My first takeaway is that New Brunswick, New Jersey is really cute. It’s a college town with a downtown that reminds me of Boulder, Colorado and San Luis Obispo. I haven’t spent much time in New Jersey, and New Brunswick made a great impression. Random people—waiters and baristas—expressed genuine interest in writing when I told them I was attending a writing conference. This is markedly different from the “Oh, that’s nice” response I often get in San Diego when I tell people I write.

Once the conference was underway, many good and useful easter eggs came through. I mainly attended sessions on publishing, since I’m in the query phase for my debut novel. For me, the most helpful feedback and information concerned comps (comparative titles).

The following is a collation of useful information I gathered from conversations with agents about my book, and from a lecture on comp titles by Jessica Berg, literary agent with Rosecliff Literary.

• Pick comps that aren’t too “big.” I was recently advised by someone I paid for a consultation to use The Wedding People as a comp, but this was actually used as an example of a too-big comp—it has 1,300,000 reviews on Goodreads. Jessica, along with other agents at the conference, advised aiming for mid-list comps (between 40K and 250K Goodreads reviews).

• Know your genre. Genres aren’t iron-clad categories, but you should understand where your book fits. Your book may fit more than one genre—if so, be sure you know why. For example, my book fits domestic suspense because it centers on relationships (a dangerous relationship partner, close and complicated family relationships, a close friendship), while also fitting psychological suspense (the story is told with a lot of interiority, and the suspense is built through psychological manipulation).

• Define what you’re comping. Who will love it, and why. It doesn’t have to be the same plot as another book—think about what made people love that book, and how yours is similar. Think of it as a vibe check: twisty, warm and fuzzy, cerebral. Also look for similar distinctive elements, such as dual timeline, unreliable narrator, found family, dark academia, epistolary, ensemble cast.

• Spend time doing strategic research. Go to Goodreads, Amazon, and Publishers Marketplace. Search for what’s in your category and what people are saying about those books. It’s a good place to see what readers love about the books you’re comping, so you can assess the feel.

• The sentence test. Be sure you can say something like: “This book is for fans of [Title] because...” or “This book has these elements of [Title].”

• Checklist for your comps: 1. Published in the last five years. 2. Visibility sweet spot (more than 25K reviews, less than 250K). 3. Vibe check—does the reader experience match your book (dark and twisty, warm and fuzzy, cerebral)?

After these sessions I realized I was using comps that were far too “big.” I knew not to comp anything as big as Harry Potter, Gone Girl, or The Hunger Games, but I didn’t realize that recent literary fiction that’s done very well, like The Wedding People, counted as too big too. One way one agen put it was, “If your hair stylist has heard of it, it’s probably too big.” (No shade to hair stylist—mine, I know, is very well read—but you get the point.)

The task of finding comps can be onerous. I’m not sure I have the perfect ones, but I know I’m a lot closer. It was also mentioned that if you sign with an agent, they’ll redo your comp titles for the publisher—because they have their finger on the pulse of what’s selling in a way all the Goodreads research in the world can’t match. So do your best, but don’t imagine you’ll find the Platonic form of comp titles.

My odometer read eighty-five miles per hour as I merged onto I-70 West. I slowed to avoid the police who often sit at the base of the foothills. Once I’d past them, I sped up again, desperate to put distance between myself and Denver.

I didn’t want to think. I focused on the rumble of the pavement beneath my tires. When the opening to the Eisenhower Tunnel came into view, I let my thoughts creep back in. I never ceased to marvel at the massive feat of engineering ducking beneath the Continental Divide. The point of determination for water. East or West. My cells responded to the pull. A small pride swelled at joining the westerly flow.

I thought of all the travelers before me, caught in the same current. Towards possibility, or perhaps oblivion. From my speakers, Jim Morrison purred The West Is the Best, his dark song of patricide and annihilation.

The sun pounded through my windshield. Then I plunged into the dark tunnel, and traffic slowed abruptly, choking the air with exhaust. When I finally emerged a summer storm rain covered the mountain in thick sheets.

Traffic crawled under the assault. Tinny echos drowned out my music. I switched it off and checked my voicemail.

My dad’s voice boomed: “So, have you left? What’s with the lack of communication? Call me when you get to St. George. You’ll stay there tonight. I’ll reserve a room at the Marriott. There’s a restaurant with great cinnamon rolls.”

I texted back: Thanks, Dad. I’m on the road. I’ll stay in St. George, but I already have a hotel lined up, so no need for the Marriott. I’ll see you tomorrow, early evening.

Annoyance bled through his reply: Fine, have it your way. But when you get into Orange County, stop at Ikea in Newport to order cabinets for the apartments going up downtown. It’s open until 9 p.m. You’ll make it if you stay on schedule.

So it had begun. I’d be Johnny-on-the-spot the moment I arrived.

I replied: Sure. Send me the specs.

The hail stopped, ushering in a torrent of rain. My windshield blurred gray-green, my windows fogging over. I pulled off at a scenic overlook. Once parked, I restarted my music. Van Morrison crooned Into the Mystic, smooth and tough as leather. I leaned back and nodded off.

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A light scratch of nails on metal roused me from my nap me. When I opened my eyes, the scratching was gone. Rain pattered steadily on the roof. I closed my eyes again, but the scratching returned, on the passenger side door. Reorienting, I ran through a mental catalogue of mountain creatures. None I could think of would scratch so gently.

I strained to see through the side-view mirror and caught sight of a tiny, drenched Ewok. I reached over and pushed open the door.

