friday love list: post-surgery edition
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Friday is Venus’s day. A day for connection, for beauty, for joy. For sharing what is bringing us joy, and what we’ve loved.
As ever, the Friday Love List is in honor of and offering to Venus. Here are some of the things that most brought me pleasure and delight over the last 3.5 weeks of my convalescence.
I have every hope of returning to regular posting with this weekend’s New Moon in Leo. Thank you for your patience with the slower schedule this month! Hysterectomy recovery is, truly, no joke.
none of this is sponsored; i’m just screaming into the void about shit i love
Things I’ve loved lately
Tanner Leatherstein’s videos
Ever since this sweet Turkish leathermaster started showing up on my TikTok FYP with his videos deconstructing luxury bags, I’ve been obsessed with his channel. (It doesn’t hurt that it hits at the exist at the perfect intersection of fashion and unintentional ASMR.)
Those initial post-surgery days, where I was laid out in bed, were perfect for an Oxy-fueled hyper-fixation deep dive. Watching practically every video from this guy led me to the strange world of luxury handbag YouTube, and I now know more about the Hermès game than will ever be useful. Ask me about quota bags.
Loose, flowy dresses
I divested from hard pants around the same time that I started to work from home in 2019. Since I am also a girly girl, it should come as no surprise that I have a decent selection of everyday house dresses, and over the years have developed opinions about fabric, tightness, length, slits, and so much more.
This is the perfect (warm weather) house dress. Initially purchased in anticipation of a vacation a few years ago, it instead became a dress I lived in when my appendix burst, which landed me in a hospital bed instead of on a beach in Mexico. Which is to say, this was a tried and tested post-surgery, I can’t fucking move and everything hurts dress that I knew wouldn’t irritate my incisions or my skin.
This dress is soft (truly, so soft) and is the perfectest amount of skin-skimming looseness. It has knee-high slits on both sides, which is ideal for not feeling constricted; in normal times, it’s one of my favorite running errands around the neighborhood dresses. It has stretched out over the years, and I simply do not understand the weird little breast pocket it has, but for an everyday house dress, it can’t be beat.
(Yes, it’s from Amazon. It’s also $20 and I’ve had it for almost three years and wear it all the time. Post-surgery, I even slept in it! And writing all of this is making me think I should get another of these dresses in a different color.)
The Olympics
It’s that strange moment every few years where suddenly, I become wildly patriotic and weep at things like Pommel Horse Man.
This year, in part due to convalescence and in part due to the time difference between New York and Paris, I’ve watched a greater variety of sports than I have in years past. Swimming, of course, but also surfing, BMX riding, women’s rugby (step on me, Ilona Maher). The versatility and diversity of human expression through the body is remarkable.
Which brings me to Simone Biles and the USA gymnastics team, who won the team gold on Tuesday. Gymnastics is usually the only sport I make a point to watch in the summer Olympics. I loved my tumbling classes as a child and idolized the Magnificent 7 of the 1996 US Olympics team; my parents got me an Olympic Barbie who I immediately named Shannon Miller.
This current team is awe-inspiring. Gymnasts like Suni Lee and Jordan Chiles would be megastars in any other era; Chiles, in particular, has a charisma and showmanship that is rare in the sport and is so much fucking fun to watch. I will drop everything to watch a Jordan Chiles routine any day of the week.
But, as we all know, most folks are tuning in for Simone Biles — as they should. To call her a generational talent doesn’t feel sufficient. Her peers aren’t her fellow gymnasts, but athletes like Serena Williams, Pele, Michael Phelps, Michael Jordan, Wayne Gretzky, Usain Bolt — people who were (and are) so dominant and visionary as to redefine their sport.
I’ll probably be writing more on Simone Biles in the New Moon newsletter, but suffice it to say: what a gift to get to be alive during her rise and rise, to get to witness the kind of Greatness that refuses to settle and so, consequently, inspires the rest of us to reach higher.
Also! There are still ways you can work with me to help support your book project/creativity/life this summer.
Folks with major life events coming up in the next year, like a wedding, move, or big publishing milestone: if you want to find the best possible timing for your event and really maximize its impact, reach out to me for help on timing with electional astrology.
Nonfiction writers and memoirists who are still figuring out what a book proposal is and how the hell you write one, here’s a supportive, 4-part self-paced class available for immediate download on How to Write a Book Proposal.
Writers of all genres who want to understand how your ideal writing practice is already written in your birth chart: book your 1:1 reading with me for later this month/into September!
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I'm with you as a fellow gymnastics fan since the Mag 7, and I have been rambling about Simone to anyone who will listen! Not only is she inventing new ways to do gymnastics at a rate the scoring can't even keep up with, she's made the sport safer and more joyful for all of the athletes. She's proven you can be the best there is at the sport AND take care of yourself. It's such a thrill to witness!!
Other things I'm loving: tru fru brand chocolate covered frozen fruit, jogging the slowest beginner laps on the track in my neighborhood (thanks to binging Nikki Hiltz tiktoks)
Three things bringing me joy lately.
Popsicles - normally I’m a chocolate girl but there is nothing like a really good fruity popsicle on a hot day.
Brooklyn Nine-Nine - I started watching for Andre Braugher and his deadpan humor. The jokes make me laugh out loud. I need this so much this summer.
Ripping old blue jeans into fabric - I’m finishing a really big project and when I need to keep my hands moving but my brain to quiet, this is it. My fall project is to make a denim backpack with all these lovely beat up colorful yardage.