HOOHAS, EMPATHY, AND KAMALA IS BRAT

LIFE OF A BOOKMAN

Bookman: 1. a person who has a love of books and especially of reading. 2. a person who is involved in the writing, publishing, or selling of books. Oh, hi that's me!!

Reluctant: Would I finish The Guest by Emma Cline? Would I not? As of mid-last week, it was as much of a toss-up as Biden's candidacy. But the weekend shook things up for us all. I, indeed, kept going with this book about a woman who was lying and seducing her way to the next roof over her head. I flipped each page like I was watching a high-speed train wreck. Totally stressed, and also sorta unable to look away, and also questioning at every page why I'm reading something that makes me feel bad. That's the same question I posed to my gal pal, the one who texted me:

I LOVE THIS BOOK I'm truly obsessed with it.

As you can imagine, we had no choice but to hash it out over the phone because I needed to understand her love of that which I loathed. She made great points about the novel:

Her: why do we need to know her backstory? Only to learn some cliche? Can't she just be unlikeable? Isn't that more real, more human?

Me: But I want to empathize!

Her: Can't you empathize without knowing all that?

Me: I'm shitty. So, no. I want to understand. And ultimately I never get there with the character. I sorta can't stand her the whole time minus like twice. And I hated the ending.

Ultimately, our tastes are sometimes very similar but when it comes to The Guest...very different. Read it, and you decide ;)

What I'm writing: Sometimes the writing is the not writing? If you're around me long enough you'll know that's my favorite way to justify not doing the book work I need to be doing. Like character sketches for That Second Novel. It's coming! Next week I'll report more progress.

WOMEN’S STUDIES

What gets passed down becomes our history. A few for the canon:

It's only been one single day of Kamala Harris being the likely presidential nominee for the Democratic party, but already her campaign is showing prowess and command of the attention economy. From the amazing brat mashup to the coconut emojis everywhere, if you're not on top of some (imo very Gen Z) culture, you might miss it. Do yourself a favor and read this play-by-play on Kamala's use of memes from TIME. I'd like this woman-power to keep going all the way to the White House, so the rest of us can keep access to the sovereignty of our bodies and have access to reproductive freedom. Until then, read-in on the Kamala meme life!

PASS IT ON

Stories are heirlooms. Here's one of mine:

“It's giving corpse.” Voted quote of the boat day, and I stand by it. A little too much zinc SPF will make anyone look like they're dead in the water. But also maybe not what I should be saying to new friends??? While I was out here offending, they were asking so many curious and wonderful questions of me and everyone else on the boat. I can't tell you how impressed I am with humans who are equal parts wildly inquisitive and willing to share. There's so much softness and trust that hangs in the balance of those two things. If you're meeting people, on a boat OR on shore, try asking them about them more than you explain more about yourself. We default to what we know, which is ourselves (no shade, this is me!!). But boat day SPF corpse was a lovely lesson in the aliveness in connection, sparked from listening.

Woman on xx

JK not done. Some stray confessionals:

I'm actively putting a vaginal probiotic up my hoohah thanks to SEED. And loving it??? (use this link if you want $25 off)

I asked if I could only buy the right sandal of these gems. Turns out that's a no. Two more broken ankle boot weeks so I took the pair (but who's counting). My right foot has aged backward into velcro slingbacks.

Very into heavy-cotton oversized crew necks styled with biker shorts because I saw a picture of my bestie and was committed to copying her look. Somehow that landed me in the men's section of Lululemon for this tee, which reminded me of this 100% accurate description of half my closet rn: