Food, Fashion, Sexton, Springsteen

It has been a week.

Hello humans and angels. I was busy this past week on a staycation from my job. Sometimes it was good and sometimes it was sad. All of it was likely necessary. Here are some things I recently saw, did, considered, ate, pondered, etc.

Table of Contents

I. Recommendations

II. Unnecessary Shit I Bought This Week

III. Unnecessary Shit I Didn’t Buy This Week

IV. One Great Moment This Week

V. One Not-Great Moment This Week

VI. On Writing: When You’re Stuck, Find a Poem

Recommendations

Three of Cups - A lovely restaurant in NYC’s SoHo. Try the pretzel (my favorite food) or the mocktail with beet juice in it, or the donuts, or really anything else.

Veselka - Hit up this East Village staple (since 1954!) I’ve been eating Ukranian food here for approximately 10,000 years.

Crowley Vintage - Sean’s shop in DUMBO is great. I bought this sweatshirt, which I assume was worn with hallucinatory joy at some horrifying corporate retreat circa 1999. The store is open 12-6 on Saturdays and by appointment only on other days.

Long walks on rainy days - In general, with the proper weather gear, I approve.

Parents or other elders taking photos of photos - A classic move. Now, I might personally try my best to position it correctly, maybe run it through Lightroom later to make it look presentable. Not parents! They do not care. There will be a glare off a shiny shiny shiny candid from days of yore and they will still send it to you even though your best friend and you are obfuscated by a ghostly flash of glow.

Michael and Victoria Imperioli’s AD house tour - Just watch it.

Cannoli - I used to not be into cannoli, as a rejection of my heritage and my people. I have claimed my birthright as a daughter of this dessert. LaRina makes a great one in Fort Greene, Brooklyn. Also, I continue the process of working with an immigration attorney to apply for Italian/U.S. dual citizenship. I assume this photograph works as persuasive evidence.

Succession Season 4 - No, it’s not out yet, because they’re not done making it, but I nearly stole what I thought was a grocery store sample from one of their many splendiferous craft services tables whilst traipsing through SoHo this week. This is not the first time I have almost done this on the streets of New York.

Anyway, behold the above side-by-side of me at BravoCon in October (where I probably caught RSV because I didn’t wear that mask enough) and Brian Cox from the cover of his perfect audiobook.

Fashion Brand Company - It ain’t cheap, but it ain’t cheaply made, either. It’s designed and made in Los Angeles by Penelope Gazin and a small workforce hired with fair wages and labor conditions. I like that, and this sweater, too. It’s comfortable.

Unnecessary Shit I Bought This Week

Crystals from an ethically sourced dealer; pretty candles made with pretty flowers; a few Lyft rides when I could’ve taken the subway or walked.

Unnecessary Shit I Didn’t Buy This Week

Baby Jordans for my nephew who would grow out of them in two seconds anyway; an admittedly cool tote bag made of deadstock Levis jeans.

One Great Moment This Week

Remembering I had ice cream in the freezer and (not in the freezer) a full rotisserie chicken that was still warm and some kalamata olives.

One Not Great Moment This Week

Crying because I was so fucking tired.

On Writing: When You’re Stuck, Find a Poem

I’m a writer of books, scripts, essays, articles, marketing copy, and scribbled journals. I hold an M.A. in the Teaching of English from Teachers College at Columbia University. I’ve taught lots of classes and workshops. None of this means I am an expert in writing. It just means I’ve done a lot of it, thought about it often, and spoken about it with many others.

In that spirit I offer these ideas as suggestions. If you have specific queries you’d like me to address here, please email saratoninnewsletter@gmail.com

A high school teacher told me that when I was stuck, I should go read Neruda. I don’t read Neruda anymore. But I do go to poetry to jog me into something newer and better.

I was reminded of this advice when I was seated next to a poet at brunch on Saturday (maybe it was Sunday? I can’t recall.) I’m pals with the waitress, who is in her early twenties. She introduced me to her poetry mentor, who is likely in her seventies. There she was, a self-described, self-proclaimed, real-deal poet.

Anyone can be a poet, of course. But to claim it - that’s something else.

Here’s a poem I just read. I think I first read it in that high school teacher’s classroom long ago. I would later become a high school teacher myself, briefly. I know more now than I did back then, and also less, I’m sure of it.

The Truth the Dead Know

BY ANNE SEXTON

For my mother, born March 1902, died March 1959
and my father, born February 1900, died June 1959

Anne Sexton, “The Truth the Dead Know” from The Complete Poems of Anne Sexton (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1981). Copyright © 1981 by Linda Gray Sexton and Loring Conant, Jr. Source: The Complete Poems of Anne Sexton (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1981)

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“And everything dies, baby that’s a fact / But maybe everything that dies, someday comes back.” - “Atlantic City,” Nebraska (1982), written and recorded by Bruce Springsteen

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Take care out there, everybody. It’s not easy often or always. I’m glad you’re here.

All my best,

Sara

Some days are like that.