In popped a shivering puppy the size of a squirrel, a tangle of matted chestnut fur. A dainty but sturdy thing, muscle wrapped her bird-fine haunches. She cocked her head and looked me int he eye. One ear stood at attention while the other flopped toward her jaw. She was so young. I couldn’t fathom how she had come to be alone in a storm.

Soaked through, her black eyes shone with the intelligence of an animal who understood that a stranger’s car could mean rescue. I gathered the quaking creature to my chest. She relaxed into me, and I stroked her small body as she calmed.

The rain picked up again. I switched on the wipers, scanning for the car she might belong to. There were no cars in sight. I turned the heat to high, fogging the windows, and fished a sweatshirt from my bag to dry her fur.

“How did you get here?” I asked. She licked my nose. Her stomach grumbled against my palm. I bit carrot sticks from my cooler into small pieces and held them in my open palm. She gobbled them voraciously. I promised we’d find real food as soon as I could drive.

While we waited for the rain to let up, I held her beneath my chin. A warm ache spread beneath my ribs, like frozen hands warmed in the flow of the kitchen sink. By the time the sun broke through, she was mine.

A few miles up the road lay Silverthorne, where we’d find a pet supply store. I pressed play on my stereo, and this time Clapton’s Layla poured from the speakers. Instantly, the puppy fell asleep in my lap. Just like that, she had her name.

On the loading zone curb, my dad’s aftershave lingered in my hair from our hug goodbye. Before I could enter the terminal, the wind whistled a banshee’s wail. I tripped over nothing and stumbled forward. I righted myself and stood still. The conditioned air whooshing out of the sliding doors seemed to push me away. When a strand of hair whipped into my eye, I hurried inside.

At a newsstand, I picked up The Atlantic. As the cashier handed me the receipt, a muscle at the base of my skull seized, and I placed my hand on the spasm. I turned my head slightly to release the tension, and from my periphery, a glint of silver in a man’s black hair swallowed my attention. I faced the glint and time folded in on itself.

I sidestepped the newsstand and squinted, calibrating. His face. A face I’d pushed into history’s archives. Now in front of me. Still handsome. Still wrong.

His features seemed to shift before me, their aquiline proportions elongating, and I saw him as I had in our last moments. A wraith. A hollow thing. A man who had nearly emptied me before my life had the chance to root.

Pressure built inside me, then gave way to a brittle calm. I traced his contours slowly and noted a slight change: the application of a thin veneer. When he walked a few paces, I saw the change clearly. A new restraint. Affected. Performative. He’d sanded down the overconfidence of the man who once strode toward me in another airport, a seeming lifetime ago.

He leaned against a pillar while keeping watch on the ladies’ room, feet carefully crossed, an empty face, waiting for a cue to take shape. He pulled his boarding pass from his bag and eyed it.

When a pretty girl in her early thirties emerged, he pushed off the pillar, and after a second’s lag, his face came to life.

She padded toward him on brown driving loafers, tan trousers swishing at her hips. Silky chestnut hair gathered into a ponytail at the nape of her thin neck. Her lived-in polish clashed with the newness of Sergio’s straight-cut, American sports coat like mismatching shades of black.

Had I not been horrified, I might’ve laughed at the cosplay.

He touched her arm, and old fury lifted its head, snake-fast, hood-flared and ready. A foreign instinct took control of my limbs before I could catch myself. I moved toward them. When I gained control and halted, they stood a few paces away. I had no plan.

He hadn’t noticed me yet. “Let’s find a seat, love. Let me take your bag.” A whiff of Locust Valley lockjaw trimmed his voice. So obvious, I thought. But it wasn’t to her. He’d cloaked her in his delusion. She wore it like a perfume.

“Thank you.” She beamed at him and handed over her brown woven tote, then re-tied the sweater around her shoulders.

Her handbag hung from the crook of his elbow, and his boarding pass dangled from his fingertips. Sensing he was being watched, he stood a little taller, alert and preening. I recognized the posture. He scanned for adoring eyes.

Instead, he found mine.

His face slackened. A drooping latex mask.

I glared unblinking.

His olive skin paled to a grey-green, highlighting the thin scar on his left cheek. In a flash I saw the slash that made it. The half second we both stood in shock before the blood seeped down his face, dripping onto the collar of his shirt.

The boarding pass fluttered from between his fingers to the carpet.

I closed the space between us. “You dropped something,” I said, tilting my head toward the limp slip of paper. I couldn’t read it clearly, but the last name printed on the paper wasn’t the one I’d known. Rage, a decade buried, smoldered beneath my sternum. I leaned close enough for him to feel it.

His date’s wide eyes bounced between us, confusion escalating to alarm.

He bent down and grabbed the ticket, spilling the contents of her handbag.

Mute, he gathered a worn alligator-skin wallet, lipstick, and an antique brass compact engraved A. Sutton. After stuffing the items into the bag, he placed a heavy hand on her shoulder, directing her away. “Actually, on second thought, let’s grab a bite before our flight. It’ll be better than whatever mush they’re serving on board.” His panic muddled his Nassau County intonation.

Did she notice? Maybe the wrongness lodged like a splinter somewhere in the back of her mind. I hoped so. Her body stiffened at the force of his touch. She frowned. “If you think so, love, but Air France has excellent food.”

“I cannot deal with airline food today, Annabel!” he said, pitch rising an octave. He shoved her tote into her hand.

