housekeeping, month one

the braid is one month old! thank you for being here!

The braid celebrated her one month birthday over the weekend so I wanted to take a moment to thank everyone for their subscriptions thus far (thank you!)

For those of you considering supporting my work with a paid subscription, I am offering a limited time 20% discount through the month of December.

Your paid subscription will include:

• access to all past and future posts.

• access to “chat threads” which I will launch in the new year for paid subscribers to get some much needed conversations going.

• funding future projects/essays as I attempt to build this out into a more communal space. My goal here for 2023 is to afford to pay people I admire and respect to write bravely about their experiences here as I continue to share my own.

• eligibility for all item giveaways. (See below!)

You can also give a the braid subscription as a gift!

Other subscriptions I recommend for gift giving include, Men Yell at Me, a substack by Lyz Lenz, one of the most important culture writers of our time, Mad Moms, a substack by Amanda Montei who I had the honor of doing an interview with a couple months back and is brilliant and so incredibly perceptive, and Permission Granted by Jeanette LeBlanc who rules. Also, The Audacity by Roxane Gay, who posts personal essays as well as publishes other writers’ work is a must-subscribe. (If you have a substack, please drop the URL in the comments. I would love to recommend your work as well.)

Every month, I’ll be featuring things that I’m into/doing/recommend. Here are the sharable highlights of my last month.

• The Skyview Hotel & Bell’s, Los Alamos

See above photo snapped in room at The Skyview where I got to hunker down with my person for his birthday. It was raining most of the time but we still managed to explore surrounding towns (San Ynez, Solvang) and it was an ideal time. I’ve lived in LA for almost 24 years and am pretty familiar with most weekend getaway locations but knew not of Los Alamos and I can’t wait to go back. The Skyview is awesome and everyone there was super cool. We ate at Bell’s for birthday dinner which is life changing as far as eateries are concerned. We sat at the bar and watched Daisy Ryan do magic in the kitchen with her staff — all of whom are brilliant and fascinating, highly recommend. We also ate at Bell’s sister restaurant, Bar Le Cote which was equally amazing. Company was even better.

Union Hotel, Los Alamos

• Darshana Avila, Erotic Wholeness

I did an IG live with “Anne’s” sexuality coach, Darshana last week (When Pleasure Doesn’t Always Come) and she is so smart and interesting and I loved every minute hearing from her. For those who have asked for the directory of therapists who do work like hers but may be more local, it’s here. You can also check out Darshana’s resource list, here. Lots of good stuff. Thank you, Darshana!

• The Hitachi Magic Wand, Mini (Giveaway alert!)

Everyone’s fave vibe now has a mini alternative and I have one to giveaway this month. To win? You just have to leave a comment below (and be a paid subscriber!) The comment with the most up-votes will win. (Hoping this means we will all be supportive of the person who needs this masterpiece of engineering most!)

• Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder

I have been so swamped these last few months that my usual diet of two books a month has become finish one book every two months, maybe/hopefully and at the moment, that book is NIGHTBITCH which I have been meaning to read and am very happy that I am. I haven’t finished it yet but I am already recommending it here because I’m pretty sure you will love it.

Here is a sample, because, YES, FUCK:

“…You light a fire early in your girlhood. You stoke it and tend it. You protect it at all costs. You don’t let it rage into a mountain of light, because that’s not becoming of a girl. You keep it a secret. You let it burn. You look into the eyes of other girls and see their fires flickering there, offer conspiratorial nods, never speak aloud of near-unbearable heat, a growing conflagration.

You tend to the flame because if you don’t you’re stuck, in the cold, on your own, doomed to seasonal layers, doomed to practicality, doomed to this is just the way things are, doomed to settling and understanding and reasoning and agreeing and seeing in another way and seeing it his way and seeing it from all the other ways but your own…”

• Celebrating and Enabling Abortion Access

My friend, Sophie hosted an event for SHOUT YOUR ABORTION and Plan C pills last week and Amelia Bonow who was in LA for the People’s Choice Awards (LFG!) spoke so passionately about the work SYO does and its origin story.

I urge you to support SYA’s work and familiarize yourself with abortion pills via aid access and plan C. You can read more about how to access abortion pills and how to use them, here. Please share this info far and wide.

• The White Lotus S2

(Spoilers ahead!) I loved the first season of White Lotus VERY MUCH but season two was on another level. It was fucking brilliant and had so much to say about fidelity, power dynamics and desire. Also, no one wants to have this conversation because very few are willing to have nuanced conversations about infidelity (save for Esther Perel! A queen!) BUT as someone who hears from people every day who have had affairs (when you write about this stuff, you hear about this stuff) I can tell you full stop that fucking other people has saved many a marriage. That is not to say it hasn’t also killed many more. However. The focus on infidelity (and its relationship to mystery, equity, retaliatory behavior) and the way it all shook in White Lotus was FAR more realistic than most “he cheated! the bastard must die!” storylines. And while I have always had a particularly French attitude when it comes to monogamy and fidelity, I appreciate a show that doesn’t clutch its pearls when it comes to this stuff — addressing that desire often comes from a carnal place that is often antithetical to society’s puritanical morality clauses. White could have easily victimized certain characters and he didn’t, instead he did what he does best: he humanized everyone.

Also, I love this Sondheim/Into the Woods epiphanic reference so much:

… Now I understannnnnnnnd/And now it’s time to LEAVE THE WOODSsssss!

Also I love that Mia and Valentina (White Lotus S2’s true heroines) were the architects of every happy ending.

And if you love White Lotus, I highly recommend you watch Mike White’s Enlightened. For the last two episodes of Season 2, if nothing else. Dude knows how to drop a perfect finale on the people.

And while we’re on a Mike White kick, I also really loved Brad’s Status, which somehow flew under the radar even though it’s Ben Stiller’s finest.

• Gilmore Girls

I am very late to Gilmore Girls but apparently also right on time because watching it in bed on a Sunday morning (or evening) with my 14 year old has been one of the great highlights of 2022. Highly recommend.

• Recovering from Shingles

I’m still pretty rashed up from the shingles but instead of pain, it’s numbness now, which is a far superior feeling. I have also heard from so many of you that while many assume shingles is a thing that older people get, it seems to be a thing that stressed people get, too. (I think we’re finally done submitting college applications/financial aid docs but there was a minute there when IT WAS DEFINITELY A SHINGLES WORTHY STRESS!) Anyway. So many people I know who are under 50 (which is when you’re vaccine eligible) have gotten shingles — some of whom got it multiple times! I’m very grateful mine are (sort of! almost!) gone.

• Other places you can find me/my writing this month:

• On Romper’s Sex & the Single Mom (I just typed SHINGLE mom, lol), I have recently written about dating as a public facing writer who writes explicitly about said life. I also wrote about NOT bringing your partner home from the holidays. Other columns that were crowd favorites include, red flags to watch for when dating post divorce, heartbreak after divorce, sexuality and body-hangups, and rediscovering one’s sexuality when we’re (moms!) touched TF out. There’s also a great sex-toy round-up! (Big ups to my IG community for weighing in on that!)

• I recently fell in love with Elena Brower and was honored to chat with her on her podcast, Practice You. You can listen to it, here. (And follow her, here. She’s wonderful.)

• My book, All of This, a memoir of death & desire is available where all books are sold. You can also find it on Audible where I will read it to you with my voice.

Thank you all, again, so much for being here. I appreciate your support very much! All love. <3