this is the last thing i’m letting myself write about twitter

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Every tweet is deleted, DMs in the process of, switches turned to off, one by one: every success and failure and hope and disappointment and opportunity and clusterfuck and useless ephemeralilty from 14 years of my life, from 27 through 41.

Were those 14 worth it? Not really, no.

While I've made some wonderful connections with now-lifelong friends and creative collaborators and had a few good opportunities, it wasn't worth what I let it do with my brain: I got sucked into its promise - which was very real - when I was at my most vulnerable, having lost my job, then my house – and I bought into the fantasy that it could give me a road forward.

The only road it gave me was a roundabout back into the feeding trough, dangling the hope that maybe I could be mentioned in the same breath as those writers with the 200k followers (a need for validation for which I’ve nothing but shame), that maybe I could have some impact on the world, that my hopes and creations were more than poker chips for a rigged game.

In the slot machine of Twitter, at least, they weren’t.

Anyhow, I'm not letting myself repeat those mistakes in this new social era (if I make the same mistakes at 41 as I did at 27, I won't be angry, just disappointed): I've happily moved on to Mastodon and here and the newsletter, doing whatever I feel like doing creatively and sharing it with whoever finds their way to it because at this point, honestly, fuck it.

“Fuck it”: was a more apposite summation of Twitter ever written? Probably. But fuck it: I'm free. And so are you.

two and a half seasons

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41ºF, clear: welcome, Fall. Finally / at last / at long last / until it isn't, which might be tomorrow, given that it's Ohio and there are two and a half seasons, Summer, Winter, and Not-Summer/Not-Winter.

While I feel somewhat dirty including the two in the same breath, it does make for a useful (if only for me) contrast in the act of lamenting the passing of distant people: Whereas QEII's passing was more of a historical fascination – there will be another queen – not in my lifetime, probably/certainly, but there will be another – and an answer to "what happens when" – the news of Hilary Mantel's is a brutal punch because we won't be getting more Hilary Mantel books. One of the best writers who ever lived: If you haven't read the Cromwell series, read it NOW. So, so good.

Totally off the subject and profoundly unrelated to one another but a.) ABBOTT ELEMENTARY is every bit the delight its not-inconsiderable accolades suggest and then some and b.) I managed to get the trash out on time yay victory etc etc.

wed/20220914

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58°F, clouds: First assembly of my TSR return / interview with Maud Newton complete: usually try to get to it within a few days of the interview, but I managed to pick a newsletter week to record, so I put it off until this morning which provided ample time for me to think about whether it was worth continuing the pod at all which, of course, it – despite the insane amount of work involved (at least I don't do transcriptions) – is: I enjoy doing the work so I'll continue doing it. Next up: write up a cheat sheet for the intro and outro that gives context to WHY I wanted to talk to Maud (other than it's Maud and she wrote a fucking brilliant book). Unless some delay pops up, on schedule to release a week from today.

(Also: learned that my desktop metal dry erase thing is BRILLIANT for taking notes during pod-assembly. VICTORY.)

Nintendo Direct inspired me to download ZELDA: BREATH OF THE WILD and ok I get it. What an amazing game: I've no clue what I'm doing, but I'm absolutely hooked. I've chopped down many a tree.

Funeral today for my great aunt. Coffin lifting and all that good stuff.