Not y'all forgetting about little ol' me
It's 03:16 PST, on November 9th, and Venus is finally Libra.
Dearest Faguettes,
Thought you’d seen the last of me, huh? Well, I’m back and I’m sluttier than ever. No, but for real, I’ve missed you dearly. The last six months have been wickedly stacked: a runaway train of five back-to-back musicals, a summer camp demanding choreography, a youth production also demanding choreography, a me meeting those demands, a staged reading pulled out of my ass, a never-stopped-traveling stay in New York, a wedding in which I happily did the marrying, and a birthday that tried to kill me. No time to sleep, never enough time to write. After catching up on some much-needed Z’s, I am returning to our regularly scheduled programming: a monthly letter, a lunar horoscope, and an occasional long-form essay. Keep your eyes peeled for the latter most latter. I trust it will be a thought-provoking hoot as soon as I convince myself I am smart enough to write it. Until then, take dick (if that’s your thing) and most importantly take care.
Sincerely,
E.Y. Washington
Endangered Bookslut Caught Reading in the Wild
Blackouts, Justin Torres’ second novel, stalked me mercilessly. Toying with the dangers and delights of erasure, Torres blurs the line between fantasy and reality rendering art, trauma, and the archive an undeniably queer site. From Instagram to Twitter, Facebook to TikTok, algorithm be damned, authors and their readers sang the book’s praises as I scrolled down my feed. Strolling into a bookstore, eyeing the gleaming face-out, and purchasing it, I felt compelled. I carelessly flipped open to a particularly jarring sentence as I walked out. “And the song is a lament,” Torres’ line read, “something camp and bluesy, about how there ain’t no shame in being a bitch, but, Lord, be a bitch that barks.” It couldn’t have come to me at a more perfect time. I had been drifting through a sea of uncertainty——still am——and would like to scare my fears away. Maybe, just maybe, finishing Torres’ book will assist me in doing so. Here’s to hoping: one hundred and fifty bittersweet pages to go.
Books with Pictures, Books with Words, and Books that Caught My Eye:
New York, unlike California, seems filled with readers. Their bookstores and their painstaking curations are what gave them away. Bureau of General Services Queer Division, Powerhouse (formerly Dumbo Bookstore), and McNally Jackson Books, thank you. You made me fall in love with your beautifully gritty city. Next time I come I am bringing a bigger suitcase.
Notes: Justin Torres’ novel Blackouts has been nominated for the National Book Award. I’ve been eyeing Eloit Duncan’s Ponyboy but that’s for another “Not y’all . . . ” Anyway, I scoured Al Gore’s internet for other writings by Justin Torres and came across this piece. It’s moving, deals with homelessness, made me, a formerly homeless gyal, cry. Read ‘em and weep, kids.
The Sordid Necessity of Living with Others
by Justin Torres
My brother and I walk to the laundromat; he’s carrying the clothes I bought him last week, which are the only clothes he owns at the moment. He talks to me about the dignity of work and the indignities of charity. It’s October in L.A., sometime in the late morning or early afternoon, which is to say it’s all unrelenting brilliance and very few shadows, and the midterm elections are coming up.
“Trump gets it,” he says.
I love my brother, deeply. He’s in his early forties, handsome, fairly grizzled. I’m not looking to get drawn into a political conversation at the moment. I am looking to get out of the sun, get his laundry finished. But my brother can talk; he comes up with the most wonderful flourishes, the most provocative arguments, and, somehow, I always take the bait.
“Trump doesn’t care about you,” I say. “Or people like you. Or me.”