Tuesday, January 28th 2025
There was a time in my life when identifying as a writer felt like the truest thing I knew. I rarely imagined myself as anything else. Even as I explored physical art forms, I always returned to words. I often started writing with the ending first—whether in one of many notebooks during school as I pretended to take notes or scribbled on a napkin while waiting tables. I’ve even described this habit as intuition. More than one psychic has told me that while I don’t have any psychic abilities of my own, my intuition is undeniable. And that I should trust my gut.
Today, my therapist and I talked about things we hadn’t touched on in years. Not because we couldn’t, but because, over the past 11 (nearly 12) years of meeting weekly, there were always more pressing matters to unravel. There’s something to be said about commitment issues here—I’ve never known anything to last as long as my time with my therapist. Yes, I recognize the privilege in that. But that’s not the point.
I’ve been in some form of therapy since I was 12 years old. I’m nearing 32 now. Shit.
When I first met my therapist, I hadn’t been in regular therapy for a while. But I was going through a life-altering breakup, and my mom insisted I wouldn’t heal properly unless I talked to someone about it. It took months of weekly sessions before I could even bring it up. I'm not sure if avoidance is the opposite of commitment, but maybe I struggle with both.
An hour ago, I set out to write about Tracey Emin—maybe I still will. But I started somewhere else, and I’ll let myself land where I land.
Anyway.
Today, we revisited parts of myself I hadn’t needed to examine in a while—pieces of my anxiety that, for some time now, have been under control, even, dare I say, pretty fucking solid. I fear regression and relapse, but as I often quote, "What is past is prologue." There’s no real way to let go of the past—only ways to keep it there or allow it to stumble into the present.
I remembered myself at 20. She was outrageously naive. She feels almost unfamiliar now. I think of all the shapes she has molded me into and out of, how I navigated life in a body that constantly rejected itself.
I have been struck by echolalia whilst writing, and these two phrases (both from songs) keep replaying in my head:
My body is a burden.1
I used to hate my body, but now I just hate you. 2
We talked about my guts today. They feel safe in that room. I could describe it properly if I wanted to—but I don’t. Instead, I told him that beyond logic or reason, I trust him to maintain that safe space for me. I think he wondered if I meant it. I confirmed that I did.
Lately, my intrusive thoughts have been making a resurgence. Sometimes, one small thought unravels into a spiral that consumes me for hours. Lately, they’ve sounded something like this:
Am I allowed to ask my therapist what he thinks of me? Does he think I must be a fascinating subject? Is he studying me for a research paper, or maybe a book? Maybe that’s the first way I end up in a book. I thought I was going to be a published writer when I was a teenager, imagining my first novel to be written and published by age 15. I imagined it would land me a scholarship to a college where I would study writing and I’d graduate high school early, even able to pay for my education without my parents help because my books would be revered, successful and I’d be paid real money for my real thoughts. Real…is therapy real life? Am I accurately representing myself? How do I represent myself? What is…my Self? Who am i? If my therapist doesn’t know, I may need another twenty years of therapy.
Don’t worry, I won’t ask my therapist for his opinion of whether I am a good or a bad person. He would only tell me that black and white thinking won’t lead me to the answers I desperately want to procure. Not find - procure. I have to make my world in the way I want it to feel.
I’ve written of warning signs, of how I may have turned a human being into a home, of how I was a human being turned into a museum. I prefer the latter, however on my own terms. And while I may think my body has been a burden, I now choose to think of how unencumbered it could be.
My body is also a power, and that power can hold a positive or negative charge. Maybe it is something in the middle but magnets feel more definitive. Magnetism comes back to me. I remember one of many dead friends, and which of them spoke to me about that topic.
If I could be a museum, is my home made of my feelings? Is my internal map a refraction of my characteristics? I continue to question my Self and now- in this exact moment, I am laughing to myself. I have to describe it properly now for you.
I am in a safe space, because I have made it to be so. A calculated, chaotic calm. I’m sitting on my bed, crossed legged near the edge where the day-quilt sits; this is where I relax. I sleep on the other part of the bed. This is a strategy to avoid sleeping every time I am in my bed, which is quite often these days. Quick glance over my right shoulder and there I am in the mirror, face gently illuminated by the cycling art screensaver on my wall mounted tv. I see my hands as they type on my keyboard, barely glancing up at my iPad to catch any of the sentences as I write them. If I re-read before I’ve finished, I will butcher the entire moment. Editing has always felt like an assassination of my own creative intuition.
I might have been a better artist if I revised my work.
The joint on my joint holder ring I keep on my pointer finger has gone out. I need another light. I can see the ending now. The ash bowl could tip onto my bedding at any moment, staining the lavender. The cats circle and whine for attention. I ate a donut for breakfast, lunch, and dinner today. I’m still wearing a nice new blouse I wore to work today. I think I want to start wearing ties.
David Lynch recently passed away. While I don’t want to dwell on that specifically right now, it has profoundly shaped my thoughts on life and death. The parasocial grief of losing an artist who has influenced my personal art practice is still grief—one worth honoring.
His passing forced me to confront an inevitable reality: other artists who have undeniably shaped pieces of who I am will one day be gone, their voices silenced, their work no longer evolving. That thought lingers.
Art, in every sense of the word, has been my tether to existence. I wouldn’t be here without it.
I was in love with Tracey Emin’s artwork before I knew who Tracey Emin was. When I went to London in 2017, I scoured the city to find any gallery or museum that had any of her work actively on display. I don’t think I had the luck, besides two postcards with her paintings printed on them from the Tate Modern. At least I tried!
For four years in the early 2000s, Tracey Emin wrote a weekly newsletter of sorts for The Independent. During a brief stint in graduate school, a professor gifted me one of my most treasured books: My Life in a Column. This collection of her writings—nearly 400 pages—feels like a sacred text to me, much like another book of hers.
I haven’t read it in its entirety yet. Instead, I savor it, picking up a few pages at a time, trusting that the right words will find me when they’re meant to. Just a gut feeling, I suppose.
She is everything I wish I could be—both as an artist and as a human being. Maybe that’s a trite thing to say, but fuck it. I admire her wholly. Through sheer passion, she has been a guiding light, helping me discover, at least in some ways, who I am.
I read one of her columns today. The whole piece was profound, but this part stuck with me—like a glue that was meant to bind itself to me.
Everything I am is already within me, but I think it’s time to let some of it out—to set parts of myself free.