Gaza. A sore subject; I hate Trump and Israel, my parents love both those things. We agree we want the violence to end. I don’t believe a ceasefire will commence, but people are posting celebrations, if you can call it that, on Instagram. I head upstairs to tutor Algebra II over Zoom. Marie is learning logarithmic functions. She seems more present than usual.
We finish at 9:30 pm, 6:30 pm LA time. My parents are in bed. I give them each a kiss goodnight and take George on a walk in the cold evening air. When we return I microwave popcorn and watch two episodes of Arcane season 1, saving the finale for tomorrow. The box of Godiva chocolates sits at the top of the pantry and I keep forgetting to ask my mom if I can have some. My parents are health nuts and this is the only treat in their home.
Someone in the LA Fires Mutual Aid Signal chat shares the Coalition for Clean Air’s 2.5 hour webinar. I bookmark it for tomorrow. I thought I’d have cooler shit to report on today; art gallery openings and friends birthday parties in my exciting LA life, but it was a lowkey suburban day and honestly it’s exactly what I needed.
Mir Jivotovski is a writer, knitter, and dog daddy deciding whether to be based in LA or Brooklyn. You can subscribe to their bi-monthly Substack Analysis Paralysis where they over-analyze mundane (and occasionally thrilling) topics including pet ownership, gay shit, and sociocultural analyses of their favorite coffee shops.