Man, I don’t even know where to begin with UNDERSTUDY. Call it experimental if you want. Call it post-punk or cold wave. Call it electronic or industrial. To me it sounds like primitive future ritual music from a society and culture that doesn’t exist yet. It’s post-apocalypse sounds. There are few notes beyond that it was recorded in Chicago over the winter of 2020. That sounds about right. Ice and fire, though it sounds like winter in Chicago in 2120. It’s a struggle soundtrack.

Or maybe it’s perfectly 2020 and I just haven’t fully acceptance that we’re not just going to hell, but that we’ve already gone.

I will say this again. It can’t be over-emphasized. We are headed into a long winter. Given global warming, climate-change etc., it may not be the coldest, but it might just feel like it. The initial joy of the DC regime getting narrowly voted down seems to have dissipated. I don’t know if anyone really feels confident that there will be a peaceful transition of power, or any kind of a transition at all. There are 300 million Americans, whether they voted for one or the other, waiting to exhale. I might have said a year ago that it won’t end in grotesque violence but I’m not 100 percent certain of that anymore. Shit is getting real out here. There are a lot of things that could be said with some degree of certainty a year ago that can’t be repeated now. We shall see. One day at a time.

ODAAT.

My Staycation notes yesterday read pretty bleak. It’s not entirely a reflection of all my feelings yesterday but it definitely reflects some of them. It’s all the under-the-surface shit bubbling along beneath the day to day. Anxiety is the common thread weaving all the good and bad together but it’s not just specific to me. You can see by how quickly people jump that everyone is right there on the edge of feelings. Don’t trust anyone these days who tells you they are “carefree.” That’s always been rather a bullshit line wherever and whenever you hear it but headed quickly into December 2020 you just know it’s plainly a lie. Only a sociopath would be carefree in the middle of this.

One day someone is going to read these missives and deem me a fucking nutjob. It’s very far from the truth. I feel very grounded and level and perhaps that’s because I’m so accustomed to chaos that it’s easy to navigate. These are not even feelings (as even I’ve described them) as they are observations. These are sick times in a sick city in a sick nation in a sick world. Worry more about the people who believe everything is “just fine.” Worry about those who appear confident. Worry about those who don’t admit to fear. Worry about those who are determined to come out the other side of this in the same state we went into it. Worry about those who are opposed to any kind of change, either in themselves or in us.

The best way to get through all this is to let go of the silly notion that we need to feel okay to be okay.

And don’t be a cunt to other people because we are all struggling.