While Olive shouts —“Hey, squirrel! Come here!”—I ask Sean if he thinks it’s okay. I don’t expect him to know more about wildlife injuries than I do (which is nothing, really) but it’s habit to share all my questions with him.

“They’ve got to be used to it, right?” he replies. “I mean, that has to happen all the time.”

“And it climbed back up, which must be a good sign. But what if there’s internal damage? That was such a loud thud.”

We don’t have much more time to contemplate the squirrel’s fate. Olive is already sprinting toward the next thing, and we run after her, no longer Haley and Sean but Auntie and Unc.

I throw myself into the day—and it is a wonderful day—but later I can’t help but think: I kind of relate to the squirrel.

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Like when we sit across from a quick-to-laugh stranger at a painting class we almost didn’t attend and she invites us to a brewery and we learn her fiancé used to live in our own old Florida town. Three days later she and I swim in the Atlantic beneath the cold sun—it is 8 am, 50-some degrees—and after three months I can’t imagine not knowing her, not loving her, not gleefully greeting her dogs and her stories and this city we briefly share.

Or when I apply for a writing incubator that doesn’t work out but the co-founder connects me with an author she thinks I’ll like. “Like” is an understatement—this writer’s work makes me feel seen—and she not only replies to the email thread with wide-open arms but lives on our planned travel route and is completely free the one day it’s most convenient for us to swing through. Two weeks after learning her name I am walking through her front door, talking about creatures, pinching away disbelief.

Or when someone who follows my Instagram spots me in line for the bathroom at a concert and is bold enough to say hello. She is so lovely and the encounter so surreal I can’t stop smiling. Later, at the same show, the lead singer brushes my wrist as he walks through the crowd and the band plays my favorite song (which isn’t even one of their most popular) and I scream as Sean sings next to me. We float home hand in hand.

Or when an acquisitions editor sends me a cold email asking if I’d like to write illustrated nonfiction the summer I’ve lost freelance clients and am riding a rollercoaster of discouragement then motivation then terror then joy. I spend an hour thinking the message must be fake, but it isn’t. After I sign the contract we stumble upon another title from this publisher at a big busy store and I get to hold the book in my hands, show it to my mother-in-law, imagine a different name—my own—on the cover.

Or, a shorter story: I smile at a bulldog on the walk home from the farmers market, our last morning carrying flowers back to an apartment before we are again nomads, and her owner says they’d love to say hi before I even ask. The bowling ball of a creature is named Luna. She presses her nose against my own, sneezes in my face, wags not just her tail but entire body. I wag mine too.

Or, simpler still: The repair worker fixes the internet two minutes before I am set to meet with an editor about volunteering for her literary journal. I get to see her face and show my own.

Or, back in time: My sister called after my first niece was born to tell me she gave this perfect new being my own middle name. Olive Elizabeth, she announced. Olive Elizabeth? I cried. Years later the small human reaches for my hand and throws the ball for my dog and asks, sometimes when I am not there, for me and her Unc. One July morning I wake from a dream where she simply says “I’m proud of you, Auntie.”

Or, further still: I bonded with the quiet guy on the edge of the friend group because we both liked mint chocolate chip ice cream (what a silly tiny thing) and now we pass a melting cone back and forth on the beach without spilling a drop, awash in ease from years of loving and learning.

It seems this was never a poem about the universe.

It’s about people.

Other notes and news

• I met up with E.B. Bartels! She is as lovely (lovelier) in person as I could have dreamed after reading some of her work. She gets life with a sensitive dog. And her book, Good Grief, comes out in paperback soon—if you’ve got the means, preordering it would be a wonderful way to support her.

• More serendipity: Caroline Beuley published this essay about jealousy at a time where I’ve been “feeling green” a bit myself. And I enjoyed this reflection on ignorance and realizing things in our own time by Courtney Bowers.

• Also: “What the Body Knows, What the Story Withholds” by Jeannine Ouellette stopped me in my tracks when it arrived in my inbox. I have a lot to work on here!

• My incredible amazing fabulous friend Jess (yes, she deserves at least three adjectives before her name) opened Coping with Canines again, and so many dedicated dog guardians enrolled, and I’m super proud of what she does at Handlers and Humans. (Enrollment for this session is closed now, but there will be more—and she offers 1:1 coaching too!)

• Scout is so happy to be back in her van that I feel like a jerk for moving her out of it for three months. (Kidding… sort of. Thanks for your adaptability and trust in us, cattle dog.)

• I’m also having a great time with The Common’s 2025 Weekly Writes prose program. (How could I not when these are the emails they send?!)

In case you missed it

We officially said goodbye to our little studio apartment in Maine. (Sing it, Willie Nelson.)

This summer has been everything we hoped for and more: a refreshing break from road-life logistics, a resounding affirmation that the tradeoffs of full-time travel are still worth it overall, a robust well of creative capacity, and—most unexpected but also most joyful—the origin of what I think will be some lifelong friendships.

Bittersweet has scarcely been a more fitting word.

My writerly morning routine

I wanted to take full advantage of waking up in one place. No moving the van from a parking lot before the sun rises or getting a head start on the day’s driving—just stepping onto the same sidewalks day after day?!

5:30 — Get outside

Quality sleep does not come easily to me. I’ve optimized and adjusted (and reoptimized and readjusted) at length to figure out what helps, and top of the list are 1) waking up at a consistent time every day and 2) viewing morning sunlight as soon as possible. Ever since we moved into our studio, Noah Kahan’s “Maine” sounds at 5:15 and we set off on a family stroll before the neighborhood rises.

I love this habit. For one thing, Scout’s favorite time to sniff is when the sidewalks are minimally crowded. (She handles being a city dog but does not prefer it.) For another, waking with the sun makes me feel like the morning is endless in the best possible way. There’s so much time to fit in so much joy!

6 ish — Exercise, breakfast, ready ourselves

After fulfilling Scout, Sean and I might head back out for a humans-only jog (our aging heeler no longer keeps up, especially on pavement) or just stretch inside. I’ve also gotten in the habit of taking a quick cold-as-the-dial-goes shower before breakfast. (It feels miserable at first but incredible when I get out. I’ve never been so alive awake alert enthusiastic!)

Scout eats kibble soaked in bone broth or fancy wet food if she’s lucky. Then she begs for a few bites of whatever Sean and I are having, and we almost always oblige.

8 ish — Journal and deep work

By eight, Scout is ready for another bathroom break followed by a lengthy nap—and Sean and I are ready to dive into work. I’ve been trying a handwritten journal with four daily prompts:

1. Things I’m grateful for (ranging from core securities like being in a healthy relationship to small joys like noticing a bright flower)

2. My loose plan for the day (less to-do list than visualization)

3. Things to watch for (helps me get ahead of likely insecurities or frustrations)

4. Things to strive for (“joy” and “energy” have come up a lot)

Then, on the ideal days, I spend a few hours in my Paws and Reflect manuscript doc before checking email or anything else. (In the last few weeks my own book dreams have taken a backseat to a different project I can’t wait to share publicly!)

Afternoon — Wherever the day leads

Because I focus best in the morning, we’ve prioritized consistency in the first half of the day and flexibility in the rest. We try to fit in one or two longer outings with Scout (like playing tug at the park—something more fulfilling than a quick bathroom walk) and more creative time. I’ve loved collaging with colored construction paper!

Pending our meeting schedules, weekdays and weekends are pretty interchangeable. The opportunity to do whatever’s best for our deadlines and momentum on a given day is almost always on my morning gratitude list.

Carrying steadiness into road life

Scout will be thrilled to move back into the van (this apartment stint emphasized just how much more comfortable she is in her home-on-wheels) but my own feelings are mixed.

I’m going to miss spontaneously meeting up with new friends. (City community is unmatched.) Travel logistics mean it won’t always be possible to devote my most productive hours to writing. (The prospect of querying agents and actually getting my manuscript published continues to feel like fantasy.) I’ve loved the comfort of a single place. (For the first time in years I watched spring ease into summer on sidewalks I knew by heart—cherry blossoms giving way to lilacs, then lupines, roses, sunflowers…)

Still, I long for the novelty of traveling. The energy. The inspiration! And much of what I’ve relished about our mornings in Portland can be adapted for life on the road. I’m committed to blocking out focused creative time and building my ability to work more efficiently in a range of environments.

