Heads up.

My friends, three things:

1. this newsletter is going to be coming out on a somewhat irregular schedule over the next few weeks. Everything is okay but I’m moving and … wow, it’s taking so much time.

2. if you’re typically here for advice, I don’t have any this week. This one’s more of a personal update. If you want to dip now, we’ll be back to life-improvement essays pretty soon. And if you want to read on and extract lessons anyway, there may be some. You’re welcome!

3. finally, we are not gonna talk long or often about my stupid divorce, but I do mention it today. Thus TW: stupid divorce.

So I’m moving into an apartment. Big downsize. Many decisions to make.

(And when I say “an apartment” I mean a theoretical, non-specific one. At the moment my forwarding address is an Extra Space Storage™ locker in another town. I only have the outline of what’s next. A wishlist.)

Not for nothing, my most-pulled tarot card has been the Tower for months and months now. Surprise divorce, loss of my house*, selling my wedding band for the going price of scrap metal: I didn’t want any of this shit.**

* and my fig tree! that is finally producing perfect figs! DAMMIT!!

** And you know what? It’s honestly shit. Yes if you didn’t know this about me, my disposition is at least 51% sunny and YET:

• I don’t believe everything happens for a reason. I believe in some portion of randomness.

• I don’t believe everything happens for the best, either. I believe some things are just shitty.

• I don’t believe “there are no failed relationships”. I believe in failure like I believe in death, because they’re real and I’m a fucking grownup.

• And I don’t like having a failed marriage, but this one’s a little more bearable than the last one, because I don’t believe we’re all “equally responsible” for failed relationships. Lol this one ain’t on me.

Yikes! See how I am? Been a long time since I’ve written like this. And this is why it’s been a long time since I’ve really written. If you’re still here and reading, I FREAKIN LOVE YOU.

ANYWAY. You know what’s worse than a total Tower of a year?

Oh what could be worse than a heaping plate of “I did not order this!” destruction-of-the-first-water? I will tell you what: worse would be wasting this opportunity for a fresh start.

Maybe it’s a little twisted? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ But I’m honestly excited for my new life. (See above: possibly as much as 60% sunny disposition.)

I didn’t want the events that forced this fresh start, but I sure am ready for my new beginning now.

Also I’m moving to Salem.

Oh Marblehead. I’ve enjoyed it! It’s said to have the largest concentration of colonial-era houses on the continent. (I mean. They survived because this village was dead broke for centuries, and couldn’t afford to tear them down and build anything bigger. But they’re eccentric and charming, and you should see this place sometime.)

But anyway. It’s not a super lively place. It’s better for established couples and families having dinner parties and parties on their yacht or whatever. Not a place for a newly single laydee.

Marblehead v Salem: a quick side-by-side comparison

Marblehead then: pirates (actual) and shoemakers.
Marblehead now: yachting ppl (weirdly down to earth tho, way more than you would think) and rubber ducky shops. These if you don’t know are shops that sell only rubber ducks.

Salem then: witches (accused).
Salem now: witches, actual. Witches, self-described. Effectual witches, soi-disant witches, beginner witches, baby witches, old-timey hippie crone witches, commercial witches, capitalist witches cappin. All sorts.

Idk, there’s just a lot more life in Salem. I look forward to moving to what was once the black pepper import capital of North America!! It has some other claims to fame too.

Also I splurged on some new bedding. That helped.

Anyway that makes this a whole newsletter of personal updates from your friend

—Max

One more thing

Oh wait! Have you read my book? If not, I want to say a few words.

This is SUCH a good little book! I mean, GENIUS, for real. Not a staggering work of genius, just a little work. Of genius.

Lookit I’m not good at promoting my book! I don’t go on podcasts, probably because I don’t pitch them, and I don’t pitch them because I’m not good at speaking in that podcast way.

(I am a writer. For a reason!)

But I’m telling you, if you live in our chaotic problematic world, where our food is often problematic, and your eating is likewise chaotic and problematic, meaning you don’t like it, this little book will help.

It will show you how to get your shit together in as little time as it takes to read, which is no time at all.

And not only can I just about guarantee that it will relieve you of 95% of your eating problems, I guarantee laughs. You will enjoy this and it will help.

📚 Buy it here.

RECOMMENDING.

writing.

Over at my spiritual home-on-the-internet, aka Modern Daily Knitting, I wrote about The Basics. The foundational actions that support my focus for the year. (Which is toughness, an idea that makes me lolsob and that also I respect about me so much rn.)

I quote myself: “Muscle feels like toughness because it is. When you can deadlift your own body weight, you’ll never have to hit the button and say ‘I’ve fallen and I can’t get up.’”

reading.

Just finished In Five Years, by Rebecca Serle. She writes magical-realism romance, except her novels are as much about love and friendship, really. Sort of looking at romance upside-down.

Anyway, this one was … well, no spoilers from moi, but let’s just say it made me cry a lot and decide to do something spontaneous and quite out of character. And I’m still glad I did, unlike some other impulse decisions we could name. I will definitely be telling you more about this mad journey. And then we can all blame Rebecca Serle together.

eating.

For my cookbook club I made something I’ve literally already forgotten plus as a throwaway effort the Breakfast Cereal Chevvdo (above) from Amrikan by Kushbu Shah. DO YOU LIKE SNACKS? I thought I loved shrimp crackers. It was not love but the illusion of love, I see this now. I’ve learnt a lot from shrimp crackers and they helped me grow as a person. But Breakfast Cereal Chevvdo is the snack I will take to the grave.

Just look at it. It has everything. Do you know how expensive breakfast cereal is these days? This has four kinds of breakfast cereal that do not come in cup-noodle portions, plus one that does. I have never made a more extravagant dish 💰💰💰 for cookbook club and that statement alone is probably grounds for kicking me out.

Amrikan is likely the book of the year for me. Even if you have no morbid curiosity about the chevvdo, I recommend you have a look at the other recipes. Just a great book.

watching.

While my sister was here, I rewatched Daisy Jones and the Six, because she hadn’t seen it. She loved it and I still did too on second viewing. What child of the 70s would not delight and thrill to the sound of a previously undiscovered Fleetwood Mac album ascending fully formed out of the vault, trailing silk hippie scarves? I mean it’s not a perfect soundalike, but the vibes are very much there.

I am even listening to the album (Daisy Jones and the Six: verified artist 🧐) in the car and I’m too fucking exhausted from packing and lugging (toughness tho! toughness!) and microdecisions and letsbereal, a shocking abandonment, to be embarrassed about liking something.

And that, por fin, makes this the week! I will talk to you soon. And I hope you will tell me how you’re doing. I always love to hear from you.

👊  respect!

💗  adore!  

🙏  and thank you for reading.