Kia ora from the final wash of December. Kei te pēhia koe?
We’ve slid right into the end of the year, though to me it doesn’t feel much like an ending. There’s very little, now, that remains contained in its allocation of the calendar: work persists; widespread conflict persists, as does the need to stand firm amidst its torrent, and the denial of settled endings to the many experiencing shattered ones. There are joys, of course, and books, and music, also always in bloom. But sometimes we get to the end of the year and I miss semesters, and formal education, when you could get caught up in the grasp of something and then have it be done.
I’ve been spending this holiday period with family and thinking, a little bit, about school, particularly those early-to-mid-teen years I was overseas. Thinking about how much affection I hold for many of those other kids, now adults all over the world; thinking about what I’d go back and tell myself if the chance arose. You’re buying into a hierarchy that creates a divide between you and those people you’ve learnt to admire, because you think there are worlds between you, but really you and they are both just kids. I’m sure that’s a symptom of the general teenage experience—and not just the teenage one, either. I also spent a long time feeling like I was fighting to get somewhere or become something, within those environments, whilst not realising I already had or was it. There are certain things you can only come to in hindsight.
Different friends, over the past few days, have brought up their approaches to the incoming year: some are making vision boards for the first time; some are setting word intentions; some are hoping for the twists and turns of life to allow them greater relief than the past couple of years have offered. Mostly I am just excited for another stretch of time to unfold before me, to bring with it surprises and new turns, delight and actualisation, and to, when March or August or December rolls around again, reflect that god—I never could have seen this coming. I have been so steadily caught off-guard by life. I hope to continue to be so.
This past week has brought with it rather dreary weather—another example of a sentiment Sarah Marshall has brought up several times on You’re Wrong About: that our constructs, wants, and narratives are nothing against nature’s lack of concern or investment in them. At any rate, there was sudden, torrential rain outside just before. I stopped writing and went and sat under the awning and the downpour misted its way to me. The sky was dense with low-hanging cloud; the veil of it sat like a cooled take on the white panel of Rothko’s No. 13.1 For the brief time I was out there, it felt almost Bedingfieldian. ‘Unwritten’ has been following me for months.2
I think, perhaps, we let that be it, and we allow for (and are galvanised by and toward) renewal, even if the break isn’t clean. It’s ‘the rest’ that Natasha sings about. That’s what’s coming. That’s what we’re making, each of us, all together, day by day anew.
Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin, which is full of sparkling articulations I’ve been encountering in extracts for years but am now experiencing in their totality.
Roses Dining Room: My introductory trip to Roses coincided with Georgia van Prehn’s time as the guest chef. Holly Girven Russel of Three Fates Wine was serving up a pre-release teaser of their 2023 wine selection, and I was reuniting with A after a two-month period of oh, god, here it is, the world you work towards and now find yourself living in—and the hectic nature of what that means—had kept us apart. Ophelia and Karl, who run Roses, have crafted a supremely warm, beautiful experience—the décor, the atmosphere, the food and drink on offer, all sitting at the perfect nexus of welcoming and well-constructed. Anyway, I’m not a food reviewer, but I am in love with the place. Go!
‘Not Just Passing’ by Hiba Abu Nada (trans. Huda Fakhreddine), particularly these stanzas:
And since it came of age, this ancient language
has taught us how to heal others
with our longing,
how to be a heavenly scentto relax their tightening lungs: a welcome sigh,
a gasp of oxygen.
Softly, we pass over wounds,like purposeful gauze, a hint of relief,
an aspirin.
O little light in me, don’t die,even if all the galaxies of the world
close in.
Finding out someone you think is cool and current and successful is at least half a decade older than you thought they were, even though the age they actually are is still very much a young one, which opens up the reality of longevity in a way you need to be reminded of sometimes.
‘Houdini’ by Dua Lipa, including the music video and the extended edit.
Tuesday, 22 August —
You’re overcome with a desperate urge to exist outside narrative.
If I enter into this thing, I am locked into a world with you.
Sunday, 17 September —
Let’s do away with that flitting, oysterish vaguery. I’ll tell you where I am.
Wednesday, 1 November —
Last week, Short Films turned one year old.