Here’s to holding the routines we love most and leaning into fun chaos everywhere else. 😁

Some Portland favorites

Coffee shops

• Double Great Coffee: So much natural light! An ideal writing spot.

• Radial Coffee Co: Also lots of light.

• Smalls: All-day cafe great for afternoon visits.

• Novel: Bookstore, coffee shop, and event space in one. Where one of my weekly writing workshops meets!

• The Proper Cup: Okay, I definitely have a thing for big windows. (Also, the baristas regularly complimented my colorful outfits, which does not hurt.)

Bakeries and treats

• ZUbakery: There is no better ham and cheese croissant.

• Willard Scoops: There is no better mint chocolate chip ice cream.

• Scratch Baking Co: Not only delicious but also one of the most efficient serving setups I’ve seen in a to-go bakery.

• The Baker’s Bench: Worth the drive for their cinnamon rolls.

• Smiling Hill Farm: Ice cream and more (including goat yoga)!

Restaurants

• Empire Chinese Kitchen: Our most-visited restaurant. Who knew green beans could taste so good?

• Yosaku: Sushi with a massive patio.

• Lil’ Chippy: Excellent fish fry and weekday happy hour.

• Izakaya Minato: Heaven = their chef’s choice courses!

• Hot Suppa: Breakfast comfort food galore.

• Hi Bombay: Our go-to takeout spot.

• Nom Cafe: Some of the best lunch ever.

• And too many more to list—Portland’s food scene is phenomenal!

Breweries and hangouts

• Root Wild Kombucha: Happy hour is perfect for an afternoon change of scenery.

Bookstores

• Longfellow Books: One of my favorite bookstores even before we lived here, just from previous visits in the van. (I got my copies of Several Short Sentences About Writing and The Crane Wife from the staff rec shelf!)

Pet stores

• The Fish and Bone: Natural chews galore. Also, the owner’s red heeler sometimes hangs out behind the counter.

Beaches and parks and hikes

• Eastern Prom: If you know anything about Portland, this one probably goes without saying.

• Rewild Maine: Educational walking tours around the area!

• Deering Oaks Park: Hosts the farmers market twice a week.

• Wolfe’s Neck Woods State Park: Classic Maine coast and wildlife a short drive away.

• Willard Beach: Excellent community atmosphere.

• Pine Point Beach: The closest to a “real” beach we found in the area. (Don’t blame me for previously living in Florida. 😅)

Tattoos

• Broken Crow Collective: Josh gave me an incredible seahorse inspired by Katherine Rundell’s Vanishing Treasures. (See also: My essay for Opposite of Nihilism about wonder!)

Writing resources

• Create With Emma: My summer writing workshop was great, plus Emma hosts a bunch of community events.

• Maya Williams: Maya creates the softest atmosphere each Sunday morning.

• Portland Public Library: Accessible downtown space with regular programming.

In case you missed it

Last week’s morning reflections about slowing sensitive (still lovely and beloved) Scout Finch.

My excitement was well placed. Sean and I received our first Stio pieces in July and proceeded to wear them almost every day. In the fall we were welcomed back to the program—this time I added the coziest fleece and joggers to the mix—and come winter I snagged another sweatshirt, a duplicate pair of those aforementioned joggers, and a bright beanie I am wearing as I type this.

(Actually, I am wearing almost entirely Stio as I type this. Socks. Sneakers. Yellow patterned fleece. Joggers.)

Obviously we love the brand.

This spring I’m an official Stio affiliate once again. Sean and I each got a pair of shorts that will be perfect for summer in New England, and I ordered yet another shirt from the Hylas line (with which I am obsessed for keeping my tattoos safe from sun damage).

But I don’t want more gear after this season.

Or maybe I do want it—there is something forever satisfying about opening a fresh package, especially full of items you know you’ll enjoy—but I don’t need it.

And I think not needing more is a testament to how great the clothes actually are.

One of the best things about our favorite Stio pieces: They’re holding up to lots of wear. Living in a van means we don’t have much closet space, so the clothes we keep need to be functional. If something doesn’t serve multiple purposes? It doesn’t make the cut. My standards for material belongings have never been higher.

Right now, four out of my ten pairs of pants/shorts are from Stio. Three out of my five sweatshirts, too. One out of two pairs of sneaks. One out of two beanies. My only pair of gloves. My favorite running shirt. All in all, about half my wardrobe boasts Stio’s whitebark pinecone logo—it’s a similar ratio for Sean—and when asked about my favorite outdoor wear I will quickly point to their lightweight UPF protection and almost-too-soft turpin fleeces and brightly colored shorts. (Even when not asked, I will still mention them regularly.)

I just don’t need them to send me new stuff because I already have plenty of stuff. Hell, even with my increasing lean towards minimalism, I have too much. Continuing to acquire clothes (even if they are lovely clothes) does not align with my value of trying to consume as little as possible.

This decision to opt out of an affiliate gifting program is particularly exciting for me because earlier in my “influencing” days I felt like I couldn’t say no to free things. I mean, gifts were cool! They made me feel vaguely important! And it also felt harmless—I could donate what I didn’t actually use, and the stakes were low as long as I didn’t enter into some wild contract that demanded a bunch of labor in exchange for product (terms I learned to avoid after my first clumsy experiences).

But even just sharing new thing after new thing on quick story slides can perpetuate a culture of consumption. And if I say yes to every free product… how can people know what I truly do and don’t like?

Maybe part of me is jealous that I’ve never understood how to authentically, comfortably make more income on Instagram. Part of me is also happy about that though, especially as I step back from social media (and don’t have to worry about missing monetization opportunities like I would if we’d come to rely on them). I cheer for my friends who rock the “influencer” space in a way that feels honest. I cringe from accounts that post a seemingly constant stream of new new new—of waste waste waste.

If you are looking for some outdoor gear? Please still use my affiliate link and discount code (pawsandreflect). Goodness knows I will still live in Stio clothes! But please, please, please don’t let anyone make you feel pressured to buy new things just because they have new things.

“You’re an old soul.” “Wise beyond your years.” “Impressive for your age.” “Very mature.” “I mean, I just assumed you were older than me!”

These refrains—from my parents and teachers and bosses and colleagues and, later, social media connections—should have been motivation to grow further. (If I am here now, where could I go next?!)

I instead took them as permission for stagnancy.

“You are doing better than your peers” people said subtly (sometimes outright). And because I was so often complimented in regards to my age, I believed I was ahead. Of course that begs a question: Ahead on what route? “Ahead” implies a straight-line trajectory I and my fellow students were supposed to follow, which is something I don’t even believe in—and yet that’s how I felt. At age ten already part of a competition. At age ten already ahead of the pack.

At age ten convinced I would stay there indefinitely, no matter how many times they read us The Tortoise and The Hare.

We had a poetry assignment when I was in the fifth grade. I loved everything about it: getting to write for fun in the middle of class, hanging our art on the walls, inviting parents for a celebration, perusing everyone else’s words. I wrote about capturing a dark fairy (loosely inspired by Neopets, lest you think I was actually arcane or profound) and my dad was shocked by my piece. Impressed in the way that made me—his little girl, desperate for pride—preen.

His voice takes on a similar tone when he talks about the picture of a shoe I drew in kindergarten. “It actually looked like a shoe,” he emphasizes, gesturing about, trying to explain how little the other five-year-old’s drawings resembled anything in the real world. My parents talked about this occasion for years afterward. Once I asked my mother what career she imagined for me, back when I was small and she knew me best, and she answered “an artist was one of the first things, because of the shoe.”

These memories are fuzzy both in clarity and countenance. Decades later I still feel warmth looking back on them.

But then I wonder: Is that all I’ll ever be? A kindergartener who drew her Reebok sneaker more literally than her peers? A fifth grader who better imitated the poetry she’d read?

