volume sixty-nine

an old t-shirt that still fits

hi, lauren deborah! is free for subscribers every week.

if you want more LD in your life, find me here.

if you would like to say thanks for this love letter, please like or comment (it means so much to me to hear from you 🧡), forward it to a friend who might enjoy it or if you’d like to, you can buy me a slice 🍕

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I wonder, like I do each time, if this is the moment I declare we stop doing this. But soon the wondering will come to an end and the choice will be taken from us. Soon enough there will be oceans between us and no more late-night appointments filled with kisses on the back of my head, arms wrapped around my belly, whispers in my ear and pleasure-filled meetings. So for now I ignore the gut feeling that tells me this is a terrible idea bound to end in hurt — for you or me I don’t know yet — and I continue to give in to the satisfaction and temptation that is you.

A candle burned down to a stub sits on my table, the candlestick remaining empty and awaiting a new companion. My desk is a mess I choose to ignore — not letting my need for order take me out of this scenario — the laptop mid-editing of a piece discarded to make room for a human in my bed instead, the wrappers of a letter opened in haste, the stack of tarot cards we riskily read together in laughter. The plants that fill gaps in the room have doubled in size since your first visit to my new home. The notebooks tucked onto shelves and under tables hold many mentions of you that you will never know about — some written by the old me and some by the new — stacked with my collection of scribbles and scrawls of others, all of them brief in comparison.

Right before I switch off the dim lamp light we have enjoyed each other by, I see my throw cushions live up to their name, scattered around the room as they were tossed out of our way. The blinds are drawn, covering every inch of possible viewpoints — the blessings of living in a city mean little privacy — this is our space, closed off from the world to exist only in ours. I hear the heavy autumn rain outside and tell you it is my favourite sound. I ask that even though it is cold out, would you mind if I cracked the window to hear it better, it will help me sleep. You answer by getting up to open it for me, telling me you don’t want me to have to leave the comfort of my bed — a cloud of blankets and drying sweat. 

The smell of incense lingers, and pairs perfectly with the sweetness of your breath on the side of my face as you climb back in with me and scoop me up.

The Lovers II, 1928 by Rene Magritte

We attempt to doze off in adrenalin and conversation and know that tomorrow there will be no rushing off or needing to gift each other our day back. Not like usual. There will be no urgency of needing to be somewhere — an act we put on of showing each other how full our lives are. There is no performance anymore, we are too tired and we are too aware of what is coming. This is our moment now, perhaps both of us knowing it is the last chance before I pretend not to miss you.

Or maybe pretend not to miss this.

Or maybe pretend not to miss the idea of you.

This is our last chance to do something that never called to us before: spending the day together.

Next week I might run away to the other side of the world, creating the next chapter of my life, chasing my dreams, without you, and that feels right.

You ask me in the quiet of the morning what my perfect life would look like and I tell you I am about to start it.

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got an idea for a future volume? want to hear my thoughts on something? feel I am not sharing enough? ask me an anonymous question and I will answer it in a future post.

here are three things I struggled with this week:

🌈 Y’all I need a favour. I got off social media and it changed my life, dramatically. When I was sick recently, I was alarmed at how easily the habit crept back in — as a source of entertainment in my boredom while isolating — when I visited the account I have for my podcast. The addiction came back in full force and is seriously affecting my headspace. I know from past thoughts that my only way to maintain a healthy relationship with social media and doom scrolling is to not have it all, I can’t limit my time, that doesn’t work for me. I would love it if you subscribed to my substack for my podcast. It is fun and joyful and queer and involves zero infinite scrolls! In fact, it is quite brief! A little injection of happiness for you once a week. If enough people subscribe, I can justify the fact that there isn’t a need for my IG to the wonderful people who keep the podcast going. It all takes time, but every sign-up helps. 

🪴 I had to put Jenny, one of my plants, into our plant hospital this week. I have full faith she will make a full recovery (and actually more so that I am leaving and she will be in one of my roommate’s care who seems to be a plant doctor).

🕮 I have been struggling to make time for my novel, and the longer I leave it, the less I feel inclined to return to it. It is a story I want to tell so much but the day gets in the way and then I am too tired, too burned out, too busy…

here are three blessings from this week:

❄️ It is dark when I wake up, but when I ventured out for my second cup of coffee on Tuesday morning, and the sun had lit up the outside just enough, I gasped at the sight of the first gorgeous snowfall of the year. (I mean literally I gasped then cupped my hand over my mouth because it was so loud and I didn’t want to wake my roommates.)

🔓 Continuously, therapeutically, ritualistically shedding layers — things, people, plans.

🥲 Boundary setting that I do not budge on. I am proud of me.

here are three goals for the coming week:

✏️ My goal is to switch things up and instead of having my 5am writing time reserved for writing you this love letter, change that to my later time and use 5am for the novel. My novel needs my attention and I need it in my life. I think using my most brain-ready-for-writing hour will help me do that. NEVER FEAR! My time slot reserved for this love letter is just as productive and will serve me well in regards to giving myself more thinking time before writing to you.

🕯️I stole some extra time in my week next week for relaxing and I intend to tell no one about it. My time is sacred.

👑 Express myself. I have been shedding things (like clothes) which means what is left is really me. I am going to lean into her more now that I no longer have things that always felt like “shoulds”.

here is something I enjoyed this week: 

This volume of one of my favourite substacks —

Write As You Are

by

Susannah Rigg

— has completely changed my ritual (or rather created it) around my writing. Now, as I switch from task to task, be it creative, freelance, email etc, I make sure whatever is on my desk only applies to that. I take away all distractions and to-do lists and find it so much easier to concentrate on what is in front of me. I have also gotten in the habit of pulling a tarot card right before I switch gears to something different, and I have been lighting a candle to indicate when it is my sacred creative time, so that my desk feels different when the work is feeding my soul. Thank you, Susannah!

one more note from me: THANK YOU to everyone from this community who donated to my One Foot Forward walk for mental health research. I walked 158km in October (even when I lost a few days being in bed sick) and I wouldn’t have felt the love and motivation without your support so thank you to Carol, Amie, Louise, My Cooler Younger Cousin and Sarah. I so appreciate you helping me raise funds for vital research and support services for The Black Dog Institute 🧡🧡🧡

pics or it didn’t happen:

host and producer celebrate a successful season of recording and queer joy

I love you,

LD

xoxo