Content Nausea No. 87: Zoom Out
We got dancing, we got screaming, we got laughin' and we got feelin'
Welcome to the 87th edition of Content Nausea. You can read No. 86 right here. Please let me know what you think. Thank you for being here. Here is the welcome blog.
I was originally going to publish this on my 30th birthday on May 14, which seemed like a cool and poignant thing to do. But then I changed jobs and entered a transient couple of weeks, and I didn’t do it ahead of time. After that, I thought it might be cool if I wrote all of it on my 30th birthday and published it right after. I quickly realized that the number 30 is pretty large when it comes to writing, and maybe I don’t have all that many insightful things to write down.
I wrote the first third of this outside of Grit Coffee in Charlottesville, Va., on my actual birthday. Then I wrote the rest at my Airbnb in San Juan, Puerto Rico, over the course of the next week. I touched things up a bit when I was in Southampton, N.Y., for Memorial Day at the end of the month.
Now, it’s July 5 and I’m typing this up in State College. I’m procrastinating ahead of a week-and-a-half of traveling between Vermont and Michigan — if you have lunch recommendations for Hudson, N.Y., (or that vicinity) please let me know for Thursday — by laying on my bed and reading The Flamethrowers by Rachel Kushner and listening to Superdrag on repeat because I really like the Snail Mail cover. But I’m rallying, or something.
When I finish typing this, I’m not sure there will be 30. I might, for once, self-edit. There will be cases where I can’t read my handwriting or feel embarrassed and give up. I might also give up because I’m tired. Anyway, this is too belabored. In my 30s, I want to be more to the point because I think it might help me navigate some situations more easily. I’m not doing that right now, but it feels like I should stop delaying the inevitable.
30 THOUGHTS ON TURNING 30
1. I listened to “Wasted Days” by Cloud Nothings as I turned 30. It’s a good bit — I’ve also listened to it at midnight on New Year’s the past couple years — that I’ll never get tired of. It's something that I say [unintelligible] (editor’s note: God, my handwriting is absolutely atrocious and this is only the first one), but it’s a song that came out when I turned 20 in what I thought was the worst year of my life, and now I’m listening to it when I turn 30 at the end of the actual most miserable year. It’s an elite banger, though.
2. The real first song of my 30s that I listened to was “This Is A Photograph” by Kevin Morby. It’s a great song and the sentiment has burrowed inside of me ever since it dropped as a single. I’ve been thinking a lot about capturing moments and having those archives. And plus, mortality has been on the mind.
3. I spent the last day of my 20s walking around Richmond, Va., and listening to the new Morby album. It was appropriate. My first Morby exposure was in Brooklyn when I was 17 in 2009 and his music — The Babies, Woods, solo — was one of the more consistent presences in my 20s. I feel like we’ve grown together, in a way.
4. Shout out to Allison for hanging out with me in Richmond. I was glad to spend one of the final days of my 20s with someone I spent my 18th birthday with. It was a good way to close a circle.
5. [This entry just says “Using last.fm to filter out what my most-listened to songs of my 20s were.”]
Swearin’ – “Kenosha” [269 scrobbles]
Day Wave – “Drag” [195]
Carly Rae Jepsen – “Warm Blood” [183]
Carly Rae Jepsen – “Emotion” [181]
Justin Bieber – “What Do You Mean?” [171]
Justin Bieber – “Sorry” [169]
Cloud Nothings – “I’m Not Part Of Me” [167]
Real Estate – “Green Aisles” [163]
Cloud Nothings – “Stay Useless” [162]
Fetty Wap – “Trap Queen” [161]
The Wonder Years – “Woke Up Older” [159]
The Wonder Years – “Came Out Swinging” [158]
The Babies – “On My Team” [157]
CHVRCHES – “The Mother We Share” [156]
CHVRCHES – “Lungs” [154]
Carly Rae Jepsen – “Run Away With Me” [153]
Carly Rae Jepsen – “Tiny Little Bows” [151]
Deerhunter – “Never Stops” [149]
Jamie xx – “I Know There’s Gonne Be (Good Times) [feat. Young Thug and Popcaan]” [149]
Archers of Loaf – “Web In Front” [148]
Cloud Nothings – “Modern Act” [147]
Carly Rae Jepsen – “I Really Like You” [145]
Pavement – “Gold Soundz” [143]
Big Troubles – “Misery” [142]
Youth Lagoon – “17” [142]
The 30,000-foot analysis in this is that I can see where my listening switched from being more album-oriented to playlist-oriented in 2015, but that’s another conversation for another day. But “Kenosha” feels apt as the No. 1 song for my 20s. [My Chromebook crashed at that revelation.]
6. Matt got me the American Water painting that David Berman picked for his Silver Jews album cover, which was a very cool and thoughtful gift. It was also appropriate, given that we were in Charlottesville. On the morning I turned 30, I walked to Berman’s “Red House” (217 14th St NW, Charlottesville) while listening to Sundowner by Morby. It was a pilgrimage that felt necessary.
7. Some of the UVA yard detritus was impressive and really did make me respect UVA a little bit more.
8. My favorite thing was still the Georgia O’Keeffe home with the pong table in the front yard and the beer keg on the front porch. I really do love college towns.
[The above was written in Charlottesville. The below was written in San Juan over three days.]
9. Jack sent me a Spotify screenshot of albums “Turning 30 in 2022” that had Slanted and Enchanted and It’s a Shame About Ray on it. I’m in good company.
