SOON, issue 2
Katie Lee Ellison answers the 'Taking Care' questionnaire, a new series about how we manage our inner and outer lives as creative people.
Welcome to Something Out of Nothing, a newsletter about meaning—making it, finding it, offering it. My name is April Sopkin. I talk about the writing life, teaching, thrifting, books, travel, obsessions and idle interests, and much more.
‘Taking Care’ is a questionnaire about how we manage our inner and outer lives as creative people. I can think of no better person to take this questionnaire first than my good friend Katie Lee Ellison, a brave-as-hell writer devoted to the ever-mercurial, ever-demanding process of memoir-writing. I’ve often asked Katie how she recovers from the deep work of dredging up the past, and I think my need for these kinds of answers is where the idea for the ‘Taking Care’ questionnaire really comes from. As creative people, we exchange the work itself, looking for feedback, insight, direction, but we talk so little about how we literally care for ourselves on a daily basis. How do we recover from repeatedly wading into the mentally demanding and often-solo space of creating?
Katie Lee Ellison is the founder, curator, and host of the literary event series, Nonfiction for No Reason. You can find her writing in Shenandoah, Moss, The Seventh Wave, J Journal, and elsewhere. She’s a 2016-2017 Hugo House Fellow, a 2018 fellow at the Yiddish Book Center, and a 2020 Tin House Summer Workshop attendee. Find her work at katieleeellison.com or read about the next NFNR and/or random musings in her Substack, A Beautiful Fad.
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Katie! What are you working on?
An essay about the artist BuBu de la Madeleine and her large-scale installation piece about mermaids. I’m trying to understand why it made me cry. I’m also writing an essay about throwing a reading series in my last family home, ten years after my family sold it. I also want to write an essay about perfume, specifically my mother’s and mine. There’s another I’m cooking up about my uncle’s lifelong career as an actor, which I’ll start by returning to New York to watch recordings of his stage performances. Ultimately, I believe these will help make up a memoir-in-essays about building a self through art and story.
What is something you once thought about yourself that you no longer do?
Like many women, I used to think I had to bend myself in a million directions to get anything close to what I wanted. I used to think I had all the time in the world. I know now that I don’t have to bend to anything, and that in fact, that will mostly do me harm. Learning and stretching in the ways I desire now will only bear more and more fruit in the ways I like later. And I don’t have all the time in the world, in fact, time is very limited, and what I do with it now is all I have. Kind of typical aging stuff, I think. Is this enough about me?
When is bedtime?
Sometimes it’s 9pm, sometimes it’s 1am. But even if I’m in bed at 9, I’m not asleep until at least 10:15. Typically, 11 is when I’m really sleeping.
What’s a habit or behavior that feels like taking care of yourself?
Stretching, like, somatically. Foam rolling. Rubbing my own hands or neck. A really, really hot bath. Taking my vitamins and supplements on time, all day long.
What did taking care of yourself look like in your twenties?
Oof! Making my lunch for work to save money. Slicing a baguette from Fairway into four pieces and putting a single slice of cheese, some mustard, greens, and olive oil in there. An apple or some sliced carrots on the side. This way I could afford a drink at a reading after work on Thursdays or Fridays.
How do you prepare yourself to write about particularly difficult subjects?
Honestly, particularly difficult subjects get stuffed down these days until they’re scratching so hard at me, I have to give them some air time and let them through my fingers. There’s so much that's been hard the last few years, it’s tough to give my darkness time and attention. That said, when I do, it can be devastating, but it is also a relief and a rough kind of gift to myself. I’m lucky to find myself in that urgent space, where I want answers, and for that I always look to writing.
How do you recover after doing intense creative work?
Stopping the work is a recovery in itself. Walks help move it out of my body and change the feeling to something else, something new. Also, YouTube celebrity interviews, a show I really love at the time, and sugar. Preferably chocolate or coffee ice cream. Haagen Daas, if I can get it.
What self-care advice rings false for you?
Doing anything under the guise of “self-care.” Taking care of my skin feels good, especially at 40. Taking a bath is good because I sweat and get toxins out and can get a really good exfoliation session, but I’m using epsom salts not bubbles and a candle for dim light because I only have overhead and it gives me a headache. I think what I’m saying is that self-care as luxury is bullshit and superficial to whatever I’m trying to tend to. The same actions can be superficial or they can feel really intimate, and how and why I do them makes that difference.
