Where am I going?
Plans and Contradictions and Coffee
“Where am I going?” is one of those amazing questions that can be asked in the middle of driving three hours south to visit your aunt, or, in the middle of therapy.
I’m writing to you from my parents home in Sonoma, California, where I’ve taken up residency for the rest of the summer. Teaching summer camps, going to cousins’ weddings, pretending I’m not 31, etc. You know the vibe.
I am not a person who thinks too much about the future (though I did start a Roth RA account last year, if you can believe!). Unless it’s me sitting in the bath tub late at night panicking about the fact that my parents will some day die—then, yes, I obsess about the future—but when it comes to my actual future (what I want to happen, where I think I’ll be, what I plan on doing, if I’ll have children) my brain shuts down outside of a 3-ish week calendar.
Sure, I have some outlandish ideas where I literally never grow up and just move back into my parents home and things are as they always have been, or ya know, I build my own cartoon empire made out of cartoon money and I’m surrounded by cartoon dogs (these are both possible, no?). But outside of that, there’s few things I truly know. I want to create, I want to work on being happy, I want to laugh, and I want to dance.
(Please note, I also hate change which really contradicts with a lot of things I am saying but that’s a whole other post, ok!!!)
I might have shared this memory before, but I’ll never forget my sweet cousin Sophie saying this at the spry age of 23: “If I knew what was going to happen in my life, I’d just lay down and die.” It’s a great quote to live by. I mean have you SEEN the movie Click!?
I feel the same way about future plans as my hometown neighbor Pattie feels about organization (and coincidentally, I also share her feelings on organization).
Pattie and I have been spending a lot of time together and we both refuse to wear bras which is great, but what’s really funny is, if you saw my weekly planner, you’d think I was a complete liar.
I, Hilary, in fact, am obsessed with plans. What am I doing Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday… who I am I seeing? Where are we going? And at what time? My planner is literally filled to the brim. I simply must know the details of all the events!! Since I’ve left New York for the past few weeks, I’ve received numerous texts from my gals stating “We don’t have plans without you, we’re so lost.” Which came as no surprise to me. I’m constantly scheduling activities. I mean, they mostly involve alcohol, snacks, and long walks, but I’m still the one scheduling them!
Here is one of my really early submissions to the New Yorker back in 2016.
This habit comes from years of being a freelancer, of being a woman who works for herself, someone who needs to make sure they schedule time to see other living humans so they don’t go insane sitting at home “thinking of funny ideas.” Plans are actually… how I survive this psychotic thing we call life.
(PS I honestly think it is psychotic to ask someone “what they want” outside of the movie What Women Want—how could a person know!)
So I guess that means there’s not one simple definition of this thing we call plans. Which of course, you already knew. There’s long term and there’s short term. There’s tomorrow and there’s next Christmas. There’s people who can handle flying by the seat of their pants and there’s those who simply cannot! I am feeling a lot of this energy being back in my home town, encountering people who thrive on knowing where their life is headed and myself feeling quite the opposite (no surprise!).
While I am a creature of comfort, someone who loves routine, eating toast every day, I still don’t know where it is that I’m going, but it doesn’t bother me. It rarely has. Next week I’m teaching camp and then after that I have a wedding, but beyond that? Not a clue!
This is very cliche but time has been moving so differently for me here in California compared to New York. I’m teaching 11 year olds how to draw, I’m playing with the dogs and I’m in bed by 9 (though I’m writing this newsletter at 10 PM which feels quite frankly, insane). I can’t say I don’t miss the thrill of New York throughout the week, of filling in my notebooks with constant ideas and overheard conversations, but I know I’ll be back in the fall so it’s not a painful yearning. For now I’m just, as they say… soaking up the sun (isn’t there a Sheryl Crow documentary coming out soon???) and truly not worrying about the future, and I hope you aren’t either. What the fuck else is summer for?
Here’s a list I made on my last weekend in New York before my east coast hiatus:
Thank you for reading! New posts every Friday!
Show on repeat: Forensic Files duh
Excited for: My cartoon camp next week!
Recently watched: NOPE!!!!!!!
Order prints and more on Etsy!
You could be in my next book: Tell me your fav snack!
Have you read Murder Book? I’d love to hear from you!
The cartoon about being awarded 6-months residency?
BRILLIANT! TRUE! MAGNIFICENT! HILARIOUS!!