Sycamore Press November 2024: A Day Late & A Dollar Short

It’s hard to believe that this is the penultimate newsletter of 2024, but here I am shopping online for 2025 planners and lounging in what is finally starting to feel like cool autumn air. As an incredibly eventful October came to a close, I noticed more and more a sense of resolution. Chapters turning over and maybe — if we’re lucky — making way for new beginnings. It’s been tough sometimes, but I feel increasingly as though I have an awful lot to show for it.

There really is a lot to dissect this time around. So, without further ado, let’s … ah, what is it that I usually say at this part?

once—


— Built to Spill, “Big Dipper”

Vegas, Baby!

The month started out pretty hot, weather-wise. No surprise there. Before I could even notice that the days getting shorter and the nights getting long and melancholy, we were off to Las Vegas.

The city was odd and alien and overwhelming and scary and mostly awful. It was also kind of not that different from here. But somehow it was pure bliss, and not just because I was off work or because the ever-present cigarette smell reminded me of Grandma. We were with very dear friends, and I was spoiled for socialization. They are so sweet and funny and easy to talk to, and they empower me to experience new and exciting things my anxiety would normally keep me from doing.

We drank $20 Lisa Vanderpump cocktails. We drank $1 Bud Light. We saw “Big Elvis.” …You know about Big Elvis, right?

Actually, we saw a lot of live music. We caught a show at a “real” local venue and took in some shoegaze performances. I was struck by how young everyone in the crowd seemed to be. I guess it was only a matter of time.

Thankfully, old people abounded at the music festival we were actually in Vegas for, ha! It was an absolute tour de force, and, at the risk of simply name-dropping bands, it was so exciting to see Everyone Asked About You, Home Is Where, Built To Spill, The Dismemberment Plan, American Football, Unwound, and so much more. And, by so much more, I of course mean CAP’N JAZZ!!

Somehow though, my most cherished memory is coming up with a drinking game (or, rather, a funny name for a drinking game whose rules we just got from the Internet) based on TV’s Monk. It’s called Monk Till Yr Drunk, and it’s basically the best multimedia adult beverage murder mystery experience you can have, IMO.

OK actually one more anecdote from Las Vegas

Sorry, sorry — I actually have (*Columbo voice*) just one more thing. During one of the festival sets, a dragonfly stopped to take a rest on an audience member’s hat for kind of a long time. I’m not sure they ever noticed. It was magical. But maybe you had to be there.

Anyway, I had to insert this here as its own section lest I break from my trademark stream-of-consciousness format. You understand, I’m sure.

Blog Self-Promo Interlude

I added a few new posts to my blog over the past month. Some of them are honestly kinda bad, I think. My writing on there is somehow both painfully earnest and a little self-censored (both of which I’ve been guilty of on here too), and I’m not always thrilled with how stuff reads back. But it’s all still me and whatever words I could come up with in the moment.

It’s hard for me to believe it myself sometimes, but people have told me they really do enjoy hearing my quirked up perspective on things. So poke around on there if you want an extra dose of that, I guess!

One of the more notable (and very recent) additions is the (re-?)birth of the Sycamore webcomic! I have always found the webcomic format endearing, and I wanna leverage it to practice my writing and drawing skills in a not-so-serious format. Anyway, I’ll save you a few clicks and drop the first installment right here (inspired by real events):

Speaking of webcomics, I recently caught up with one called what happens next. The content is pretty disturbing, and it maybe won’t hit home unless you were Online (and especially On Tubmlr) in a pretty specific way during your impressionable years. I definitely got something out of it though, and it feels cool that I can look forward to updates now that I’ve read through the backlog. It’s good to have things to look forward to.

General Life Updates

Whoa-ho! Switching up the format, are we? You never know what to expect when you click open this thing, huh?

I have been cautiously experimenting with more feminine looks, including in public settings. It feels good. I was surprised to find that, in doing this, I haven’t been fighting with my body as much as I expected. Higher waists on pants and shorter tops and tees with more fitted waists and sleeves — they just seem to flatter me.

I don’t want to dwell on this because people obviously have diverse and complicated feelings about their bodies and clothes, but just being able to try things out and take stock of how they feel has been really impactful for me in a positive way. Once I make some room in my wardrobe, maybe I’ll permit myself to do just a little bit of shopping…

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It’s been an exciting month professionally too. For both of us. Sonora had a few pieces in a gallery exhibition. Seeing her intricate work, unique style, and artistic voice on display in that setting was so cool and just felt right. Obviously, it was a pretty big moment. The other pieces were cool too — the overarching theme was about “subcultural longing,” which I think many of us can relate to.

As far as my own work goes, I finally overcame some technical hurdles and have some real-deal experiments going which I am hugely excited about. I’m really starting to feel a greater sense of confidence in the lab environment, from computational stuff to wet lab experiments and microscopy to overall conceptual discussions of the science. It feels really good. I honestly think that, if I could just get my role as a scientist to square with other important parts of my identity, I could really have it all figured out. Here’s hoping.

This all has me thinking about the next steps. If I finish my PhD in about a year-and-a-half as planned, then, well…that’s pretty soon, all told! I hope I can find myself closer to home home before long. I recently acquired a new baby niece, and it’s hard being so far away for those kinds of moments. And, while you lovely people are increasingly scattered geographically, I would love to be even like a six hour drive away from some of you. I miss you all so very much.

An Election Season Prayer (+ Reflections)

This shit has not been fun. For whatever it’s worth, I pray that this is not the most important election, or at least not the most important political moment of our lifetimes. Protecting our institutions from those who so transparently seek to exploit them for unchecked power is such a grim affair when we are so aware of the suffering those institutions have already wrought under the status quo. Whether or not power is centralized in the state (but especially when that is the case), we will always have to compromise. But I pray that we will one day refuse to compromise our humanity. That we will reassess our priors, see our cruelty and senselessness, and, with rage and shame and compassion, force a genuine shift. I pray that it won’t be too late. For so, so many, it already is.

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Well, I guess I’ll talk to you in December. (I mean, hopefully before that too, but definitely in December.) I guess I’ll say more on this topic then, but it means so much to me that you all have stuck around in some capacity to read what I have to say (even when it’s dumb and half-baked or a little too self-indulgent). Doing this newsletter is its own reward and is right up there with starting therapy in terms of things that have made this year feel different — like waking up from a years-long daze and snapping into lucidity. But the response I get makes it all the better. Hopefully I’ll see you (or write to you one-on-one via snail mail or call you or something) soon. I hope you have a great rest of your weekend.

xoxoxo

⸺N