10. It took me 30 years and 3 days to finally get off the continent.
11. It feels hard to explain, though the vagueness is mostly a self-defense mechanism, but last year, my relationship to my birthday fundamentally changed, and I wasn’t sure exactly what it would be like, but it’s a testament to my friends that it was one of the more memorable ones that I’ll ever have.
12. I stumbled through most of the day, but I finally found my footing when me, Matt and Colleen were listening to Bad Bunny in the parking lot after Jess and Dan’s ceremony.
13. Un Verano Sin Ti was a life raft for me in May. “Enséñame A Bailar,” “Ojitos Lindos” and “Otro Atardecer” are so good and definitely saved my mood over the two weeks leading up to my birthday.
14. I read Happy Hour by Marlowe Granados on the plane to Puerto Rico, and it was an interesting juxtaposition to square turning 30 and perceiving a burden of responsibility that is totally artificial, and contrasting that with a book about two 21-year-old girls living in New York City for a summer and getting into shenanigans while trying to scrape by. I need to re-read it at some point.
15. Happy Hour was another book like so many others I’ve read in the past year that featured a left turn — a well-done one — about grief that I wasn’t really expecting.
16. I’ve completely lost track of what day it is. When I look at my phone, I’m more concerned with the time instead of the date. Candy House by Jennifer Egan is ready for me to pick up, according to a text from the library I just got. I think I’ll be back in time to get it.
17. It has been great to start a new decade surrounded by so much love.
18. Bloom by Beach House had its 10th anniversary this week. I forgot how early in the album process that it leaked in 2012, but I listened to a version of it that was the worst quality quality of almost any leak I’ve ever had. (Honestly, the main reason I started using Spotify with regularity in 2011 was that the mp3s I had for The Year of Hibernation by Youth Lagoon were so bad, and Spotify was the better alternative).
19. The rhythms of aging are so offbeat into adulthood — 10, 13, 16, 18, 21, 30 doesn’t have a pattern to it. Vampire Weekend and Kanye West both released albums the years I turned 16, 18 and 21, which is something I ascribe some extra meaning to. Vampire Weekend released an album I didn’t really like when I was 27, and Kanye released albums I didn’t listen to when I turned 27 and 30. This got much less romantic.
20. Bloom came out the day after I turned 20. Anna and I won tickets to the album release show at Bowery Ballroom, and I had a hilariously embarrassing encounter with a celebrity (it was Aziz). Shout out to the dark and stormys at Manhattan Inn, though. [Editor’s note: Manhattan Inn with another Content Nausea shoutout in the year 2022.]
21. I had given the idea of turning 20 some psychic heft for whatever reason [editor’s note: He was dealing with a breakup. That was the reason]. My end of the semester radio show that year was titled “Goodbye, 19.” Being 20 ended up being the worst age until I was 29. I never emphasized another year of my 20s.
22. I’m once again remembering the interaction I had with a classmate before college graduation in 2014 where she said, “I can’t believe it’s been four years,” and I said, “I can.” Dan saw this happen. (I want to be a better person in my 30s). I feel the same way about being 30, and I’ll feel the same way about being 31, 32, 33, etc.
23. Kevin Morby: “Time’s the undefeated, the heavyweight champ.”
24. Kate Zambreno in Drifts: “We are looking for new spaces, but what we are really looking for is retreat, clarity, to escape our eternal chaos. For the days not to feel glued together.”
25. I’m saying/texting, “Hell yeah,” too much.
26. I settled into a sort of contemplative melancholy on my final morning in Puerto Rico (editor’s note: it was a hangover the morning after a fun wedding, nothing special). I’m listening to “Suburban Beverage” by Real Estate and I feel absolutely wiped out, but in a good way. I feel hollow, or like a blank slate.
27. In the past few months, I was worried about that fundamental change in the relationship between myself and my birthday. It obviously has changed, and I’m not sure there’s any coming back from it. I took a selfie in the hotel mirror in Philadelphia after I heard Benn died. I don’t know why I wanted to preserve that moment — typically, I’m looking up to the sky or down at the ground, not back at myself — but something compelled me to do it. I look back it every so often. I had been dreading the past few weeks, my birthday, the addition of a new anniversary to my life. But being around so many people, so much love proved to be a salve of sorts.
28. I want to capture this feeling of calm — instant coffee, air conditioning blasting, reading, Real Estate S/T — and bring it back with me. How can I create this feeling in the middle of Pennsylvania?
29. I love arbitrary beginnings, like when a month begins on a Monday. I don’t ascribe much meaning to turning 30, other than all of these words, but the timing is [unintelligible — maybe “serendipitous”? But that’s not really a “me” word]. After a couple years of free fall/wanting/getting battered by the waves, I began to find clarity and focus. The contours of life became more clear. Certain things have fallen away. I'm more present. I can feel a presence within myself.
30. The crux of the issue, of course, is what to do with that, how to use it. In the past, I haven’t been very good at that. Is it finally time for me to make some long-term goals? To figure out “what I want”? To go “get it”? I don’t know. This feeling is always fleeting. There’s real work that goes into it that I don’t always acknowledge. I haven’t quite figured out those answers yet, but some day I might. I feel like I finally want to, in whatever form that might take.
Thank you for reading the 87th edition of Content Nausea. It will get better. Thank you, and see you soon.
When you zoom out, tomorrow is now
When you zoom out, together is now
Earth’s shut down and space is so passé
When you zoom out, tomorrow is now
When you zoom out, together is now
Earth’s shut down and space is so passé
—D.G.