119. (Mild) horror

Heal my brain

What I’m up to

Someone asked how my weekend was the other day, and I said, “Uh, yeah, it was fine? We didn’t really do much.” And then I remembered that Saturday was Anna’s high school graduation. This lapse in brain function was not in any way indicative of how important that milestone was (obviously!) - it was, instead, a direct reflection of how absolutely exhausted I was by the end of the school year. Each day felt like both a minute and a million years.

The end of the school year is always tiring, but this year is, unsurprisingly, extra tiring as we’re also processing our kid soon moving out.

Having a kid about to leave home is disorienting and heart-breaking, but having a near-adult kid is also super awesome. She sends me music recs, watches movies with me, and tags along while I run errands.

Last night, we watched Maggie Gyllenhaal’s The Bride. Do I recommend it? Ehhh… Do I recommend watching it with your 17-year-old (to whom you taught Frankenstein) and then discussing it afterwards? Yes. We’ve spent hours speculating over would have happened had Victor created a companion for Frankie (our affectionate nickname for the Creature), and this plays out the scenario with an intriguing feminist twist. I did find the Mary Shelley possession parts awkward and unnecessarily chaotic and the actual plot thin… but I felt like the movie was vindication of Frankie, of sorts, which we liked.

Anna’s heading to Sarah Lawrence in the fall.

We don’t leave for the US until the 17th, and I was thinking this time here in Taiwan would be the most relaxed and free I’ve been in who knows how long. I usually teach a summer class and take a grad class during break, and we usually leave the country quite early, but this year, we have more than two weeks of nothing. Of course, my calendar filled up quickly. The very first day of break, I literally went to five parties (two of which I hosted). During the first week of break, I’ve barely had any time at home. But it’s been so, so good. Shelby and her family visited, and it was SO nice to have my errand buddy back, and I loved sharing drinks on the rooftop and balcony again. We took a day trip to XLQ with friends, where we had to swim away from the sea turtles to avoid being fined.

Now Anna, Lucy, and I are at a cafe working on our respective newsletters, no homework in sight.

What I’m reading

I scored an ARC of Taipei Story by R.F. Huang, a much-hyped book that made me nervous about how it would portray a place I know and love. Huang gives a disclaimer in the preface, that the story is about getting things wrong because of mistranslation and miscommunication. But by the end of the novel, I was more in tune to what the author got right: the distinct self-loathing and resignation TCKs experience when we know we can never truly escape our foreignness.

It’s not the story I expected from Huang, but I enjoyed it and appreciated it. I think I’m going to recommend it for our high school book club next year.

I also very much want to read Taiwan Travelogue, which just won the International Booker Prize. I joined the teacher book club just after they had finished reading and discussing this book, much to my disappointment. Now the book is sold out at our local bookstore!

I read Strangers by Belle Burden, a memoir about a marriage that very suddenly implodes when the seemingly-devoted husband decides to leave after 21 years. (You can read Burden’s Modern Love submission that distills her story here.)

I finished This Story Might Save Your Life by Tiffany Crum. It was… fun as an audiobook, but otherwise not my cup of tea. The main romantic trope is one I just learned the name for — Missed Connections — and I can emphatically say I hate this trope. It basically means the only reason the main characters aren’t together is because they weren’t able to communicate their feelings because of bad timing, misunderstandings, etc. etc.

I read The Lilac People for book club. It’s a perfect case study for why book clubs should exist - I wouldn’t have picked up the book on my own, and I appreciated it better having discussed it. It essentially provides a history of transgender rights around World War II and beyond.

Several of us (the English teachers!) had quibbles with the actual writing. It was, at times, heavy-handed. The plot felt contrived. YET as one person conceded, many of the points that felt extra-contrived are, in fact, based on historical truth.

There’s a particular burden carried by minority writers, a burden to represent a whole experience. Someone from the group pointed out that there are a million shi**y non-transgender books about the Holocaust, and it feels kind of bad to rip apart this one. But we concluded that we just need more and more books representing voices that historically have been silenced. As another book club member said, “While I didn’t love the book, it’s a book that had to be written.” Maybe someday, with more understanding and more voices, we’ll get the beautifully written book, but for now, it’s important to read and learn.

What I’m watching

Movie night picks since I last wrote: LA Confidential (both slow and riveting), Fargo (a rewatch, and I loved it even more the second time. SO funny and SO dark.), and Everything, Everywhere All At Once (holds up).

Late after a party, Paul and I were scrolling through Netflix, dodging movies I deemed “too heavy.” Then we decided just to look for a Robert Pattinson film and landed on The Devil All the Time. Lol lol lol. This movie is probably heavier than all the other ones I skipped, combined. Yikes. It was 2+ hours spent in, well, hell. Do not recommend.

I watched Cabin in the Woods with P and B after our last day of school, a hilarious way to kick off the beginning of break. Then I watched Backrooms with the same friends, which was so fun. At one point P was so freaked out, he punched me by accident. I cannot believe I now enjoy (mild) horror. (My verdict of Backrooms? This was, again, a fun watch because of the company and the ensuing analysis more than because of the merits of the movie itself.)

We weren’t able to finish Band of Brothers during TV night, so I’ll probably finish that on my own. I’m also caught up on Your Friends and Neighbors, finishing Beef season 2, and starting Widow’s Bay.

And of course I watched the (devastating) Champions League final and now the NBA finals. Sports, man.

What I’m thinking about

Speaking of sports, Anna asked me in all seriousness why people watch sports at all. It just seems like torture, she said. You just look so stressed all the time.

It’s true, watching sports is stressful. When I was admitted to the hospital last year for a heart thing, several of my friends joked that my Celtics fandom was probably to blame. During the Champions League final, I hosted a watch party and proceeded to kill the vibe by just being super nervous about the game the whole night. (Even the guest wearing the PSG shirt stopped heckling.)

BUT but but! I love watching sports! It brings people together! It engages even the most stoic people’s emotions! It gives us the low-stakes opportunity to experience life’s highest highs and lowest lows, collectively.

And that’s really it - sports is communal. Celtics games kept me connected to my friend J, who moved continents last year. The basketball talk was conduit for life talk, and I think we’re closer now than we were when he left. (If you’re reading this, correct me if I’m wrong, J.) Steelers football (and movie nights during the off-season) gives us a reason to hang out with friends on a school night. When I post a pic of a game on TV, I hear from people from very disparate parts of my life. A good contingency of middle school boys follow me around school to heckle me about Arsenal after every loss (and win, smh), kids who would otherwise not have reason to talk to me at all.

Go Spurs.

What I’m learning

How important it is to rest. I play hard and work hard but don’t really rest hard. I’m hoping a few weeks of enough sleep and no multi-tasking is going to heal my brain, whose function slowed to a crawl the last few weeks of school.

What I’m digging

World Cup season is coming up!

Until next time,

Kate