What I’m listening to: Spotify pushed me a “Scarf Season” playlist that’s on constant play lately. Also, if you haven’t listened to Romy’s new album (our gal from The Xx) omg it’s so good. Little gay love poems set to Y2K dance beats. I’m in. (Oh! And music from high school.)
What I’m watching: The Blue Angels flying over San Francisco for Fleet Week. It’s one of my favorite times of year for so many reasons: the weather is fantastic, everyone comes out on their roofs or to the park or the sidewalks which charms me completely, and it’s also the North Beach Festival which means parades and pasta everywhere I turn. It all feels very Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood. Sure, I get that Fleet Week is military propaganda, and there’s always a moment during the flying where I’m like – oh, these machines were designed to kill and these noises are the ones that children in other countries fear because it means an attack is coming – but then they come roaring through and I grab a plate of pasta and salute the skies because the whole experience really just knocks me flat. We as human beings created these machines that can hurl our bodies upward in to the atmosphere (and do tricks!) and it’s just all so beautiful and overwhelming. Anyway, it’s complicated. Fleet Week!
What I’m reading: I just finished The Goldfinch and moved onto Middlesex, which I read years ago and decided to revisit in my pile of books I bought at a used book store in Ptown. (On my honeymoon.) I also read this article in the The New Yorker about this program in Austria where they housed and tortured children under the umbrella of “psychology” and whew lawd it was a tough read. It was run by this Catholic woman who was so strict about “training” these kids who were deemed unfit for society; for example, if they wet the bed at night (which, what kid doesn’t?) they were ripped from the mattress and hosed off in an ice cold shower where they stayed until dawn. I kept beating myself up and being like, geez, Tighe, stop getting so upset about this what’s the matter with you and then realized … you’re reading very true stories about the torture and murder of children, it’s OK to find it upsetting. I was also struck by my own lineage to Austria, on my mom’s side, which we really don’t know much about. Not that my family was in the old country in post-Nazi times, but I wonder how much of that cultural relevancy was brought over a few generations back? Which then got me thinking about generational trauma and all these things that we live day-to-day but don’t know. Anyway, lots of thoughts and unpacking on this one and I’ve already brought it up in therapy once so maybe more to come, maybe not, that might end up being my business completely.
What I’m eating: Pasta! North Beach! Fleet Week!
What I can’t stop thinking about: I got married two weeks ago and it was an absolute delight. A dream. A dream and a scream (I laughed a lot). So much fun and so funny (there were wigs!). I don’t know what else to write other than I’m so thankful for my husband (!) and my friends and family and I wish that I could live in that experience forever, and since I can’t, I want to take the joy and love and celebration from it and keep paying it forward where I can. Anyway – my good friend Blake (aka Miss Mary Lou Pearl) made this reel about it that’s gone viral (!!) so there’s that.