The Saturday Letter: March.

#007: It's a long one.

So, I’m thinking about doing a book club here, where we read and reflect on just one chapter of the same book (Flux, an amazing book on to navigate the waves of change) each month rather than reading one book every month (who has the time?!?!). Maybe a Zoom or something to chat? Maybe the amazing author, April Rinne, can join us for the last meeting? If you’re interested, will you let me know?

Two last updates: Starting next month, I’ll be pubbing twice a month but you won’t know when (to honor the spontaneity value I started “In Deep” with!). And this email is long. Damn, March. Click the title and open it up in your browser if it cuts off for you. I love you!!! So much!!! Thanks for hanging with me, sexy!!!

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Hello from around a table with friends. We’re sitting in a low-lit lounge tucked away in SoHo, laptops on knees, pizza crust in mouth. The plans came together fast and last minute. I can always tell Spring is coming by how spontaneous I become.

I’ve wanted nothing more than to be in my own world this winter. I am still struggling with feeling guilty about that.

In this temporary world I created, it was slow and small. Friends from North Carolina visited us and stepped into it. We took them on the ferry (my absolute favorite mode of transportation, besides the bus!). We rode just one stop across the East river, but it was charged with just 10 minutes of this electric child-like freedom I find myself chasing often. At lunch, I indulged in one perfect glass of Prosecco with a grilled shrimp Caesar salad and fries while we looked out at the water. We searched bookstores for nothing, shared bites of the same donut on a bench, and ate bodega egg, bacon, and cheese bagels at our kitchen counter. When friends from Virginia visited shortly after, we went on a long neighborhood walk on a spring-feeling day amongst a pit of wintery ones, watched movies while cuddled up on the couch, had Thai-takeout and long conversations.

This world was filled with my favorite things and it was made even more tender with people who welcome so much of the same (Laura and Carolyn are those friends and always reading these newsletters, hi!). But I also tried a few new things, too. I saw Lord of The Rings for the first time (and it was the last one, oops, lol), roamed a comic book store, attended a publishing workshop put on for free by the New York Public Library in the Bronx (I love the NYPL so much). I tried my hardest to go at my own pace this month and I came out on the other side feeling great.

At dinner, on the ferry, at Radio City Hall for the LOTR screening with a live orchestra, getting my author headshot at the NYPL publishing workshop

A new load of work responsibilities and bouts of not wanting to be bothered otherwise took over my life and this month, so I willingly threw routine out the window. But because of this (even though the type-A part of myself was screaming underneath) it created space for all of the other things that made this month feel more fluid, looking back. I let things get a little messy around my personal parts of the apartment (Dan, on the other hand, is so clean and organized always) and maybe didn’t care so much about looking put together and cancelled plans instead of pushing when my body was asking for rest. I kind of woke up each morning and did what I needed to do, but not what I *always* do.

It made me think of something Olivia Muenter said recently: “I spent so long wondering who I would be with The Perfect Morning Routine that I failed to ask myself who I was without it.” Without perfection and routine, I am a sloppier, freer version of myself. And that’s okay.

I volunteered at an after-school youth writing center this month and was revived. I’m sure teachers and folks working with kids all day every day might disagree, but I was dazzled with the elementary schoolers I met. They were imaginative and tired and excited and brilliant, bubbling with questions and ideas. One little second grader asked me about my French manicure (yes, using those exact words) and after telling me it “looked weird, but a good weird” and me holding back a laugh, she mistook my expression for anguish, looked me in the eye, and said, “I’m sorry. I think I upset you.” I wasn’t, but I was impressed she took the step to check in. I was speechless at the show of this second grader’s emotional depth and intelligence.

I served snacks from behind a table at the start of the event, and tried to ask names and remember them and say my name back. What was interesting over the course of the night was that a few of the kids I did this too came running back to me. I hoped it was because they felt seen.

I noticed one little lady’s parent couldn’t make it to the event, so I squatted down next to her to help her with an activity. “Do you need help?” I asked. “I don’t want to write anymore today,” she told me with her hand cupping her chin. “I need a break.” In volunteer training, they taught us to be curious about what the kids were saying and lean into that. “What do you like to do when you need a break?” I asked. “Sleep,” she said. “I love a nap,” I told her. “But do you want to know my problem?” She nodded and her beads bobbed up and down. “I can’t just sleep for 20 minutes. I end up sleeping for three hours!” Her eyes lit up. “Me too! One time, I went to take a nap and woke up the next day!” I overreact for her. “Wait. Me too.” We pause. “Should we write a story about that? I can write with the pencil so you don’t have to.”

I think kids want to be listened to. And to feel important to someone (I love to shake their little hands when I introduce myself). Sometimes, just being there with them is enough. That’s half of what help is: just being there. And aren’t we all just kids?

The kids are going to be alright. We will too.

As always, thanks for being here. I’m planning potential trips to Puerto Rico, Guatemala, and Waco, TX — any recs? Some questions for you: What gave you that child-like wonder or an electric jolt this month? Is there someone you need to check in with/apologize to? Are you letting go of any old routines, or adapting new? I want to choose a few comments from you and include them in next month’s letter :) Message me or leave a comment. See you at the bottom.

