[Chorus]
A little bit wrong than you like it
A little too broke to buy it
A little too great to hide it
I'm little bit wrong
A little too bent to fix it
A little jam on that biscuit
Lipstick's like love, I'll kiss it
I'm a little bit wrong
[Bridge]
These things are not meant for you
These things are not meant for you

Often I can't resist brandishing whatever pop song has particularly caught my  fancy. (Members def bear the brunt of this impulse in happy mail, tyfys.) I just want you to feel what I feel... Okay, that's a lie. I want a lot of other things too.

More to the point, the actual must-listen track is "Theme of the Girl Listening to This" by Aria Salvatrice.

This month I'm still kickin' it on the stoop outside death's door, wondering when the reaper will get home. Not that I'm eager to see him, but it can't be long at this point. Charon is a reliable ride in either direction, I hear.

In case you didn't read the last email: Death isn't coming for me, but a family member. "She is too young, by most human measurements." Nonetheless.

"Take ye heed, watch and pray: for ye know not when the time is," Jesus said of the world's apotheosis. The loved one in question, she loses track of her own moments. No longer can she line them up like beads on a string. The present, this instant, is demanding enough. Beads roll together in a small dish, glinting under dim light; bright lacquer masked only until dawn returns.

Does it bother you that I'm super Christian now? I prefer to be open about my paradigm... perhaps to a fault, she typed ruefully, wondering how many times she'd trotted out that quip before. (Same with the snappy line earlier, "I want a lot of other things too." Pretty sure that's a repeat.)

Faith has illuminated my salience landscape over the past couple of years. I doubt that I could disguise my newfound existential orientation if I tried. But the people most turned off by religion have already split, right?

Or maybe you're about to... no hard feelings, it is what it is. Indeed, I'm convinced that phrase, "it is what it is," condenses the totality of human wisdom. However, I'm only 27, so don't listen to me.

Sorry. Even if I could have known in advance how much I'd change, we'd all end up in the same places, saying the same lines.

My husband and I drove home last weekend. Now we're about to bounce back for the wake, though exactly when remains undetermined. So it goes! I worked as much as I feasibly could during the previous trips, which in retrospect was kinda stupid. Gonna admit defeat this time and take days off. "When the choice is letting things slip or nosediving into burnout, I let 'em slip!" Heed what you said Sonya, dang.

Anyway, here's a note that I jotted down to show you:

How I manage stress: yep, this is stressful [radical acceptance]. Paradoxically, as much downtime as possible. Partition commitments to work sessions [in order to rest despite not being "done"]. Aggressively reevaluate, the plan is a map of territory we haven't reached yet so of course it's wrong. Overcommunicate status and capacity then feel like a fuckin dork but no one is surprised and that's priceless. These are less "best practices" and more hard-won coping tools.

Oodles to read — don't be a completionist about this list tho, u doofus 💗

Oodles to watch:

Thassit for now, ttys.

— Sonya

[do I usually sign off in this newsletter? can't remember, fuck it I do what I want]

Header paintings by Jan van Huysum and Jean Louis Prévost.