This Week—September 22
Hello! My sincerest gratitude, again, for being here and supporting this newsletter. It truly means so much to me. Going forward, my weekly notes and happenings will be exclusively for paid subscribers—this means you! So, thank you thank you thank you!
It is my birthday today. The big 35. I’ve been thinking a lot about this birthday, which feels transitional in many ways.
Thankfully my frantic and anxious thoughts from several weeks ago have calmed down. As a woman who wants to create a big family of her own, turning this age, with ne’er a romantic partner in sight, felt like the future I’d always imagined and hoped for was getting narrower and narrower. But as I got closer to this day, and how the days felt like any other, I’m thinking maybe it’s not such a big deal after all. I still have my dream, my vision of my future family, and I see them as clear as I see my family, friends and neighbors today. In any case, I feel 27, maybe 28. Solidly still in my 20s, yet with lots more wisdom from experience and just living in the world. And I’m remembering to not compare to anyone else, as we’re each on our own very individual journey. Our own fated lessons to be learned, or relearned. And when the time is right, just right, we’ll see how the previously close encounters were just that, until the exact moment they were meant to be encounters had. So cheers to my first 35, and the next 35, and the next one (maybe two!) after that. I’ll be celebrating loads with family, yummy food and my favorite dessert, a hazelnut chocolate torte that my mom makes for me every birthday. <3
This week I’ve been:
Reading: I am making heavy progress on clearing out my Safari tabs across my devices—my phone alone had 267 tabs open, not realizing I hadn’t closed out Googles of ‘Little Mermaid showings near me’ or ‘meaning of post-apocalyptic dreams’ or ‘spiritual meaning of seeing 33 everywhere.’ And now only 67 (!) tabs open across two Safari windows on my computer. Trust me, it’s progress.
I finished reading The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende. Wow, just wow. It’s one of those books where I say ‘wow’ out loud to myself upon reading the last sentence (the last few of which I cover with my hand so that my skittish eyes don’t go wandering ahead and ruin the surprise for me), and then close the book, feel and smooth over its cover, and hug it tightly to my chest. It’s a sweeping semi-autobiographical novel with magical realism woven throughout it, set in Chile from the 1910s to the 1970s. What a read. 20/10 recommend.
I started reading The Book Bible: How to Sell Your Manuscript—No Matter What Genre—Without Going Broke or Insane by Susan Shapiro. I love it so far. I’m reading it in advance of my online literary publishing class starting next week, with the author as my instructor. I am beyond stoked. My writing group friend Erin is taking Susan’s online class on pitching newspaper/magazine editors, and she raved about it so I think it will be very practical and helpful.
The recent articles I’ve been reading are:
Jobless, Divorced, on Probation; a Pandemic Hobby Turned His Life Around from The New York Times
We Know the Cure for Loneliness. So Why Do We Suffer? from The New York Times
Her Choice: Love, or the Lease on a Beloved Studio. It Took Some Thought. from The New York Times
Why Are So Many Millennials Going to Mongolia? from The New York Times
When I Stopped Trying to Self-Optimize, I Got Better from The New York Times
Beloved Banyan Tree That Burned in Lahaina Fires Shows Signs of Recovery from The New York Times
A Flash of Recognition in a Lonely Universe from The Atlantic
The Greatest Museum You’ve Never Heard Of from The Atlantic
Traveling to See the Total Solar Eclipse? These Are the 7 Best Places. from Outside Magazine
This Charming Slice of the Tuscan Coast Is Old-School Italy’s Best-Kept Secret from Robb Report
A Crucial Character Trait for Happiness from The Atlantic
Notes on Complexity: A Buddhist Scientist on the Murmuration of Being from The Marginalian
What the people of the Amazon know that you don't: Mark Plotkin from TEDGlobal 2014
How Did Consciousness Evolve? An Illustrated Guide from The MIT Press Reader
Brain Waves Synchronize when People Interact from Scientific American
Destroying an Idea Is a Path to Progress from Nautilus
Dating coaches are everywhere. Next up: Friendship coaches from the Los Angeles Times
If anxiety is in my brain, why is my heart pounding? A psychiatrist explains the neuroscience and physiology of fear from The Conversation
How Often Do Women Think About … ? from The New York Times
First private US passenger rail line in 100 years is about to link Miami and Orlando at high speed from AP News
Earth at 8 billion: Consumption not crowd is key to climate from AP News
How New Balance Reinvented Itself from Complex
‘I was responsible for those people’ from The Atlantic
Rare color photographs offer intimate glimpse of 1963 March on Washington from National Geographic
Bees can learn, remember, think and make decisions – here’s a look at how they navigate the world from The Conversation
We’re Building Things Based on a Climate We No Longer Live In from Scientific American
Nearly Five Years After Fires, Recovery in Paradise Holds Lessons for Lahaina from Bloomberg CityLab
Temu: China’s answer to Amazon is already Australia’s most popular free app. What makes it so addictive?from The Conversation
Have a look back at every Pulitzer Prize for Fiction winner of the 21st Century. from LitHub
Writing: I’m still on my morning pages game, though admittedly I’ve lately been writing them at night. Still counts though! The point is to just write and get the jimble-jamble out of my head and onto the page. I’m also revising my query letter and the first 50 pages of my novel Julia’s Orchids. I’m starting an online class next week that helps students through the publishing process—finding and getting a literary agent, having them sell and negotiate your novel with publishing houses, negotiating any film and tv rights, book advances and residuals, etc. (hoping to learn more)—and connects us with agents. So I’m readying my query letter, which is like a cover letter for my book, and the first couple chapters of the novel so they have an idea of my writing.
