two-thousand and twenty-three

I’ll always remember 2023 as an incredibly special year. It’s honestly hard to comprehend how much happened to and for me, how many once in a lifetime experiences were smooshed into the past twelve months. I spent so many days rushing around, peddling my feuds and hunched over my laptop and crying and laughing. But now it is time to slow down and reflect. I probably ate a hundred croissants—what other yardstick does one need.

I’ll start with my art. The two workshops of my new play were far more successful than I could have imagined. I applied for and was rejected from a dozen fellowships. But what came to be was SO much better. And the juice is so much sweeter! I squeezed it myself! I will never forget when those audiences leapt to their feet. The outrageously talented writers and managers and executives who gushed to me on the street, in my email, over cherry Italian sodas. The young actors who made the piece their own, the directors who cared more than was fair. To quote Kelly Clarkson quoting someone else, some people wait a lifetime for a moment like this.

I completed a B_rbie series, wrote another, have just started another. It hurts my brain to consider how much experience and magic the podcast brought into my life. Again, this year was such an embarrassment of creative riches. In another galaxy, my entire personality is those shows. In this galaxy I wake up in Tokyo, half skim an email about being in the New York Times. We’re number one again, we got this icon or that great mind into the studio. I make myself small next to AP and try to remember all the wisdom she casually throws away. She invites me to a fancy dinner and invites me to her girls' party and invites me over to be in her Masterclass, strangely something I wished for when I first bought a membership in 2019. Dramaturged a solo show I so believe in! Went to live comedy when I could! Never regretted it.

I pitched a show I co-created with ____ ____ to HBO and afterward the VP of comedy wrote me a nice email. Then ____ ____ asked me to punch up his newest movie, a serious honor. A showrunner out of my league asked to be in my league. I wrote a new TV sample, just because I had the idea. Wrote a third of my newest play—will finish in 2024. Wrote a third of a new movie—may not finish in 2024. It irritates me that I don’t want to finish this project. I typically finish everything I start. However, I’m trying to listen to the artist inside me when she pitches a fit.

I pitched on a sequel to an iconic movie (project killed). I pitched on IP with a fantastic producer (project stalled). I reflect on options for the show I sold (project died). A thriller killed. A youth podcast rudely offed. Made two TikToks for this fancy company I suppose I believe in. Wrote an essay I couldn’t get published.

My god! I was on strike for six months! I’m changed from it! We won! That was, like, an entire life of bump-ins and middle fingers and free snacks and sunscreen and holes in my shoes.

Acted in two improv TV shows, did maybe three live shows? Was in a pod episode with three heavy-hitters! Barely registered, which is evidence I really don’t have it in me to act anymore.

A new little ham at home! More time on the balcony than ever. Three weddings! Heavens the weddings! At an iconic inn! In bright, clear Denver! The most outrageous parties and pool time in Palm Springs!

My mom visited California. We roamed around getting facials and going to the movies. My dad visited California. We cruised windy highways and dined in the local pizza joint. My aunt visited California, and I drove back from lunch, toward the rolling golden hills, enchanted. I visited the midwest—twice! Lake Michigan and the Beach Bunny concert and deep dish and walks around Evanston and corn fritters and keeping up with the peace bugs. AND THEN everything reset at the summer camp reunion—a whole world! The gals went to Disneyland at Halloween for crying out loud!

I spent Christmas with all the people and summer obsessively searching for Taylor Swift tickets. Managed to pull off getting the literal best seat in the stadium? That concert shook me to my core, is now and forever a part me. That folding chair, a dot in the timeline of culture. “You’ll go to space,” Puhg said of my tiny cameos in the movie. I saw the movie over and over in theaters—with Puhg, with my manager, with strangers, with friends, alone. I went to so many movies in general, sometimes bopping around the mall after. Making good on a resolution to have more fun, I wore down my Six Flags season pass.

Puhg and I went to Japan twice! The first time so wrapped up in the tender spring, the second reflecting on autumn. I grasped for a fortune at the Nara shrine and cheered for it coming true over caramel corn at the Kyoto studio tour. Each day could be unpacked and repacked and unpacked a million times. Thick toasts, prayer tablets, steps, gates, Godzilla, moss, cream puffs, rotating sushi, speak easys, Hello Kitty, rocks, castles, ponds, rainy days, volcano black shells, cab rides, sunrises, ferry rides, fall colors, train nods, soft boiled eggs, soft boiled eggs, soft boiled eggs.