I do not want that in my obituary.

Always I have been young, thanks not only to my last name (oh, the jokes over the years!) and summer birthday but also the habit of using my older sister as a benchmark. I was the youngest member of our local waterskiing team when I started climbing human pyramids at age seven. (I stayed among the smallest until I finished high school.) I graduated college a year early at twenty. (I could not legally drink a single day I attended UW–Madison.) For three years I was the youngest employee at my first “real world” job, a digital marketing agency where bosses and colleagues felt vaguely like uncles and aunts. (We once had an intern older than me.)

It was not just that I was nominally young, though. There was something about my outward youth—obvious enough that last year a barista asked if I was in high school—that contrasted against my inner world—reflective and awkward, coming off a little reserved—and emphasized both. Two years into starting my dog’s social media account, a stranger told me that from my writing alone she’d assumed I was much older than 23. How could someone with so little life experience discuss so many things?

I took this as a compliment. I am wise beyond my years! I declared yet again. Look at me: I do not understand “the kids”. I do not use trendy slang. I am not active on TikTok. I am an old soul in a young body—a cute girl contemplating philosophy—and oh, what a delicious combination in which to take pride.

What a dangerous combination in which to take pride.

Because if you obsess about being young—if you believe you are impressive only because you are young, only in comparison to caricatures of other kids your age—each year eats at your identity.

If you aren’t young anymore, what are you?

In three months I will wake up and look around and it will have been a decade since I turned 18 the summer after graduating high school, since I worked as an AmeriCorp tutor hastily eating lunch in a borrowed car between shifts at the middle and elementary schools, since I nervously attended college orientation at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, since I spent those final weeks in my hometown wrapped around the finger of my then-boyfriend (now ex-fiance).

I am not foolish enough to declare 28 old. I have hesitated to write this piece for weeks, abandoning the stream-of-consciousness idea in my drafts, because it’s rich for a woman to talk about aging when she’s still in her 20s.

But my relationship with youth feels increasingly fraught. I am still the little sister, the youngest daughter, the baby of my friends—but I am no longer ahead.

My favorite client tells me I am professionally impressive for my age. “You have so much of the important stuff figured out already,” she says. I beam. She is worth looking up to.

But I do not feel professionally impressive. I feel increasingly professionally lost, making enough money to get by but often second-guessing what I am putting out into the world, what I most want to do, why I can’t seem to finish my book manuscript and start querying literary agents. Will this be the work in progress that dies with me? Will I literally take my dream of becoming a published author—a dream that hundreds of thousands of other people have accomplished before 28—to the grave?

Ah, the book manuscript. That’s mostly what this (*waves arms wildly*) is about.

Years ago I picked the arbitrary number of 27 years old as a goal for a bunch of things. I did not make this decision with any thought, and I knew that—I threw darts at the metaphorical wall because I just needed something to look forward to—but it turns out it’s easy to internalize even arbitrary goals. Sean and I said we’d live in a van by the time we were 27. (Success: 25.) We figured we’d be married by then, too. (Success: 24.) And I said I’d publish a book. (Not a success.)

And publishing a book, if it’s something that happens at all, is not a quick process. Even if I get an agent and find a publisher who wants my ramblings about dogs, there will be months and months—possibly years plural—of preparation before the words I’ve written exist in a tangible form you can buy at a bookstore.

I recently read an essay by Lucie Eleanor about her own yearning to be a “young” writer. She is three years younger than me and already feeling these things—and if that isn’t evidence that I am behind, what is?

I cried the night I read her (beautiful) piece. When Sean asked, I claimed I didn’t know what the tears were for.

I’m beginning to worry the things I’m drawn to write about are childish. When Sean and I were 21 years old, reading philosophy and working so damn hard on our relationship—me from an abusive romantic past, him from none at all—I felt precocious.

Now it feels overdone.

An epiphany at 22 seems like old news at 27. I’ve been there, I’ve done that, and so has everyone else, right? There is nothing I could say that someone better hasn’t already said. And if the only thing making it okay for me to say the thoughts before was the mouth they came out of—the mouth on that young, young face—then surely they’re just cause for cringe now.

I have used my youth as a crutch. My age justified my cluelessness, my melodrama, my exuberance. Now I feel like a curmudgeon shaking my head at what I’ve accomplished: Not much, the venomous voice insists on a bad day. Not much at all.

And oh, even this essay, if that’s what you can call it, is so boring. Our society has been afraid of growing old forever. Villains in childhood movies have gnarled hands and gravelly voices; we do not take our elders seriously; here’s another girl who can’t approach her 30s without a jolt of panic. I am not special, and I have never been special, and I will not feel okay about my path through life—my momentum and lack of it, my accomplishments and blunders—until I embrace that truth with steady arms.

Maybe I can talk myself into it.

Me versus me, a (is it unhinged to talk to myself?) dialogue

Me: I thought I’d have done more by now. Who am I supposed to be? How much is enough?

Also me: But you’ve done so much! You interned at an elephant sanctuary. You started a social media community, mostly on accident, that ended up connecting with more than 30,000 real live people! And those people have more than 30,000 combined dogs who have somehow been touched by what you’ve shared! You built the healthiest relationship I can imagine with someone you love (and not just love but respect and grow with). You bought and moved into a van, and you’ve spent more than two full years traveling the country. You were successful in your agency job and then you were brave enough to go freelance. You have a life other people literally dream of?!

Me: But none of my pursuits have been that successful. There is always someone else—often someone younger—doing it so much better. Sure, I ended up with 30,000 social media followers… but a low engagement rate and inconsistent content focus and also too much of my mood tied to Instagram performance. I make less money with my freelance writing, even when putting my heart into it, than some people I know who casually create TikTok content on the side. I still haven’t finished my book let alone found an agent who will stand behind it. And living a life people literally dream of is one of the problems! It makes me feel ungrateful. Like a fraud. Like I have been telling everyone I am successful—pretending to be successful—when I am really not.

Also me: But you get to choose your own definition of success.

Me: Yeah, I know. And some of my confusion here is that a lot of the time I do feel successful! At least in a few ways I really care about… but then not at all in others. I’ve done so much more than I thought I would by now but also so much less. Does it even out?

Also me: What does “even out” even mean? Expectations, reality—you know this thought spiral doesn’t go anywhere. What about are you happy? What about do you love your friends? What about do they love you? What about are you satisfied with what you put into the world?

Me: Maybe I haven’t been feeling good about what I put into the world.

Also me: That has nothing to do with your age. That’s you. Your work, your behavior, irrespective of years you’ve gone around the sun.

Me:

Also me: Do something about it.

I have a visceral reaction to “gossip”.

Like most visceral reactions, this one comes from salient personal experiences. I got engaged to my high school boyfriend at twenty… and several months later called off that engagement. Leaving was a decision in which I was both completely confident and not at all confident. There was no other choice, really, once I tore our faux-polished exterior and finally accepted the toxic base underneath—but I was throwing my life plan away.

I was barely an adult, and I was collapsing a relationship that had comprised nearly a quarter of my existence, and you bet my small-ish hometown had thoughts.

Not all of those thoughts were kind to me. And I didn’t appreciate people I hadn’t talked to in years digging through the most painful experience of my life in search of conversation fodder for their next evening at the bar.

Years later, after I’d started dating my now-husband and everything ought to have been hunky dory, we visited my parents in my hometown. Talk turned to one of my sister’s acquaintances. She’d gotten married young and divorced not long after—and I saw myself in her. Though I’d never made it through my own twenty-year-old nuptials, I might have. That was almost me. And so despite the fact that we’d never had a proper conversation, I cheered for her from afar in the way you root for an old friend of your own.

This night my sister told us her acquaintance had just gotten engaged. My dad said, so quickly he couldn’t have thought about it, “she’s getting married again? Twice already?”

I withered.

Then I got angry—“as your daughter who was once engaged and is now not, and is very happy about that healthy decision, I hope no one ever sits in their living room and talks about me that way”—and he apologized, and it was fine. My sister’s friend will never know. No harm done.