Photographing/Photo Editing: I went with my dad on a day trip to Key West last weekend—a belated Father’s Day gift—and we had the best time! We both took lots of photos, including some really neat underwater ones he took. Unfortunately, I didn’t capture any of the jellyfish, but know that they were plentiful, and massive. Two, sometimes three times the size of my head. I also enjoyed some pre-birthday celebrations with my brother Anthony and his girlfriend Jazzmin and it was the best! We went to a delicious new food hall in downtown—Julia & Henry’s—and then watched Ted Lasso and then went to a stand-up comedy show at the Miami Improv theater. And I’ve also just been capturing quotidian life here in Miami—visits to my granma Nonita’s house, walking on the beach, quirky things I spot on the street, art exhibits, and generally the minutiae that make life, a life lived.
Painting/Drawing/Crafting: I finished my replica painting of Monet’s Cliffs at Étretat, Sunset. I grew less and less frustrated as I eased into the flow, remembering that art, like all things in life and life itself, is a process. I’ve tended to be perfectionistic—a trait I’m trying to shake—and learning painting has been really helping me with this. I made this painting over two classes (six hours total) and initially I really disliked it, not yet able to see, or rather feel, its direction, its voice. But there was a shift, a sudden but potent dialogue between me and the painting I wanted to express—my interpretation of Monet’s Cliffs. Suddenly it flowed. I am pretty happy with how it turned out.
I’ve also started sketching one of my next paintings. The piece will be three panels and each panel will be a scene from a vision I had (I’m a little clairvoyant), more of a past life memory from a solitary bath house that was my refuge in Babylon. Stay tuned!
Watching: After finishing binge-watching Love Island USA (my neighbor was on it so you know I had to), I needed a replacement guilty pleasure reality tv show. I found it in Selling Sunset! The show is certainly not winning any Emmys, and the repetitive drama bores me, but I love seeing the fancy homes and envisioning aspects that I want in my own future home. I finished watching Painkiller on Netflix. Watched some Ted Lasso. I watched Barbie with my mama, both of us rocking the hot pink.
Listening to: Like most days, I listen to the YouTube nature ambience videos I play on my Roku in the background while I work. When I open the windows to let in more light and air (it’s finally starting to cool down a bit in Miami), this artificial ambience blends with the natural ambience in my neighborhood, namely construction vehicles on my street, my neighbors’ kids and fire trucks from the nearby station. It’s still been too hot for many birds to be out and about singing their sweet tunes, but I relish when they do. After finishing reading The House of the Spirits, I relistened to the Isabel Allende interview on Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ podcast Wiser Than Me. I listened to the Huberman Lab episode How to Use Music to Boost Motivation, Mood & Improve Learning. His podcasts have interesting topics, and he’s wildly intelligent, but his tangential delivery makes me a little impatient and anxious for him to get to the main point. I listened to the Alain de Botton—The True Hard Work of Love and Relationships episode of the On Being with Krista Tippett podcast. And I listened to my That Certain Chill Spotify playlist, my YASSSS Spotify Playlist and Spotify’s Hans Zimmer Mix.
Have a great week!
Xo,
Jessica ♾️