September Endorsements

Don't try to reason with hurricane season.

I had a plan.

I was going on a writing retreat this weekend. I was writing the ‘24-’25 Main Characters: Women newsletter. I was drafting the newsletters I have planned for the next couple of weeks. I was researching Substack and how to grow the audience and how to improve my graphics. Maybe I was even writing a sketchy outline for the new idea I have for a novel. I would be free of my dog running from the window to the wall, barking and barking and barking until I took her outside to let the dog next door really have it. I was taking two days off work and letting someone else deal with whatever seemed important there. I would be with friends, in a cabin in the Blue Ridge Mountains, taking a creative vacation.

But then, Hurricane Helene.

And then I was doing a different kind of planning. I’m from Louisiana, so I know what to do.

Checking my flashlights for batteries. Filling my bathtub with water, just in case. Gathering my non-perishable food. Hunting for that extra phone battery that I put SOMEWHERE. Panic ordering shelf-stable cans of espresso from Amazon. Bringing food to my friend’s house because she has a generator. Cleaning out the drain on my patio. Looking up what to do if a tree falls on your house— who do you call first?

And I was privileged that I could do any of this— that I have the means to even try to plan for a hurricane.

But then I was lucky. My power went out for an hour. I went to work on Friday in a fog, horrified by the images and stories out of Augusta and North Carolina, trying not to be selfish and think, “There but for the grace of God go I.” And then feeling guilty when I thought it anyway. I stress ate my hurricane Pop-Tarts while watching TikToks of families sloshing through their underwater neighborhoods, trying to get to a dryer person’s home.

I should feel relieved. But I just feel haunted. I’m trying to turn that outward and find reputable places to donate to support the absolute devastation in North Carolina (please share if you have good suggestions). Trying to write about skaters this afternoon felt like trying to write through brain jello. My friend Rachael stopped by earlier. She was supposed to be on the retreat, too. We figured we would try to bottle a little of that retreat magic at my kitchen table— we could still peer pressure each other into writing. But we gave up after about thirty minutes of actual work. We admitted to each other that we just can’t concentrate. All that hurricane prep adrenaline is gone, and we’re in that post-crisis fog. We agreed we should probably just let ourselves breathe and recover, even though nothing actually happened to us.

Alas, the Main Characters newsletter for the Women will have to wait until next weekend.

For now, it’s much easier to write about things in September that I recommend. Here’s a quick list.

Nobody Wants This on Netflix

Chances are you’ve already heard someone else in your life rave about this Kristen Bell/Adam Brody rom-com series on Netflix, so I won’t write you an essay here. Kristen Bell plays an agnostic podcaster who makes her money opining about dating and relationships; Adam Brody plays a recently single rabbi. They meet at a dinner party and fall for each other FAST despite everyone around them agreeing it’s a bad idea. I say this as someone who often rolls her eyes at Kristen Bel: it’s charming. It’s the rom com you’ve been missing. I watched without reaching for my phone to doom scroll, and if that isn’t a ringing endorsement, I don’t know what it.

Water Aerobics

While on a girls’ weekend a couple of weeks ago, our party stumbled upon a water aerobics class at the community swimming pool in the neighborhood where we were staying . The ladies invited us to join them, and we did. It was great. Low impact but still a little challenging. And fun! We kept looking at each other and giggling. And the retired ladies were kind, taking extra time to explain moves to us and gently teasing us when we moved too slow. I even researched water aerobics classes in my area before realizing that almost all of them take place during work hours. Because most people in those classes don’t work. But I think I finally found a form of exercise I genuinely like!

Socks School on Grace Atwood’s Newsletter

There are so many fashion trends I just dismiss as, “for the youths.” Good luck to all of the Gen Z fashionistas replicating the 90s grunge look; I wish you well. Enjoy the currency of youth while you can. That said, I did appreciate Grace Atwood gently nudging her fellow elder millennials to give socks a chance. With the help of her younger personal assistant, she put together a newsletter with some helpful suggestions on how to incorporate socks into your fashion. No-show socks always leave deep grooves in my skin, and I think they cut off my circulation, so I’m ready to embrace the Dad Socks look.

Bel Canto by Ann Patchett

You’ve probably read this, right? I feel like you’re the type of people who read this years ago. But I was in college when this was published, and I’m sure I didn’t notice any new releases when I was knee deep in required reading. And if I did have time to read, I was reading something that took minimal effort to absorb. Probably something like Meg Cabot (No shade to Meg Cabot-- I genuinely like her and her books). But this book has come up enough in recent casual conversations and bookish social media accounts I like that I got curious.

And it’s lovely. It sounds wildly dramatic— a group of guerillas storm a fancy party with an internationally renowned opera singer in an unnamed South American country to kidnap the president, but he’s not there. They end up stumbling into a hostage situation. All of the action takes place in the first couple of chapters and the last chapter; the middle is just the gentle day-to-day of an increasingly Stockholmsian situation. The characters seem so real, I almost Googled, “where are they now,” after I finished. Clear, precise writing. Easy to read, hard to forget.

Three Figure Skating Things:

• Per Russian media, the ISU has upheld the Russian ban for the 2024-2025 season. If true, this means that even if the ban is lifted before the 2026 Olympics, Russia still will not be able to send more than one participant per discipline. Most countries qualify their Olympic spots at the Worlds the year before the Olympics. This is where countries like the US and Japan hope their skaters place high enough to earn three spots per discipline. There is another chance at an Olympic qualifying competition in the fall of 2025, but it would allow one skater per discipline. That will be Russia’s last possible chance, if it’s even open to them.

• We’ll talk about it more next week, but Isabeau Levito has now been beaten in early season competitions by both Sarah Everhardt and Elyce Lin-Gracey. They’re both B-team American skaters who didn’t even have Grand Prix berths when the initial assignments came out in June. Since then, they’re both earned spots— Sarah got one when another skater withdrew, and Elyce won the Skate America spot that Team USA got to pick. It doesn’t necessarily mean anything; both Sarah and Elyce needed to peak earlier in the season so that they could even earn Grand Prix spots, so they’re better prepared than other skaters in August/September. But, given Isabeau’s nervy last season, it could mean something. Keeping my eye on it.

• Skate Canada found a way to profit off Queen Deanna. Now can they buy her citizenship, please?

  

  What’s Next: Main Characters for the Women! Assuming there is not a second round of hurricane weather next weekend in the southeastern US, as some meteorologists are predicting.