Oh my God, what haven’t we watched this month? Anora, which I thoroughly enjoyed the journey of and the acting and will think about forever. The new Snow White, which had terrible pacing but was a visual treat! (Rachel Zegler is enough reason alone to see it.) Erin Brockovich is a Julia Roberts classic I had never seen but finally dove into on a plane ride — one of her best performances, in my opinion! Dan and I went to Chicago briefly this month and instead of partying with lingering St. Patrick’s Day crowds, we did what we love most: sat in the dark at a random AMC and saw two movies back-to-back: Black Box then Novocaine (I can’t wait to rewatch this when it comes on cable in hotel rooms). Oops. In TV land, Running Point gets five stars from me. I’m telling everyone to watch. Happy Face is a Paramount+ new show that I’m three episodes in and totally in on, which is interesting, because I don’t love true crime but I’m liking how they are approaching it from the serial killer’s daughter’s perspective (and I’m just an Annaleigh Ashford stan). I’m so late, like, a year late, but the new Mr. And Mrs. Smith series slapped, especially because of Maya Erskine (Did you know she’s married to that man from Sky High?! I had such a crush on him!) and Donald Glover, whose performances were believable and excellent. Severance is the best show on television right now. It’s a perfect example of what a slow burn can build to, while White Lotus has been a little too much white dilly dallying for me this season. Love is Blind suffered the same symptoms as White Lotus this season. With Love, Meghan is as much of a fantasy and escape as any other show right now. Once I accepted that, though, I found it quite nice :) This is the absolute longest this section has ever been, so my point to every TV and film executive still stands: STOP RELEASING AN OVERWHELMING AMOUNT OF AMERICAN TV IN THE SPRING AND GIVE IT TO US IN THE DEAD OF WINTER WHEN WE NEED IT MOST PLEASE THANK YOU

In this house, we play Doechii. Loudly.

Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld. Being set in the world of a fictional Saturday Night Live was so fun. Giving In by Jessie Lian, which is the most perfect little indie book of poetry that nudged my heart into a more beautiful place. Each section is based on the seasons, and it was so whimsical and uplifting and it reminds you of your own abundance. I received it as a thinking-of-you-out-of-the-blue gift from my friend Kristin that I will most definitely be sending to others. Words are such a gift. In non-book form, I gobbled up Haley Nahman’s essay about what she calls the purity vortex (or why we judge others) which was stunning and spot on, and — if you read nothing else this month — let your one read be this wonderful essay by Aminatou Sow about Ramadan. Beautiful.

1. A seasonal uniform. Every chance I get, especially when I don’t want to think, I reach for the same black oversized sweater and black jeans. It’s a cute outfit that can be dressed up or dressed down. And I love not thinking. It’s saved me many a morning and outing!

2. Shower mood lighting. We’ve found something life-changing. Turning of all the lights in the bathroom, taking a hot shower with the door closed so it gets all steamy, and only this light on is the best thing that’s ever happened to me. I’m being dramatic but I also MEAN IT.

3. This recipe before it gets too warm. I’m going to miss soup season and this one freezes really well :’) https://smittenkitchen.com/2013/01/lentil-soup-with-sausage-chard-and-garlic/

⊛ I wrote my first foreword for a lovely book called Table for 51 :)

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⊛ If I was MIA this month, it’s because work/The Residence has taken over my life. That’s fine, because it’s a great show and I’ve loved speaking with members of the cast. I interviewed Uzo Aduba (Orange is the New Black) and Susan Kelechi Watson (This Is Us), I produced this video with the cast and this this one too, I really, really loved this scene stealer and this scene stealer and Everything That’s True on ‘The Residence,’ Thanks to Our White House Consultant was sooo much fun to write.

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⊛ No one played the film vs. movie game with me in the comments and I felt like talking into a void for this month’s “In Deep” but I did write about it and The Substance for a very famous publication. It’s below.

You know what else feels right? 2 Billion people around the planet unified in self discipline and empathy for those less fortunate. I can’t be mad at that. Ever. If you find yourself thinking that we live in hell and nobody is doing anything about it, please remember that 2 Billion Muslims are fasting. For 30 days, they are foregoing food and water from sun up to sun down. And sex and even music for the really strict ones. 30 days no music? I can’t do that but I am fasting. Muslims in extravagantly rich countries are doing it and Muslims in the poorest conditions you can imagine are doing it. People in war zones are fasting. People in prisons are fasting. Muslim athletes are fasting. Bus Drivers, school teachers, the people who deliver your food, the people who clean your homes and offices, the people who cook your food and keep our cities running. Sometimes this is what “doing something” looks like. You don’t have to agree with it but you cannot say that people are doing nothing. What are you doing? Reading the news and talking about the news? That’s it? How’s that working for you? Reading the news is not a sacrifice. It’s consumption. So again, I ask, what exactly are you doing that is not serving just you and your appetites?

— Aminatou Sow in Creme de la Creme

Thank you again for reading, sweet friend. Ciao for now. 🤍

A snowy Chicago :)

Hi there! My name is Mia Brabham Nolan and I’m a writer by day and by night, currently living in New York City. I write In Deep with Mia Brabham Nolan, the entertainment, music, and culture Substack newsletter. I’m on Instagram @yourstrulymia. Leave a comment with your thoughts or saying hi and I’ll always respond. Thanks for reading :)