FRIENDS! Had a big fat birthday. New York for theatre and Henne! An Arizona journey for Kiles’ big show and Shell’s almost baby. Two bachelorette parties. Swimming bitter with Buckle, game nights with the other couple, Survivor dens, jolly patios with K___, and a haunted house with SW. Last night, as always, dream boards with Tira. Went on a writing retreat alone but was somehow front row for Find’s set. Now anything is possible.

Ah the tough stuff. You know I have beat my fists against pillows and screeched about how unfair poor health or stupid benefits are. You know I have worried about the distance between things and people who float away. But you know I'm more resilient than I used to be. I do believe terrible things are happening now and in the future. I hope to be wrong, but at least there's nothing smaller to be afraid of.

Diligent work on my handspring. I am landing it, but I wish for something less ugly by this time next year. Oh yeah, and I won that playwriting award for something I wrote on a plane.

Christmas Tree Farm

I never realize how intensely LA has taken over my brain until I leave for long enough.

The Midwest is such a jovial schlubby little hamlet. I love how people rib each other about everything. On Christmas Eve Eve I approach one of Puhg's uncles. He's in a recliner in the middle of the room, children bouncing all around, cookies being consumed at lightening speed. I ask him, "Do you know where our suitcases ended up?" He says, "Yes," and then pauses for a long time--before a mischievous little grin creeps across his face! The next morning I feel guilty I don't want the cheesy potatoes and ditch everyone for a fancy latte. I sip it, trotting through the suburban forest.

All I want for Christmas is to have dinner at my favorite high school pizza spot. My sister and mom indulge my request. The meal is not overrated, a teenage dream, and probably $30 for the three of us! We go to the fancy grocery to buy "snacks" to watch the filmed Waitress musical. Pookie sneaks an entire cake into the theatre. There are walks to the river and gingerbread folk to decorate, living room couches piled with wrapping junk and old ornaments to tap. A Santa garland from my childhood on the banister going up the stairs.

In farmland my dad always knows someone. In the grocery store parking lot, at the coffee shop where I toil over my final deadline of 2023, at the lodge, near the fireplace. I sit there journaling about my next play, into the night, wool socks on.Two ladies with crooked teeth greet me at the resale shop on main street. (Or, "a" main street.) They ask where I'm from and then frown. "I would not like living in a big city!" they assure me. People aren't shy about their preconceived notions where French names are butchered. We sit in the bakery, we sit at Cracker Barrel, we sit at Baskin Robbins, we sit at lunch I think at the very same table we had to evacuate during a tornado in 2017. The winter is more than mild but I have to wear my gloves.

On Christmas Eve there are coolers on the porch and only dips with meat and all eight adult siblings peer into the Fannie May box, detectives on the hunt for caramel. God help who gets the lemon creme. The teen girls always find me. One a class president who shows me her collection of homemade cards, the other a crackly drama queen who tells me about torturing the boy she likes. She has 18K TikTok followers for making Hunger Games edits.

The bathroom is marble and the fireplace is fake. We walk around the Macy's windows. No bustle at all, just pods of unhoused families. The plane is full, and everyone working at the airport is miserable.

Buzzing About Tuesday

So many surprises Tuesday. Rushed out to Starbucks in the morning, for example, and ran into this girl M______. We did an improv show together almost exactly a year ago and followed each other on Instagram. She's always doing such artsy things, like indie shoots in Panama. We congratulated each other on our years and then she whispered low, "I am so sick of my survival job though." She still has to nanny. Despite being an esteemed writer. I recently found out Alexander Payne sold a script after grad school (unproduced, I think) for 60K and lived on that for four years. No disrespect to Alexander. I do enjoy his work.

I had a Zoom with Toy Conglomerate to kick of my 17th series. My survival job--but I do enjoy the work.

This musician I collaborate with texted me. The video we wrote for A___ M____ needs some exterior shots--am I available? We live in the same neighborhood, so I threw on jean shorts, braided my hair, and dashed out. I zipped by a Chicago improviser at a cafe on the way. "What's up!" I shouted before filming this guy scream emo lyrics on a residential street as I walked backwards--a very poor man's tracking shot. A professional, as soon as we got five takes, he was gone. Delivered the finals by 4 PM.

C____ came over to pick up our vacuum--Puhg doesn't need it anymore. I emerged from my work cave to gossip, then back in, then back out to meet a stranger buying our lamp outside. She handed me a ten and mumbled something about her roommate liking black and white, left in a flurry.

I was fully prepared to record with AP and MR the next day, so I made a pan of toffee. Taylor Swift's movie dropped. I downloaded it at 11, watched THE extended song. The moment she pointed at me in the crowd was in the cut! Forever immortalized!