Well, maybe just a little harm done. Because even all that time later I hated being branded as stupid girl who almost got married too young and hated how people reacted even when they didn’t mean to (it was almost worse when they didn’t mean to) and hated imagining all over again the conversations people had about me in the spring of 2018.

You can argue that I was too sensitive about this whole thing. And I’ll agree with you in part—I have always been soft; I know I can overreact; perhaps a bigger person truly wouldn’t care that old classmates were talking about her relationship status behind her back. Perhaps I should have accepted that returning someone’s diamond ring after dating them for five years would effectively make the local news. Hell, maybe I should have felt flattered that my life was interesting enough to warrant any sort of attention!

But this talk affected me. I felt like I wasn’t just losing the most important person in my life but also any comfort I’d previously felt in my hometown. Who knew? Who cared? Who would ask me about what they’d heard instead of speculating about my character? Who did ask me how I was doing only in search of information? I lost friends. You expect that in any breakup—especially one this difficult—but the stories that circulated about my role in our relationship’s demise were almost exclusively terrible. (See, the bulk of this gossip happened in my hometown, where my ex was living… and where I was not.)1 I worried about who I’d see in public. Once I ran into a guy from my high school who looked me in the face and said “oh, it’s the bitch and her dog”. This happened two hours from where we’d grown up, on the college campus where, until that moment, I’d been feeling at least mostly safe.

I’ll stop there because dwelling isn’t productive, and because I realize everything that happened to me as a result of people talking about my failed engagement paled in the face of actually, you know, calling off that engagement. That first thing was the worst thing; it was right; life is better now.

But when I think of “gossip”, I still flash back to that feeling of horrible exposure, like my difficult decisions were dissected for an operating room’s full theater. And I do not want to make anyone else feel that way.

A few days ago I saw an essay defending gossip on Substack. Earlier this year I read Wordslut, in which feminist linguist Amanda Montell explores the origins of gossip and debunks the myth that it’s always frivolous or malicious. Just two weeks ago The New Yorker published an essay called “Is Gossip Good for Us?” centered around former Normal Gossip podcast host Kelsey McKinney’s new book. The more I encounter positive connotations with gossip, the more I realize my own perception—anchored in personal recoil from all those bad memories—might be narrow.2

Because everyone seems to define “gossip” differently.

Even gossip-defendant Patricia Meyer Spacks agrees. “Definitions of gossip often illuminate the definer more than the object of consideration,” reads the first page of her essay “In Praise of Gossip”.

You don’t have to tell me twice. Semantics are messy.3

I found this sentence telling in the aforementioned The New Yorker piece: “McKinney, a champion of gossip as a personal and social good, is out to change its bad reputation; when she encounters gossipers who challenge her thesis, she finds that they are doing it wrong,” writes Alexandra Schwartz. McKinney has her own perception of gossip—and even she can’t settle on one definition. In Context A, “gossip” is good: whisper networks, solidarity, social connection. In Context B, “gossip” is bad: malicious smugness, untold ripple effects.

“[Gossip] is mutable, anarchic, endlessly paradoxical, and that is another challenge for McKinney,” Schwartz continues.

It’s a challenge for me, too, as someone who wants to understand what friends around me mean when they say “omg I love to gossip”—because these are people I like and respect and know are not Bad Humans—but who still cringes away from the term myself. And any musings on the practice would be remiss not to acknowledge, clearly, that one of the biggest reasons so many of us have internalized negativity toward “gossip” is that we mostly associate it with women. Vilifying idle talk about other people has deep roots in seeing women as “lesser” (not to mention religious doctrine).

We can talk about gossip ad nauseum and still not really agree on what it is, what it isn’t, and most importantly when it’s okay. What parts of the act do we want to reclaim and support? What parts deserve their derogatory associations?

According to Oxford Languages, gossip is “casual or unconstrained conversation or reports about other people, typically involving details that are not confirmed as being true”.

I struggle most with the “typically involving details that are not confirmed as being true” part. Often, spreading anything unconfirmed feels a bit gross to me. Is that because I’ve been socialized to think so? Is my “raised in a religious society fundamentally unkind to women” showing? Or is it because I’ve been affected by it personally in the past? Many of us grew up playing the telephone game, teachers and parents and other adults trying to show us how rumors can hurt—but where does harmless gossip end and a damaging rumor begin?

I have further questions. (Maybe if I ask them enough times, over and over, I will absolve myself of any responsibility to think of answers. I shall sit here in this coffee shop, rain pounding the window, simply questioning forever.) Do any of us have the right to a “private” life when we live in communities of other people? What about celebrities who have opted in to their careers progressing under the spotlight? Does that consent apply to their personal exploits too? How are we deducing that they “opted in”, anyway? What about the value of people being tough enough to not care so damn much what others say? (I admire them greatly.) What about practicing kindness to be the sort of people we want to be? What about valuing intrigue more than kindness? (Seems valid, sometimes.) What about enjoying drama because it’s normal to enjoy drama, because gossip has evolutionary roots and ongoing social benefits? What about furthering that drama?

My friends, I have no idea, really. I have more feelings than thoughts. I don’t mind that in general—but here it means the purely emotional intro to this essay is automatically stronger than the how-do-I-logic-this rambles following it.

Once again I whisper-shout, perhaps a little weakly: It’s nuanced.

For so long when I’ve thought of “gossip”, the term has represented the kind of hurtful comments made about my own hardest life choice. But depending on how we tweak the dictionary definition (or which Reddit thread we listen to, what other articles we read, who we ask in real life) that’s not it at all.

So it’s worth talking about the distinctions between gossip meant to be hurtful—cruel conversations about other people—and gossip that is healthy, benign, even prosocial.

And maybe it would be helpful to use different terms for these different things “gossip” can be. When you poison a cue in dog training—say you tried to attach a verbal signal like “sit” to a behavior but your dog assigned it a completely different action or developed a negative association—you generally just stop using that cue and start using another. It’s not worth the hassle of undoing what’s been done.

Could we do that here?

So much “gossip” is just storytelling. These stories can be harmless and reinforce bonds between the people sharing—a low-stakes, normal interaction between inherently social creatures in a social world. It’s one of the ways Sean and I connect with friends after months apart: We roll up to their houses with tales from the road, inevitably involving strangers we brushed by in cafes or breweries or campgrounds. We try to tell the truth, but it doesn’t really matter if we stick only to confirmed details because the people we’re talking about don’t know us and don’t know our friends and there is no hurt that can come from our recollections (besides maybe us internalizing larger stereotypes, which is a problem I think we can avoid and another discussion entirely).

Then there’s shit talking. Snark for the sake of “this person offended me once and now I need to confirm that they are in fact terrible”. Snark for the sake of ego. Snark for the sake of snark. Manufactured drama because our own lives don’t feel interesting enough—a dangerous area where natural curiosity rubs against main-character-syndrome and we stop seeing other people as full humans in their own right and start using them as props in the tales of our own lives.

I like the definition of gossip that is “serious” coined by Spacks in her 1985 book. “[Serious gossip] takes place in private, at leisure, in a context of trust, usually among no more than two or three people. Its participants use talk about others to reflect about themselves, to express wonder and uncertainty and locate certainties, to enlarge their knowledge of one another.” (Emphasis my own.)

Personally, I want to engage in this kind of “serious gossip” or no gossip at all.4 We can argue if it’s really “gossip” if the focus of talking about other people is less those people and more the relationships here, right now, as we share—up for debate, hence this whole essay—but preceding adjectives like “serious” or “thoughtful” at least help me outline the distinction between gossip-that-hurts and gossip-that-connects.

I’m not sure I’ll ever shake my initial flinch when someone mentions “gossip”. But I can at least understand that the word itself doesn’t have to be a villain. It can wear many expressions like all of us—and we can eschew it in favor of more specific descriptions if we want.

This is the one email I send to blog subscribers each month. In it I round up everything I’ve written (plus a few life updates) in lieu of crowding your inbox each time I post. To find a middle ground between constant notifications and radio silence, I also recently started sharing links in the Substack chat feature when I publish something new. That means your email remains clean with one newsletter a month—but if you want more updates, all you have to do is log in on browser or the app.

