059: Something in the Air (Tonight?)
First, Tha NEWS.
I am finally writing from a place that I had envisioned doing so almost four years ago: the bay-shaped sunroom of our Chicago apartment. Originally I had conceived of it as a sort of open-office-like workspace, and so I put a table in there with side chairs, centered so as to be both in the larger living room and in the sunroom, where the leaves of the trees surround most of the windows. It’s a very light space in general.
Instead, though, that space is kind of a generalized activity space, more living room than individualized work area. To be fair, a lot of work does happen here, it's just that none of it is the calm writing I had imagined. It's where we assemble hobby projects like electronics or LEGO or the occasional Gundam figure. It's where we play games. It's where we eat. Heck, now it has a 35-inch CRT TV in it for retro gaming purposes. But it's so very, very rarely for writing. So here I am, even though the cicadas are making me reconsider that idea. Being effectively inside a tree canopy means one is also serenaded by sex-crazed prehistoric insects from late June until, well, September 1st at the very least. It almost makes me want to go back to the more office-like space (in the dining room!), where my desktop computer is, to write there. But I shall persevere. No horny bug can stop me.
I probably ought to do these things at least slightly more often, as it's becoming difficult to remember what has happened over the last 5-ish weeks.
I've been slowly adding to the 22 CARDS project, as I'm well beyond the initial triggering point and the New Relationship Energy has fallen off, and it's into the actual work of writing. It's fun when a new piece falls in, but sometimes that new piece is only a line and a half in a week, and that doesn't feel like progress, even though it is. What's that old Oscar Wilde quote about spending all morning taking out a comma and then replacing it the afternoon?
In more active news, this past month I was a featured reader for the Traveling Mollys Literary Series, along with poets Judith Valente, Patrick Reardon, Terry Lucas, and Virginia Bell (and several other open mic readers!) One of the great things about the Mollys series is that they've swapped to a fully virtual setup, meaning the entire reading is available to view on Youtube, right now. While I am at the back of a large group, pretty much everyone involved in the reading that night is worth giving your attention, even if you don't catch it all at once. (There are one or two readers I don't jive with, but that's down to personal taste.)
The weather has been quite mild in the city this week, and it looks like this weekend should be no different. We definitely seem to be in the False Autumn season, and I'm sure the end of the month will have a week or two of Haha You Thought I Was Gone summer, but my favorite time of year is starting: Pie Season. There has also been a request this year for apple butter, since we have finally acquired a slow cooker.
Beyond that, I have several ducks to get in order outside of writing--we're going to a race in Wisconsin this coming weekend, I have my monthly bullet journal update to do, I have several health professionals to get in contact with for the purposes of Major Surgery next year, and so on. I also have a few posts that need to go up on the Patreon. Busy busy.
Second, INTERLUDE.
Lord Percy, it’s up to you: either you can shut up, or you can get your head cut off.
~ Miranda Richardson as Queenie, Blackadder II
Third, CONSUMPTION.
Someone outside is blasting U2's "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For". I have heard tell that Bono was actually searching for Boo-Berry Cereal. Some say he's still out there to this day, looking for it.
I have finished reading the book of Virginia Woolf and Vita Sackville-West's letters. It ended sadly (predictably, as with any book on Woolf will), but there were many wonderful (and hot!) turns of phrase in there before that point. My .epub edition has several dozen highlights. I didn't mention why I was reading it, but it was as research for 22 Cards, so it wasn't entirely "for pleasure" reading, but it wasn't not, either.
A distinct falloff in video game playing--I've lost interest in Diablo IV after hitting the endgame loop, and so it's back to a couple of daily items on MtG Arena and GT7, and that's pretty much it. Though we did recently acquire that huge CRT TV, and A Link to the Past looks reeeeeal good on it...
Tabletop stuff! We got Gloomhaven at an extreme discount from our nearest Half-Price Books, and I went through it and made sure all the parts were there. They were. Took me the better part of a morning to be sure, though. Also, last night we played our first session of Magical Kitties Save the Day!, which is intended as an all-ages TTRPG experience. But played by four adults with a significant amount of Whimsy. It went well enough that we're definitely playing it more regularly. It's a pretty rules-light game, and focuses largely on what cats can actually do, though being Magical does come up often. If you have kids you want to introduce to the hobby, it's a great starting place.
By Queen Mab's grace, Florence + the Machine has a new song and video out. And an album to follow on Halloween. Really leaning into the "Florence Welch started a coven in high school" angle of Our Wispy Lady's backstory.
Fourth, HUSTLE.
The new hotness is THE FAILURE EXPERIMENT, which you can get here. It’s a serial poem based in Philip K. Dick, JG Ballard, 20th Century cyberpunk, Jack Spicer, and, well, me.
confessions from a drainage ditch was released in late 2023 through Amazon, and is available in ebook and paperback formats. If you haven't picked it up, it's a great introduction to my more concrete and mainstream work.
There’s my chapbook, A Void and Cloudless Sky. By being a subscriber to this newsletter, you're also entitled to a free PDF version, which you can get here. If you want a hard copy, it’s available here.
If you're liking this whole project and want to support it directly, here is my Patreon. There are lots of little benefits you can get there, from poems written to your specifications to subscriber-only limited-edition chapbooks.
Finally, THE OUTRO.
Speaking of Florence, it's about time I set to making the playlist for 22 CARDS. It's a sort of ritual I picked up from games journalist-turned-comics writer-turned games designer Kieron Gillen, whose work has often been intimately intertwined with music, from his breakthrough work Phonogram to The Wicked and the Divine (both with artist Jamie McKelvie) and beyond.
Of the two major works I've done so far--my thesis, HYDROLOGY, and THE FAILURE EXPERIMENT--both had playlists, as well. The former was a little more programmatic; each song was paired with a poem in the book. The latter was more of a sonic mood board. And that's likely what I'll be going with this time, as well. Queer songs, witchy songs, queer witchy songs, etc. Obviously there's going to have to be some F+tM in there. She's been pretty pivotal in both my work as an artist and in the relationships in my life. (In an intersection of both, Elle also often uses Florence's work as evocation and muse for her painting and mixed media work, and in that case the influence is pretty overt.)
Beyond that, I haven't thought too far ahead. It would seem pretty obvious to have some Stevie Nicks, right? But I also think back (again) to Gillen's second volume of Phonogram, in which two of the characters cast a spell on the dance floor using Blondie's "Atomic." Not too many people would cite that as particularly "witchy," I don't think. Do I include any songs to go to specific poems? I don't know. I'm no DJ, let alone phonomancer.
Anyway. We're heading into spooky season again. See what you might have inside you that could be activated by the right music, the right pie, even the right kind of light in the evening. We'll talk again soon.