I DON'T NEED TO BE LUCKY, I JUST NEED TO BE HAPPY : music, books and other sentiments from twenty twenty five

  Honningbarna released an album earlier in this year called Soft Spot that my friend heather described as norwegian black metal, and though i’m no expert in the scene, i wouldn’t call it black metal, i wouldn’t know where to begin with genre boundaries and placement. I don’t have the stomach to be that kinda mark. If i’ve learned anything over the year twenty twenty five, it’s that i’m not made like a know-it-all. I start most conversations with ‘I think it’s interesting that’, and now my mouth is all dry, and my mouth tastes clammier. When i drink water it just goes over my tongue. I haven’t really learned that i’m not made in any specific way. I just know that it’s music with spirit, man. The music has got the fucking spirit. It’s the party that never stops, that never dies, that keeps fucking going. It’s down woodland road at 15:15 without breaks on your back wheel or a helmet. My living has been in the hands of the surrounding world for a long time now, I’m only doing my job to physicalise this. Brother, i’ve been feeling a certain way, and brother, i’ve been making sure to feel it full, and brother, when the deathtrap crashes, i am ready to feel the effects through and through. But no fuck is going to make me sit down and take away the party. I dote on, etcetera, 867, This Is The Glasshouse. mud again leather.head, Pain To Power by Maruja, Attempted Martyr by Prostitute. I’m living, i’ve lived, i’m a dog watching the coin and kicking the table when it lands. I do not have the stomach to check the result. I find it interesting that I don’t need to be lucky, I just need to be happy.

            I also find it interesting that I’ve only read through exactly 10 books this year. My students won’t read — and there the double em dash strikes with organic ambition — why should I? Live by the sword of comparison, die by the blade with self-conscious smothering. God. Some of them aren’t even novels. Crush by Richard Siken and Where I’m Calling From by Raymond Carver, for fucks sake.  I don’t know what to tell you. We sort of fell apart in the first half, but the manager gave a good speech in the changing room, and okay, sure, we could have done better, but you know how these things go. I’m happy with the performance but I know we can do better. Some things have to give and we’ve got a clear idea of what we have to work on. I cried reading two of them, Stoner by John Williams and Set My Heart On Fire by Izumi Suzuki, reading both at the opposite ends of the year. I cried at Night Palace by Mount Eerie in the summer, 51.453470, -2.6059920, looking up through the leaves and towards the sky. Not a couple months later, Wren proposed to me around the way, though I don’t know what I was listening to then, nor do I think I need to know. I wasn’t reading, that was certain. It was a guilt that stuck over me until I got to Death In Her Hands by Ottessa Moshegh and devoured it, really devoured it now, in a day. Then through to Scaffolding by Lauren Elkin, then Eurotrash by Christian Kracht, into november 1667 words a day (all the while asking my hands ‘please god materialise into something i really need something to come of this’) (how do i say this to an agent) (without sounding desperate and slash or suicidal) plus caroline 2 by caroline now I know your mind, now I know your mind. Listened through the posthumous collection Love is Overtaking Me by Arthur Russell in a&e after a panic attack when working over reading week. Yep. I find it interesting I didn’t have the heart for that sorta work. The girl on the bus home said I was a really chill guy. She’d lost her coke and said she was gonna get killed by her housemates. I didn’t really know how to explain my evening. I just said I was feeling better now, like some sort of 3am geek. 

A lot of these came into focus over the last four slash five months or so. I’ve wanted to be more present in my day to day, my choices, my thoughts, my shots. Keep the needle at 90 degrees and don’t be too slow but don’t be too fast and hold it in for 30 seconds to keep it from coming back out. Lucky girl. God’s Gonna Give You A Million Dollars, making the most of my september, keeping my hands open for the wind, amazed after moving house that this is better, it’s getting colder, and there is no sound like the sound Shallowater get together here. There you are, alone, breathing. That’s all you can do. Girl who’s got nothing and keeps herself happy. Doesn’t leave bad reviews but stops speaking to everyone nearby because to be remembered is better than being gossiped about, talked to, invited, found. Not me, man. Just pass the thought a buck and drink in my name and think of me well. Girl who doesn’t have the words to describe what she’s going through. In the earth again Chat Pile & Hayden Pendigo. Later summer slash early autumn feature Suntub ML Buch. Either/Or in the earlier months of the year in an office with a broken window that will never, ever be repaired. I want to teach Stag Dance by Torrey Peters, who liked the question I asked about The Chaser. When signing my copy, she asked what I write, and god damn, with my pockets turned inside out and empty, I had naught to show but a fuckin fly and some buttons. Balled my stupid eyes out at I Saw the TV Glow from the opening frames. I’m not that sort of animal, but I’m not that good a writer either. Stupid fucking broken social scene. That’s on me, though. Speaking about it, I find it interesting  

