sunday scaries < monday morbs
August, not to put too fine a point on it, is the worst month — not for everyone, just for me. In news it’s “silly season,” when nothing of actual importance happens and you scrape the bottom of the barrel for content (or, alternately, when people do the weirdest shit and then you’re forced to cover it). In my own life it’s the nexus of a few bad anniversaries. My family always used to pack ourselves into a rental car and go camping around this time of year, which is probably a perfectly fine time when you aren’t a queer kid with shitty parents whose only lifeline is internet access. When I was in college, living in a first-floor apartment with airshaft light and a leaky bathroom ceiling and neighbors who occasionally screamed violently at each other, August gave me insomnia so bad that it required psychiatric intervention. It's the airport waiting area of months, nominally summer but not really, without any of the anticipation of September.
This August has been another for the list. Though Dylan and I are both semi-employed, we are currently trudging through the hinterlands between doing work and getting paid for it. Last week our power went out for a little less than 24 hours and we watched one and a half Pirates of the Caribbean movies by solar-powered lantern and then threw out all the food in our fridge. This week he has a dentist appointment and an oil change, and that's just the stuff we know about.
It's hard to move, frankly, under the weight of sadness. (The usual caveat that we always have more to lose.) Last year I wrote that "one of the absolute worst-case scenarios here is that the pandemic plays out however it inevitably will and then we all go back to the normal we thought of as normal before." At this point I feel safe to say that this is exactly what's happening. The only difference is that now we have a vaccine, access to which has already broken down along racial and financial and geographic lines. Evictions and foreclosures and utility turnoffs have resumed. Police budgets have increased. Employment has broken down into a very simple dichotomy: those who can work from home (by and large those privileged enough to credential or talk their way into white-collar work of some kind) and those who cannot. The latter suffer and risk for the former's comfort and safety. The people who do mutual aid work and community support are burned out, largely, from a year of making up for structural failures and collapses. The grants and funds that opened up to redistribute income and support those in need have now closed. The need is still present. What have we learned?
I've been thinking about climate grief a lot lately, and not just because I've gotten to read and edit some really good work on the subject for khōréō. (Our third issue went live yesterday!) In general I've been thinking about what it means to try and fix something that has been broken for centuries, perhaps as long as it's existed in the first place. What does it mean to live a good life, to do good, to be a good person individually and in community with others? What is the best use of my time? Is it possible to do that work without relinquishing happiness? "And when all our eyes are closed, when even the ghosts have gone, what will be left of our beloved world? Our ruined and dishonoured and beloved world?"
I don't have any of the answers, obviously, though it feels like a bit of a cop-out to leave things there. How about this: Next week I'll be back with a rare piece of cultural criticism, about Supergiant's games and how they are all, in a way, trying to answer this question. Sometime after that I'll be back with some grim musings about how getting older inevitably means watching people you know get worse in real time. In the meantime, here's some stuff. [Medieval vendor voice] Get your stuff here! Finest stuff in all the land!
- Love at the End by Deborah Germaine Augustin — I got to edit this speculative story about what it means to find personal happiness amidst climate catastrophe. It's very good!
- For Future Generations by Rachel Gutin — I also got to edit this speculative fiction story about tradition and loss. I love both of these stories and it was truly a joy to work on them. I'm very glad they exist.
- Future Feeling by Joss Lake — A weird twisty story about being trans in a near-future speculative setting that made something in my chest feel like a balloon being blown up very slowly. In a good way, to be clear.
- Roasted Chicken With Fish-Sauce Butter by Eric Kim — I feel like everyone probably knows about this already but it's so good. Easy and quick for hot days when you don't really want to turn the oven on. Goes great with smashed cucumbers of any variety.
- Les Fleurs by Minnie Riperton — On repeat. Sorry if you have me added on Spotify but also, arguably, you're welcome.