She allowed herself to be ushered away by the hand on her lower back. Her compliance unleashed a thousand stinging nettles beneath my skin. I wanted to scream, Don’t be so fucking weak! But I was no braver than her. I just watched as he pushed her along, close behind her with quick, awkward steps.

She glanced over her shoulder. Her questioning eyes met mine and a maternal swell drowned my anger.

I wanted to run after them and tell her everything. But the unhinged are easily dismissed. I bit my cheek, drawing blood. My feet stayed planted.

I had once been an Annabel, bewildered by a sudden change in the weather. I, too, had been hustled away in jarring confusion, solid earth eroding beneath my feet.

Annabel Sutton. I would remember that.

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In the slow relaxing hours of evening, I often find myself counting the hours until I can go to bed. Not because I’m terribly tired, but because it brings me closest to the morning when my mind is freshened and I can devote a few precious hours to my writing. A few precious hours of giving form to my inner world.

I’ve always envied night owls. Time seems to stretch out for them with an elasticity not accessible to early birds. For us, the minutes count down until the momentum of the day pulls us into a rhythm set by the life’s demands.

My consummate status as a morning person is entrenched not just by biology, but by where I live and the shape of my life. In the beach towns of southern California, a 9PM dinner reservation is essentially unheard of. As a clinical psychologist specializing in trauma, most weekdays are spent forging through the labyrinthine inner worlds of my patients to clear the monsters and demons obscuring their paths. I am an excellent compartmentalizer, so the creatures of the day don’t follow me home. But I rarely find my way back to the open channels between my own mind and the page. In the evening I can rarely connect with the experience of wonder.

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about wonder and meaning. Wonder is an experience so easily accessed in childhood through the little things: cottonwood trees sending tiny puffs into the sky, the way grass smells during an Easter egg hunt. We so often forget to notice these things once adulthood has gobbled up the newness of life, once one’s own monsters and demons have become known, and once many curtains have been pulled back to reveal many wizards.

Wonder is what we feel when the unknown is at our fingertips but not yet in our palms. To write is to experience wonder in this way — newness flowing from my fingertips and the cottonwood trees of my childhood returning in vivid color as I describe them through the eyes of a character.

Meaning is different, meaning is what we discover once we’ve had an experience — when we examine it as it rests in the palm of our hand. Then from it we create our stories. Meaning is the trodden path of adulthood.

I’ve taken the creation of meaning seriously — understood my childhood, worked through my trauma, accepted my quirks, figured out how to make a meaningful contribution to the world through my work.

My re-introduction to wonder through writing evolved slowly, first a poetry seminar. Then revising of past writings that I’d never really taken seriously. Then a novel formed in my mind and I began putting it on the page.

As I began to take my writing seriously, I developed my morning ritual. It goes as follows: Wake early, drink a cup of bone broth — protein before caffeine is crucial for midlife cortisol management, have a first shot of espresso, take to the treadmill for a walking meditation, prepare two more shots of espresso, begin writing.

I can see how that might sound like the privileged wellness routine of a southern Californian, because it is. But it is also the gateway to a mind still and open enough to create a whole world built only of words. It is my gateway to wonder.

When I finished the first draft of my novel, I understood its meaning — a thing discovered within the connective tissue of the characters’ experience. In the subsequent passes, wonder and meaning lived more or less as neighbors. When I finished, I panicked fearing I’d lost my avenue to wonder.

But then I began a second novel. I am deep into my first draft and soaking up every moment I can of the wonder of the new creation. It waits for me each morning, knocking on the door of my mind like a child excited for a day at the beach.

As I slow my clinical practice and my husband and I spend more time in Italy, my circadian rhythm may shift. I will at least have to get used to 9PM dinners. Perhaps then I will find my way into writing through the dark hours. But for now, I will look forward to early hours when my mind is clear and the gateway to wonder is lit by the fresh sun.

Yesterday, I was at an anniversary party for my cousin and his wife at their Laguna Beach home. My father showed up three hours in for a short visit. As always, he made a splashy entrance. He arrived in his new Bentley wearing a cashmere Loro Piana baseball cap. In his pocket he had a piece of paper that turned out to be a booking sheet for the arrest of his ex-girlfriend. On the sheet was her mugshot and the details of her arrest.

My dad proudly showed the booking sheet to anyone who would look while explaining that he had gotten her car, a 2019 Mercedes whose interior appeared to have been remodeled by a raccoon, out of impound. The ex-girlfriend is now in her 80s, and her escapades are another story. They are a story about which my father has little interest beyond where he is highlighted.

While most people would not think having an ex-partner with a rap sheet is much of a flex, for my dad it gave him bragging rights. Specifically the right to brag about helping her with her car and now helping her to get the care that she needs going forward. He plans to provide support for her until her children are able to take over. These plans come much to the chagrin of his current partner, for whom he is also caring after a health crisis last year.

In some ways, I am proud of him for this. Caring is not something that I am used to him doing. He didn’t do it when I was a kid and as an adult the care that he has offered me has always come with some kind of a price tag.

In other ways this caring he is doing for his ex-girlfriend is a creative version of the disloyalty he has always brought to his relationships. I can understand how his current partner might view the energy and resources going into his ex a kind of infidelity. Although, he assures me that this is not how she sees it.

I believe that his current caretaking comes from a part of him that wishes to make amends for the chaos he’s caused. Even though I am sure he is far from finished causing it.

This odd vignette above is a tame one among the of hundreds I’ve experienced with him over the years. Most have taken place in beautiful spots like my cousins home. Beverly Hills, Whistler, Vail, and Aspen have all been subjected to my father’s antics. He has lived life committed to a strange behavior in fancy places.

