how can I write when *gestures at…everything*

between certainty and silence, a third path "forward"

Sarah Charlesworth, Goat, 1985

Is this a big deal or are things totally fine?

I mean, I know they’re not fine, but how much panic is too much panic, and isn’t part of why Democrats lost in 2024 because they were seen as panicking over the wrong things?

Is freaking out what They want us to do while they pass tax cuts for the rich?

How do taxes work? Is bitcoin real and why the hell didn’t I make a boatload of money on it?

Is the torrent of insane news just Steve Bannon’s “flood the zone with shit” strategy in action ? And if so, what are we supposed to do about it?

And, with all *gestures at everything* this going on, how am I supposed to write an essay about the hero’s journey I went on last Saturday stuck in the bathroom with my 3yo son, 1yo daughter, and 11yo elderly dog?

Also, are “They” real? Or is the frame of the evil masterminds puppeteering this all itself an illusion? And if so, is that what They want us to - shit!

What about how, for some people, I am “They”? What if history shows that I was the problem and They (my They, not their They) were the solution?

Or is separating people into ‘us’ and ‘them’ the real problem? Do I need to set up a podcast where I talk to people on the other side and see if we can be friends?

And AI! I mean, have you seen what the AI is doing? Is it the problem, the solution, or the reason why this essay took way too long to write¹?

Do I need to chill out and breathe and restart the The Artist’s Way or - or! - start my ‘protein for creatives’ brand, The Artist's Whey?

Seriously I think that has legs. Big muscular ones. Also, Creatine for Creatives.

Is it crass to think about get rich quick schemes at a Time Like This?

Or is laughter the thing we cannot let die?

This implies things are bad, but in my bubble of bliss, they’re mostly fine. If I didn’t watch the news, I’d be confused about egg prices (the egg prices!), but that’s about it.

Is that privilege itself the problem? Or part of the woke mind victim mentality that’s keeping me and everyone else from actually doing anything substantial about the shitfuckery that may or may not be destroying our nation.

Things are always fine until they’re not, right?

Are we in the early days of what I read about in Lion Feuchtwanger’s 1934 novel, The Oppermans?

It’s a classic "it can't happen here" story about a Jewish well-to-do family in Germany losing everything as the Nazis come to power. It was written seven years before the start of World War II at a time when such a thing, let alone the Holocaust, were unfathomable, beyond the pale ideas. No way, everyone would say.

And then, just a short time later, way?

Whey?? Or no whey??
And if no whey, then what? The farts borne of pea protein will destroy the world and of this I am sure.

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the answer, my friends, is I don’t fucking know

Last Friday,

Debbie Weil

interviewed me about age and creativity. Her first question was basically '“how is all of *this* affecting your creative work?”

I spent ten excruciating minutes rambling before giving up and saying "I don't know."

Because I don’t.

And prior to that convo, I was too paralyzed to even admit it.

schools need to make ‘idk’ one of the right answers

Every question in school had a right answer. When you didn’t know, you guessed. Maybe you got it right, maybe you got it wrong, but what you were learning - really learning - was that for every question, there is a right answer.

But in life, the answer is almost always ‘idk'.

The ‘right’ answer - or at least one of them - to at least half of the questions in school should be ‘i do not know and let me tell you why.’

Especially with AI nipping at our heels (I gotta figure out how to make money on that too), the skill that will most matter is the ability to sit in your idk without falling apart.

But that, my friend, is very hard to do, especially on the world (!) wide (!!) web!!!

Because there is nothing worse than being wrong on the internet.

So of course I became paralyzed into not saying a thing:
If I say nothing, I’m terrible.
If I say something and this all ends up being nothing, I’m also terrible.
If I admit that I don’t know, I’m a spineless sack of shitakke mushrooms.

The thing with feelings

The thing about feelings is they're insane. Emotions feel both like way too much (What are you so sad about, everything is fine?) and not nearly enough (do you not see, you tiny fool with the big shoes, the world is ending??)

Besides and perhaps even including math and science, everything is

Yet we're expected to have them figured out, categorized, and properly labeled at all times. Especially in Times Like These, we think we need to know exactly where we stand before we can speak.

When in reality, it is the not knowing that we need most. I won’t speak for everyone - it’s what I need most right now.

The answer, my friends, is literally my friends

Maybe the reason I’m so afraid to say idk is not the admission itself, but the implicit ask that comes with it.

To say idk is to ask for help in finding out, or help in holding with others that which cannot be known.

When I’m feeling helpless, the hardest thing to do is admit it. I want to show strength.

But doing so closes me off from the real strength² that comes from being doing the hard yet simple thing of being honest.

Meanwhile, saying idk is a communal act. An invitation that says:

I'm lost, are you? Let's grab some coffee and a scone or Artist’s Whey Vanilla Karenina and breakfast sammy whichever you want and not know together, me and you, and anyone else who wants to come too."

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comment

1. Lotta goofs here but I am genuinely curious, how is all of this going for you?

2. Do you know?

3. What am I missing here?

5. Would you buy “The Artist’s Whey” in bulk to support me getting it off the ground?

6. Anything else - floor and the walls and the ceilings and the door are all yours.

7. I can tell this is good for me bc I have more energy now than when I started. How do you know you’re on the right track with these feelings and thoughts?

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1. this is a separate piece that I’ll soon write, but in short - being lazy and askign the AI to write for you may feel like its working at first but it does not work ultimately and ends up with you having to edit some frankenstein version of yourself that you yourself created. sickening stuff tbh

2. and with the Artist’s Whey, I can! - I wanted so badly for this joke to be in the piece itself but I am learning that you can only do so many dumb jokes in a piece before it gets annoying