I sometimes find myself in two minds about marking occasions like this one—indeed, about bringing up the book at all, now that it isn’t so fresh; calling it the book, with a kind of nonchalance I don’t always mean—for fear of sounding, I suppose, like I’m milking it. Like I’m holding on to a piece of a past I’m meant to have moved on from. Like I managed one thing, once, and I’m trying to spin it into forever.3
There are, and have been, next projects. Not so publicly mine, I suppose, but still meaningful. All those trappings you need in order to build the catalogue of life and self from which whatever comes next will spring. There are a couple of particular nexts in motion, slow swirls and a hot pink heartbeat. But on the day in question, the 27th of October—and now—I thought I would allow myself a moment to acknowledge Short Films.
It hit me a couple of times, on Friday, sitting at my desk at work, in the lounge at home. I’ve recently reorganised my home writing set-up, and now it looks markedly similar to the way it did when I first moved back into this apartment: ancient desktop computer atop a circular glass table that came with the lease, the only surface deep enough to accommodate the computer and its various accoutrements as well as all the papers and books and vases and mugs desperate to take up residence at any given point. I locked off Short Films in this configuration.4 Whenever I think about that period of time, I’m almost overfull with it—the fact that before the book was published, it had already given me so much.
It’s a remarkable thing: an object, a body of work, the very existence of which is proof of faith and generosity.5 Even more remarkable is the fact that the miracle subsists. It grows, malleable and fluid—and suddenly, you’re in Te Whanganui-a-Tara, in an art gallery, in a Thai restaurant, in a converted print house; the book is out there, on shelves, in homes; it receives some careful, involved (and here the word ‘generous’ reappears—there can be nothing else for it) readings; it comes into the possession of people to whom it will mean something, and sometimes they feel compelled to tell you so. I’m grateful for that. Grateful that it’s done its job out there. Glad it’s been a vessel for experience. I stand by it. I’m proud of it.6 What rare satisfaction.
Time for another now. Or time for something else.
Tuesday, 12 December —
Reaching over the gap and taking your hand.
And here we are, and that’s that—for 2023 as a whole. Another one, gone. I hope you had the best time with it you could have.
I’m also on Instagram, if that’s your thing; and I have a website (including exactly one [1] Succession Easter egg, if you can find it).
The aforementioned Short Films is available directly from Tender Press and in bookstores across Aotearoa. You can also read Starling, full of wonderful work from New Zealand writers under 25, right here.
Ngā mihi o te tau hou Pākehā! Happy (incoming) New Year!
🦋 T
If you find yourself in Paris over this holiday period, or at any stage up until April, this painting is exhibited—alongside a great deal by Rothko, from collections across the world—at La Fondation Louis Vuitton.
I’m always looking to work this song into things.
I imagine if there’s anyone who thinks I talk too much about Short Films, it’s subscribers of this newsletter. Which is fair enough, I suppose—but this is a safe space, isn’t it? These overlong postcards? This little tannoy we’ve built?
Thank you, Tender Press legends 💘💘💘💘💘 The beloved fka WAB 🌈
I may well have said all of this before, in an only-negligibly-different cadence. If that’s the case, may the repetition let loose the truth. This happened to me. It meant so much.
It was strange to realise this and feel it with my whole chest. I have family members who are very hesitant to dole out declarations of pride, especially in other people, because they feel it indicates a kind of possession of, or involvement in, the characteristic or object or achievement of which one might express said pride. I’m not proud of [blank], they say. Like, yeah, it’s great, but I had nothing to do with it. [Blank] just went and did it. So I’ve inherited a kind of pride-averse tendency by osmosis. That said, I did have quite a hand in Short Films.
oh this is lovely Tate! I read two books by James Baldwin last (!) year (for the most internet reason- my favourite podcast is named after a Baldwin quote) and it felt long overdue. Perhaps Giovanni's Room is next! Also very much agree with the finding out someone is older thought.... I have been swimming twice a day for the last few days and not looking at my phone at all and knitting clothing with my hands and resolving to read massive novels. Really the way to be, the calm undefined wash of time that indicates a new year and living with possibilities