I have long ceased being embarrassed by these moments, although they can still take me off guard. I have also long since made peace with who my father is as a person and to me. I’ve been able to do this through the one condition-less gift he has given me. The gift of honesty about who he is and the life he’s lived.

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Sometimes this honesty has been too much and I’ve had to remind him that I’m his daughter not his confessor.

Nonetheless, his willingness to let me see him for who he is has given me the ability to know my own reality without confusion or the guilt that one may feel for calling out a seriously flawed parent. This is not a gift bestowed by most parents of his ilk. I know this as a fact because, while I am a writer, I am also a clinical psychologist and I work with the children of men like my father.

He has also given me the gift of allowing me to write about him. In my upcoming novel, the father is, essentially, my father. Not all of him, but a certain cross-section of his personality. I’ve given him the book to read. He loves it and has given me full consent to publish. I didn’t paint him positively, in fact when he read it he said, “you’ve captured my narcissism artfully.” I know there are parts of him that it would be cruel to expose. I know where the line is. But he is willing to allow for those dark places that I will not include in my writing, to simply be what they are.

Some people who know my dad and the story of my upbringing have a hard time understanding how I consider myself close to him. I understand that. It’s strange, especially for people whose parents had roughly normal-range personalities. Sometimes I question it myself. But at the end of the day it’s about being able to level with him about what reality is.

Many people with his personality tendencies won’t do this. They will gaslight and bend the truth to their dying day. If this were the case, I am sure I would have long since cut contact. The gift of truth allows me to have feelings or memories without questioning them. It would also be different if I were dependent on him in any material way. But as it is, when I see him I can sit back and allow the surreal spectacle to unfold.

All of that is to say, Happy Father’s Day!

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“Is that the blue you’re using?”

These are the six words that ended the painting career of Eve Babitz, queen of the late mid-60s and early 70s Sunset Boulevard from Vine to the Beverly Hills Hotel. They were spoken by Earl McGrath, a close friend and crucial figure for her as an artist. For Eve, the words were “devastatingly undermining.” Their impact is described in great detail in the pages of Didion and Babitz, Lili Anolik’s heavily editorialized dual biography of Joan Didion and Eve Babitz.

While the book—about which I have much to say beyond the scope of this short essay—provides context and nuance, it describes something universal to artists of every medium: the fragility of nascent art, and the power of the wrong words from the right person to cripple an artist’s spirit.

I have talked to many writers whose careers stalled early due to cruel and most often amateurish critiques from fellow students in writing workshops. Some recovered; others quietly stopped taking their work seriously.

I knew I would be susceptible to such poisoning, so I nursed my words away from the eyes of others, save a trusted few. At first my voice came out of me with a rasp. A little unrefined. But as I developed my first novel, draft by draft, I found a voice that is genuinely mine. I can feel it vibrating from my fingers as I write. When I use it I feel its resonance, and I know when I’ve gone off pitch.

In this age of AI, I feel sad for what the tool may be taking from this messy genesis of something raw and real. A process that is often so painful. I still cringe when I look back at my early drafts. I’m sure I will feel the same about future early drafts. But in not shying away from the pain, I know the difference between what is authentically mine and what is not.

That is not to say it’s perfect, or that it won’t at times come out too quietly, too loudly, or with the occasional squeak. Refinement will be a lifelong task. But I know now that if someone asks me, “Is that the blue you’re using?” I can confidently say, “Why yes, it is.”

1. Be born into a… how shall we say… difficult family. Be sure the family tree is full of odd fruit. Mental illness, emotional dysregulation, general eccentricity, and occasional genius. It will be difficult at times, especially when you’re small and trying to figure out how to be a human, but trust me, if you stick with it there are gifts. You’ll develop a keen eye for the moment things are about to get weird.

2. Try to fix your difficult family. Learn to read the air for mood shifts. Try to fix moods in all of the unsophisticated ways a child might: mirroring, appeasing, performing, etc.

3. Learn to interpret astrological charts in an effort to make sense of the incomprehensible around you.

4. Try drugs. Start with marijuana. You will feel calm and detached. Then begin going to raves and learn all about party drugs. Never take anything that threatens the point of no return.

5. So you can get into a good college, be sure to keep up your school work. And do some extracurriculars so For example, do ballet, no one suspects that ballet dancers are sneaky partiers.

6. Turn 18. Stop partying just as your peers are amping up. Go to the parties, but be a little bit out of sync with your peers. You’ll be able to observe it all from a slight distance. Pretend that this doesn’t make you feel a little lonely.

7. Study psychology and philosophy in college. Return to your earlier pursuit of trying to fix your family, and thereby yourself, with your new arsenal of complex clinical and abstract. Spoiler: it doesn’t work.

8. Start writing. Just for yourself. Make sure you don’t take yourself seriously. You’d probably need a serious credential, like an MFA to take yourself seriously.

9. Revisit step five, this time by getting a doctorate in clinical psychology. Spoiler: it still doesn’t work.

10. Come to peace with the fact you can’t fix your family, no matter how many letters you put behind your name.

11. Move to Encinitas, California. The ocean will help you heal.

12. Start a private practice where you help people from families like yours. This is where you can make a difference. It will feel good.

13. Take a professional sojourn into consulting for Reality Television. Watch dysfunctional systems on steroids, both in front of and behind the camera. It will pay well and you’ll meet some great people, but the whole time you’ll know it’s not where you’re meant to be.

