Thank you for the picture of your kid and thank you for the well wishes, much time has passed and much has changed and you look the same, or you don’t; we hang your cards in the dining room, we like a full kitchen.
We’ve never been the family that sends a holiday card, and maybe that says something about reciprocity, maybe it says more about what specific ingredients make up the families that do and the families that don’t, maybe I thought there was a recipe for family, or: I thought things like holiday cards made a family good, maybe I thought things like holiday cards made family.
. . .
2023.
Tana’s hands are hurting, she wants to go shopping for new glasses.
The Warby Parker worker says her skin is luminous, she also says “of-course-we-can-get-those-to-you-tomorrow-all-you-need-to-do-is-sign-here” as she wears the same frames and suddenly: is it good how quickly we can buy our vision or suddenly is it scary?
Time passes in the form of eye exams. By that I mean it dilates, of course.
. . .
Paul keeps tilting his chair back.
Once: he was six months old in Brooklyn, once he had a high chair.
Now: I ask him not to lean back so far; he teaches lessons about evaluating risk in silence, he wants to live a little.
. . .
Patrick’s in New Jersey, so this is how it feels when kids are adults and adults are kids; so this is what it means to have blood with roots in other states.
. . .
Julia is so much happier now, and you didn’t know that she wasn’t before, we didn’t write it on the Christmas cards we never sent. Happy holidays, and our daughter is depressed. Welcome: new year, and she’s happier than you are, now.
. . .
Thank you for the picture from this year, I like the way I know this moment must have meant something — the way you chose to send it to someone you haven’t heard back from, though that was not on purpose. I like the way you freeze yourself in time; the way paper nods. Happy holidays from me and mine, we didn’t forget about you, we just forgot how to remember, we just remember a little too much, we just high-chair-trust-fell into something we can’t quite see: we called it New Jersey, we are happier, now.
2023, and we made it. also, my parents say hi (yes, even to those of you they don’t know). thanks for reading my newsletter — can’t wait to send more emails into the abyss next year! wishing you love, peace, safety, and whatever else it is you’re hoping for.
- Julia
Question to ask your mom: What is something you want to remember from this year?