New Year New Moon
Month 1 of Hotness Studies
Hi all,
Shoutout my sweetheart Alex Bruce for the new banner for the New Noon Newsletter! We got a facelift :)
Oh boy, what a start to the year. I went to the Moby Dick Reading Marathon in New Bedford Massachusetts. I got COVID. I moved from one plant nursery to another at my job, which involved the puzzle piecing of 36 work tables into a UHaul. I was so sore I couldn’t bend my arms. My grandfather passed away and I went home to Maryland for a whirlwind 48 hours that felt like years. I am increasingly scared about the world and increasingly hopeful about our ability to rise up and meet the moments we are living through. I’ve been thinking a lot about how hope is sort of seen as embarrassing or naive, but how hope is foundationally my posture for moving through life. I got wrangled into listening to this breakthrough program on the CHANI app — it’s thirty days worth of meditations and guided activities, and I’m not following in any sort of order or regimen. But I was listening to this meditation yesterday about meeting your inner critic, how there is a part of you trying so hard to protect you, that they feel like they need to control everything because nobody is coming to help them, how that part of you is moving from a place of disbelief—-I don’t have support so I have to do it myself, this won’t work out so I need to prepare for that inevitable outcome of failure—- as opposed to the dreaming, hopeful part of you that moves from belief—-I am capable of this, change is possible, I can make this happen. When I got back from Maryland, I was settling back into my lists and different applications for artistic things, and I was so buoyed by it. I have so many good people in my life. I have so many projects I feel real excitement to be in the weeds of. As I’m thinking about my clown persona for the next Noisy record, I feel like the embarrassing part of me, the clown in me, is the part that is so relentlessly hopeful, that believes in goodness no matter what. In my friend Zenaida’s tarot reading that they do for me every year, their advice for me in 2025 was The Star: Stay hopeful! Stay connected to wonder and to your spirituality! There is wonder and beauty always always, find it!
We called my grandfather JimDad, and my grandmother Sharrymom, per her request, because she said she was too young to be a Grandma. JimDad grew up on a pickle farm in Ohio. He was a rescue pilot in the Coast Guard, he ran two marathons, his favorite movie was When Harry Met Sally, and he made the very best chocolate chip pancakes. When I was little, he was my GUY, because he was so good at being goofy. He used to do this thing where he pretended not to know how to skip, and I’d get exasperated and be like, “JimDad, NO, it’s like THIS!” He was my godfather. He loved my grandmother, Sharrymom, so so much. Like they were sooooo in love. They did a vow renewal on their 50th anniversary, and it was when I was in my Cake Boss phase, so I made them a three tier white cake with quilted fondant and gold edible pearls and a hibiscus on top. JimDad loved the Orioles. He was a Taurus which makes sense because he was extremely stubborn. He loved John Denver. He loved to play cards, Pepper and Euchre, and he always overbet. So many other things have been happening in my family I feel like I haven’t been able to focus on grieving him, but I put his picture on the altar, watched When Harry Met Sally Friday night, and I’m trying to talk to Alex about it, keep telling stories. His funeral won’t be for a couple of months but I’m looking forward to seeing my cousins and aunts and uncles then and getting to just share stories.
Sitting down to write this I remembered that I swore I’d do hotness studies for this year’s newsletters, and I had to laugh—one does not feel particularly hot in a time of family crisis. But let’s see. I’ve been grateful to look in the mirror lately and actually have a feeling of, I look like myself, which was not always true last year, in years past. I think so much of feeling hot is about feeling connected to the people around you, being present enough where your interest in a situation overtakes your self-consciousness, and you get to genuinely enjoy a conversation, enjoy getting to know the people you’re with in new ways. Getting drinks with a friend once I was back in Philly this week and asking them about clown and laughing a lot. Reading Intimacies by Katie Kitamura in a day, and feeling tapped into interpersonal dynamics in a heightened way because of the way she writes. Potting plants for my nursery job and having my hands in the dirt and feeling quiet but content. Driving to the Moby Dick Marathon in the middle of the night, that teenager feeling of trouble and being out late, but also the part of it that was talking with my friend about how much we love our lives in Philly during the drive. Getting back from the hospital in Maryland and Alex had driven down from Philly and was there cooking Mac n cheese. What immense joy and what profound relief. There have been a few moments in the recent past where Alex has been there for me, or just said something that made me feel known, recognized with such clarity, and I love that that will only grow deeper in our years together. I think feeling known, knowingness, is the very hottest thing. John Denver has this line in his song “Poems, Prayers, and Promises” where he says, It turns me on to think of growing old. And I was listening to that the other day and yes, thinking about how youth has such a chokehold on our sense of desirability, so I was trying to situate myself in the sentiment. But when I think about getting to know Alex more and more deeply, I think, I understand!!! More John Denver:
I’ve seen a lot of sunshine, slept out in the rain
Spent a night or two all on my own
I’ve known my lady’s pleasures, had myself some friends
And spent a time or two in my own home
I have to say it now, it’s been a good life all in all
It’s really fine to have a chance to hang around
And lie there by the fire, and watch the evening tire
While all my friends, and my old lady sit and pass the pipe around
And before I fully get off this subject, I realized I’ve been collecting related material. I am starting to take notes of artists who talk about aging or time passing in a way that I like. This is from Big Thief’s song “Incomprehensible,” and obviously Adrianne Lenker is amazing, but after seeing her perform live for the first time I felt simply changed.