14. Take a sabbatical from Reality Television work when it starts making you a little queasy.

15. Notice a growing itch you can’t seem to scratch. Do more yoga, take up tennis. Keep writing, but tell no one.

16. Realize that you’re happiest when you’re writing.

17. Develop the crazy fantasy that you could write a novel.

18. After a few months, tell your husband and a couple of best friends about your novel. Be sure to underplay your ambition lest anyone think you’re having a midlife crisis.

19. Find a writing coach. Someone who’s kind and encouraging. A nascent novel is after all a very delicate thing.

20. Spend three years creating a story you can be proud of. It’s not your story, but maybe the father in the novel is pretty much your father. He said it’s okay to use him like that. So go for it.

21. You’ve written a novel. You’re a novelist. Query agents if you like. But no matter what, you are now a novelist.

The bar of a lounge at the San Diego Airport is crowded. Patrons are crammed in elbow to elbow. I’m seated at the bar with my laptop and a Negroni waiting out the time until my flight. Two men take the stools directly to my right. In the tight quarters, they speak at a volume indicating they wish to be overheard. I gather that they are colleagues, but not exactly friends.

The two calibrate their banter on the topic of guns. They speak of the guns they own, the guns they’d like to own, and discuss an acquaintance who they think will shoot himself with a gun he owns. The reason they think this man will shoot himself is unclear.

Apparently the at-risk man is in his late thirties and recently inherited a million dollars. The colleagues agree that this man should just live off the money. They also agree that they could sustain themselves on the $80K annual return, which they think the million should yield. With this information, I gather they are not from San Diego. After a brief discussion of hunting, fishing, and Oregon Football, they fall silent.

To the right of the co-workers is a nervously friendly man who is making an effort to strike up conversations with nearby travelers. The nervous man appears sweaty in his tailored blazer and jeans. His hair is slicked with pomade. He attempts to chat with the two men. The one closest to him responds with polite friendliness. He reveals that he and his co-worker work in the food industry and have been touring production plants.

The man closer to me emits irritation about his co-worker friendliness with the nervous guy. From the corner of my eye, I see him examining the viney tattoos on his bare arm. I glance sideways to see how closely he resembles the image of this that formed in my mind during the conversation about guns.

I’m surprised to find that this man with the armful of tattoos has enviably red, pouty lips, as if he’s discovered the perfect plumping lip tint. His hooded eyes carry the unmistakable look of disdain. I recognize this expression from the faces of people who judge harshly as a matter of course. I decided to think of him as Mr. Judgy and his co-worker as Mr. Friendly.

Mr. Judgy proves my impression correct over the next twenty minutes. When Mr. Friendly turns his attention back to his co-worker, Mr. Judgy brings up a colleague who is “a massive dick.”

In response, Mr. Friendly walks a tight rope. To be agreeable he says, “Yeah, the guy’s difficult.” Apparently he’s strictly business and refuses to socialize. But, Mr. Friendly adds, that the guy is also reliable and honest.

Mr. Judgy says it’s a good thing the guy will retire soon.

After a brief hiatus in their banter, apropos of nothing, Mr. Judgy says, “I made the mistake of revealing how much my wife is worth to my wife.” He then reveals to his co-worker and everyone else in earshot that she is worth $5 million.

I wonder about the dynamics in their marriage.

Mr. Friendly doesn’t respond to the revelation of Mr. Judgy’s wife’s net worth. Instead, rivaling his colleagues non-sequitur, Mr. Friendly mentions that his favorite show is about baking.

A few seats down a woman begins a loud Facetime chat. Mr. Judgy makes several irritated comments then says, “Should I throw something at her?”

Mr. Friendly says, “As long as you can find something that isn’t sharp.”

Mr. Judgy chuckles and says, “It’d be funny if we got kicked out.”

Mr. Friendly orders a beer.

I finish my cocktail: the only alcohol I’d had in weeks. I’m a little buzzed and I decided to engage. Having an easy out with only five minutes before leaving for my flight, I deem a conversation low risk.

I say, “So you guys work in food?”

They say they do and proceed to tell me about the relative cleanliness of the Impossible Burger plant compared to the other vegan meat plants. Mr. Friendly reports it’s so clean you could eat off the floor.

I ask the composition of the protein in the Impossible Burger.

Mr. Judgy says that it’s a proprietary brown sludge and no one knows the contents.

I say it sounds disgusting.

He agrees, but said it’s a lot less gross than what you see in actual meat plants. I grimace and say, “No more details please.”

The pair tells me they are from Kansas City, where many restaurants have removed vegan options to appeal to Trump voters. Not wanting to veer into everyone’s stance on the culinary trends of the new American fascism, I tell them of how years before while at a restaurant in Montana I asked about a vegetarian option. The waitress told me, in all seriousness, that they had chicken.

Mr. Friendly asks what city I was in. I tell him Bozeman. He says, “That tracks.”

I say goodbye and depart for my gate.

I almost didn’t notice

the paper lanterns,

glowing like deep sea creatures

at bottom of the canyon.

Too, I almost missed the sound

of children playing,

while parents sipped wine,

glasses chiming

in the still-hot evening breeze.

My gaze steadied

on the perfect half moon,

her shadow side visible,

as the earth

kindly reflected back

her lunar glory.

And the purple sky

melted into the ocean,

pitching the dark into night.

(c) Amanda Smith July 2011

(This was my first poem ever published. I wrote it while looking at the pacific ocean on a perfect summer night a few days before my life truly began, although at that point I didn’t know it hadn’t.)

