On process, progress, and imperfection

I turned 45. And it is now June. Two inevitable and unremarkable events that have made me acutely aware of the passage of time. We’re now midway through the year and I’m now officially midway through my forties. Time keeps passing. I kicked off this year of being squarely in the middle with multiple celebrations, including one with a dear Gemini friend in Brooklyn. So I’ve written this newsletter under the haze of iced coffee and kinship. Spending time with friends in New York always gives me a kind of satisfied saturation of belonging, of feeling held by the company and community of friends.

Currently I’m doing my best to participate in 1,000 Words of Summer, organized each year by Jami Attenberg. This two week sprint encourages writers to write 1,000 words a day, every day. It’s a great way to create a container of time for creation and give yourself a dose of motivation and accountability. I always look forward to Jami’s daily emails featuring reflections on writing from a wide range of inspiring authors. If you need more structure, jump into the daily write along at 8am eastern organized by the Writing Institute at Sarah Lawrence College - if you’re looking for a way to start, this could be a good one!

I started this round of 1,000 Words of Summer strong, full of swagger and intention. Last Saturday, the first day I decided to walk to a coffee shop with my laptop and journal, one of the luxuries not available to me in the desert. But I couldn’t decide on which coffee shop to go to. One with a backyard seating area tries to position themselves as a brunch spot on weekends and probably wouldn’t appreciate a laptop. Another one felt too corporate and had no personality and was too perpetually full of laptop tappers. Another had a garden-like seating area, but it was too dark and damp for the beautiful May day.

Finally I faced the obvious: instead of taking the time to walk to a coffee shop, spend $15 for a coffee and pastry, elbow my way to the table and connect to the wifi I could just start writing from the comfort of my own kitchen table. I could write in the overgrown backyard while admiring the enthusiastic rosebush currently spilling over with blossoms. I didn’t need the perfect moment or setting. I could just start.

My point in relaying this story is also inline with the 1,000 Words of Summer. Pick a place and get going. It can be a prompt, a project that’s been hanging over your head, an idea that’s been nagging you and won’t let you go, it can just be opening up a blank page and seeing where it takes you. Today I’m writing this newsletter as part of my 1,000 words. It doesn’t have to be perfect. You don’t have to find the most ideal place to write. Instead of making another excuse, start where you are.

While trying to cultivate moments of creative focus, I’ve been swept up in the manic magic of Gemini season, going to a show or a reading or a dinner with a friend every single night since I arrived in New York City. There are some seasons that this would deplete me, but now I feel the fresh summer energy and am buoyed by the bright green chlorophyll of the new leaves on the trees, the intensity of the washed-blue sky, the sunsets after 8 pm, and the restless breeze. May and early June is always a roll of the dice weather wise, you can get drenching rain or perfect sun, but I like it that way.

I’ve been spending a lot of time with my band Skirting putting the finishing touches on the vinyl release of our EP What You’ve Been Told. We’re playing our release show this Sunday, June 7 at Mama Tried, our favorite clubhouse under the BQE in South Brooklyn. It’s at 4pm, a perfect Sunday afternoon. There will be two other talented bands, Neon Grlz (from DC!) and Gladys, and an all vinyl DJ set by Sue Problema (from Texas!).

We finished the recordings a year ago, but took time to decide how we wanted to release the music on vinyl. In undertaking this project I’ve been struck by all the little decisions that go into making a piece of art. Even though the songs were already written, recorded, produced, mixed, and mastered, it has been a long process. The tracks needed to be remastered for vinyl. Album artwork needed to be conceived, agreed upon, and laid out for vinyl. We needed an insert. We needed to ensure we got all this done in time for the records to arrive from the pressing plant in the Czech Republic in time for our show. Each one of these steps required coordination, decision making, creative thinking, time, dedication, consensus, and delegation.

Bringing the record to life also required help from our friends. Our talented engineer Matt Shane remastered the music for vinyl. Our amazing friend Keight helped lay out the artwork for printing. I was also grateful for Justin, our rep at Pirates Press, who answered every annoying amateur question that I had about the vinyl production process with grace and also somehow broke one of our boxes of records out of French FedEx purgatory. If you need to press vinyl, he’s your guy.

The whole process has been an illustration of the levels of work and the community that goes into creating a work of art, however seemingly simple or ordinary the end product may seem. I’m proud of the effort we’ve put in, to realize a longstanding goal to commit our songs to vinyl. If you want a copy you can order from bandcamp or just reach out directly if you live locally!

Every time I make something, I am reminded of this lesson: Art takes the time it will take. Whether it’s in the raw creation or the final production, art needs to be given time to breathe. While deadlines, accountability, and deliberate containers of time are the only strategies that really get me to produce, I also have learned nothing can be forced.

This applies to my writing too. Right after I graduated from my MFA (three years ago! Time! It doesn’t stop!) I wanted the book of essays about the desert that I’m working on done so badly. They were part of my MFA thesis and I wanted them as a book out in the world. In my mind I could see the cover, read the blurbs, and was ready to organize the book tour, solicit the reviews, and pitch myself to podcasts for interviews.

I was getting angry and impatient at myself, at the work, at the generous friends and peers who served as readers of the essays. Why wasn’t it done already? Why couldn’t I have a critically acclaimed book out in the world that showed I was a real writer now? I wanted proof that I was a an important literary voice and I wanted it soon.

Of course, I’m still very excited to do all of that necessary promotion work when the time comes, but the book is still in the creation stage. My impatience with the process and attachment to the product of course meant that the writing suffered (and my friends too). This kind of attachment doesn’t serve us or our art. It doesn’t make our art better or us happier. It skips over the most pleasurable and difficult part of art: the making. Besides, even the most successful works of art will be forgotten one day. It’s not just about creating something to be remembered, but something that feels essential to us now, that bringing pleasure in the process and the making.

We’re in a time where culturally we’re always told to hurry up, cut corners, and produce a product already. We’re pushed to have an output polished and done without effort and before it’s barely a fleshed out idea. In this environment, it’s a small act of resistance to give our creative ideas the meandering time they need, to make a choice to pay attention and nurture our creative work until it emerges. The effort behind every small choice is what makes our art intentional and fully ours. That’s not something I ever want to lose.

Speaking of time, my essay The Desert House was printed in the beautiful new Jackrabbit Journal, which is only available in print. This piece was written as part of my MFA thesis and is a love letter to my home in the desert (it was also rejected 17 times before publication). I’m so happy it’s found its publication home in a desert-based lit mag that centers desert writers.

Finally, thank you to everyone who reads this newsletter and tells me you enjoy it. In this attention economy, it is an honor to have yours and I don’t take it lightly. While I do have typos (I am a human), every word is weighed and considered and I love that you take a time to read them. Please share with a friend if you think they would like this newsletter as well!

And if you’re in New York, I’d love to see you Sunday, June 7, 4 - 7pm at Mama Tried in Sunset Park for Skirting’s EP release. Not in town? You can order our EP from bandcamp (or just ask me)!

Are you doing 1,000 Words of Summer? How’s it going? Otherwise, what are your creative plans for the summer?

xox,

eleanor

Currently reading: Work to Do by Jules Wernersbach (I highly recommend this novel to anyone who has ever been part of a food co-op, worked together on a community organizing project, or spent time in spaces that are trying to serve communities and be “values driven” while surviving during capitalism. You know these characters. I know these characters. I love and hate these characters and have conversations with them in my head. This book is tough, tender, and frustratingly hilarious).