I really appreciate you being here 💛 Enjoy a new cute Scout photo as a thank you!

✏️ What I’ve published lately

Here on the Paws and Reflect blog

• On taste, romantasy, thought, and nuance (book reflections)
  Everyone has an opinion—and I might not actually care about yours? (Alternatively: I have a lot of thoughts about Fourth Wing.)

• My weirdo dog likes neighborhood walks now? (dog training)
  Reflections on preferences and fulfillment opportunities changing over time

• Why “Start a Riot” by Banners is my Empyrean theme song (books and music)
  Not just because of what we call a group of dragons and riders. Plus more songs on my crying-over-fictional-characters playlist

• Dogs need more than love (dog training)
  Well, depending on how we define “love”

• I don’t know what I’m doing (writing, social media, personal)
  Is life just a series of feeling stuck? Escapism, social media, insecurity, etc, oh my.

• Why I fulfill my dog differently than I used to (dog training)
  It wasn't a purposeful shift—but we've become much less pragmatic. Here's a look back on Scout's fulfillment changes and their causes.

• Close encounters of the creature kind (wildlife)
  It is so often these close encounters that fill us with wonder—that allow us to more fully appreciate our fellow creatures. But they are also, so often, one sided.

• A “virtue signaling” deep dive, anyone? (social media, communication)
  Please enjoy (or sigh exasperatedly) at me taking social media conversation seriously

• Why I love to eschew marriage norms (relationships)
  Pride in the juxtaposition between where I used to be and where I am now

• On procrastination and productivity (work, personal)
  I often feel like I don’t have the focus or ability to do something perfectly right now… but maybe I will tomorrow. Or the next day. Or, you know, when rubbing right up against the due date.

Featured elsewhere

• Does enrichment have to be expensive? for Juniper
  A few minutes on Dogstagram or a canine Facebook group encourages me to try dozens of new enrichment staples. Many of these inventions are incredible. Some of them are also inaccessible, boasting high price tags that make pet parents wonder if we’re really doing enough.

• Does it matter how long an enrichment activity takes your dog? for Juniper
  As usual: It depends. Effective enrichment is about how satisfied your dog feels after an activity—not just how much time they spend on it.

📚 What I read last month

My March book recap

Click here for brief thoughts on a romantasy rabbit hole, a favorite essay collection, dark corporate surrealism, plant intrigue, and more.

And a few articles that stuck with me

Either because I loved them or they made me think or I was compelled to forward them to a friend or all the above:

• A memento mori for the anxious age by Courtney Bowers of Half Life

• Go, Dog. Go! by Jon Klassen and Mac Barnett of Looking at Picture Books

  • See also: This open letter to the dog in a hat that I found via the comment section of the above piece

• They’re Stealing Colour from Your World by David Speed of Creative Rebels

• jeremy strong, kieran culkin, and the cost of caring too much by Sophie of that final scene

• wanting to be a writer vs actually writing by Lindsey Peters Berg of dear diary

• “Protecting your peace” can kill your friendships by Allie Volpe at Vox

🚐 March shenanigans

Since moving into a van, my sense of time’s passage often correlates with how much physical distance we cover. Just over three weeks ago we were taking one last dip in the Atlantic before leaving Florida. Today we are traveling east through Ohio—and I feel like so much happened in between!

This month saw us saying goodbye to our favorite places on the Space Coast, camping at Cloudland Canyon in Georgia, making dinner with Sean’s little brother in Nashville, taking a guided tour in Mammoth Cave National Park, playing board games with friends in Indianapolis, spoiling my niece after she had another ear tube surgery in Wausau, celebrating my sister-in-law’s wedding in Milwaukee (we learned to salsa for the occasion), getting to visit friends in our old city of Madison, and driving all the miles connecting those memories.

Busy, exhausting, fulfilling.

Sometimes I struggle with creativity when we are around other people this much in quick succession (hi it’s me, introverted!) but we are so damn lucky this lifestyle allows us to see loved ones in different cities.

😁 What I am excited about!

I did not have an excitement list in last month’s recap, and January’s felt rather forced (which is fair considering the sociopolitical climate; I do not want to have full blinders on). But this month I have actual news:

• We signed a short-term lease in Portland, Maine for May through July! If you made it to the bottom of this newsletter, congrats on being one of the first to know (until now I have not said anything publicly about it on the internet). 😉 Many more thoughts to come. Suffice to say I am hyped!

• Before we get to Portland, we’re going to spend a week or so in New York City, which has become another of my favorite places.

• I’ve been almost entirely off of Instagram—and while there are still moments of grief and uncertainty, I mostly feel great about it. I am exploring Substack’s social media functionality a little more, and some of the publications I’ve found via Notes are delights.

I am not against escapism. I think a perfectly reasonable part of building a life you love can be sometimes escaping it—emphasis on sometimes.

Lately I’ve caught myself trying to escape too much. Trying, specifically, to escape my work. Sometimes I do this by leaning into other here-and-now activities (like playing with Scout and swimming in the ocean and convincing Sean he wants a three-minute-long hug) which feels fulfilling and reminds me there is so much more to my existence than a career label or an income statement. Other times I do this by consuming books and podcasts and TV shows. When that looks like The Crane Wife or If Books Could Kill, I’m at least briefly sated. When it’s mindless, I only feel hungrier when I surface from my media feast.

The other day while Sean was physically in the office, my best intentions of writing words I’m proud of were foiled by Netflix’s Love is Blind. Wait, let me fix that passive voice: I threw away what I thought were Very Good Productivity pla…

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Sean and I don’t regularly wear wedding rings. (The ones we do have are cheap nontraditional bands.) Our ceremony was short and, to be candid, kind of not a big deal. He did not only see me in my dress before our vows—he actually found my dress in the first place. I kept my last name. We rarely celebrate anniversaries beyond a “hey, look at the date!” nod.

I am unduly proud of the ways we eschew marriage norms—and I think I’m finally able to name why.

I worried for a while that my feelings were some sort of petty self righteousness or a “look how I’m not like other girls!” desire to be special. (Which... ew.) But that doesn't track with the fact that I’ve felt truly, properly happy for all the people in my life who do embrace western relationship norms in their own ways. Like, I have never once wondered if my best friend’s relationship is any less fulfilling or progressive or meaningful than mine because her ring is fancy gorgeous. I would never dream of telling my badass feminist colleague that taking her husband’s last name makes her a slave to the patriarchy. Still, though: I loved that I wasn’t doing these things.

What gives?

In my serious relationship before Sean, I relied on any and every surface-level signal that we were a couple. I needed evidence—traditional, obvious evidence—that our love was real. It wasn’t just the big things like my fancy engagement ring (come to think of it, my ex spent more time talking about how he chose the diamond on the day he proposed than why he loved me) or our over-the-top anniversary presents. We also needed constant nicknames and good morning texts and social media posts. (We once had a huge fight after a road trip because I captioned an Instagram of us—just one of many from those two weeks—something simple instead of using it to profess my love.) We were that couple. You’d hate seeing us on your feed, using public posts to insist things we didn’t even truly feel in a flawed attempt to grease the wheels of a squeaking, falling-apart relationship. (Sidebar: This habit made our breakup even harder because I’d spent so long convincing casual acquaintances we were great!! that they couldn't believe we’d actually had a billion problems. Ugh.)

Anyway: I needed so much “evidence” of our love precisely because there wasn’t, in reality, all that much love. I thought I could cover our failings with the right decor. What do you mean there’s a massive gap in the floorboards? No no, it’s nothing; we can hide it with a super fancy sofa!

It’s the exact opposite with Sean. I don’t crave external signals or classic traditions to reinforce our commitment because I already know we’re real. I believe in our love more than anything else—I have never doubted it, never felt the urge to mental-gymnastics something out of nothing.

Saying no thanks to nice rings and elaborate rituals isn’t a larger statement about how I think things “should” be done. (I do not believe there’s one “right” way in basically any area of life. And obviously not everyone uses traditions to mask massive relationship problems, in which case… more power to you. My past self is jealous.) No, my pride in this regard is about me, as an individual, emphasizing the juxtaposition between where I used to be and where I am now.