On January 20, a cloud gathered around the country and my mind. I couldn't write. I gave myself a week, believing it would disperse and that I would be able to find my groove again. The wrecking ball began its path through our country with executive orders delighting in their own cruelty and ignorance. Today is March 8th and this is my first attempt at an essay.

In Norman Fucking Rockwell, Lana Del Rey croons, "Your poetry's bad, and you blame the news." I don't want to blame the news for my creative failure, but I'm struggling.

I don't want to write political essays here on Substack. My plan has been to keep my political efforts in the sphere of the ACLU and other spaces of the resistance. I've wanted to keep my creative work as an island of beauty and safety. But I fear that this is a privilege for those not living under the threat of authoritarianism.

In 2019, my husband and I went to Cuba to visit the country's most renowned artists' studios and listen to them speak about their processes. None of their work existed without a subversive political dimension. At first glance, it is an odd juxtaposition. How, in such an oppressed country, could government-funded art be so critical of the regime? Like many dictators, Castro heavily funded the arts, provided that artists' work served as propaganda for their countrymen and a totem of sophistication for the eyes of the world. However, also like most dictators Castro had no eye for nuance. He seemed to not understand the double meaning of the pieces any more than those who criticized the Super Bowl halftime show as incomprehensible.

Artists took the money and produced work of incredibly layered meaning. In the National Art Museum, a piece that exemplifies this portrays a vast crowd listening to Castro, which he saw in his simple-minded narcissism as an adulation. But look closer, and you see that the audience is painted in grey, muted colors, and the proportions of the man on stage are strange. This symbolizes the mind-numbing experience of listening to one of his excruciatingly long, rambling addresses.

During this trip, I thought how sad it was that the oppression of an authoritarian regime could embed itself so deeply into the people's consciousness. The work was incredible, but I couldn't wrap my mind around the idea that escaping the political was impossible even while channeling the eternal muses. I am starting to understand their experience in a way I never believed I could as an American.

I am still committed to writing about life beyond the terror encroaching on all sides of our society. I believe allowing ourselves to see above and beyond our current situation is vital. Perhaps it's possible to walk this line even as funding for the sciences is eroded, women's rights are chiseled away, the department of education is dismantled, our international alliances are broken in favor of aligning with our enemies, and our land is fleeced to circumvent the need for our trading partners. Perhaps.

My intention is for my next essay to be about something else. But I am coming to realize that no matter what I write about, whether it be travel, nature, art, or any aspect of the human experience, the all-too-real will loom and threaten the boundaries of my thoughts. If I deny this fact, my writing will become hollow and inauthentic, but if I allow the pressure to take over, my creative spirit will be flattened.

My husband and I decided to start 2025 with something different. Instead of spending New Year’s Eve with friends, drinking champagne and risking a New Year’s Day hangover, we went to bed early on the last night of 2024. On January 1st we awoke refreshed and energized and set out for a drive up the coast. Our destination: a storied seaside town nestled between the rolling hills of California wine country and the dramatic cliffs of the Northern California coast. We packed the car, loaded up our two dogs, and hit the freeway.

Thanks to the holiday’s open roads, we made record time. As we drove into town on winding roads, we were greeted by fairy-tale cottages, majestic old-growth trees, and a lovely little downtown. Everything about the place radiated an earthiness buffed glossy, like polished jade.

We chose this destination for its mix of raw coastal beauty, culinary delights, architectural charm, and interesting bohemian history. I imagined these elements coming together like a beautifully plated, well-balanced meal. The reality, as realities often are, was more complicated.

The following are three conversations on which I shamelessly eavesdropped. To me, they seemed to reveal the messy, human undercurrents beneath the town’s lovely façade.

CONVERSATION I

Picture a young girl in the painfully awkward throes of adolescence—teeth in the vice grip of metal braces, broken out skin smeared with poorly blended concealer, and a baggy sweater hanging off slumped shoulders. Despite all this, it is clear that one day she will be very pretty. She doesn’t know this yet. She exudes excruciating self-consciousness, which pulsates from her pale skin.

Now imagine this poor girl in a chic Michelin-starred restaurant seated across from her mother—a perfectly maintained blonde who has mastered the understated coastal elegance. Think Nicole Kidman in any recent film, swanning about in cashmere, wine glass in hand, gazing worriedly at the sea.

Now envision the following exchange between mother, daughter, and waiter.

Waiter: Good evening, Mrs. X. Will Mr. X be joining you tonight?

We’ve established Mrs. X is a regular.

Mrs. X: Hello, Damien (not his real name). No, Mr. X won’t make it—it’s just me and my daughter. Have you met Baronessa?

Baronessa isn’t the girl’s real name, but her actual name is an equally royal albatross for a kid who looks like she wants to slide between the cracks of the beautiful oak floor.

Baronessa: (Mumbling while staring at her plate) Hi.

Mrs. X: Baronessa, please speak up and tell Damien about the school you’ll be attending in the fall. (Turning conspiratorially to Damien) It’s the same school I attended, where I was captain of the lacrosse team and president of student government.

Baronessa, still looking at her plate, enunciates just enough to inform Damien—and everyone at the nearby tables—that she’ll be attending a well-known boarding school in Vermont. It’s clear she’s unlikely to become captain of a sports team or a leader in student government anytime soon.

Overhearing this brief, painful exchange, I was struck not just by the weight of status placed on this young girl’s hunched shoulders but by how it clarified something I’d sensed since arriving in this iconic seaside town that titans of industry, movie stars, and other household names call home.

