The art of skin-shedding
calling off my wedding + starting over at 30 in nyc
I was supposed to get married mere weeks from today in an intimate New England library wedding to another author. Instead, I’m drinking a flat white in a cafe on the upper east side, watching spring rain sluice off cars and awnings outside, alone. All plans of moving to the UK as newlyweds have been tabled, and my life is back in boxes once again.
I spent almost my entire twenties with my prior partner, a stone’s throw shy of eight years. For a long time I was happy to be caught in the light refracting off his intelligence, his calm demeanor, his hedonist’s love for everything beautifully patinaed by time. We published together, moved cities together again and again, whipped up a dozen dreamy possible futures together, and of course, cut ourselves on each other’s growing edges. After we began to drift apart — slowly at first and then all at once — we tried to fit ourselves back into the shapes we were when we first met, only to discover that we had changed so much that there was no finding our way back to each other without betraying ourselves.
We stayed coupled until it became undeniable that we had been knocked out of the center of each other’s lives by incompatible dreams and desires, and until the home we had built started to feel like a cage. Until we realized that it wasn’t a home at all, just a very comfortable shelter where he we could take refuge from all the hard revelations we were running from.
Despite all the air raid sirens telling me to get to higher ground, I truly believed we would make it out of the trenches together, right up until the very last moment. Our romantic relationship was bigger than us after all. It was a cosmic plan there was no arguing with, a long-forgone conclusion, a pre-ordained happy ending. I believed love would be enough. Love had to be enough.
The best thing about me? I can romanticize anything. The worst thing about me - I’ll romanticize anything.
This is probably all I’ll write and publish about this relationship, the way it came together and came apart. I always endeavor to tell the radical truth about my life while leaving the people I love out of it, although I’m not always successful on either count. But it’s worth it to try to be discreet in this case. The separation was mutual after all, two artists going their own way like so many literary couples before us.
Why muddy the well by trying to draw the last few cups of clean water up from the silt?
Now I’m in New York City, a place I’ve been in long-distance love with for a decade. My time and my social calendar and my career and my recreational activities are entirely mine again, a sort of freedom that is as intoxicating and miraculous as it is totally gutting.
The thing no one tells you about getting older is that there is no “later”, there is no “I’ll get to it someday”, and there’s certainly no “I’ll become that person when I’m ready”. There is no right time, there is just the fleeting, electric, never-guaranteed present. So if I’m going to get knocked off the entire timeline I had been envisioning with another person and into an alternate universe where I’m a single working artist in her thirties living in the greatest city in the world, I’m going to make the most of it. I’m going to wear what I want, write what I want, go where I want, kiss who I want, cultivate the social networks I want, throw myself wholeheartedly into the work of living. I’m going to treat my life as a piece of art to be curated and cultivated because it is.
My own evolution is an itch under my skin, inviting me to peel back all the layers of dead skin and grief and self-blame to find the new me underneath. It’s a raw process, sometimes painful, often ugly, but it’s glorious too, all new birth and flushed cheeks and rooms opening up in my heart that I locked up a long time ago. It’s exciting and terrifying and it feels like teetering on the edge of a precipice, like making eye contact a little too long with someone at a party and knowing that if they walk over and say hello, something inside you is going to change forever.
It sounds incredibly dramatic, but I feel like the last of my girlhood died along with my broken engagement, but also that the girl within has never been closer to the surface, asking for attention and affection and play.
To come along on this journey of radical artistic authenticity and romantic adventure and personal re-discovery with me, sub to the newsletter. I’m going to be posting through it, like any good zillennial, and filling you in on all the films and perfumes and new york spots I’m loving in the process. Sometimes, if you’re very well behaved, you might even get cultural criticism and essays on the interplay between spirituality and creativity from me, not to mention publishing industry gossip.
Events
If you’re hitting up the con circuit this summer, don’t miss me at Imaginarium in D.C June 6-7th, and at Romance Con in Milwaukee September 5-6th, with some tickets still available for both cons! Information on programming coming soon. US babes, I know last year’s domestic tour was on the mini side, but I’m trying to spread myself around a little bit more this summer. Keep your eyes peeled for bigger and better US dates soon.
Everything I’ve Been Loving Lately
Glossier You Doux. Glossier You is a utterly wearable, creamy-clean skin scent that’s popular for a reason (my first in class in that category is L’eau Papier by Diptique. The worn parchment and white rice steam accords really knock it out of the ballpark) but I would argue that Doux is better that You. The addition of frankincense, palo santo, and the subtlest myrrh and violet notes make it a touch sexier, a touch more unisex, and a lot more shot through with yearning. If You is a straight A student, Doux is a true thought daughter.
The sundress and sneakers special. Every single beautiful girl in NYC is out in force this week in their sundress and sneakers. I personally have been loving wearing my green and white striped seersucker midi dress from Marks and Spencer with my chunky white and lavender pumas. Not one but three women stopped me when I was out running errands in the UES to compliment my dress; that’s how you know an outfit is good!
Ava Reid books. She’s a genius prose stylist with one of the best grasps of pacing, suspense, and character work in the game right now. Living proof that none of us have to choose between being literary and being commercial.
Yves Saint Laurent Babycat. I’m sorry it’s $330 dollars a bottle but you know what, YSL can charge whatever they want for this. A grown-up animalic vanilla that smells like saffron, suede, more black pepper than you would expect, and being kissed with a warm, bourbon-sweet mouth. It has enough presence to turn heads, but someone with the right carriage could wear this as their daily signature. A true it girl (or it boy, I would EAT UP a man wearing this) fragrance.
Crying on the Acela train. Something so chic about weeping into my diary in high speed business class, and the seats are comfy enough to snooze in.
Co-working with my friends. New York truly is a city of writers, and I am being upheld and encouraged in this season of my life by my amazing group of author friends. Getting together to work on our books together in shared physical space in the age of zoom is everything.
That’s all I have for you this week, beloved. Thank you for reading this meditative newsletter, and for being here for the rebirth. I’m whipping up a essay on writing polyamorous romance and situating it in the market for paid subscribers this month, so don’t forget to hop onto the paid tier or grab your free trial to make sure you don’t miss it.
Until we meet again, be safe and well.
-S
Heartache is a sickness as any other and whatever growing you have done and will do will heal such ache. Your friend is a text or letter away… if you need it.
This was a powerful and personal read! My friend is going through a similar experience— I can’t wait to pass this along to her!