I have, at various times, been described as solar powered, a sunflower, and a basking lizard. In other words, I am deeply reliant on the sun and good weather to be a functioning member of society. Which is to say, spring has sprung, the trees have leaves, and we’re in my favorite time of year.

A bit of fun from April: I was a guest on the Superhero Ethics podcast to talk about Project Hail Mary! Project Hail Mary was my recommendation last month, so having an excuse to geek out about it even more was a delight.

Where I’m At

I seem to have discovered a rift in the space time continuum which gives me extra hours in the day. This will not be revelatory for many of you, but for me… oh boy.

The first thing you should know is that when I was a teenager, my dad jokingly threatened that someday, I’d have a real job, and I’d have to get up at 6 AM every day. That sounded like a nightmare to me, a teenager who slept until noon or later whenever I was given the chance. I was a night owl, and my peak creative hours were basically 10 PM to 2 AM. I have many memories of sitting at my computer overnight, pushing out thousands of words as easy as breathing.

I was a night owl through my twenties, too. Yeah, I did settle into white collar, office job life, and yeah, that did start at 9 AM, which meant I was out the door around 8:15 most mornings, but hey! I was in my 20s! I didn’t need sleep, going to bed at 2AM and getting up at 7:45 was fine! And any of my friends can tell you, if I did have to drag myself out of bed early on a weekend, I might be technically awake, but I was in no way coherent. My brain was not online until 10 AM at earliest.

Then at some point, that began to change. I can’t put my finger on when… but a few years ago, while on our annual summer writing group retreat, I realized I was the first person up. Not early, but earlier than my friends. I’m someone who does really well with routines, and my circadian rhythm is strong. At some point, without me asking for it, those habits and rhythms adjusted and now I’m out like a light by 11 PM every night, and awake around 7 most mornings. What?!?

The second thing is, my previous job had an 8:30 AM start time. That’s not bad, considering I was (and still am) working from home. After playing around with alarm clock times periodically, I settled on that 7 AM wake-up time… but what that really meant was laying in bed with my laptop until about 7:45, then getting up to shower and have my coffee, and sitting at my desk at 8:30. Then, with my recent job change, my start time became 9.

That’s where the rift in the space-time continuum comes in. My alarm was still going off at 7. I was still staggering out of bed at 7:45 or so. And then I had an extra 30 minutes of time every morning, which felt like a weird magic trick. What could you do with an extra 30 minutes?!

Well, write, obviously.

I knew I had to seize that moment before it started to feel normal. So while that half-hour still felt like a weird, magical discovery, I began fiddling with my schedule. I started making myself actually get out of bed at 7, instead of laying around. Which meant I was usually done with coffee and such by 8. Which means… more writing time.

Me?! Doing stuff in the morning?!?! It feels like a fundamental betrayal of who I am as a person. If you told teenage me about it, they’d never believe you, and then would say something disparaging about me-in-my-40s for giving in to The System. Which I guess I have, but also, writing in the morning feels good and energizing. The actual writing sessions don’t always go well, but I do look forward to them. Which feels crazy!

I have a theory about it all. As a teenager, and a 20-something, I did not have all that much responsibility. Yeah, I had school and/or work, but it wasn’t all that intense. Which meant I was left with plenty of mental energy at the end of the day — so yeah, I could be creative and productive well into the night. That’s definitely changed over the years. I’m not doing rocket science or anything, but since at least my mid-30s, my various jobs have taken a lot more brain power. I end the day frazzled and the thought of sitting back down to write at the same desk where I just spent eight hours working? UGH. I simply can not make myself do it. So I became more of a weekend writer, which is fine, and I drafted a couple projects that way. It works!

But… if I write before work? My brain is not fried. It is, in fact, fresh and alert, which turns out to be a pretty good state for drafting. I’m also still writing on the weekends, but having done some work during the week takes a bit of pressure off, which is great for the weekends I’m actually busy… and overall, it boosts my word count, because it does feel like I discovered a pocket dimension where the time doesn’t count so the words appear mysteriously.

I don’t write every morning — usually two days a week. I also, some days, get up and exercise… and some mornings, I’m just not feeling it, and I don’t make myself do anything. I promise, somewhere in my core I am still Not A Morning Person… but I do like my little pocket dimension.

A Thing I Made

This month’s cup was an experiment in a couple of ways.

For one, it was the first thing I made on a standing wheel. Last summer, a few of the joints in my lower back decided to go on strike and it made sitting at a wheel to throw pretty much impossible, because OW. In January I decided to experiment with a standing wheel — my joints are doing a lot better, but I definitely didn’t want to agitate them again, and throwing at the wheel involves a certain amount of hunching over. I’m not sure the standing wheel is great for my posture either, but it’s definitely better… but trickier. This cup was the first thing I made that survived the process.

Second, I wanted to play around with glaze techniques. Specifically, I love this red clay, I think it’s rich and beautiful, but it is always kind of a pain to glaze. Colors don’t pop as much a they do on white clay, or have the lovely speckles they do with brown clay, so deciding what to do with it can be annoying. In this case, I decided to leave a segment of it bare, to show off the clay itself and play around with texture a little.

I like it! I’m definitely showing you its best angle — one thing I learned is that I’ll keep the bare patch quite a bit smaller if I try this again — but I do really like the contrast between the shiny blue glaze and the rich bare clay.

Something I’m Enjoying

A bit over a month ago, when I was traveling, I saw a random but interesting looking rec for Lily Allen’s most recent album, West End Girl: a fun pop album with great storytelling about the absolute toxic mess of her marriage and divorce. It sounded interesting so I grabbed it to listen to on the plane.

Then I listened to it on repeat for the next month solid. The vibe of the music is light and airy, occasionally turning mellow… But oh boy, the subject material. There’s cheating, insecurity, pressure to try an open relationship, boundary trampling, sex addiction, and finally, divorce. (Thank god it ends with divorce after all of that.) And it does all of that with a sense of humor.

It’s poppy and funny and tragic, and every track has spent at least a few days stuck in my head.