Semantic Distance

i’m always intrigued by artwork that casts the author’s personal relatives as religious figures. it feels like the ultimate form of flattery. imagine being immortalized as mother mary for observers to see. maybe the act of rendering a person on canvas is a religious act itself; you are preserving memory and making a figure omnipresent in the rooms of galleries.

• this month started like most: overwhelming. while i usually take the contours of my life with relative grace, there’s something about this month that scares me. lots of decisions are being made in the next couple of weeks, let’s see if they’re correct—or at least worth the wait.
• ever since i’ve been writing more, the specter over my shoulder is starting to be exorcised. reality seems to be taking shape and i finally have the eyes to see it.
• i think i need at least ONE roommate. living alone is obviously a luxury most want but don’t receive, however, i’m starting to talk to myself way too much. it’s a habit i picked up in high school, regurgitating study material to myself silently in my school’s media center, but it’s ended up overstaying its welcome. i can clearly remember moving into my first apartment in dc rehearsing my professional elevator pitch in front of the bathroom mirror wearing only a towel while hitting power poses. i recite monologues around my place too, of course thinking i’m preforming like there’s an eviction notice on my door. anyway, i think i just need a pet. i was cat-sitting for my friend momina a couple months ago (if you’re reading this hiiiiii) and i was immediately taken aback having another living thing in my home. i don’t necessarily ignore the silence, i didn’t really have the ears to hear the frequency. it’s like the cat’s signs of life widened my understanding by reminding myself adolescence, back when i was sharing a room with one or both of my siblings. i miss the noise.
  

• not to sound like every 25 year old ever but i’ve been thinking a lot about neuroplasticity. it’s pretty rare that i lose my train of thought while i speak as i’ve always tried my best to be exact with language, even as a kid. it was to the point where i wouldn’t event start essays in my 8th grade languages arts class since i needed my introduction to be perfect. and ngl, this kinda followed me into adulthood as i get into writing consistently as a hobby, evidenced by my countless essays drafts i furiously wrote in a dream-like haze after reading for more than like ten minutes. i feel like there’s a metaphor there if you squint hard enough. i mostly find myself lacking the words in the middle of work meetings, looking to the side of the screen trying to connect the cerebral dots in my brain back again, making eye contact with megan on my katesye poster that is blue tacked above my desk.
• my apartment is a two minute walk from a harris teeter (this is giving context i swear) and i wear the whole most horrific outfits of my life in there—like i know it dad would side eye me if i was stranger. it’s mostly bc that short of a walk doesn’t necessitate a full “outfit” to be worn. and by “outfit” i mean putting on jeans and a t-shirt i guess? it’s not like putting on those articles of clothing takes a ton of effort, but why do i need to try that hard before 9 AM. anyway, it makes me eternally grateful i don’t live by any of my coworkers. i would be absolutely stunned if i saw my manager saw me in the dairy aisle (she might be lactose intolerant idk her tea), staring directly at the banana socks i stole from my bf peeking through my all-black birkenstocks. that fr just sent a chill down my spine.
• i’m being dead serious when i say this but why don’t more people use vsco?

i’ve been keeping a running list of “ideas” in my notion for coming up on three years now. the term “idea” being from the podcast, exploration: live!, where charlie and natalie share their everyday conjectures and hypotheses with each other, with emma, their producer, riffing in the background and adding her (always) correct takes. when i first listened, i felt like running into old college friends at a mutual friend’s party yelling “OMG HIIIII” from across the crowd, b-lining towards each other trying not to knock drinks over in the process. they also had the same energy as a girl that would defend you from bullies (who were always homophobic) and ask you how your mom is in between classes. needless to say, i was obsessed.

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i think i was the only kid in america that grew up with a scarcity mindset before i turned 5. i’m not sure if this is one of those childhood stories that had the truth bent a couple times when my parents relayed the story back to me as i’ve gotten older, but nevertheless, it developed. was it because i became anxious at the beginning of the month to see if rent will be paid on time or lived as an immigrant from a non-english speaking country? well, no! in fact, i grew up without worrying about where my next meal would come from AND i don’t speak spanish—i deeply apologize to my ancestors, i promise i’ll pick it up before i turn 30.

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who’s the clown? — audrey hobert

when i first listened to “chateau” (high btw), i sent the song to two of my friends and basically told them audrey hobert is olivia rodrigo’s kid through ivf? i think at the time i didn’t say taylor swift because i didn’t want to be that annoying gay guy that thinks all white women with guitars make the same music. anyway, this album is really good! it does a great job at doing what it needs to do, and well: be a straightforward pop record with snappy lyrics, clean production, and a peek into what hobert can do as a songwriter. that’s not to say this album is basic, it actually has a lot of moments that surprised me—made me rewind to certain sections of songs more than once just to hear how each layer melded into one another (re: silver jubilee, she was rapping on that song idc).

her visuals for the tracks themselves are also pretty cohesive for someone that has only has one project out. she really impressed me with what she did on thirst trap, but the music video for bowling alley is more of a standout for me. it’s dynamic, energetic, and honestly really funny—reminding me of the types of videos that would play on disney channel at like 4 am (you thought i was gonna say something about taylor swift but i didn’t). i feel like hobert is kinda in on the joke of what she’s doing? like “yeah i’m making this for an album rollout but at least i can have some fun while i’m doing it,” but in a surprisingly authentic way that is hard to come by (which probably happened because pop stars didn’t retain their well hidden lifestyles from early 2000s, we are bombarded by how they through tiktok quotas their labels put on them… ALLEGEDLY).

closing thought: i think hobert paid a karmic debt in a past life because wdym brother is malcom todd (whole other conversation), her roommate at nyu was gracie abrams (an even longer conversation), and got signed to rca like right after those co-writing credits hit her wikipedia?