September is my preferred New Year. Not January when it’s cold and bright, teeth chattering with talk of gifts and goals. I like my New Year vibes less chipper, more daylight shrinking than expanding. It’s why I think, though not Jewish myself, I’m drawn to the observance of Rosh Hashanah, or the Jewish New Year, which ushers in ten days of repentence. How wise to begin again not with champagne dreams but sorries, sobering and human.
Unintentionally, I seemed to have ushered in my own sobering season of sorries. Sorry for the way I impacted you. (Intention does not equal impact, I add.) Sorry for my badly chosen words. (I’m kinder in writing, promise, my speech just a shitty first draft.) Sorry my face did that thing that triggered your thing. (And thank you for saying so; my face is a rogue operator.) My ego wishes she never had to say another sorry. But my soul knows she’s lucky, lucky for the ritual to slow and repair.
And so I will keep saying daily sorries like daily prayers. I will read Marge Piercy’s poem, Coming Up on September, and keep composting my “ripeness and rot.” I will remember what my hot yoga teacher, Leilani, used to sing as she came around and pressed our limbs into alignment: “To receive a correction is a sign of great luck.”
I will try not to roll my eyes. (Tell my face for me.)
XO,
Erin
P.S. It’s been awhile since I last wrote—so, some news! I have an essay on St. Anne in an upcoming book of portraits and reflections called The Modern Saints by Gracie Morbitzer. St. Anne is the patron saint of childlessness and infertility but I noodle on whether she might better be remembered as the patron saint of any woman who believes herself woman enough, mother or not. It’s very on brand for me. I hope you’ll like it. You can pre-order here.
P.P.S. My dear friend J. Dana Trent also has a new book available for pre-order now called Between Two Trailers about breaking free from the person our parents hoped we’d be—which, for Dana, was a drug lord’s heir and debutante minister. Lucious prose, a ludicrously good plot, and a foreword by none other than Barbara Brown Taylor make it more than worth the read. I’m poring over an advanced copy now.
P.P.P.S. I honestly haven’t been reading all that much lately. (Too busy causing and contemplating sorries.) So children’s books feel more like the speed of the season. This new one, My God, Love is Everywhere, from new friends Victoria Robb Powers and Cameron Mason Vickrey is a small celebration of big emotions—and love’s presence in the midst of them. Hang in there, human ones.