It’s funny that the excuse I gave some family members for why our nuptials were so small (I already planned a big wedding and we didn’t work out, I want my real one to feel as different as possible) turned out to be so centrally true. I love not doing these traditional things because I love not needing these traditional things.

If you want them, though? That’s a whole different story.

Sometimes I feel like I live two lives.

This isn’t an intentional separation. There are no, like, secrets. (I would tolerate it terribly if there were.) But between physical distance and mental distractions—writing for clients, mulling over personal essays, exploring new places, diving into books—I sometimes feel like there is “Nomad Haley” and then “Wisconsin Haley”.

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Today I’m struggling with the reality that sometimes when I say “I made a different choice” other people hear “so I think yours is stupid”.

The messiness makes me think, vaguely, of Lauren Oyler’s essay collection No Judgment. Oyler talks about how “no judgment” is a silly thing to say when the truth is we judge each other all the time. It’s like adding “no offense” to not-exactly diffuse an inarguably offensive comment.

But do we really judge each other all the time?

I guess by the Oxford Languages definition, yes. We can’t help but “form an opinion or conclusion about” everyone and everything we interact with. But those opinions aren’t always negative. While I can’t help but judge you, I am very rarely judging you. (Translation: While I can’t help but compile an impression of who you are and how you live, I am very rarely thinking “this person sucks”.)

The “my choices don’t have to be the same as yours” idea first started coming up for me in the dog training world. Scout is a sensitive …

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I am once again thinking about the fact that Scout is going to die. Not soon—not if all goes as planned, if we continue to be so lucky in our lives together—but not in a distant unimaginable future, either. She will die and I will have to go on without her (how?) and my habit of scrolling through old photos, soaking in memories, will feel different than it does now.

It already feels like grief just to realize how much the three of us have changed since I adopted our shy-but-sweet stray heeler. Scout’s body shape has sagged. Her ears and whiskers are graying. Sean and I have new wrinkles around our own eyes.

Of course core parts of our lives are the same—we love each other; we have great fun; we prioritize play—but I still feel vaguely like I’m blinking in confusion on my way out of the movie theater or waking from an accidental nap. How much time has passed, you say? Where am I, again?

All this (*gestures wildly*) is amplified tonight because Sean and I reminisced. Reminiscing itself is …

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Reading Maybe You Should Talk to Someone makes me realize (not for the first time, but I’m terrible at internalizing this morsel) the obvious: There is no finish line. There will never be a finish line. No streamers, no cheers, no clear-cut you did it, well done (note the past tense) because until I die, I will still be doing.

Sean and I used to talk about “moving the goalposts” in regards to Scout’s fear reactivity. Those first months after I realized the extent of her behavioral problems, I told every trainer we consulted with that I just wanted to take her for a walk—a boring neighborhood walk—without her freaking out and embarrassing me.

Eventually we could go on walks. They weren’t seamless, but they were possible, and I yearned for more possibilities. Now I want to go on busier walks, longer hikes. Now I want to sit at a brewery, a coffee shop, the restaurant near our apartment complex. Now I want to go on outings with other dogs. Now I want trick titles. A Canine Good Citizen certificate. Engaged games of tug in distracting environments. Twenty thousand Instagram followers. A more polished narrative.

Mostly, what I wanted with Scout was the same thing I want in all areas of my life: to be seen. Not just observed, but seen, and specifically seen as successful. Each time we made progress, the line for “success” moved with us because there was always someone ahead doing it better—and our past selves fell further behind, failing to remind me just how far we’d come unless I actually sat down, took out the binoculars (read: scrolled my camera roll or Instagram memories), and tracked their blurred forms.

I rarely think about life with Scout feeling different now. It’s not that we crossed a finish line—we didn’t—but that I’ve come to see our journey as something beautiful and flawed and ongoing. As the end of our shared life approaches, faster each year, I run from finality and can’t believe I ever craved it. If we finish all the struggles, then eventually we will finish the joy. I never want our time to be past tense.

Why is this hard to translate to the rest of my experiences? Haven’t my insights about the pet world—training and emotions and optimization and all the rest—always fit rather perfectly into my growth as a human being beyond the “dog nerd” label?

I hold the knowledge itself: Be present. Life is a series of nows. Don’t burn the future to stay warm. Sometimes I act on the knowledge, relishing the sun’s warmth or Sean’s skin or the fact that I can still at 27 lose myself in a story like I did as a kid.

But often I live at odds with this thing I express as a tenet. I act as if there is always a finish line, and it’s just around the next bend, and once I finally cross it I can breathe, I can sleep, I can relax without guilt—I can settle into my life, I can hold my own against the world, I can love myself.

Once I leave my nine-to-five marketing agency job. Once I land regular freelance clients. Once we move into our converted van. Once I make arbitrary-number thousand dollars a month. Once I finish the first draft of my book. Once I finish the second draft of my book. Once I get published in a magazine I admire. Once I have arbitrary-number “real” bylines. Once I find an agent for my book. Once my book is published.

But I know from meeting some of these milestones that I can’t hang satisfaction on the others. If I do publish a book and it’s well received? I will surely stack another goal atop its podium. If it doesn’t touch people the way I hope? I will punish myself with more hoops to jump through and the futile promise that once I clear them, then I can feel successful. Not now, though. Never now.

Because I am ostensibly a minimalist—my material belongings are few—I have convinced myself I do not struggle with our society’s “more more more” mantra. I mean, I travel full time without much in a converted van! I haven’t worked a “traditional” job in three years! I watch almost every sunrise! My physical space is less than seventy square feet (and I basically never complain about that) and I know at least a few people look up to me as a model of peace and contentment.

How could I have a problem with wanting?

Well, goes the too-simple but too-true answer, because I am human. Because I am a creature. Because I will never carve perfect, unchanged, permanent meaning out of my life—I will never finish my own story the way I sometimes finish an essay thinking wow, that wrapped up rather nicely. My accomplishments, my wants, myself will never be wrapped up. Isn’t that the beauty of being alive?I don’t want to be done.

And yet I do with so many things. I want to be done so I can be loved. Maybe the ultimate item on my checklist is separating the two.

Clad in my bucket hat, saltwater dripping from day-old braids, I make Sean follow me outside for a celebratory photo. “You want a picture of the pie here?” he asks, slightly incredulous as I try to balance the melting treat on uneven gravel. It’s heavier than you’d expect.

“Yes,” I reply. “My key lime pie in our keys campsite!”

Later he sends the picture to his mom. She says it looks delicious—and it is.

Let vacation begin.

I can’t get over the view from our bed. I take entirely too many photos (Future Me will have a problem cleaning them out) trying to capture the awe—sun-bright awe—that my house is parked in a place like this. My backyard is a rocky shoreline. My kitchen rustles with an ocean breeze. My eyes can’t drink it all in.

Our campsite is Scout’s dream, too. No matter where she is—claiming her yellow lawn chair, curled in the front cab, sprawled on our bed—she is immersed in fresh air.

We breathe deeply, all three of us.

“What a faith-in-humanity moment,” I say to Sean, finally unclenching my jaw.

Shortly after we arrived at Bahia Honda State Park, an off-leash golden retriever barreled into our campsite. Sean tried to intercept while a boy looked on from the road. “Please get your dog!” I hollered, darting to my left to match the creature’s swerve.

The boy’s mother appeared at a leisurely stroll. “She’s friendly! She’s really friendly,” promised this woman I’d never met (and had no reason to trust).

“My dog’s been attacked before and isn’t,” I called. “Yours can’t be in our site.”

The next minute blurs a little, even in such recent memory. I know I body blocked the retriever again while her owner tried to attach the leash. Finally, oversized adolescent paws scratching my thighs, we succeeded.

“She’s only eight months old,” the woman said, a bit pleadingly.

I felt myself flush. Scout had done well—only barked once, stayed lying down on her blanket, knew her humans would handle it—but this was not how I envisioned the start of our vacation. My voice had an edge: “That’s not an excuse.”

