2020 is coming to a close, and many of us are probably reflecting on the year, and looking towards the next one. If this was a normal year, I’d be writing down resolutions and thinking about who I want to be in the New Year right about now. In all honesty, I just haven’t had the energy lately. This year has been exhausting for so many reasons that I don’t need to put into words because I know you already get it.
When I sat down to write this newsletter, I knew exactly what I was going to write about. I was going to write 20 thoughts on 2020, and the prompt was going to challenge you to write 20 thoughts on 2020 as well. I only got to #3 before it started to feel like a pointless exercise:
There is a video somewhere of my friends and I cheersing to 2020 at midnight on January 1st. We’re clinking glasses and watching the ball drop on Leah’s iPad. The camera shakily pans to my friend Ash who says,“2020...what the fuck!” If my life were a movie, this scene would CUT TO:
INT. AIRPLANE - DAY
CELESTE (23), wearing a mask and gloves sits wedged between two unmasked COLLEGE BOYS in St. Patrick’s Day gear on a crowded plane. She is one of the many New Yorkers who are fleeing the city, as a global pandemic plagues the country. She will feel guilty about this later. But she won’t regret it. She will learn to hold these two feelings at once.
When I was in LA for 3 and a half months it felt like my move to New York was ruined. It didn’t feel like I could really call 2020 my “first year” in New York if I didn’t technically live there for the whole year. Almost like when a couple says they’ve been together for 3 years, but had a 6-month breakup within that time frame. In reality, I still lived in New York for the majority of the year. But somehow, the gap makes it feel illegitimate.
I certainly could have continued from here. I could’ve written about how I bought my first pair of Birkenstocks in 2020, and how I wonder if that means I’ve become more basic. I could’ve written about how I shudder when my Dad calls me a “New Yorker,” but how I also want to punch anyone who talks shit about New York. But after writing out those first three thoughts, I just stared at the cursor on my screen. Nothing sounded less appealing than typing out 17 more thoughts about this grueling year.
This happens to me a lot. I start writing something, and all of a sudden in the middle of a sentence, what I’m saying just doesn’t feel true to me anymore. Does anyone else feel this way?
It reminded me of Rachel Nguyen’s most recent vlog, which came from an idea she’d previously scrapped. She talks about how rarely we get to see the fullness of a person’s creative process. How we never see the “crumpled up papers” if you will. “What I would give,” she says, “to see the crumpled up papers of people I very much admire.”
There have been many crumpled up papers behind this newsletter. I started Not a Writer’s Club in May, and hit the ground running with weekly newsletters. But when George Floyd was murdered I lost a lot of steam. I was struggling to put my thoughts to paper, and also wondering if I even should. Then again, it felt weird to be writing a newsletter as a Black person in America, and not say anything about it at all. I wrote so many drafts that never saw the light of day, growing more and more frustrated with each one. When I did finally write another newsletter it was two months later. Instead of weekly newsletters I began writing them monthly, which felt like a more feasible goal to hold myself accountable to.
I’m saying all of this as encouragement for any writers who may feel like they’re drowning in crumpled up pieces of paper right now. I would like to believe that some of those crumpled up pieces of paper are worth revisiting at some point, but lots of them aren’t, and that’s okay. That doesn’t make those ideas a waste of time. They were a part of the process.
We (at least I) tend to undervalue the parts of the process that are less visible to the world. But I’m finding more and more, through conversation with other writers that writing is rarely easy for anyone. That doesn’t mean we should stop trying altogether. I think it means we just learn to work out different ways of writing. Refining the process.
In the interest of transparency, I’d love it if we could all share some of our crumpled up papers (only if you feel comfortable, of course.) In this Google doc, you’ll find what were the beginnings of a newsletter that was never sent. The doc will be open edit access, so you too can share any writing ideas you may have previously abandoned. This can be unfinished paragraphs, a simple summary of an idea you had, that you never got around to – anything! More instructions and details will be in the doc.
〰️ DECEMBER FAVORITES 〰️
These newsletters that I would like to peer pressure you into subscribing to:
MUSH by Rose White, aka the writer featured in my November newsletter.
My dear friend, Han Na’s newsletter.
Only Child by Chuckry Vengadam – this one in particular was a delight to read
This blog post by Alexander Chee, in which he recommends handwritten drafts as a solution for the infinite revision process.
Another blog post by Alexander Chee about overcoming writer’s block.
This article on The Good Trade that shouted out Not a Writer’s Club. (Thanks, guys!)
You can find me online in most places at @celestuhl.
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This happens to me often, where I'll start a sentence and soon have to force its ending. Which sucks because writing's supposed to be honest and cathartic. Sometimes I'll write stream of consciousness or make a list of things on my mind or apply pressure when handwriting to tease out intensity which sometimes help by being a proxy for blocked ideas. But sometimes nothing helps lmaooo
"This happens to me a lot. I start writing something, and all of a sudden in the middle of a sentence, what I’m saying just doesn’t feel true to me anymore. Does anyone else feel this way?" ALL THE TIME!! when i journal for myself, and get deep into it, sometimes i enter a weird dissociation where nothing i write seems real or true.