a photo of one corner of my writing office cork board

Well, this is sudden.

After a nearly two-year silence (which I tried and failed to break a couple of times along the way, insufficient oomph), the Zephyr has decided to come back today.

You just never know.

Also, here we are on Substack, no longer in TinyLetter. Because we’re not in pure cozy email form anymore—and because time has elapsed and everything changes in this world—some things about the Zephyr will be different.

The Zephyrs of the past almost always highlighted an artist, for example, among everything else, but now that these posts will be standing out in the world where anyone can see them, I think I’d need to put more work into acquiring permissions in order to do that with integrity. That’s not something I’m going to do. I have enough work to put enough places. We’ll have art from the public domain—and if any of you reading know an artist who’d be happy to have their work highlighted, we can have that—and we’ll have other visuals that don’t require special permission.

I’m startled to find myself here talking to you, in fact. When some kind of true wind blows through me to do something, I find myself doing it before I can wonder why.

So here we are.

And I think, yeah, I think the art thing is the only thing that will truly be different. The Zephyr will still come out on Thursdays, but probably not right after midnight at the very crack of Thursday, how it used to. Sometime on a Thursday, here it will be.

Yes? Good? Okay.

SO.

How, uh, are you all?

When we met last, in what I believe was the pre-sourdough period of the pandemic, before we were even sewing our own cloth masks (which have now become pointless vintage face negligées) we were gaping dumbly around while things* rolled to a stop.

*excluding things in hospitals and things in the workplaces of people who were not afforded the option to stop

 On the content of the last two years: NO COMMENT

what am I, insane? what am I gonna do, sum up? No thank you

Now we’re here in the Omicron Wordle times, worn out to shreds but charged with going on anyway, same as all humans ever in any of the bad Earth times. Who even wants to consider that the times can get worse than this? Nobody does but we’re all considering this nonstop anyway. Exhausting, but, again, not the worst. The Worst is always hanging out backstage, ready to enter and outdo the last Worst that held the role. We wish it would go away but it won’t so we must live in the moment with whoever the hell is onstage now.

The wind blew through to revive the Zephyr, I think, so we can at least keep each other company some more, and think about how to find interest, joy and strength while we scramble for our continued survival. 

Just so you know, I wasn’t asking how you were in a totally rhetorical way, or only because it’s funny to ask such a dumb question. Please do feel free to actually say how you are because now we have comments! I always loved receiving your direct responses to the TinyLetter but I really love the notion that you can talk not just to me but amongst yourselves if you’re so inclined.

How I am = Fine, aka the world’s limpest answer, but this will do for today. All of our family members are alive and safe, none have passed away, and overall we’re operating in good spirits and sturdy mental health. For 2022 Earth this is spectacular.

That’s it. I’m not going to try and do more today here. No links, no big thoughts, just:

a standing-up,

a dusting-off,

some looking around at our surroundings,

an agreement to walk on.

XO