Wow she wasn't kidding about this
IT'S A NEWSLETTER, we're alive and reading it, life is a miracle
And my tombstone will read: “[Collective group remembrance]”
I’m seeing Shakespeare tonight and I’m fucking stoked! The theater where I’m a company member is doing The Taming of the Shrew! You may recall that I played Hamlet there once upon a time, which was, OMG, mentioned in the show preview I read today! And ye gods, I can feel the stage lights on my face just as I did when I spake the words of the doomed prince, doesn’t it just feel like yesterd—
Green: The last time Shakespeare was done here was when I directed Hamlet.
SP: How long ago was that?
Green: [Collective group remembrance]. Hamlet was October of 2012.
Alcantara: It’s been a minute.
HAHAHAHAHAHA OUCHIE!!!! I’M AN ABSOLUTELY DUSTY ANCIENT CRISPY CICADA SHELL OF A PERSON!!! A SINCERE BREAKING OF LEGS TO THE TAMING CAST, AS I’M SURE MY LEGS WILL ALSO BREAK SOON, LIKE LITERALLY MY FIBULA AND TIBIA BECAUSE MY BONE DENSITY IS NEGATIVE A MILLION CRUNCH CRUNCH GOODBYYYYYYE
On keeping going(ing)
The last couple months of getting drafts to my writing partner, Kristin, have just suuuucked. I’m dragging myself into Scrivener, I’m avoiding the work, feeling like I’ve painted myself into a corner. I don’t always feel this way, but I feel stifled lately, like I need to stretch my arms and set off some fireworks and blow some shit up.
This tweet quoting Megan Stielstra got me to tear up and finish another damn draft when I really didn’t know how:
AND SPEAKING OF CRYING
Just some videos I cried at recently, along with when I began crying at them
Sorry you have to click through, I know from my work as a web designer that *abso-lutely dripping with sarcasm voice* people haaaaate to cliiiiiick:
First time through I started crying eeeemmediately but upon repeat viewings I can hold it together mostly
I laughed through the whole thing and also started crying halfway through! h/t to my beloved spouse Larry for finding this premium A+++ content, GREAT job, love to be awash on a sea of emotion
I teared up when the baby chuckled like an old-ass man! Also I kinda feel like… why don’t we ALWAYS talk to babies like this? It seems… efficient?
A modern-day Aesop’s fable
The other day I was in beloved downtown Urbana store Art Coop (excuse me, ~ art coop, inc. ~) and as I stood at the counter with my credit card (OMG I just remembered I have an Amazon Chase card, so much for subverting capitalism by buying small D:) and my pens and whatnots, I also impulsively bought a sticker that says i like art:
The next morning, purse and lunchbag hanging from my shoulder, I took a second to wipe off excess car grime and then, trying not to analyze it too much, I peeled off the paper backing and stuck my i like art sticker to my lil Honda Fit, just below the license plate frame. Because I’d decided the act of buying this $3 sticker was also the act of stepping into being someone who puts stickers on her car! The new me!! Bold colors! Earnest and charmingly simple declarations!! CUTE!
It was cute. I mean, I grimaced a little seeing it when I returned to my car that afternoon to drive home—heh heh heh wow, SOOoo earnest!—but willingly chose to embrace it all: earnestness, the color red, feelings, sharing them with strangers in traffic.
It wasn’t til the next day that I thought clear as a bell: oh my God it’s ONLY a matter of time before some stranger with a Sharpie makes it say I LIKE FART.
Like, place your bets on date and time.
(And honestly if you live in Urbana/Champaign and you don’t stop in art coop at least occasionally, YOU are proverbially living your life with “i like fart” on your trunk and all the kids are Snapchatting pictures of you!!! amidst all their young activities like vaping and establishing mutual consent before sex!!!)
Speaking of youth, I had a chilling thought recently that maybe young people don’t know about Bjork???
Your flirt finds me out
Teases the crack in me
Smittens me with hopePossibly maybe possibly maybe
possibly maybeAs much as I definitely enjoy solitude
I wouldn't mind perhaps
Spending little time with you
Sometimes
SometimesPossibly maybe probably love
Possibly maybe probably loveUncertainty excites me
babe
Who knows what's going to happen?
Lottery or car crash
Or you'll join a cultProbably maybe possibly love
Probably maybe possibly love, possiblyMon petit vulcan
You're eruptions and disasters
I keep calm admiring your lava
I keep calmPossibly maybe probably love
Possibly maybe probably loveElectric shocks?
I love them!
With you, dozen a day
But after a while I wonder
Where's that love you promised me?
Where is it?Possibly maybe probably love, possibly
Possibly maybe probably love, possiblyHow can you offer me love like that?
My heart's burned
How can you offer me love like that?
I'm exhausted
Leave me alonePossibly maybe possibly maybe
Possibly maybeSince we broke up
I'm using lipstick again
I suck my tongue
In remembrance of you
I MEAN, COME ON.
TIL I’m a Bertie*
This week I told my therapist Andrea something kind of hard to say: that I had wanted to leave the house on Sunday night, but felt too afraid to. (She reached for her notebook when I said this and I was like ohhh shit, now we’re In Therapy!!) All it took was one second of imagining men looking at me as I walked, and thinking what if they followed me, or yelled at me from a passing car, or stared at me, or whatever. So instead I sat on the couch and stared wistfully out the window at the perfect 73-degree weather, the sunshine on the leaves, all afternoon.
Andrea makes it a point to say “and” instead of “but” in as many instances as possible to highlight the fact that two seemingly conflicted things can be true at the same time. They don’t have to cancel each other out. So when I’m feeling anxious, por ejemplo, she advises that I observe my feelings like:
I’m feeling lots of dread
AND
I know it will all be fine
I’m feeling panicky
AND
I’m safe and capable
So when Sunday night, after not leaving the house all day, essentially skipping a perfect day out of fear, I watched episodes of Tuca + Bertie where Bertie’s too anxious to wear the cute outfit she wanted to wear, too anxious to go to work, too anxious to leave the house after imagining all the potential gross interactions she’d have with strange men. …. . .. .
I felt so thrilled and seen and okay! MAN I LOVE THIS SHOW. It took me a second to figure out what we were doing AND!! it’s so relatable and fun to watch.
Honestly, who hasn’t had a panic attack at a grocery store?
P.S. I love writing about TV, and TV posts will be part of the extra shit I write for paid subscribers soon. One of my “I bet I’m a secret prodigy at this”** fantasies is writing TV recaps, but like… stupid ones.
*from Tuca & Bertie, not from Love, though I also admire that Bertie
* “…so I’d better not ever try it and prove myself wrong” is the secret second half of that sentiment
Oh and speaking of television,
Riddle me THIS, BARTMAN
How in the world did I buy THIS KNOTTED MADEWELL TOP
WEEKS (!)
AFTER
seeing the TC Tuggers sketch on I Think You Should Leave??
(A show we’ve all watched, RIGHT???)
I also think I clearly got that top in a too-big size but whatever.
Taffy Brodesser-Akner!!!
Here’s an article about the (v. small and personal and cheap) tech she uses during interviews that’s mildly interesting, but MUCH more importantly, I need to alert you to her NYT Mag profile of Gwyneth Paltrow last summer (THEY SMOKE A SINGLE CIGARETTE TOGETHER AND BLOW THE SMOKE UP GWYNETH’S FIREPLACE).
Evergreen headline: I’m trying a new thing
I vigorously brush my hair in the mornings now, sort of as an alternative to washing it. DON’T WORRY, I’ll tell you all about it soon I promise!!!
I love you, tomorrow is Friday!, it’s so fucking hot outside I love it!,
Lindsey