It’s a place where people land after they have summoned the highest peaks of their industry or by riding the coattails of someone who did. The old guard still stands, those with roots reaching back to the town's wilder days. But the old guard is well, very old, and departing one way or another.

As we walked the storybook streets, my husband and I sensed something we struggled to articulate. Though beautifully crafted down to the last genteel detail, it felt blanketed in something heavy. While walking along the beach one evening, I said it reminded me of an over-oaked Chardonnay or a French dish drowning in too much buttery sauce. My husband agreed, calling the decadence heavy-handed.

We lapsed into silence, and I thought about Baronessa with her weighty royal name, which she may well grow into. At boarding school, she’ll learn the ways of her tribe. Once her acne clears and her braces come off, she’ll realize she’s pretty and rich. She’ll learn to reap the benefits of her position. Who could blame her? Alternatively, she might rebel, piercing and tattooing her skin like a Banksy on the stucco of a historic home—but I didn’t sense this was her path.

I wondered what this girl might become without the grooming she was about to receive. Similarly, I wondered what this town might have become had it not been so thoroughly co-opted by the ultra-wealthy. Historically, this land of milk and honey was home to native peoples and soil so rich it provided for humans and animals alike. Later it became an enclave for bohemians and artists. Lots sold for $100, and the wild coastline and majestic forests of oak and cyprus inspired the writers and artists who found refuge on the sandy shores.

Off the coast lies one of California’s most turbulent stretches of sea. When the fog thickens like cream, the land takes on a haunted quality. Madness has been inspired as often as creativity. The days as an artist colony were rife with stories of brilliance interspersed with mental illness, outbursts, and occasional suicides.

The town’s most famous son is a poet whose raw, rich, darkly beautiful words echoed the natural environment from which today’s inhabitants are largely insulated. He urged humanity to de-center itself in the cosmos, to lean into the wildness of nature and ourselves. Yet the town has ignored his sentiment, touting his accomplishments while erasing his message. There’s no room left for wildness or spontaneity.

Let the following exchange demonstrate my point.

CONVERSATION II

Outside a shop, a saxophonist was busking—badly. Notes sounded through the street and into boutiques like an unexpected splash of water from a car driving through a puddle.

Patron: Wow, that’s some music. It must be driving you batty!

Shopkeeper: It’s not great, but I’m not worried—it’s not allowed. They’ll make him stop soon. He’s only been at it for about five minutes.

Patron: Five minutes sounds like enough to me.

Moments later, the irritating music stopped. When I stepped outside, the musician had disappeared.

I can’t say I wasn’t relieved to be relieved of the racket, but the swift removal of the busker unsettled me. Did they simply tell him to leave? Issue a ticket? Escort him to the town limits? Any scenario seemed plausible.

Similarly unsettling was the complete absence of unhoused people. California’s beach towns, with their temperate climate and relative safety, are typically home to many refuge seekers. Yet there wasn’t a single one. Again, I wondered at the methods for maintaining the movie set perfection.

Cracks in the veneer are best seen in the moments where the performance of perfection fails.

CONVERSATION III

A woman sat near us, dressed for a date in a black cocktail dress, her hair perfectly styled. She waited uncomfortably for her date who arrived ten minutes behind her. He appeared to be late 50s and wore a nicely tailored suit and a gold watch with a skeleton dial. He kissed her on the cheek took his seat with bravado. My husband stepped away to the restroom, and I followed their conversation.

Man: The forum in Davos last year was incredible.

He was speaking of the World Economic Forum, where leaders in business and politics meet to discuss the intersection of the public and private sector. It is a who's who of power, and a flex to have gone. This man flexed hard in the drawing out of the word Davos.

Woman: I’d love to go to Davos. Listening to the business leaders would be so inspiring.

Man: Well, what’s really impressive are the world leaders. That’s what it’s truly about.

You see what he did there? He positioned himself above her by dismissing her interest in business leaders and implying she didn’t understand what Davos was really about.

Woman: I can see that. But I’d still love to hear Sam Altman speak.

Man: I suppose. But you know Gretchen Whitmore? Mayor Gretchen Whitmore? She’s amazing—a true visionary.

He waxed poetic about “Mayor Gretchen Whitmore” for several minutes.

For a moment, I was confused. I was certain that it is GOVERNOR Gretchen WhitMER, of Michigan. But this man had been to Davos, so I doubted myself. Maybe she had been a mayor at one time? Or maybe he was talking about someone else from the forum? Still waiting for my husband to return from the bathroom, I googled her.

Governor Whitmer was never a mayor and she did in fact speak at Davos in 2024. I wondered if the woman knew this and said nothing to avoid showing up her date. I hoped he would go to the bathroom so I could tell her, just in case she decided she was tired of his mansplaining. The opportunity never presented itself.

This dumb conversation lingered in my mind, bothering me. Then, it bothered me that it bothered me. Men bragging with skewed facts isn’t unusual—it usually earns no more than an eye roll. But as I walked the chilly beach, digesting our heavy meal, I realized why it stuck with me. I’d been impressed by the man’s Davos flex. When his ineptitude revealed itself, I saw the wizard behind the curtain.

Whether he went to Davos or not, this man was likely one of the town’s owning class. Someone who really needn’t brag and inflate himself. I thought of poor Baronessa and her mother who’d saddled her with a royal title for a name.

