What I needed was right here all along

I guess I'm Dorothy now

I inherited a sewing machine from my mother-in-law. She was a quilter, and at some point stopped quilting, and she asked if I wanted her Bernina 1020, and I was so happy to say yes. The sewing machine we had at that point was one that Dave bought. It was very old (and metallic green!) and had one speed (fast) and nothing else. No reverse, no zigzag. One speed, forward, fast. It sounded like a machine gun and terrified me.

I love the Bernina and love sewing on it, but sometime in 2022 the light bulb went out. Not having a light on it isn’t the worst thing in the world, but it’s a pain. I’m not historically known for my eyesight (once an eye doctor told me, “your vision is really bad” like, yes, thank you, I know) and after a while the lightlessness became a problem. I ordered many replacement bulbs, and none of them worked. I worried the machine was too old, and that proper working bulbs were no longer available. I bought a clip-on light, which worked ok, but which vibrated jarringly whenever the table moved, which was whenever I was sewing, which was what I needed it for.

And then one day a few months ago I was looking in the manual for something and noticed a funny square on the back of the sewing machine in the diagram, and looked at the corresponding description, and do you know what it said? “Sewing light switch.” Sewing light switch. I pressed the button, and the light turned on. Just like that. There was a button. The whole time.

THERE IS A BUTTON.

Last month, I was recording the week 1 video for an online class (which starts today, see below). My webcam takes mediocre videos and the audio is truly terrible. Zuzu (my 15-year-old) bought a film camera from the thrift store, and so we went to the photo store to buy film for it. While she was looking at options, I mentioned to the person working behind the counter that I’m trying to record better videos, and that I have a nice but old digital camera, but it’s hard because I can’t see myself, and sometimes I record a video and the top of my head is cut off because I didn’t line it up correctly. He showed me a fancy camera that’s especially made for making videos for the internet. He showed me how the screen could fold out, so then you could see yourself. And I thought, yeah, well, that’s nice, but my camera is pretty old. 

And then I went home and looked at my camera and noticed a little hinge on the back and folded the screen up and now I can see myself when I record. I’ve had this camera since 2014, and only just learned about this feature.

OH HELLO.

You might conclude that I’m not great at paying attention. And that might be true.

But both of these experiences, which happened pretty close to each other, made me feel like: I have what I need. In both of those cases, I really, really needed the feature.¹ And then, somehow, what I needed appeared. 

This certainly doesn’t apply to everything (for sure, sometimes you need something and it doesn’t appear), but, like I always do, it made me think about writing. And how sometimes I get annoyed that I can’t figure a story out. I get frustrated. I feel like “I guess I’ll have to make it work with what I’ve got here, which isn’t ideal.” But maybe, in fact, I do have what I need, right here. The magic of it was that I didn’t think I had any of those things. I wished for a light bulb, I wished for a camera with a flip-up screen so I could see myself. And there they were. 

I am noticing lately that the harder my writing work is, the more the internet calls to me, like a piece of chocolate cake yelling from the fridge that I should eat it. So much of the internet is the same same same but some part of me thinks I can find the different thing, the radical thing, that will make all the clicking around worth it. Or I check my email, because maybe there’s good news, or just news, and that happens maybe 1 out of every 1000 times I check.

I wonder, what if I only checked my email when the regular mail came from the post office? Once a day, and never on Sundays or holidays. That actually sounds like exactly the right amount to check my email. And why do I keep reading the internet like it’s a task I can complete? Like anyone has ever said, “Well, I did it. I’m done. I finished reading the internet.” What if I just…stopped?

Getting off social media gave me so much time, but it didn’t quite give me back my ability to follow my imagination slowly, dreamily, with interest. I want that back.

And so, the same way I wished for the light bulb and the other things, I wish for the ability to dream creatively. I wish to write something wondrous. I wish for flow. I wish for brilliance, inspiration, and top-notch jokes. I know those things are right here. The key is to stop pretending I can find them somewhere other than in myself.

How about you? What are your creative wishes? Tell me about a time when you needed some esoteric hobby gadget and it materialized in your house!

The Map to Inspiration starts today!

If you’re frustrated because you know you want to get certain creative work done, but it’s not happening (and you know why, but somehow you can’t bring yourself to stop doing these things), then The Map to Inspiration is the class for you. And it starts TODAY. Doors close Friday, but if you want to do it, join today, so you don’t miss any of our discussions, and so you have more days to devote to streamlining and strengthening your creative practices. More info on the course page, scholarships and payment plans are available.

Thoughts and Links

• Thank you to the excellent newsletter The Whippet for linking to this video of a mouse who was secretly tidying a Welsh man’s workbench every night.

• Quiz Lady was a hilarious romp.

• I agree with everything from this post from

  Jodi Meadows
  : “Seven Tips to Survive Social Media.” You don’t have to be on social media, you don’t have to promote your book there, but if you want to be on there, her tips make sense.

• Rebecca Makkai
  ’s Substack is so good, and I love her take on how Frank Lloyd Wright’s weird desire to not scootch a pot a few inches relates to writing.

Books I read recently and loved

Disclosure: book links in this newsletter are affiliate links to Bookshop.org, a site which supports independent bookshops.

• Remember by Jo Harjo and illustrated by Michaela Goade is a gorgeous work of picture book art.

• The picture book Mr. S by Monica Arnaldo is hilarious and completely unexpected.

1. I had forgotten until just this second another situation, where I wanted a special attachment for the sewing machine to make it easier to sew t-shirts (a walking foot, for you sewing nerds) and the ones I looked at cost over $200, and I just couldn’t justify it, and then I was looking through the same cases of extra bits I always have, and there was exactly the thing I wanted, already existing in the stuff from my mother-in-law, with the price tag of $60 still on it.