“I’m not making excuses,” the other owner half-snarled before stomping away. “I’m sorry.”

I could feel my heartbeat in my fingertips. Sean hugged me; Scout asked to play; we tried to move on. Then I realized the woman and her dog and her son were our immediate next-door neighbors.

Then I realized they were also the campground hosts.

Is this a bad sitcom? I texted my mom, venting frustration. It is not encouraging when the people in charge of a shared space’s rules (like, you know, keeping your dog on a leash and under control) are the very ones violating them.

I buzzed with anxiety until, as Sean removed a raw neck bone from the freezer for Scout and I started thinking about our own dinner, the off-leash-neighbor-campground-host family again appeared in our site. Sans dog this time.

The woman had a special treat for our heeler. Her husband offered a soft handshake. Their boy rode a bright bicycle. I’ve never received such a sincere apology—I’ve never witnessed, so clearly, the results of a stranger pausing to consider their impact after the fact.

“That must have been so scary for you,” she said simply.

“Thank you,” I replied, meaning it.

Their dog never ran at us again.

It is not uncommon for people to comment on our campsite as they walk by. They like the van’s bright color; they love when Scout curls in a lawn chair of her own. (For introverts, we certainly aren’t inconspicuous.)

This morning a woman with arms of tattoos asks if our dog’s name is Macaroni. What? She clarifies with a grin: Then we could refer to her and the van, together, as “macaroni and cheese”.

Sean and I burst into laughs as she walks away, equal parts bemused and delighted. “That’s near the top of the ‘best comment ever’ list,” I declare. He agrees.

I have worked ahead—client work, the stuff that pays part of our bills—so I can avoid email and Webflow and Canva here on the ocean’s edge. It feels wrong to be lit by a computer screen when I could be lit by the sun.

My Kindle’s glow is different. I read three books in three days: lying on our bed, sitting under blue sky, stroking Scout’s fur. I read in my head while walking to the bathroom building (a few neighbors look on, confused) and aloud to Sean while he cooks breakfast (pancakes, mostly) and under my breath as the evening colors fade.

I wanted to live inside a book, wrote Ann Hood in her Morningstar memoir. How lucky I am to do just that.

I am still damp with saltwater. Sand coats my feet—more determined than I after two rounds of attempted toweling—and I realize I don’t even mind that our rug is a noticeably different color than it was two months ago.

This is pure luxury, I think. Lavender lotion on gently tanned skin after a day of fresh air. What more could anyone need?

I choose a postcard with a cactus—Organ Pipe National Monument—even though the landscape is nothing like our current humid world. I’m drawn to the simple shapes. I want to think simple thoughts.

Next to me Sean hand-solves a calculus problem his boss sent him “just for fun”.

Is this balance?

I sit, cross-legged, at the edge of our bed. My face meets the breeze. I can see more of the sky if I crane my neck forward, and I let my eyes adjust—I know, from two nights of sleeping with the back doors open, exactly where Orion’s belt will appear.

Sean brings me decaf dark roast with whipped cream. As I lean against the foot of the bed, legs toward our pillows to ensure the best sunset view, Scout sprawls to my right. “Can you get my phone?” I call to the front of the van. “I just need the camera. To capture this moment.”

This evening world is so quiet. I’m nearly done reading The Darkness Manifesto, and I’m not sure I’ve ever felt so excited for the night—for the bats, for the stars, for the sounds. For the stretching increments between “last light” and “full dark”.

For my newfound ability to appreciate them.

I painted my toenails when I was in Wisconsin, while my niece napped and wouldn’t ask to make her own mess with the bottle. Now the bright-orange squares peek above the water—satisfying contrast against an impossibly blue backdrop—as I float in gentle waves.

I’m not sure how long I lie there. (Sean tells me I’m lucky to float; he, too dense, always sinks.) I feel dizzy when I climb back on shore, struggling to reconcile the firm sand with the water’s give.

It’s not a problem. I just wade back out.

Scout tries to eat the cucumbers off my eyes. How can I expect her to understand food that is not food? I laugh so hard I snort; she wags back hopefully.

“You’re an idiot,” Sean and I tell her, often. The words mean so many other things: you are perfect, you bring us joy, we love you more than anything.

I never want her to change.

We are on this jog for a stupid reason: I saw a sculpted woman on the rocks late this morning and felt, crushingly, that I was not enough like her. Jiggly, I asserted to Sean, pointing at my triceps. He sighed. “Please don’t say ridiculous things.”

But now that we’re moving—feet brushing cracked pavement, shoulders sweating in humid air—I don’t feel “jiggly” at all. I feel strong. I feel chastised. I feel so damn lucky to watch the sun dip behind the water’s edge.

We detour to the sandy beach when we’re done. I sprint to the edge, trust fall in the water, nearly forget to close my eyes before diving under each wave. We stay, quietly—nothing needs to be said—until Sean is shivering and we cave to the promise of homemade ramen in the van.

I eat a huge bowl.

I pick my way around hermit crabs—too many to count—with a lawn chair draped over my shoulder. We are finally heading to the shallow bay we keep walking by, the one tucked along the road with a view of the old railroad bridge, for sunset. (And civil twilight. Maybe nautical and astronomical, too, if thoughts of Scout snuggling by herself don’t call us sooner to bed.)

The clouds put on less of a show than they did last night—we watched yesterday’s sunset from the van’s front windshield on our way to the dump station for a gray tank emergency—but somehow the evening is still more beautiful than I imagined. I inhale. An osprey squawks, perches on the sandbar a dozen feet to our left. Each passing moment reveals a new star.

I stop trying to chase my anxiety away and instead invite it to sit with us, share our snacks, sip from Sean’s thermos of decaf with cream. I sing “Of Love and Life” in my head. The song sticks with me all night, even after we’ve waded back to shore (without stepping on a single sea creature) and crept to camp in the dark. I sing it to Sean and Scout as we pile atop each other in bed.

“Hear me out, take your time, watch the setting sun
Take your hands out of your pockets, feel the water run
Don't worry about tomorrow
And yesterday is gone”

Sometimes a stranger’s poetry seems written just for you.

Sean and I walk through the small restaurant’s door. Old-school entrée photos obscure the walls, captioned in Spanish; I feel a bit sheepish when the cooks’ replace their background chatter with “do you need an English menu?” as we reach the front of the line.

It’s a glorious day: pure sun, eighty degrees, shallow blue-green ocean on each side of the highway. Melancholy laced the morning as I thought about leaving the keys. We’ll be back soon (an incredible delight) but I’ve always struggled with endings—even the simple ones.

All that messiness dissipates with my first bite of tamale. We pass our Cuban coffee back and forth across the picnic table, Sean’s gentle grin—the soft one, the one that reminds me of his shyer college self—igniting my own. After this we have more local cafes to visit as we make our way toward Homestead (where home for the night will be a dingy Cracker Barrel parking lot). “A restaurant crawl,” Sean proposed before we left our campsite, doing what he always does.

“Thank you,” I say now. “For making today feel more like an adventure than a goodbye.”

I meet my younger self for coffee. (She still only drinks chai tea.)

How can I leave? she asks. This must be as good as it gets.
I know she wakes up at three am gasping the opposite: This can’t be all there is.

It isn’t.

She dreams of good enough. She looks so small. She wonders how anyone can love her, and I’m ashamed of my flicker of agreement: I don’t tell her I look back as a stranger thinking thank god we are not the same. I sit around a campfire with her college friends and roast them—lovingly—trying to ask why they stuck around.

What made you stick around?

She’s engaged. I’m married. There is a lifetime of pain between those sentences, landmarks she can navigate only if she stops trying to write herself into existence and starts trying to live a life worth writing about—
She isn’t there yet.

She’s here, checking her phone the instant it pings atop the table. He needs a picture of who she’s with (they’ll fight about this later) but won’t tell me the truth so I won’t tell her the obvious.

You’re not in love! I want to scream. This isn’t normal.
She already knows.