Like its inhabitants, the town would be impressive without the heavy-handed polish and performative importance, which stifles the aliveness that first drew the artists, thinkers, and mad ones. As we headed back to our hotel, I wondered what magic could alchemize if a bit of spontaneity and authenticity were allowed to creep back in.

We are always in the process of becoming something. Life begins with naturally unfolding transformations: cells multiply, bones lengthen, and neurons prune like the branches of a bonsai tree, shaping the brain for movement and thought. The planes and angles of adulthood are carved from the soft roundness of childhood.

At some point, we become aware of our ability to direct parts of this becoming. Searching for a sense of self, we awkwardly try on identities like clothes off the rack. If we’re lucky, we eventually find a rough combination that fits well enough to wear through the gauntlet of adolescence. Later, in the clearer light of adulthood, some meticulously tailor their self-image. Others avoid mirrors, letting movement and life’s currents shape the contours of their being. For a long time, life feels full of anticipation, possibility, fear, and excitement. Jobs become careers. Relationships grow into communities and families.

The world expects us to grow in these ways. For the fortunate, support and resources guide the journey. For others, scrappiness, grit, and cunning fill the sails. And for some, further pruning must be done: painful childhoods in need of reckoning, lessons to unlearn, or malformed senses of self to reshape. Some don’t make it. But for those who do, those years are a flurry of newness.

Then the tide begins to recede—not all at once, but in a series of waves. Our bodies stop growing new connections and abilities without effort. We’re told we’ve peaked: fluid intelligence at 25, athletic ability before 30, and, for women, the cruel threat of an expiration date dictated by a patriarchal society obsessed with youthful malleability. As the tide turns, we might find we’ve “become”—a doctor, mother, wife, manager, or some other simplistic title that we’ve identified with.

In this slack tide, dissonance arises—dismissively labeled as a “midlife crisis.” This term, however, fails to capture the depth of what is happening. What stirs in the froth of receding waters is the powerful drive to continue becoming—a drive that society fails to accommodate once adulthood’s milestones have been reached.

The urge to grow collides with the static mold of our lives.

Instead of tending to this yearning, we busy ourselves maintaining those molds, unsure how to address the itch to grow into something greater or more complex.

At 38, I found myself slightly out of sync with my peers. My husband and I became empty-nesters when my stepson left for college, a moment that felt misaligned with my friends’ lives, as many were still expanding their families. We explored the idea of having a child together, but at 48, my husband was ready to grow in a different direction. My own medical challenges, while not insurmountable, ultimately felt like too great a gamble.

I found myself with the unusual luxury of time. For a while, I floated untethered, at loose ends, increasingly aware of a pressure building within me. By evening, the pressure grew so intense that I sought relief in a glass of wine. But this habit didn’t sit well with my body or my better judgment.

One morning, during meditation, I turned toward the pressure. I asked why it pressed so insistently against my ribcage and bore down on my gut. It spoke clearly: the time had come to continue becoming. Vague, I know, but somehow the path ahead cleared.

I’d always written for myself and occasionally shared with trusted others—poems, musings, essays, and short stories formed my private, unpolished opus. Professionally, I’d written as a psychologist, but I had never considered the possibility of becoming someone who writes seriously.

An idea for a novel came to me. It began as thinly veiled autobiography but quickly took on a life of its own. For a year, I wrote earnestly and mostly in private. I hired a writing coach to help me structure the story—a novel can easily become a messy thing. Otherwise, I rarely talked about it, fearing for the delicate nature of its development and doubting my ability to handle dismissal or ridicule.

Writing quickly became my happiest time. I started waking at 5:30 to drink coffee and work on my novel before seeing patients at 10 a.m. The pressure within me dissipated as I wrote, satisfied that its energy now had an outlet. Over time, the pressure morphed into fuel, driving me forward even now as I write these words.

For a year and a half, this was enough. But time rolls on, and the need for growth presented itself again. Molecules become cells, and cells become organs; the fetus grows until it must leave the womb and present itself to the world. My novel is nearing that point.

We live in a strange era where presenting oneself to the world involves branding—creating an identity to release into the ether. Self-promotion has become mandatory. Gone are the days when publishing houses funded book tours or carefully shepherded new authors into the literary world.

I am not a natural self-promoter, but the mandate of becoming requires that I try. I chose a new name. If you’re reading me for the first time, this essay introduces me under that name. It is my name in a different form, chosen to separate my professional identity from my new becoming as a writer. Yet, almost immediately upon adopting this name, I felt the solidification of my becoming.

Whether the world reflects back to me the self I am becoming remains to be seen. Either way, I will continue to write. The pressure has made its mandate clear. So here it is: the first essay I will publish on Substack, the first presentation of this nascent becoming to the world.

If you’ve read this far, perhaps you resonate with the yearning of which I speak. Perhaps you are where I was a year and a half ago, feeling the pressure but unsure how to translate it into action. If so, I don’t know how to help except to assure you that the urge to become—at any phase of life—is deeply human, and important.

If we fail to honor it, we risk becoming something we wish we hadn’t: a mistress, a divorcee, an alcoholic, or the owner of an absurd car. We risk dismantling the foundation we spent so much time building rather than recognizing it as the cornerstone upon which to grow. I believe it’s often best to transcend and include our former selves, becoming more complex versions of who we already are.

That’s not to say dismantling isn’t sometimes necessary—poisoned fruits are best removed from our gardens.

But before dismantling, I humbly suggest asking how you might transcend and include all that you have been, to build upon who you are for the adventure of what’s to come.

Join me on an exploration of truth best told through fiction and mythic stories found in everyday life.

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