Emily Dickinson called her Amherst home “The Homestead.” I lovingly call my apartment in St. Louis the same thing (although I definitely get out more than Dickinson). This monthly newsletter is my attempt to work through what it feels like to put down roots as a writer in my own Homestead.
Home making, home cooking.
In the past several years, I’ve learned loneliness. I’ve learned how a home can hold you, can reflect back to you what’s happening inside yourself. I’ve learned to comfort myself instead of comforting a partner. And I’ve learned that living alone well is a skill—not one everyone has.
When I was twenty-two, newly married, and living in a 450 square foot apartment with a new spouse and two dogs, I became fixated on “homemaking.” I read books about cooking, etiquette, and interior design that I’d be embarrassed to name nowadays. These were the days of the “mommy blogger” dominion, so I read plenty of blogs from homeschooling, Christian mothers who were really good at making homemade yogurt and pickles and sourdough and batch-cooked meals that lasted all week. To this day, I still use a recipe for Chicken Divan that I found on a now-deleted mommy blog from an ultra fundamentalist, “quiverfull” woman.
One of the arrangements of my first year of marriage to my then-husband was that he would handle all dog care (walks, feeding, etc.), and I would do all the cooking. This fractal system of chores shows our immaturity, I think, but we were doing our best. Aside from breakfasts and sack lunches, I cooked nearly every dinner we ate at home from 2010-2011. When we eventually moved into a house with a yard for the dogs, this cooking schedule eased up; but in that first year in the tiny apartment, it was all me.
I spent the next nine years daily aware that dinner had to be planned, cooked by someone, and eaten at a reasonable time. My ex was not a fan of the “fend for yourself,” fast-food, or the boxed mac-and-cheese models of dinner planning. We ate full meals, usually a meat and a vegetable, basically every night.
These kinds of expectations can teach you how to cook real fast. Early on, there were some “disaster dinners,” but mostly I figured things out. I bought a copy of Alice Waters’ The Art of Simple Food and walked myself through the basics of making any kind of soup, cooking any vegetable, and the requirements for different cuts of meat. The first time I roasted a whole chicken, it was while following her recipe in that now grease-stained, yellow book.
Going into the New Year, I’m thinking a great deal about how much I learned about homemaking from being married for all of my twenties. Not only did I do a lot of the cooking, but I also managed most of our finances (plenty of missteps there, to be honest). I was our chief decorator, and I remember being the person who petitioned for a Roomba for a Christmas gift one year.
It feels odd to be grateful for this education, but I am grateful. I learned how to live alone well from the work of living with another (and, for me, it was work).
Just something on my mind heading into the new year, happy and warm in a home that is entirely my own.
Some (sort-of) resolutions.
I’m wary of resolutions. Even though I’m a fan of *rituals* for just about any major (or minor) moment, I’m more convinced of the significance of the Winter Solstice than I am by a new year on the calendar. Some of this is because I’ve no energy left for moment-making after holiday exhaustion.
This year, I managed to maintain my goal of having a quiet Christmas (did not miss the tree at all, by the way), but I’m still weary. For me, the holidays include long car rides, lots of social energy, and a general frustration with the excess of it all. I’m always glad when things start returning to normal after Christmas Day.
But I do have a few resolutions this year, some things I’d like to be mindful of…
Here are my sort-of resolutions for the new year:
Make peace with solitude as one of the ingredients of creativity. This is the biggest creative takeaway I have from last year. In order for me to finish the big writing projects I have on my plate, I needed to be alone. Living by myself helps this process, but I have a (good) tendency to reach out when I’m lonely and bored. Sometimes, though, you have to sit with the solitude to see the project through. Boredom, solitude, and boughts of loneliness can show you new pathways in ideas; for me, it’s an essential part of the work.
Train myself to walk very, very far. My mom and I have resolved to train for a 465-mile hike around Prince Edward Island in 2025. I’m really excited about this, but I have got a LOT of work to do to get my body ready for this kind of distance, especially if we’re going to make the hike in a reasonable amount of time. My current training method for short walks? Walking for all of 1989 (Taylor’s Version) with the bonus tracks to keep pace.
Writing projects are not New Year’s Resolutions. Writing is my daily work. A lesson from this year is that “things take the time they take.” It’s better for me to think of writing as my daily practice, not a yearly goal. Are there projects I want to finish this year? Of course. But I’m determined to just trust the process, showing up everyday to do my job as a writer.
Like what I like. I’ve been remaking my guest room into a shrine to girlhood. It brings me so much joy. I don’t care if people think dolls are weird—it’s my apartment, my money, my stuff. 💅
What I’m reading this month…
A Life of One’s Own: Nine Women Writers Begin Again by Joanna Biggs. I’m halfway through this book—a mixture of divorce memoir and mini-biographies. Entries on Virginia Woolf, George Eliot, Sylvia Plath, Zora Neale Hurston, and others. Great reading for the start of the New Year.
Sea of Tranquillity by Emily St. John Mandel (audiobook). Listened to this novel on a long drive to Georgia for the holidays. It’s beautiful—time travel, the simulation theory, the moon, book tours. I loved it all.
The Virginia Woolf Writers’ Workshop: Seven Lessons to Inspire Great Writing by Danell Jones. I pick up this book (which I first read in undergrad) whenever I need some writing inspiration. I pull from this text a lot when I’m looking for group exercises, too.
Enchantment: Awakening Wonder in an Anxious Age by Katherine May (audiobook). I read May’s book Wintering during the pandemic and loved it. This new book has lots of reflections about lockdown without feeling too much like a pandemic book. Always love this writer.
How I made money this month $$$
I believe freelance artists should be more upfront about how they support themselves financially, rather than maintaining the illusion that they are fully supported by their art (they usually aren’t). This is me attempting to live out that principle. So, here are all the ways I brought in money to the Homestead for the month of December.
Teaching artist work for Prison Performing Arts. Teaching a weekly writing workshop and teaching Spoken Word regularly in a men’s prison.
Playing piano for a local Catholic middle school’s chapel service. I’m learning to play a lot of gospel tunes and Mass music.
Facilitating online graduate literature courses. Every day I’m grading, grading, grading.
Christmas gifts! THANK YOU, MOTHER AND FATHER!
Paid Substack subscriptions. Thank you to all of my paid subscribers. It means the world to me that you make a financial contribution to my work.
So as today, the rest of the year.
In one of her journals, Susan Sontag once wrote that her resolution was “kindness, kindness, kindness.” This is the energy I want to bring to the first day of the year: only kindness—to others and to myself.
Today starts a new year. Good luck to you.
Yours,
Courtney, Mistress of the Homestead, and Noble Midge the Cat 🐈⬛
Happy New Year!