do I want to be famous. yes. although I think I disagree with the concept on a political level. what I want at my most pure is merely a way to live with some comfort, some security, and some dignity while doing the work / labor that I love (vibrating air, saying hello). as opposed to the work I do currently (sending less fun emails, stressing out, sitting in one place, often on hold on the phone, terrible music funneling into my ear). what I want at my darkest of heart is the special treatment, to feel the eyes light up before me, my status and my import parting the crowd as if the prow of a ship. currently I think the world says yes to me maybe one third of the time. this is not scientific. and I am grateful for that one third of the time. what I mean is that 33% of the time when I ask for something - whether pitched in an instagram DM or prayed for on bended knee - it kinda goes my way. like I can will things into being every once in a while, and other times I am brutally said no to, and other times I am ignored. 33% might be way overly generous to my yes rate, but what I mean is that the world does occasionally say yes to me. you understand what I mean. and for these grantings of my wishes I am naturally grateful. i have been said yes to on some of the big things, friends, love, reasons to keep swinging. but it is my fantasy - a bit delusional - that fame and notoriety would greatly increase the amount of yes. I very much want to increase my amount of yes. desires that I have not yet named would be said yes to, my wishes would be anticipated by the collective regard of those around me, opportunities for wonderful air wiggling and beautiful parties and interest and stimulation and all the rest would pop up like crocuses out of the ground, it is spring, see how they bloom. in short I would be cared for beyond my wildest speculation, walking effortlessly on the many-palmed water of the crowd below. and when I think of it this way I see a person who wants to be cared for, is cared for now but wants more, more, is greedy with this care, can never get enough. but in another very real sense I want only what will sustain me, I imagine keeping a small fire in a pot bellied stove. In this hot little iron vessel I keep my esteem and my labor burning hot enough to keep the house warm, it crackles and I smile, looking on, the orange light of the flames licking at the edges of my face. I want to be said yes to more, I think, to summarize, in order to say yes back more often myself. I feel very small and withered of spirit when I say no to things, I feel the husk and the huskiness of the no saying (poetically I realize upon writing this that the smaller I am physically i.e. of less weight the larger I feel of spirit and the more weight I gain back the smaller my import and my consideration of myself, never have I realized the inverse relationship of these things before, I will spend some time mulling this over now. also how strange that the losing of weight requires so very much no-saying - no to drinking really ever, no to most types of eating, no to much of life in lieu of sweating it out in a solo way, i.e. i’m sorry I cannot do the thing you’ve suggested, I have to run six miles to even approach being svelte. saying yes to me feels like throwing my arms around all of god’s great bounty, hoovering down the buffet table and plopping wet kisses on my friends’ cheeks, but in that bacchanalian saying of yes which for me approaches holy I balloon out, shrinking). I want to be said yes to more often because I also want to say yes to myself more often. how often, I wonder, do I say yes to myself when I am asking something of myself, do I say yes or no more or less often than I am said yes to by the wider world, do I ignore my own needs and requests at the same rate as the wider world ignores my pleas, do I reject my desires with as much of an ejector seat response, I wonder. button smash, rocket boosters, gone, parachute deploys, gently fall to earth.

I am trying to think less when I write, as I write. I did not have an end point or an editing session in mind when I began typing this out to you. I am trying to think less about the metrics this newsletter provides me, how I can see how many people have read, have listened, fewer each week (do I stop, then? no, of course I drill down harder until the world comes around!). I’m trying to think less about the amount of money it is costing me personally to put out a record in the year 2020, how much of that is dependent on a few kept gates and whether or not a spotify playlist breaks my way. I am trying to think less about how I feel like I have been sick forever, my lungs are full of shit and will I ever run again. I am trying to think about the joy of pulling the idea, magic handkerchief like, out of your own mouth, how dazzling the colors, the awe of the pull, pull, pull. Somebody I needed to hear from told me this week that I wrote beautifully and I was so touched I had to immediately close my web browser. Another person I was surprised to hear from recently texted me by accident - wrong ben - and seamlessly turned the convo into how she enjoyed reading this. I am trying to think about how it is all worthwhile, I am trying to think less about how it is all not worthwhile.