coffee break, twelve: learning to be alone
february and march
31 March 2025
Dearest friend,
How do you handle solitude? Are you someone who savors it? Prefers it? Or are you like me, afraid of it?
For most of my life I have craved company. I fault my upbringing, naturally. My parents divorced when I was young and my only brother, who is six years older than I am, joined the Marine Corps when he was 18. Consequently, I have often felt like an only child, though I have never admitted this aloud. I spent much of my adolescence alone, playacting, daydreaming, reading. My mother worked a lot and was away for long swaths of time. Home life was quiet. Aptitude at being alone, however, did not translate into comfort with or preference for solitude.
In high school and beyond, I learned to latch onto the people nearest to me, and I was lucky enough to be accepted for/despite it. I spent nearly every afternoon and weekend with my high school best friend’s raucous family of six, which in retrospect, must’ve been burdensome for her parents. Yet, they still wholeheartedly welcomed me in. From then onwards, I have always searched for this level of nearness with other people. I wanted noise, complaints, laughter, arguments, togetherness. Returning home to silence was painful.
I say all of this because things seem to be changing for me these days (and it only took about two decades lol). Maybe it took being in a secure and stable relationship to learn how to be on my own, or maybe it’s just because I’m older now.1 And I would certainly like to think some part of it is because I’ve been actively pushing myself out of my comfort zone this past year. Regardless of the reason, lately I’ve been less scared of doing things and going to new places by myself.
At the end of the day, I will never not prefer community and friendship, but now I can at least enjoy the moments when solitude is required of me. And I feel safe in the knowledge that if no one can/will/wants to accompany me, I will step up to the plate; I can become my own companion.
the library
what i read in february and march —
Taiwan Travelogue by Yang Shuang-zi (Trans. Lin King)
Fantastic. Such a beautiful and charming story with a clever novel-within-a-novel convention. I read this during my trip to Taiwan in February, eating Taiwanese food alongside the protagonist. 10/10 experience.
The Honjin Murders by Seishi Yokomizo
I read this with Murakami’s Jazz Club and had a lot of fun being led into confusion with the club!
Scattered All Over the Earth by Yoko Tawada
This was an aggressively okay book. I appreciated the playful and thoughtful discussion of language and its role in society/culture, but the multiple POVs and overall arc of the storyline just did not work for me personally.
The Writing Retreat by Julia Bartz
A fun, well-paced thriller. I became a bit bored at around the 75% mark, but still enjoyed it overall.
The Lord I Left by Scarlett Peckham
A steamy historical rom-com between a Christian minister and a whipping-house maid. I LOVED this. It was light and fluffy, with the perfect amount of intellectual debate.
the cinema
films —
television —
Severance (2022)
Everyone is sick of hearing me talk about this show by now, but my GOD, please watch it!
the record player
the café
Kaveh Akbar’s essay on the obscene ICE abduction of Tufts doctoral student, Rumeysa Ozturk.
An interview with Michelle Zauner on her stint in South Korea, the overwhelm of fame, and her newest album.
I finally bit the bullet and got myself a subscription to The New Yorker. The catalyst was this article on a Wyoming massacre of Asian-Americans in 1885. Horrific shit.
I’m considering adding on a subscription to either Granta, The Paris Review, or another publication that tickles my fancy. If you have any strong opinions/recommendations, let me know!
The best part of Houston is 100% the food. One of my favorite places so far has been Chopnblok, which gets a shoutout in this New Yorker article on the city’s thriving West African food scene.
Sue Williamson writes for Allure about the wellness industry and its veneer of community and inclusivity, but how ultimately, it “[had] no use for [her] cancer diagnosis.”
If you’ve been on bookstagram (or probably in any literary community) long enough, you’d quickly notice the different cliques, such as: the romantasy readers, the new release readers, and…the “brodernists.” This LARB article has a lot to say about that last category.
I’ve been taking writing classes lately, which have made me realize just how little I really knew about the craft and skill of writing, despite being a lifelong reader. Here are some helpful resources for others in the same boat as me:
Brandon Taylor’s substack on story openings, which mirrors a lot of what I was taught in my class on “novel beginnings.”
A poem for the road:
April
By Mary Oliver
I wanted to speak at length about
the happiness of my body and the
delight of my mind for it was
April, a night, a
full moon and –but something in myself or maybe
from somewhere other said: not too
many words, please, in the
muddy shallows theFrogs are singing.
With the utmost of love,
Charlotte
Frontal lobe fully developing, blah blah blah.
Excellent poem choice <3 I subscribe to The New Yorker and The Paris Review!
love!!! I've also really never spent much of my life alone — lots of siblings, always roommates, moved in with my partner young. I have to actively seek out solitude, and it is really uncomfortable for me, but I'm trying to get better at it, so thanks for inspiring me :') also ty for the articles you shared, saving those for later!