that naturally, i’m left thinking that One day, somebody new is going to join our teaching team. They’re going to be younger than me, and they’re going to have more publications and accreditation than me. I’m going to look like an arse then, and I’m only getting older. I’m not gonna get that job without a PhD. goodbye, world! miffle. Songs About Leaving Carissa’s Weird. End of the Middle Richard Dawson. What’s the sentiment that Tony talks about in the pilot of The Sopranos? I don’t think there’s a need to consume our art, literature, novels, poetry, albums, or whatever. We’re supposed to keep them in an ecosystem of influence and thought, letting them build upon each other, drawing from one another to enrich, enrich, enrich. Love that for you. Looks great on you. Where did you get it from? How old is he? Sorry, I meant. You know what I mean. 

 do you ever feel like you got in something right as it’s coming to a close? That we’re near enough in our twilight hours? I turned twenty five this year, and I’ve become petrified of time passing by and freak accidents. Who’s going to be waiting for you when you’re thirty, when you’re coming home, when you’re dying? What happens if she dies in her sleep? Will i hear it? Will i feel it? Why am i wasting my time worrying? Why’s it so fucking difficult to live and be alive at the same time? Where are the publications I promised? Aja and the royal scam steely dan trim your fucking beard i won’t ever make drums sound as good as that guy nor write something as funny as any of those tweets. I’m not going to be the best at my job, my writing, my blog. How do you get over this quick easy free online. 

                        

In a horrid yet telling strategy, alongside the near complete physical social isolation, i started running two mythic bastionland campaigns. I’m a horse who knows nothing better than to step into all puddles, despite everything my nature tells me. As my father always told me, all puddles will not be as deep as the deepest puddle, duh. I don’t care how deep it gets, all that matters is that i’m submerged in some still water, something i can think about and fall asleep too. Yes. another world. Anywhere, Yawning Portal. Bleeds, Wednesday. Citrus, My Love by Guy Klucevsek. I don’t know what you want to hear - both campaigns fell off as the year has come to a close and the nights have got darker. Hey, the notebook is nearly full. I know that world but i need to travel through it, entirely unplugged, only by horseback. I couldn’t finish Gravity’s Rainbow despite daily efforts. I’m chewing on The Count of Monte Cristo now though. Don’t give up on me. Genesis 30:3, amongst other other thoughts. Let me come down easy. Clouds in the Sky They Will Always Be There For You by Porridge Radio with heather and saying yeah, i needed this. Irony poisoned locked off in a bookmark trying to read and hating myself for not being as diligent as all those other online yet demure academics and literarians and calm, well collected creative writers who’ve spent their entire career sold out and pre-hegenomized but not in the fantasy romance sorta way. I don’t have that charm and i never fucking will. I’m a wreck made of hair on my fingers and dirt under nails. I’m going to remember this, sick in my own bastard stomach. Whatever. 

 Saw Model/Actriz with Alexis. Mun Sing opened. Nearly Kansas. Felt it through my boots. Cried singing every word at Strange New Places on their Second Puberty tour. I wish I was a better friend. Saw Pup with Sam and then the rest joined after we drove down to Plymouth and I nearly pissed myself in the car down.  The new album’s good, just hasn’t stuck with me. Saw my first wrestling show. Claudio Castegnoli versus Konosuke Takeshita, even though it went to a draw. Magdalena Bay with Jacob. Home doesn't last forever. Glad we moved but wish living was easier. Been a year on the injections. Sister by Frost Children, I Love My Computer by Ninjirachi, Getting Killed by Geese though I prefer 3D Country, Stardust by Danny Brown and finally getting a better sense of Ants from Up here by Black Country New Road. I got a vinyl of Surround from my father and mother. Let’s not linger on the phrasing for too long. I have a feeling that I will not have the time for that much longer. 

I’m trying to make it through the last few days and I’m practising a new vernacular and language. I’m holding my hands against soft surfaces and making shit little prayers and getting back to my smiling, charming self. Whatever. I’m living. Here, there’s that phrase that I want to kiss onto you. My second year poetry module cautioned that love is too heavy a word, and I’m for sure not wieldy enough to use it. My hands are all fucked up with kitten scratches and blurry eyes. I’ve said enough this year. It’s just all the time, isn’t it. That it goes like this. You know what i mean - you don’t need me to spell it out any more than that. Sorry for disappearing. Sorry for being there. I like that i know what i’m capable of. I like that I'm still surprising myself. I’ll write the letter this time. Clearer. Less drowning horses. I’ll follow the form of the crucifix and don’t you dare think for a second you are unworthy of that qualification. anyway. all my love,