Katie Crutchfield - at 24:18 DJ Cheryl Water talking about Katie’s songwriting voice developing over the years!
I always think of Missy Dabble of Mannequin Pussy in this conversation too. She spent the entire I Got Heaven album cycle talking about “making it” later in her music career and being so excited to keep growing and keep getting better, how much more rewarding that is than making it quickly and burning out.
I am doing ~hotness studies~ as I am writing my next album, Good Night Hot Clown. To that end, I was wondering if I could trouble you, dear reader, to fill out a related survey and/or to share it with your friends. It can be anonymous if you want it to be! But as I’m building out a narrative or “score” for the live show, I need a little bit of audience participation…
This month, I’m in the middle of the Tin House (now known as McCormack Writing Center) online winter workshops, (I got in for my fiction project, Lawn Madonna, which I’m very proud of because I usually have my poet hat on) and Blake Mills’ songwriting class through School of Song. I’ve been working really hard on generating melodies for Hot Clown, and because of Blake’s prompts, I’ve added a couple entirely new songs to the list of demos.
I got a new guitar recently. I’m overcoming my deep fear of seeming stupid about gear and then avoiding it altogether, so I did a bunch of research, watched YouTube videos about different kinds of guitars, and landed on getting a Jaguar, but the Player II version with less circuit controls. It saved me a lot of money and I don’t need all that anyways lmao. But I had Alex take videos of me trying the guitars out and I looked back and was like, oh my teenager self would love this image of me. Alex is slowly teaching me Photoshop. I made a small collage using the tools he taught me, of part of my song drafts from the Blake Mills class.
I’ve been taking online ecology classes and watching soil and farming videos every day at work so I can prepare for running a native plant nursery. When I get nervous I remind myself this is a teaching nursery and it’s about sharing in the process, and about collaborating with growers and neighbors to make it happen, not having to know everything immediately. Now that we’re moved in, it’s time to really get started.
I don’t think I mentioned this last month but because of the protagonist’s occupation in that book, Intimacies, I’ve started to articulate a long-term dream. I’d like to start taking language classes, potentially get my PhD, so I can start working in translation. And that could be poetry translation on the page, but it could also be, again in the long-term, becoming a translator. I think this would be a great skill to just have, something useful, but I could also see that kind of work being a good fit for me. I’d like to start with studying Spanish and Italian. I’ve enrolled at Philly’s community college, and might be starting classes next month.
Here is the list of books I read in 2025, my favorites being yes Intimacies, but also Small Rain, Rooms for the Dead and Not Yet by my friend Rhoni, Sky Daddy, The Dry Season, Beautyland, and Joy is My Middle Name.
I’ve been so bogged down with all my family crises I haven’t been able to lock into all the fucked up things happening with ICE, so I wanted to use this newsletter to collect some resources for myself and also to share a few things with y’all. Here are some ways to support people in Minneapolis, and a couple specific Philly resources too:
a GoFundMe to support children of families affected by ICE in Twin Cities
Stand with Minnesota - Support Minnesotans defending their communities from ICE - this has donation links to immigrant law centers and immigrant rapid response funds. There are also links to testimonies if you want to hear more specifically what’s happening on the ground. If you scroll there are dozens of GoFundMes listed for families, for schools, and more.
Get involved with No Ice Philly by exploring the links on their LinkTree. No Ice Philly has a monthly general meeting I’m trying to make it out to, text me if you want to come with me.
Learn more about Vamos Juntos, a Latine immigrant organization in South Philly, which has volunteer opportunities and useful resources to familiarize yourself with, like their rapid response hotline, which I’ll leave the info for here:
Please save the number: 814-205-3293
Call this number to report any ICE activity in Philadelphia, including sightings, arrests, and/or raids.
If we do not answer, please leave a voicemail or send a text message.
There’s a fundraiser show coming up at Ruba Club January 30th, benefiting Vamos Juntos, with resources at the show about how to get involved
Let’s take care of each other!!!
One last thing I’ll say is I’ve been trying to stay committed to a meditation practice. I’ve been told I need it for years, lol, but finally with deep diving into David Lynch’s world last year, I learned about his commitment to transcendental meditation and I’ve been trying it. I’m supposed to do it twice a day but I’ve been starting with once a day, in the mornings, so I don’t overwhelm myself and give up. I’ve been surprised how much it helps me, and even if my brain doesn’t settle down for ten minutes, I just tell myself that’s okay, I’ll be able to breathe a little easier if nothing else by the end. When I’m settled in, images start to come up, that I try to remember and write down when the time is up. They don't immediately mean something to me but they often arrive associated with a certain feeling or emotion. I like the mysteriousness of it. I can see how certain things in David Lynch’s universe might have arrived to him during TM, and he has described almost transcribing those images without questioning them or assigning didactic meaning to them. It’s not so wildly different from writing for me in the way the images come up, but at the end of writing, I look up and realize how physically uncomfortable I am, usually I’m holding my breath or sitting in a position that’s terrible for my body. So this is more gentle, and I would also say less active. I’m not digging around in my brain looking for anything, I am just trying to be open. I’m curious how my ability to settle myself down will change over an extended period of practicing this. This week my nerves are so shot, I’m noticing how much shorter of a fuse I have, how spent I am. I am hoping that meditation will help me stay in possession of myself a little more, not get activated so quickly. I’ll try and track my progress. I’ve done different versions of meditation over the years and none have worked, so maybe a little accountability is a good thing.
Some pictures for the road:
Sending love from Philly-
Sara Mae
I LOVE U