Celebrating a little milestone

Making my first $1,000 on Substack

This morning, I got an automated email telling me I made my first $1,000 on Substack, which I could not believe. Three months ago, I wasn’t sure if anyone would pay for my writing, and now people are doing just that. Most of them are friends who have, at one point or another, been subjected to my long rants on writing. They tend to like my writing between a medium amount and a good deal, and support me because they know I’m on some new bullshit and I won’t stop until I get what I want and they’d prefer I not starve before that happens.

A few of them, however, are total strangers—a curious sight akin to finding a couple of strangers in your living room because they saw a light flare from hundreds of miles away and found the colors pretty. They are not here due to pre-existing loyalties or charitable impulse. They are here for the writing, and it is the writing which I have poured my life into and splattered on the internet’s canvas, hoping for someone to reconstitute the images I had in my mind from a confetti of letters.

I like to hope that the spell works whether you know me or not, but the truth is, writing as a woman online comes with its particular doubts. One of them is: Do they think my writing is actually good, or do they just like me as a person? Or worse, they just think I’m pretty? I am not sure if those can be separated, or if doing so is even desirable, but I am driven by some sort of stubborn purity about the craft. (It is for this reason I have avoided showing my face.)

But I don’t think any of that matters much. Today, I will allow myself to receive what has been freely given. Thank you to all of you who have read my writing, liked it, shared it, and supported me over the years. There is still a long way to go before I can make a living from this, but I feel encouraged.

Barring major life events and platform changes that would make it infeasible, I’ve mentally signed away the next 3-4 years of my life to writing on Substack. I think it’s the best place right now for me to slowly build a body of work, improve my craft, and reach the people I am trying to reach.

There is a future for myself I see. Every day I wake up, and I put letters to the page, and I do that for about 40 years. Maybe I fall in love and raise a family, but primarily I am gazing at the world in astonishment and writing down what I see. This for me would be enough, more than enough.

I am still figuring out what this Substack is. In the coming months, you’ll see me try a bunch of stuff. Some mixture of spiritual journal, essays, thoughts on books, and anything else that comes up. My only criterion is that the writing has to feel alive. It’s been another half year so I may do another journal compilation. I’ve also recently gotten the idea to make a chapbook, which I think would be fun. See you soon, and thanks for being here.

Some pink jasmine in my pocket. They are in bloom right now in SF—if you see them go smell them.