The Unraveled Month #02

Things that filled my cup in September

I’m having a love affair with words right now and much of that can be attributed to Substack. What delicious wordy goodness I’m discovering! I’m loving the longer posts and currently subscribe to 77 Substacks (10 of them are paid) which might sound a lot, but only a small percentage post regularly. I weed out a few here and there and prefer to pay monthly so I can come and go and keep things fresh. My own paid subscription is currently paused¹ until I feel confident I’m back here (and I’m feeling back here but I don’t want to get ahead of myself — see also: impulsive promising).

Reading longer posts has lead me back to ACTUAL BOOKS. Finally! I have a very on-off relationship with reading. I was a total bookworm as a teen but less so these days. I can’t just read for the sake of it — I need fiction to grab me round the throat and take over my whole life until it’s done. This is not a sustainable or realistic pastime. Plus I’m super picky about fiction themes². The other issue is my atrophied attention span. Damn you Instagram with your pithy little captions. Damn you perimeno-demic! So it’s with great relief that I find myself dipping into non-fiction again. As I noted in my journal the other night, the more words I can jam into my head, the more the words will flow again.

Frankly, I’m gulping down non-fiction like Evian in the Sahara. 💦 I hope this lasts!

Substack saves

Please will you pump my gas by

Ijeoma Oluo

Me and my girls by

Amy Key

To no applause by

Kimbra

Choose your word of the season by

Luisa Skinner

Jean-Michel Basquiat’s Notes from NYC’s Underground Art Scene by

Jillian Hess

The books I wish men read by

Recovering

Be Good to Your Spark by

Heather Havrilesky

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➸ Brie from Tip of the Moon’s ASMR videos are so calming — I watch them in bed (on my iPad with the volume and brightness turned down). They’re like sleep dust.

➸ READING: The Book of Delights by Ross Gay / Body Work: The Radical Power of Personal Narrative by Melissa Febos / Arrangements in Blue by Amy Key

“We have quite a bit of research that shows the benefits of play for children. But increasingly, we have scientific evidence that play is beneficial for adults as well, especially in the mental health realm.”

The Barbie movie has people buying emotional support dolls. Psychologists say that’s a good thing

This is papa fox, the sweet boy who sleeps in my garden every day. He made a family this year and mama and the babies (now almost fully grown teens) stop by often — their main den is in my neighbour’s very overgrown garden — but it’s this guy I always see when I look out my kitchen window. As this photo from last week proves, he is the Most Relaxed Fox in West London.

I love him so much.

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1. Pausing paid subscriptions means existing monthly subscribers aren’t charged and annual subscribers get the paused weeks/months added to the length of their subscription (so you still get the equivalent of an entire year).

2. The running joke with my friend

Caroline Donahue

is I only want to read “cannibal sex books” after I devoured Tender is the Flesh in two days. This is not too far from the truth tbh. I like racy topics, big feelings, quirky weirdness, dystopian surprises. But I can’t read too much fiction too often because it messes with my dreams #ADHD

On that note, the last quirky book I read was The Beauty. It was pleasingly weird.

What books have you enjoyed lately? 💗