I haven’t posted in a while. It doesn’t bother me much, does it bother you? I thought I’d make my triumphant return in the style of a holiday newsletter. My mother used to write one every winter and I’d pour over its contents, fascinated by my mother’s ability to disseminate our family’s year into 500 words.
We were a family of extracurricular overachievers, and our family calendar reflected it. It was a post-modernist painting of color-coordinated schedules, canceled band practices, competing PTA meetings, and overlapping lessons. But the newsletter, and attached, the family Christmas photo, were polished, edited, and embellished. My mother made our year into art. I’ll try my best to do the same.
This year for me has been transformative. However, most are. Time passes, we grow, or we’re meant to. I started the year performing my solo show Jet, Live! which has since been lovingly abandoned. I keep meaning to pick it back up, but my therapist has advised me against it. (This is not entirely true, she’s encouraged me to “act my age,” and by doing so, work less. A great excuse to procrastinate, if you’re looking for one.)
In a particularly isolated period of 2024, let’s call it April, a friend Raquel in her sage wisdom imparted upon me, “Jet, unfortunately, you’re a writer. It’s a solitary art.”
And while this advice was a comfort, I don’t love working alone. I relish making art with others. It’s why I was lured into improv, though I’ve since been saved. (But I would gladly do a guest spot if anyone deigned to ask.)
I spent the entirety of 2023 working on this blog, and my solo show. I began 2024 by writing a feature-length and a pilot. The baristas at Book Club knew my name and my order by rote.
Whilst writing, I have a habit of sticking my forehead to the nearest surface and keeping it there till an idea comes to mind. I’ve had keyboard imprints and crumbs stuck to my skin since 2021. On one such writing session in mid-May, my skull felt leaden, my thoughts weighed down, my neck unable to support my weight. No ideas came.
My therapist Marissa and I have been working on creative burnout and I’ve been reckoning with the ramifications of being a careerist since age five. Sounds like heavy work BUT Marissa and I exchange romance book recommendations at the end of sessions, so therapy is something I always look forward to. The Seven Year Slip is my most recent romance read and it’s so very cute.
So, that’s why you haven't heard from me. I decided to peel my face off the laptop keys, close the notebook, and get out more. A writer needs material, and solidarity doesn’t suit me. I made it a point to make some more friends.
Amanda and I started with martinis in the comfort of Book Club’s bar, and now we hide in bathroom stalls together at midnight raves.
María and I began as sleep-deprived co-workers, and now we split entreés and complain about being bisexual women cursed to be in love with their boyfriends. (Love you Lennon and you, too, Tim!)
Ashlon and I met as mutuals at a party, and have now slept shoulder to shoulder on Amtrak, falling to a restful sleep after a long night of screaming every lyric to Brat.
Oh, and there are so many more new friends! I can’t even begin to list them, but I’ll start with Laū and Kendall and Jess Pain and Lukas and Tori and Kate and Ashley and Logan and Paige and and and!
Not to mention the love I have for friends who’ve stuck around for years now! Jess Jaffe is the first to every party, and will always text you the next day with pictures. Morgan, Zoë, and Kiki know how to make any event a celebration. Raquel never ceases to amaze me with her eloquence, (she’s laughing me at for writing that, I KNOW IT.) I got to see my beloveds, Grace, Shinji, and Julie last week and I cried in the car with joy. (Katie and Alexa, you were so missed.)
There is always Lennon. We’ve had quite a year, the two of us. We’ve navigated it with love, and with the well-placed guidance of both our therapists, and our couples therapist, Bri! We made Bri cry the other day in session, and it was for a GOOD REASON! We’ve won therapy. We’re very privileged to have a trifecta of educated professionals helping us to sort through our shit before we start any more shit.
He is a beautiful, deserving person and I’m very lucky to love him.
I’m getting to be very high school yearbook here, so I’ll stop.
With these people, in this year, we’ve celebrated birthdays and job promotions. We’ve crossed state lines and gone swimming in the ocean. We’ve split checks and fell asleep while watching movies. We got there ten minutes late– the J was down–and we texted each other to make sure we got home safe. We did.
As the summer sank past the skyline, I started to dip my toes back into the frigid waters of writing, and have found in those depths a novella (excerpts of which you can read on the blog) and a novel. Maybe I’ll pick up Jet, Live! again, or write a new show, this time with more characters, more friends to play with. Andrew Mullins will forever be stuck as my director now, whether he likes it or not.
This year is coming to an end, and while flipping through my journal I stumbled upon the goals I wrote for my year, around this time last December. They were lofty, mostly out-of-control career aspirations, and none of them came true. But I don’t care. I had a year full of laughter, and disappointments, dancing, and drowning, and tears, of fireworks and friendship.
A year is so much time, and there’s so much love. Time’s running out and I’ve got some love left over.
I’ll pack up the love I have left for you in a glass Pyrex, it comes with a nice plastic lid, good for bringing to a holiday party. I’ll leave it in the fridge, and when you stumble home from your New Year's celebration, it’ll be there for you.
You can put it in the oven at 350 for five minutes to reheat. It’s great topped with whipped cream.
And after you’ve scraped the bottom of the dish, each crumb warming your belly, just when you think the love has run out, it’ll be the New Year, and I’ll have more to give.
There’s so much time, and the love never runs out.
With love always,
Jet
