everyday is a child with teeth #8: meditations
I finished reading Sheila Heti’s Alphabetical Diaries last week. I remember when it was an email (I think with the New York Times?) and I was excited about the concept—her diaries but the sentences are organized in alphabetical order instead—but when I opened the emails I could only read a few sentences before I was like “ok, I get it,” and moved on. Anyway, a couple months ago I randomly picked up the book from the giveaway table at work just because it was hers, and when I realized what the book was, I got really excited. I had a feeling that reading it—reading it as a book—during my morning train to work would become something like a meditation practice.
I was right. There’s a rhythmic quality to the sentences, especially when you hit a large chunk of the ones that begin with “I” or “because” or “how” or “not,” that allows you to sort of read with your main brain and let your second-level brain wander. The book is also bit of a meditation on writing simply because it is a topic that she comes back to again and again—wanting to write, needing to write, not being able to write, wishing she did anything else instead of writing etc etc. But then as a narrative, it is quite enjoyable too. The un-chronological nature of the book makes it fun, like putting together a puzzle. I think my favorite sentence was maybe “Of course Zadie Smith is married.”
During the pandemic I took a two-day writing seminar with Sheila about creating chance in your work. In one of the exercises we wrote down a lot of questions about the project we were working on and then flipped a coin three times (heads-yes, tails-no) with the understanding that we’d follow on whatever the coin said (though of course we could also not). I asked questions about the themes that I thought I was thinking about and then the answers came back No, No, No No. But then a series of questions: Is there a point to it? Yes. Will it Reveal itself in time? Yes. Should I just stop making excuses and write? Yes. Reading it back now, felt really good, you know? A message. But then a few lines down, another note “Writing is work, not divine intervention.” Right.
Listening to The Collective, Kim Gordon’s new record is also not not a meditation. On this record her droll voice is at times menacing or matter-or-fact or bored (or or or) over beats that are fucking dirty and destroyed and have the relentless energy of machines that are constantly flattening, pummeling, rooting a hole through the streets and the earth independent of any humans. Sentient. You can listen and zone out and vibe; check back in when something she says catches your ear. “Send in the clowns/send in the army” she sings in “It’s Dark Inside” and I imagine a spider-shaped metal structure ripping out trees, swimming in a fountain of lava with glee. People always describe her lyrics as stream of consciousness, but I don’t know, isn’t everything? It reminds me of NO ONE IS RANDOM, a phrase my friend T and I say to each other all the time, especially upon the discovery of someone’s family member of note. Yesterday she and I were also talking about the idea of revisiting the same topic in your work throughout the years (some people think it’s bad, we do not). In the past two weeks Kacey Musgraves and Ariana Grande both released songs about their Saturn returns and then I started thinking about Saturn returns again. I am always thinking about Saturn returns. This is the legacy of Gwen Stefani, which once again, I wrote about recently.
Anyway back to the Kim, in the liner notes she thanks Rachel Kushner for the lyric prompts. The name of the record is taken from Jennifer Egan’s The Candy House (also the name of the second song on the record). I feel like saying “stream of consciousness” is, in a way, pretending like her lyrics are more “divine intervention” and less “work.”
On “Dream Dollar,” the last song on The Collective, Kim sings (somewhat unintelligibly), “cement the brand/get in the room” and then “dreams are…???” And it doesn’t matter that I don’t understand what she’s singing dreams are because then I heard her singing ALL YOUR DREAMS WILL COME TRUE/ALL MY DREAMS CAME TRUE/BUT NOW… I HAVE A BUNCH OF OTHER DREAMS BA-DUMP-BA on “Quest for the Cup,” a Sonic Youth song on Experimental Jet-Set, Trash and No Star, which is possibly my favorite album of theirs. I liked my brain filling in the blank from the information available.
Anyway the record is really great. I am starting The Candy House this week.