How do you manage the way ambition feels?
I’m really reaching for peace with my own desires. I pay attention to how much I want, how much of that is fair game, and I’m careful and aware to give back anytime I feel like I’ve been given something. Because writers are our own universe and it’s a lot of work to be supported by anyone outside our community, I have a lot of reverence and respect when it’s other writers propping me up to help me reach for what I’m dreaming of. And I’m always hungry to cheerlead for someone else; it feels really good. I put ambition in the realm of desire, and then it feels radical and queer and right and true and human. And I watch myself so that I don’t get obnoxious or ego-driven. People around me, friends, people I trust, keep me right-sized, too.
How can you tell when you’re coming up on burnout?
I absolutely cannot. I struggle with having enough energy. But I know when I have a tickle in my throat, that beginning-to-feel-sick feeling, I have to stop, or I will get sick and it will take me down. On my very best days, I’m aware of how my head and body feel in response to whatever I’m doing, and I ask, what do I need right now. If the answer is to keep going, then I’m good. If the answer is, Water, or, To go outside, then I know. Do I always do it? No, absolutely not. But when I do, my days feel longer in this beautiful way you think you can only have in Europe or somewhere.
What level of “seize the day” are you?
I’m disproportionately and approximately 85% seize the day. I have a calendar. I make plans. I have to-do lists. I’m a Virgo rising. But I’m all water past that, so when it’s time to get down to it, it’s all intuition and the push of the wind or current. I’m undisciplined is what I’m saying. I need help.
What’s the playlist of late?
It’s pretty much always Beyonce’s latest album. But to write, I’ve been listening to Philip Glass a lot. Also, I have these work playlists from Cody Cook-Parrott that I’ve listened to a million times.
I also watch Blakely Neiman Thornton and Subway Takes on Instagram.
TV has been Jerrod Carmichael Reality Show and Baby Reindeer. Holy shit I’ve been starving for that level of satisfaction from TV for a long time. I’ve been making due with Bravo/Kardashian reality TV, but these are what I’ve really needed. I will talk with anyone at length about Jerrod Carmichael and this show. DM me.
YouTube is mind-numbing celebrity interviews, Team Coco, The Cut, sometimes Hot Ones, lately a lot of Julia Fox.
How does money, and your relationship to it, provide care or support?
I recently learned another level to which I directly equate having money with having love. Perhaps this is no revelation at all, but growing up, it was a really clear message. Stuck in that mindset, money provides no care or support because it’s a false association. From there, money is only a distraction and source of fear. If I can get myself removed from the panic, it’s just a tool. It’s hard to think of the future, at all, as a writer, in terms of money, but in the present, there’s enough, and when I can stay there, I can write more.
What are some forms of care that you’re discovering, or want to try?
Letting myself be messy publically. Being unsure while also being seen. Accepting that other people understand parts of me I wish they didn’t. This allows for more acceptance and desire to see other people as they are as well. But mostly, it just makes it easier to be alive.
What’s your relationship to night and day?
I find day to be for necessary things. Early morning, which I can rarely get myself up for, and late night are the magic hours. I’m hardly coherent in the morning and I don’t like to talk. At night, I can talk for hours. I can pack a bag or finish an essay, romantic things. The daytime is for editing and grocery shopping, necessary things.
What is comforting to you?
Feeling the same thing at the same time as someone else. A laugh. Excellent TV and a white couch. Perfect quiet and a book. A call or text from a friend. The smell of my own skin. My pets. Driving an hour or so with a good album on. Plans coming up. Tea in a very big cup. Good doctors. The right medicine. Light in through the window. A view of water. A fluffy bed. The feeling of strength in my body. Visible improvement. The library. Mindless television with my love. An empty house to myself. A crowded dinner table. Wood-fired pizza. The smell of my dog’s feet and my cat’s neck and my rabbits’ space between the ears. Horses, everything about them. Wide open country. Very hot water. Sun on the lawn. When a friend calls to check in. I’m repeating myself.
What’s upcoming for you?
I’ll have an interview out soon with one of the dearest humans I know, Greg Mania, who I met through Nonfiction for No Reason, and who I’m heartened to call a friend. The interview will be in Electric Literature this month.
Nonfiction for No Reason’s Insta
Are *you* a creative person? Or do you want to recommend someone for this series? Message me here or email directly: asopkin@gmail.com.