My world is ending, she breathes, and for once it isn’t drama. She is about to tidal wave her future, cascade hurt in all directions, collapse the precarious foundation of an unexamined life—
I tell her she’ll build a new one.

Look, I smile, hands outstretched. Look how I’ve built a new one.

The morning after our vacation in the Florida keys—more than four days where I kept my phone and computer offline—I reconnected to the internet. I started with text messages, scanning through a manageable number of updates in my family’s group chat and a couple notes from friends. (It isn’t unusual for my responses to come after a delay, so no big deal on that front.)

Then I moved to emails. It took a half hour to organize 51 new messages and schedule upcoming tasks accordingly (thank you, Todoist) before I gave Instagram a brief scan, clicking through too many story updates before shaking myself free of the compulsion to scroll scroll scroll.

In theory, the fact that it was so simple for me to jump back into the digital world should be comforting. I disconnected for the better part of a week… and nothing exploded! Nothing collapsed! That underscores the futility of constantly checking my apps when I am online. Rarely do…

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Below is my monthly recap, where I round up everything I’ve shared on the Paws and Reflect blog in one place (in lieu of sending you emails for each individual post).

As always, let me know if you have any questions! I’m trying to spend significantly more time on Substack and other writing pursuits than on Instagram lately, so comments here and emails to haley@pawsandreflect.blog are excellent ways to reach me. I really appreciate your support.

Cute Scout photo as a thank you ↓

✏️ What I’ve created lately

Published on the Paws and Reflect blog

• Vignettes from a trip to my hometown (personal narrative)
  For me, January was dominated by a nine-day solo visit to Wisconsin. It was heart wrenching and heartwarming and many things in between.

• 60,000 miles and two years in our converted van (van life)
  Reflections on our time traveling so far, plus a bunch of stats on overnight stays, lodging costs, etc.

• The siren call of shallow sharing (social media)
  Sometimes nuance risks pushing everyone away instead of connecting with everyone in some way.

• “Under control” off-leash dogs can still be a problem (dogs)
  Back on my responsible dog handling soapbox for a minute 🤓

• “What do you do?” (poetry-ish)
  Like… as a job?

• Is Scout a girl’s name? (communication)
  On feeling heard

• Wonder beyond my little black mirror (social media, culture-ish)
  Moving into a van amplified my passion for screen-free time—but it's remiss not to acknowledge how often fully logging off isn’t possible in our modern world.

• Grief memoirs and chronic illness (books, health)
  Speed reading sad tales, whispering "thank you" for the feelings, and finally writing about my mom's rheumatoid disease.

• Short musings I’d have previously posted on social media (tidbits)

• My ex got married and I went mad (personal essay)
  If he has grown into a loving husband to someone else, then could I have been the darkness?

Featured elsewhere

• Walking the Dog Shouldn’t Be a Chore for Kinship
  This was one of the very first cold pitches I sent after deciding to “put myself out there more” last summer. It feels so good to see it live on the Kinship site! (More to come: I just submitted my second piece for them last week 🤗)

• Busting enrichment myths, part one for Juniper
  Largely inspired by my podcast chat with Taylor Finton, friend and face behind Bindi’s Bucket List!

📚 What I read last month

Nonfiction

• Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted by Suleika Jaouad ★4

• You Could Make This Place Beautiful: A Memoir by Maggie Smith ★3

• My Wife Said You May Want to Marry Me: A Memoir by Jason Rosenthal ★3

• Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence by Anna Lembke ★4

• I’ve Tried Being Nice: Essays by Ann Leary ★4

• Fox and I: An Uncommon Friendship by Catherine Raven ★4

• Morningstar: Growing Up With Books by Ann Hood ★4

• Wordslut: A Feminist Guide to Taking Back the English Language by Amanda Montell ★5

Fiction

• The Last Murder at the End of the World by Stuart Turton ★4

• The Midnight Feast by Lucy Foley ★3

• First Lie Wins by Ashley Elston ★3

• I Hope This Finds You Well by Natalie Sue ★3

😁 What I’m most excited about

Truthfully, excitement is hard to find right now—and when I do stumble upon the sensation, it’s hard to feel as though I’ve earned it. This is not novel. I also know it’s temporary. But my list of enthusiasm is less robust (and took more effort to create) than usual.

• Continuing to figure out what it means to be a “writer” and how I can further improve. When I work with editors at different publications, I get to practice being edited. The process is uncomfortable and also so, so, so necessary for me.

• Watching Scout lie in the sun. Lying in the sun with her.

• Having the opportunity to think even more about social media. Yeah, I know I’ve been doing that for like a year—but it’s extra salient now. Do I want to get off Instagram all the way (especially in light of recent Meta goings-on)? Is questioning why some of my posts get eight likes after three hours and others get 1,000 after one remotely worth it? How can I better structure this blog to connect with people the way I want (when I currently feel I still rely on IG for that)?

• Making homemade key lime pies when we drive farther south this month. I love the Space Coast—but I’m itching to move on and better embrace the location flexibility that was the whole point of living in a van.

• Writing lists of kind things people have said/done (like the guy on an airplane who offered my crying niece some of his own snacks) and referring to them as needed.

The guy next to me on the airplane is kind. He says “bless you” when I sneeze. He points out an interesting cloud. When I put on my noise-canceling headphones, he leaves me alone without preamble.

He also asks why I’m traveling. “My sister-in-law's bridal shower,” I reply. He's going to Milwaukee to meet his girlfriend’s family for the first time. (They just visited his in Puerto Rico.)

I am going home for my sister-in-law’s bridal shower. It’s not a lie, merely a slight omission: easier this way. Who wants their seatmate to answer honestly? What would that even look like?

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We are making small talk before my appointment. “So what do you do?” he asks. I hesitate. The pause stretches to awkward before I clarify: “like, as a job?” He nods. Of course. That’s what this question always means, one of the first things we ask a new person, our intro to who they are.

“I’m a freelance writer. I work with brands and publications mostly in the pet space.”

It’s a true answer, a brushstroke outline of my “career”, but I spend the next ninety minutes mostly thinking about all the other things I could say instead.

I float on my back in the ocean every chance I get even though Sean just informed me, after we watched Jaws for the first time, that Cocoa Beach has kind of a lot of sharks. Even when a guy running in a backwards baseball cap on Cape Cod says I must be crazy, isn’t it freezing? (I am, and it is, but I am also delightfully alive.)

I laugh at my partner’s jokes, and my dad’s jokes, and my father-in-law’s jokes. I give my niece piggy back rides.

I journal, filling docs with stream-of-consciousness thoughts. Sometimes they become mediocre meaningful-to-me poetry.

I play with my dog. I let her win the tug toy after she puts in real effort. I help her feel tough; I tell her she’s perfect.

I get so excited talking with my most enthusiastic friend that our favorite restaurants know to always sit us in the back. Far, far, far in the back. (I don’t mind—I always have to pee, anyway.)

I wake up from nightmares. I lean into Sean. I ask if he hears the strangers walking past our van, if waking up steps from the beach or our favorite coffee shop in the city will be worth it the next day. (It is.)

I read memoirs and attempt to write my own; I lose myself in psychological thrillers and love that I wouldn’t be able to write my own. I suspend my disbelief.

I point out pretty things constantly. The full moon tinted with sunset pink. An extremely small toad. Primroses that only open their petals at night. Sean’s grin. My friend’s octagonal glasses. A washed-up olive shell that makes me miss my niece. Those little string lights trendy breweries hang above their patios. Fading murals. My own smile.

I love. I spend almost all day every day with my partner and our dog, and if someone told me I had a month left to live I’d say “very little needs to change”.

“Would you go to Mars?”

I hesitated. “Safety guaranteed,” he added, tone suggesting an obvious answer. (Who wouldn’t want to go to space?)

“I couldn’t.”

There are no creatures on Mars: no fireflies, no frogs so small you can’t believe they exist, no rare snails on the edge of a hot spring’s pool. There are no sleepy dogs to welcome you home, no grizzly bears across the river, no foxes carrying prey. How could I smile in a world without scrub jays? Sans squirrels? Bereft of deer?

I want to be an animal among animals.