girls that never diary: week 13

poems with friends, end of the semester, more travel

GIRLS THAT NEVER DIARY is a (temporary) series where I try, once again, to create a daily writing practice. This time I’m also trying to reset some of my associations around writing, because my brain is tired of only wrestling with things that hurt me whenever I sit down to write. I’ve started writing these little diaries in my notes app, and they have mostly been helpful in that they get me to write something, and also in that they help me, when I reread them, answer the question for myself about what it is that I actually do all day, as a freelancer with barely any relationship to routine, as a writer who isn’t writing very much these days. I’ll send these out once a week until my brain is fixed.

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FRIDAY

5:45am - The sun is very much back! I get up to turn on the air conditioner then get back into bed. I spend the next few hours drifting in and out of sleep in a patch of sunlight

8:30am - I get up and make an iced coffee in celebration of it being 92 degrees out today. I cut up an old tank top into a different shape and listen to You Made a Fool of Death With Your Beauty on audiobook while I redo the hem

10:00am - I move to the couch and watch Top Chef while I drink my coffee. I text with Hanin to make tentative plans to go to the duendita show tonight but she might be busy. Chris makes me some eggs and we play chess while we eat

11:20am - I go back to watching Top Chef and text with Rudy to try and find dates for her to visit. The internet cuts out before I finish watching this episode of Top Chef. Hectic day today—the building was testing the fire alarms all morning, then turned the power off for a bit, and now the internet. I do some cleanup and make a cup of tea to have with some ginger cookies

12:05pm - The internet is back so I go back to watching TV. I pause the show to text a bit with Basma and my mom

1:10pm - Another game of chess with Chris. He’s on a very dramatic winning streak. Afterwards he goes back to writing and I eat some chips and salsa and watch more Top Chef

2:30pm - I watch Etoile and text with Fati

3:10pm - A podcast and a nap

4:30pm - I wake up and remember the chocolate covered rice cake crumbles from a few days ago. I snack on those and start watching the movie Nonnas. Chris gets home and we play another game of chess—I finally get a win! I take a shower and keep watching Nonnas

5:50pm - I heat up the rest of the pasta and keep watching while I eat and text with Mustafa

7:50pm - I switch to half-watching Etoile at some point and eat some pickles. I finish the jar and drink the pickle juice and feel healed by it. I accept that I’m not going to be cooking anything for Saila’s pineapple-themed Chungking Express screening tomorrow so I make a delivery order for a bunch of pineapple sodas to bring instead

8:30pm - Chris and I play a few more rounds of chess before he goes out. I putter around afterwards emptying the dishwasher and such, then start making a packing list for my trip to Pittsburgh in a few days while texting with Hieu and Fati.

(PS: Here’s the packing list, if you’re interested—in pictures because this is the system I use! Also each outfit for the trip)