I’m afraid I might be doomed by the narrative. In the bigger picture of the bildungsroman that is my life, I don’t think I necessarily need to die (knocking on wood rn), but it definitely looks like suffering and hitting ten levels below rock bottom is in the cards for me in order for this story to progress at all. Yes, I’m okay. Yes, I’m being dramatic. This shouldn’t be shocking to you. To you, my best friend in the whole world who knows me better than anyone, this is just an average Monday. 

I think I need to get new baskets. And by that I mean I am afraid I may have put all my eggs in one basket (metaphorically, of course. Did you think I suddenly became a farmer? Sure, I could pull off overalls and a hat really well but that’s besides the point) and now that this basket is breaking, and all my eggs are falling out and everything is ruined. This problem could have easily been avoided if I just had another basket or two and distributed my eggs evenly. Do you know what I’m getting at??? If you’re confused, I just basically feel like I constantly have my hopes pinned on one thing at a time to keep me going throughout my life, and when that one thing doesn’t go as I envisioned it, I feel like an absolutely failure. It happens like clockwork every winter, don’t worry about me, I promise. It’s just my annual hopeless phase. I think I’ll be okay. I just hate how quickly time passes and actually getting to the future I had been working toward. Time’s just so freaky!!!

In your last letter, you asked me what TV shows or movies I would finally get around to watching if I had two weeks free of responsibilities or plans or anything (and that rewatches weren’t allowed…what a direct attack on me, a chronic rewatch girl…). And honestly, that’s been my life the last two weeks except I’ve… been rewatching New Girl and HIMYM…I’m sorry… but if I were to redo the last couple weeks and start something people have been asking me to watch, I think as a sitcom freak I would finally start Arrested Development and Community. I come across way too much content around those shows online and I think I just need to watch them already at this point. But you know how I get about starting new shows. I’ll get around to it though I promise!!! In terms of movies, I really want to see We Live In Time (Yes I still haven’t gotten to see it) and Aftersun, the latter because I hear good things about it constantly and it’s a favorite of so many sweet friends of mine. Wait also Before Sunrise — I can’t believe I (a hopeless romantic) still hasn’t seen it…guess I’m a fake lover girl…

While we’re on the topic of love, I want a new flirtationship so bad. My last thing (if you can even call it that. It lasted two days. New record???) fell through and while it was for a totally good reason (the guy was a bigot. A huge no-no for Faith), I wish I had someone to sneakily flirt with during the holidays. I love a good holiday flirt. Just not with bigots though so maybe it’s for the best. Maybe love—or not even true love, just a talking stage—will find me when I least expect it. So here I am. Not expecting it. I’m waaaaiiiiting… (seriously please I am so bored. And I refuse to use dating apps ever again. That was just horrendous.)

Substack is my favorite thing in the whole world. When I was in middle school, my favorite thing in the whole world was this writing site called Miss Literati. No one ever knows what I’m talking about when I mention it, literally only a few people on Substack when I posted a note about it there. But the writing community on there was so huge and supportive and fun. It was essentially Substack but for tween girls. But the site got shut down in 2017 without warning and I have lost all the stories I posted there forever… because I wrote them directly on the site and not in a separate Word document like an idiot. I still have some stories on an old hot pink, cat-shaped USB saved but a lot of stuff was lost in my own personal version of the burning of the library of Alexandria. But all this to say, I have been Substacking fairly consistently this year and I feel so incredibly fulfilled and proud of myself for building a legitimate archive of my non-music writing and it’s not just living somewhere in my computer for only my eyes to see. Same with this Superfan endeavor — I’m so glad we’re doing this and finding ways to express our creativity in such a collaborative way. It feels very representative of our friendship, if you think about it. 

Speaking of writing, I’m sure you saw that I posted on my private story a couple weeks ago that I had been itching to write a YA novel for tween girls. I primarily write nonfiction and memoir because it just feels the most natural and smooth for me to do, but whenever I write fiction it does fall under a Dork Diaries-esque genre, just sans the pictures on every page, and a little more literary. I seriously want to make that a project I pursue, so I think I’m going to be reworking some old stories I already have written. I have like 300 pages of content to work with so this should be fun. I also think I have a legit chance at publishing because I Know People Who Know People… so we’ll see. This is gonna be an extremely long term project though so it’s gonna be a sec before I have any real updates or anything. But I’m excited to make this a thing either way.

We have reached the end of today’s letter… before I sign off, I have to know: Christmas is just around the corner (time moves way too fast) and kids all around the world are busy scrawling out a ridiculous wish list to send to Santa (or their parents if they don’t do the whole Santa bit). We’re adults so we don’t really get to do that anymore, but if Santa was real and could grant you one singular wish for Christmas… what would you ask him for? Feel free to be as unrealistic and unserious as possible. I personally would ask for a bank account that never runs out. I would be such a good rich person. The universe is so unfair!!!

Love yooooouuu,