People I look up to❣️

and movies for the conflict avoidant

This is some freewriting I did over the past week—little chunks, lightly edited.
The one daily habit that has stuck: I write three pages into a notebook every morning when I wake up.

Lately, I’ve been playing around with adding six more handwritten pages throughout the day, trying to build a heavier writing practice.

Experimenting, seeing where it leads.

---

Are you eating ginger biscuits on a rooftop in Brooklyn in April?
Not bad—with Grady’s iced coffee.
It’s loud. There’s a rumble below.

People I look up to: Eileen Myles, Lena Dunham, Miranda July, Doechii, Charli XCX, the WNBA, Patricia Highsmith, Ellsworth Kelly, Michaela—the Boston-accented makeup influencer. Civil rights fighters. That interior designer with green stripes—Elsie de Wolfe. Oprah, but not the billionaire part.

Digital nomads. The idea of it.
Georgia O’Keeffe
—the minimalist painter out in New Mexico, Agnes Martin.

Can I be any of them?
Pieces of them? That’s why they’re on my list.

I’m not an expert on any of them, but facts about their lives stick with me in fragments. Things I find fascinating, enviable, or just deeply admire—like a god.

I’m losing my edge.
I’m losing my edge.

Lost. Forgotten. Wearing socks and clogs and cut-off Levi’s I thrifted in New Mexico.

---

How do you write a book?

Maybe I should reread Patricia Highsmith. She says, “Please yourself first.”

What if that’s all I know how to do?

Do I even think about readers? Sometimes. But mostly, no.

They probably don’t want this.

Octavia Butler wrote a set number of pages every day.

Creative practice meets personal mess. I do believe queer stories are important. They’re not seen or heard enough.

Who cares? People do.

Criticism is hard. Too soft. Too weird. Too slow. Too selfish.

I want to be rich, but not like that. I don’t like billionaires. That part I’m sure of.

I’m trying to understand myself by writing. The process, the people, the near-misses. That’s the cast of characters.

It’s 2:07. Almost been an hour.

You are not a monster for taking two hours a day for yourself.

---

MOVIES FOR THE CONFLICT AVOIDANT, GENTLE DRAMA

Paris, Texas is a 1984 neo-Western drama road film directed by Wim Wenders, co-written by Sam Shepard and L. M. Kit Carson, and produced by Don Guest. It stars Harry Dean Stanton, Nastassja Kinski, Dean Stockwell, Aurore Clément, and Hunter Carson. In the film, disheveled recluse Travis Henderson (Stanton) reunites with his brother Walt (Stockwell) and son Hunter (Carson). Travis and Hunter embark on a trip through the American Southwest to track down Travis's missing wife, Jane (Kinski). [via Wikipedia]

Neo-Western drama road film - that’s my type.

Watch for colors and landscapes.

The Daytrippers is a 1996 independent comedy-drama film written and directed by Greg Mottola in his feature directorial debut. It stars Hope Davis, Stanley Tucci, Anne Meara, Parker Posey and Liev Schreiber. [via Wikipedia]

Watch for Parker Posey and street scenes in Soho 1990s.

---

Sharing some of the oldies and goodies

---

Do you have a daily writing practice? What’s it like? Time of the day, method of recording. Drop in the comments.