Nerd-Vegas! On Nuns and Masks

I’d originally thought of “Nuts and Bolts” as an occasional list of things I found that were cool and helpful, so I thought I’d write one of those.

I am at my first writer’s residency ever, at Prospect Street Writers House in North Bennington, Vermont. What they say is true: holy crap is it great. Just the quiet, the space to think. I was willing to pay some (plus asking for birthday and Christmas presents to help pay for it) towards the residency because it’s only a week, and that’s what I need right now. I don’t need to leave my life for two months. Just a week. Anyway, check it out—highly, highly recommend. Especially if you’re looking for a short, accessible residency. This one has an elevator up to the rooms and a roll-in shower.

And it was hard to leave the house, because of the crisis at home that might be settling into more of a routine and less of a crisis, but I decided that it was important for myself and for everyone if I act like I’m not the most codependent motherfucker on the face of the earth. It was hard to leave, and I was anxious, but I did it. In the process I might have lost my place as the most codependent motherfucker on the face of this earth, but I’m still ranked pretty highly.

As I arrived, I had some semi-unhinged thoughts, such as:

1. Do people already think I’m weird? How do I stop other people from making fun of me and excluding me, even though I don’t want to be included in anything because I want to write? This was an active scenario that took half an hour to get past. An Instagram account I follow called softcore-trauma by Margeaux Feldman offers, among other things, pictures of kittens and slogans that say “The traumatized urge to…” And here my kitten slide would be a cat looking bewildered in a tutu and the text would say “The traumatized urge to assume that every social situation is going to be a repeat of early and terrible social situations in which I was made fun of and told I was a weirdo.”
2. What if I paid money and got financial aid and presents of other money from my wonderful in-laws and my mom to come here only to face THE GREATEST HUMILIATION EVER which is that I finally confront the fact that I cannot write anymore? Even though I wrote this morning before I left the house. Because I’ve never done this before and maybe I’ll snap under the pressure? Even though there is no pressure besides the pressure I’m putting on myself.

It was “First Day of School” anxiety, which for me didn’t stop with school. Anyway First Day of School is, in my humble opinion, not as bad as First Day of Things-Other-Than-School, because First Day of School comes with school supplies and structure and homework. If only, for the rest of our lives, they gave us little bundles of pencils and crayons whenever we had to do something new.

Sitting at dinner the first night, we heard the story of how this place was started just a few years ago, and the founders said they were going to AWP to promote the place. Promotion! A task! I tried to keep up my codependent ranking by offering to take some postcards home and share them with MFA students and at local events.

Gary, one of the folks who runs this place, had my number. He looked at me and said, “That’s great. But don’t think about that now. This is your time.”

I thought, that night, about how often I volunteer to help, volunteer with tasks, to feel a sense of connection to others, but also to stave off exactly the silence of sitting with what is next for me.

And, as it turns out, the other kids did not make fun of me. Instead I adore the other two writers I am here with, one of whom is the awesome poet Rebecca Faulkner, whose book of poetry Permit Me to Write My Own Ending is gorgeous. This is one of the only places where it’s socially acceptable to break into a conversation with, “Okay, I’m gonna go write some more.”

It feels like the most delightful binge, a buffet of silence and thinking and writing. Yes, it’s Nerd-Vegas. I’ve gotten the chance to follow thoughts, to rough out a bigger sweep of a project, to see connections that are so tentative, and that privilege of immersing myself has also been soothing, calming, and restorative.

There’s something about being here that’s very monastic, in the positive sense, and I think of convents with a lot of fondness, because four of my aunts were nuns at the St. Scholastica Convent in Fort Smith, Arkansas. My first visceral experience of feminism was roaming around the convent as a little kid, seeing women changing the lightbulbs and out gardening and doing everything they needed to keep their community running

.This delightful image is not at the convent, but outside my grandparents’ house. A young nun holds a cake in the shape of a phone, and my aunt Sister Herbert holds the receiver and pretends to talk on the phone cake, which was one of many in varied shapes that my grandmother made for extra money. When I say “the nuns,” I think not of solemnity, but of four sisters constantly joking and picking at each other and laughing.

And like at a convent, there’s something so supportive that I feel here, in the shared silence, in everyone being in their rooms or going about their business with the knowledge that they are working at a shared endeavor. It also reminds me of college dorms, of the flexibility of being able to withdraw or being able to pop one’s head out when you hear something fun happening.

I also appreciated that everyone had to test for Covid before we arrived. As we’re into late pandemic (which doesn’t mean over! Kind of how “late capitalism” is kind of the worst) and I’m thinking about gearing up for travel to AWP, I am also girding myself for being one of the only masking people anywhere. When I see other people masking, there’s often an exchange of nods or simply eye contact and “You go!” or “It’s not over!” or something like that. Wearing a mask is love, not only because it supports other people’s health but also because it makes it easier for other masked people to go about their own lives and choices.

A few other benefits to still wearing masks:

1. No one can see my facial expressions, especially in work meetings.
2. Fully enjoying resting bitch face, which is really good for me because I am an anxious smiler.
3. Oh, staying alive. Not getting covid and not getting other stuff floating around.

This is why I also wanted to share this GREAT PROJECT that is launching this week: Pandemic Solidarity for the Long Future. This “Black-led multi-racial group based in occupied North America” has released a bunch of resources:

1. A list of ten things you can do to contribute to our community health, masking being number one!
2. A conceptual blueprint that addresses “the mass death, physical and social abandonment, and loss of access to public spaces during these last four years of the COVID-19 crisis.”
3. An upcoming virtual convening for Black and brown activists “who give a f#ck about pandemic solidarity” on March 8th-10th: Register here.
4. A call for folks who want to contribute, vend, perform, or get involved in the convening.

I appreciate this vision!

While I was driving up here, I started listening to a beautiful podcast that my friend Elizabeth Hilts shared with me. It’s by Julia Louis-Dreyfus called “Wiser Than Me,” which is brilliant and soul-filling and was named the Apple Podcast of the Year. She talks with older women to get the wisdom they’ve gathered from their lives, and she also shares a lot about her own story in a way that doesn’t feel stiff or scripted. Oh my gosh, she’s all in, and I love it. The first two I listened to were with Jane Fonda and Isabelle Allende, so come on, right? She also says “fuck” in every episode so far, so it ticks all the boxes for me.

I hope you get a few quiet moments to have a thought or two this week.

xoxo

Sonya